the success of our group’s project
This report discusses the success of our group’s project, which aimed to promote changes in the sports room on the college campus. () notes that change is inevitable and should be expected as part of the organizational life due to a rapidly changing and dynamic environment. Furthermore, () maintains that it is crucial for change to occur in an organization so that the firm is not left behind or swept away by the forces of change. Our main concern was that even though our campus is massive and the management encourages the students to participate in different sporting activities, we do not have an indoor room for games. Before commencing on the project, we recognized that it could fail due to various reasons, and, therefore, we endeavored to follow the multiple stages of effective organizational change management.
We began by clearly defining the change and ensuring that it was aligned with the college’s objectives. Here, we had to ask ourselves two critical questions, what we needed to change and why it was essential to have the change. () notes that change cannot occur unless the change agents clarify the focus and the goals to be attained at the end of the project. In this stage, we recognized that it was crucial to maintain adaptability and flexibility if we were to take any step. Our vision was “To make the students mentally and physically developed and turn them to life-long learners”. By making changes in the sports room, we aimed to increase the students’ participation in indoor activities. Consequently, this would improve their physical fitness and encourage creativity amongst the participants. Moreover, the students would have a more comfortable and safe place to practice different sporting activities. Apart from the students, the instructors and other campus workers would also get a relaxing spot to rest in-between their work schedules. Besides, the sports room would offer ample opportunities for visitors to meet new friends and connect with their colleagues. We also recognized that the college encouraged students to participate in sports, and therefore, our intended change aligned with the college’s goals. In this first stage, () suggests that the change agents must plan for the change.
After identifying and defining the change, we had to determine the impact of the project and those affected. Without any doubt, our project would have diverse implications for the college’s stakeholders, and the most affected would be the management and the students. The upper management would need to finance the project, and this would affect the college’s financial statement. Moreover, as the administrators in the school, they had to become agents of change, who would champion the process. As () notes, every stakeholder has different expectations and experiences, and it is upon the change leader to ensure that he “buys-in” everyone who would be impacted by the project. This process required much patience since the management was initially opposed to the project due to the vast amount of resources needed. () advises that resistance can occur due to inadequate control of the process, but this can be addressed through effective communication. To overcome resistance, we explicitly told the management the objective of the project and how it could benefit the students that required to practice different activities in an indoor setting. We engaged in meetings with them, and these offered opportunities to explain what we were doing.
We were also successful in developing an effective communication strategy. () suggests that it is essential for all the stakeholders to be on the same page as far as the project’s implementation is concerned. For this to happen, the change agents must have the ability to communicate in a manner that reflects the general objective of the project. According to (), people may resist change due to the belief that it would introduce a temporary fad that would disappear within no time. Another major cause of resistance is a misunderstanding about the implications of the intended change. Therefore, we had to develop an effective communication strategy that would enable us to address the students’ concerns. We recognized that the students’ could be reached through an Instagram page, which would highlight the project’s objectives and its impacts on the college body. This method was selected due to its suitability based on the fact that the majority of the students are on Instagram. Specifically, we decided that the page’s name should be Norquest College Games, and this would be promoted through the other pages related to Norquest. We identified the Norquest Confession page, which had several thousands of followers, and we requested the administrators to allow us to promote our page there. Through this, we were able to create awareness of our intended change and communicate essential details about its implementation. As a result, the students supported our idea, and a majority of them promised to lend a helping hand once we commenced its construction.
() suggests that the next stage should entail the planning and provision of resources and evaluation of the project’s data. During the planning phase, we had identified all the resources and associated costs that were required for the successful completion of the project. We depend on the management’s funding to complete the project. However, this has not yet occurred since we are still working on the finances to determine the full figure that is required for the remaining stages. However, we are adamant and determined to open the sports room in the basement of the 106 campus and specifically, beside the silent room. Apart from the cost factor, we are yet to work on the security and timing issues; these are two critical factors that will determine the success of our project. It does not make sense for us to go through all these stages and then fail to work on the finer details of safety and security. This is critical since the students’ perceptions about the two issues can promote them to avoid the sport room due to these issues. After analyzing the social media surveys from the students and working on the few highlighted issues, we plan to have a special event that will mark the successful completion of our change project, and then hand it over to the college’s administration.
Despite our success and the uncompleted portions of the project, we were unsuccessful in culture shift planning. According to (), it is essential for the change leader to ensure that the planning entails not only the administrative parts of the change management process but also the people’s attitudes, feelings, and insights in as far as the change process is concerned. We spent a lot of time ensuring that we earned the buy-ins and that everybody understood the responsibilities in the project. However, we did not pay much attention to how the concerned parties felt about the changes. For instance, we failed to incorporate the feelings of the supporting staff and the instructors, assuming that they would definitely support the project. We did not take time to find out whether they would be willing to break from their work responsibilities to enjoy relaxation or sports in the proposed sport room. In future engagements, we should ensure that we minimize such tendencies, which () notes has the potential to cause deep resentments.
Moreover, we had a problem in measuring and controlling change. () suggests that it is critical for the change agents to develop a measure which would gauge the impacts of the projects and ensure that there are interventions that can be used to improve any challenging area. Moreover, the measures would help the organization to evaluate the effectiveness of the change management plan as well as the key lessons learned along the way. Through this, the organization is able to regulate its actions according to its initial objectives. Right from the beginning of the project, we agreed that we would measure our progress by analyzing feedback from both the students and the college administrators. However, we had a challenge in determining which feedback would be classified as successful or unsuccessful. It was also difficult to quantify the results. In the remaining parts of the projects, we should come up with a better technique of measuring and controlling the change process. () suggests that this can be achieved by developing a results framework.
Conclusively, this project has offered diverse lessons on the change management process. The process has enabled me to identify my strengths and weaknesses as a change agent and address some of the barriers to the success of the process. One of the most essential lessons has been the importance of incorporating people’s feelings and effective communication to minimize resistance to change. We strive to continue working on the remaining parts of the change model. However, we may not be able to get more updates since we have difficulties in communicating with the group members. At the end of the project, Norquest College will have a brand new sport room which will be beneficial to the institution fraternity.