Exploring Different Method Plug-Ins for Completing A Change Canvas - Part 5 Communication

One of the most overlooked aspects of any change initiative is the need to communicate with all members involved. This includes people directly affected by the change, as well as sponsors and other stakeholders who may be directly impacted.


Poor communication is often cited as one of the biggest reasons that change initiatives fail.
A good way to start is by understanding how you want to vacation to flow to your direct change recipients as well as the other affected sponsors and stakeholders. Simply tracing how the information should be passed using a simple notation should be sufficient.

 
Different communication channels can be bidirectional meaning that feedback and response is expected from the receiver of the condition.
  
 
As well as unidirectional meaning that up to vacation will be broadcast out to a larger audience.

 
when completing our change canvases we have often expressed the various communications that will be processed using a cadence model. Using this approach we can express the time interval that various communications will be sent out during the lifetime of the change initiative.


communication channels that we've used in the past include

• status meetings where we review progress of the change initiative often with stakeholders, sponsors, and folks were not necessarily directly impacted by the change

• intranet/Web communications that are sent out both the change recipients as well as the rest of the organization. Another alternative to this is an internal blog and or wiki which makes this a bidirectional channel.

• as well as the use of information radiators, such as posters, dashboards, and other highly physical artifacts that are placed in such a way as to attract maximum attention from both change recipients as well as other members within the organization.

It should be noted that agile visualization systems such as Kanban and agile card walls are themselves great communication channels for a change initiative. We probably can't count the number of times that somebody has walked by Kanban style visualization system and in suitably impressed enough to want to become a change recipient for the next change within the organization.

Read More Lean Change - Chapter 3: Advanced Change Canvas Topics

1. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Urgency and Change Recipient Sections
2. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Vision and Target State Sections
3. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Actions and Success Criteria Sections
4. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Benefits and Commitment Sections
5. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Communications Section
6. a Catalog of Reusable Agile Change Patterns