Mitigating systemic issues with change management
Our client—an established civil engineering firm—needed comprehensive and sustained change management leadership to untangle a range of systemic issues that came to the surface after the implementation of a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) system—a system that was intended to improve efficiencies and better support strategic decision making through accurate reporting and oversight.
The new ERP was a significant undertaking but failed to deliver the desired return on investment our client needed to manage the growing complexities within their organization. They were faced with poor adoption, ongoing process inefficiencies, software bugs, and emerging intra-departmental conflicts that were challenging the firm’s progressive culture.
Took a collaborative approach to clearly define and execute on key objectives.
Identified and dismantled enterprise-wide siloes.
Established major adoption workstreams, including project set-up, sub-consultant billing, and reporting with senior engineers.
Supported client by coaching and training key stakeholders through necessary changes.
We were engaged to support the client in repairing and improving a range of issues created and exacerbated by the ERP implementation—many of which were the outcome of not weaving robust change management into the implementation. We took a collaborative approach to help them clearly define and execute on key objectives; identify and dismantle enterprise-wide siloes; and establish major adoption workstreams, including project set-up, sub-consultant billing, and reporting with senior engineers.
We further supported our client by coaching and training key stakeholders through the necessary changes, facilitating monthly meetings with their board of directors to establish solid stakeholder management, and correcting some of the troublesome software scripting errors.
Over the course of our nine-month engagement, we helped our client understand the differences between project management and change management—and why both are necessary to drive growth, create efficiencies, achieve the ROI on their ERP investment, and empower their people. As trusted advisors, we offered clarity on why the ERP implementation fell short and helped re-establish their purpose-driven culture through trust, transparent dialogue, and building enterprise-wide comfort with complexity.
