How to rescue a technology project with change management

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In part 1, Debbie describes the philosophy of change management and how these techniques work in helping the people at your organization understand and adapt to big changes. In part 2, she discusses how to rescue a failed project and some techniques to turn a project around. She also gives a mini-case study and takes audience questions.

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Change Management Lessons with Debbie Cameron

Build Consulting Partner Debbie Cameron and change management expert in a webinar on when you can rescue a nonprofit technology project using change management techniques.

It is never too late to go back and re-assess where change management best practices can help.
Learn how to use change management principles to get more out of your nonprofit technology investments
and rescue a tech project that hasn’t succeeded – yet.

Do you have a technology tool that is not living up to expectations?

In an ideal world, change management would help inform three main phases of technology project implementation: planning, during, and after go-live. Build Consulting curated a three-part video series with Debbie Cameron, change management expert at Build Consulting, walking through the Build philosophy and providing best practices and examples at each stage of nonprofit tech project management.

But what if you weren’t present for the entire project? What if you are facing a project that isn’t going well – that you inherited – a technology tool that your organization is paying for but everyone hates – a tool your organization is stuck with … is there still a role for good change management? Is it too late to use change management best practices to rescue these projects?

In this new webinar, Debbie shares techniques and tools to help analyze where change management can support implementation after technology change.

As with all our webinars, this presentation is appropriate for an audience of varied IT experience.

Community IT and Build Consulting are proudly vendor-agnostic, and our webinars cover a range of topics and discussions. Webinars are never a sales pitch, always a way to share our knowledge with our community.

Presenters:

Debbie Cameron’s decade of experience at nonprofits before joining Build Consulting prepared her well to join the leadership team as Partner. She has been in management and IT consulting for over 25 years, starting her career in big consulting firms like Arthur Anderson and Bearing Point. Seeking more purpose in her work she moved to a division within Bearing Point that served nonprofits, and loved working with clients whose mission she believed in.

During this time she discovered change management as a practice to make technology projects more successful. She joined the World Wildlife Fund where she led their Blackbaud CRM implementation. At Build her consulting experience combined with a passion for client advocacy and change management helps clients navigate large technology projects.

Debbie is dedicated to ensuring nonprofits succeed, especially since many nonprofit tech projects fail due to a lack of change management.

Carolyn Woodard is currently head of Marketing and Outreach at Community IT Innovators. She has served many roles at Community IT, from client to project manager to marketing. With over twenty-five years of experience in the nonprofit world, including as a nonprofit technology project manager and Director of IT at both large and small organizations, Carolyn knows the frustrations and delights of working with technology professionals, accidental techies, executives, and staff to deliver your organization’s mission and keep your IT infrastructure operating. She has a master’s degree in Nonprofit Management from Johns Hopkins University and received her undergraduate degree in English Literature from Williams College. She was happy to learn more about how to rescue a nonprofit technology project with change management techniques.

Transcript coming soon

Q&A with Debbie Cameron:

Reddit AMA – Debbie Cameron

Getting back on track with successful change management program.

If your project is struggling, it’s never too late to leverage change management! Start by talking to your stakeholders: What’s working? What’s not? What do they need? Quick surveys or listening sessions can help you get a sense of where people stand. Then, put together a simple plan with clear steps and owners, and set up support like office hours or job aids. Even small steps can rebuild trust and get your project moving in the right direction.

We have a large project coming up, so keen to hear some lessons learned we can incorporate to keep the project on track

Honestly, the biggest lesson is to bring people into the process early and keep them involved. Don’t make decisions in a vacuum. Your stakeholders will have valuable insights, and they need to have a voice in what impacts them. If they’re left out, you risk missing what really matters to them.

Before you launch, take the temperature of your team. A quick readiness survey or a few listening sessions can help you spot resistance or confusion before it becomes a problem.

Also, don’t just focus on getting to go-live. Make sure you have a plan for how people will actually use the new system and keep checking in with them after launch. Feedback loops are your friend where you gain valuable insights you can use them to adjust as you go.

And finally, leadership support is huge. When leaders are aligned and visible, it sets the tone for the whole project. Remember, go-live isn’t the finish line. It is just the start of making real change stick.

What are ways to introduce new culture into an organization that is not well acquainted with change management practices?

The best advice I can give is to start small and keep improving as you go. Make change management a real priority, not just something extra on the side. It needs to be a dedicated workstream that is resourced. Get people involved with tools like stakeholder mapping, impact analysis, listening sessions, and readiness surveys. Celebrate the small wins, keep communication open, and make sure everyone knows where to get help. Over time, these habits will help your organization become more open and adaptable

Help! Scope creep took my tech project off track.

At Build we start every project with a project charter, which is a strong foundation. Internally, it’s consistently described as a tool for:

Surfacing concerns about the scope of work early
Clearly outline what is in scope and what is NOT in scope.
Aligning stakeholders on goals, roles, and deliverables
Serving as a reference point for decision-making and accountability

But it should be noted, timing matters. Project Charters are most effective when shared before kickoff, not after. Throughout the project Change Leaders should bring stakeholders back to the Project Charter as a touchstone of what is included in the project and what goals and objectives we are trying to meet with the project.

Projects should also have a formal change control process where all change requests must be documents and approved, which involves analyzing impact on scope, budget and timeline.

Risk Registers are also an effective tool to help manage scope creep.

Photo by Erik Karits on Unsplash

Video: Can You Rescue a Technology Project with Change Management?