successful project management - Commonwealth of Learning

1. Do you concur that managing a project involves management of change?
Yes
No
2. Do you think that some people could resist change?
Yes
No
3. Have you experienced people resisting change in a project you took part in?
Yes
No
4.As manager do you think management of change should be planned for?
Yes
No
I think for all the four questions you came up with a ‘Yes’ answer. If you came up with
a ‘No’ answer for some, it is OK, but see if the ideas discussed below will make you
think differently.
Jonathan Palmer (2009) has observed that resistance to change in any project is
inevitable and may be passive or active, overt or covert, individual or organised,
aggressive or timid, and on occasion totally justified. Note Justified! In my opinion
resistance is justified for a number of reasons such as:
• lack of information about the purpose of the project:
• people thinking that the intended change is not necessary;
• members seeing the project as interfering with their time;
• some team members might think there is nothing of interest to them in the
project;
• there might be personality clashes among team members, or between the
project manager and some members; and
• some members may feel that they do not have enough expertise to take part
in bringing about change, though they may not acknowledge this openly.
For what other reasons do you think people might resist? Add any two of your own. It
will be noted that an effective manager will prepare how to manage change in the
early stages of project definition, project planning, and scheduling.
Jonathan Palmer notes that resistance is a key element in why change fails. He
points out that in a recent informal survey in the United Kingdom, 120 government
transformation programmes identified that due to resistance:
• only 15% achieved their project objectives;
• 20% failed to achieve their objectives, but were nevertheless regarded as
satisfactory; and
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