It is of utmost importance to understand why Organizational Change Management is crucial to an organization if it is to have a  successful HR transformation.

Studies indicate that 70 percent of IT implementations end up in failure., Several cloud migration assessments suggest that overcoming an organization’s cultural barriers is a frequent challenge. However, there’s a difference between knowing that you need to change and learning how actually to induce that change.

One must also realize that SuccessFactors is not a turnkey solution. Instead, just like any other software on-premise or in the cloud, it demands process and talent framework, data migration, integration, testing, training, and support service.

However, the nature of many of those services is somewhat different in the cloud than had been in the on-premise software.

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Change Management in the cloud (SaaS) vs. on-premises

Organizational Change Management in cloud projects is entirely different from change management in traditional on-premises (ERP) projects. You may want to learn more about our thoughts on Process Transformation, where we talk about various process differences.

On-premises (ERP) projects are primarily based on gathering your organization’s requirements, creating a business blueprint and developing/configuring those requirements into the system (waterfall methodology).

Hence, in this entire process, there is very little process change that happens even after the implementation. Users and the organization as a whole needs to understand how to do the same or very similar processes in a new tool/technology.

Managing traditional on-premises change is relatively direct. These kinds of projects follow a linear progression of activities (the “waterfall” approach). We know exactly what we’re getting into and what type of impact we will face. So, from the changing perspective, we’re not caught off-guard.

On the other hand, the journey to the cloud or SaaS is very different. Here, you adapt to the best practices that the system offers as almost all cloud ( SaaS) systems are based on multi-tenant architecture.

The project implementation, unlike on-premise projects, happens in an agile, flexible, and iterative manner. This primarily is the reason why the process changes for the organization and as a result, all the other roles change with it. It brings in a lot more accountability for the managers and also for the employees. In almost all cases, the workload for managers and employees increases due to the separation of duty between HR and managers.

So naturally, a much more deliberate and decisive Organizational Change Management process is required to achieve success in cloud-based projects.

Change Management – Our Approach

It is evident that to achieve success in cloud-based projects; we need to have a different approach to Organizational Change Management than was used back in the ERP days. Cloud change management has to be cloud-specific (SuccessFactors) to keep pace with the agile, iterative nature of cloud adaptation and evolving user needs as they progress through the effort.

With our HR Advisory services, our in-depth HR domain, and technology execution knowledge, we’re conscious of the way teams and individuals operate to help organizations adapt quickly to SuccessFactors.

Our Organizational Change Management strategy enables HR to procure stakeholders’ buy-in, and clarify everybody’s roles and responsibilities during the change process –from the SuccessFactors implementation to its adoption and outside.

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Well-Designed change management and communication strategy help HR leaders to keep employees informed from the start, show them how their roles and responsibilities will change and help them develop the skills they require to use the new system.

The approach you take for SuccessFactors projects applies to your specific organization. It is based on various factors and may differ from project to project. Renew HR asses the needs of an organization in its HR health check assessment.

Renew HR’s Organizational Change Management is intricately integrated with SAP’s Activate methodology for SuccessFactors implementation. This helps in using an integrated program for change management in addition to SuccessFactors implementation.

Have you consider change management for your SaaS HCM project?