Market Insights

As a recruiter who has worked in the Transformation Market for 10 + years, and most of that in Melbourne, I am witnessing yet another exciting trend across the market and one I thought worth sharing as it begins to gain momentum.

Change Management has often had a tough time justifying its importance and even its existence in an organisation. In times of restructure and cost cutting, Change was and often still is, seen as a luxury. As a consequence, it was one of the first functions to be “let go”. The constant centralisation and decentralisation have historically taken their toll in terms of “Change Fatigue” and reputation.

In the last 5 years however, I have witnessed many instances where change has earnt its place in an organisation and the hard work is paying off by way of benefits realisation. Change professionals are now often one of the first hires as a business embarks on transformation and major programs. There are ample examples of successful delivery where Change Professionals were present from the outset.

Now the market is abuzz with the talk of data, commercialising data and making data driven decisions. My experience in this market is if businesses do not already have a Data Analytics team in place, they are taking swift action towards hiring one simply to keep up.

What does the impact of Data Analytics have on an organisation and its people? Data Analytics can make people nervous, wonder about the security of their jobs and create disconnect between technology and business. Insights derived from data are only valuable if they are actionable and lead to value. i.e. more emphasis on how they are consumed rather than produced. If data can impact every business process, thereby touching people across the whole organisation, not just those with a technical role to play, then shouldn’t there be more emphasis on helping people in the business to become better consumers of data?

Change Management can play an essential part in driving analytics into action across the organisation. If the leadership group value Data Analytics as critical to business growth, but the staff on the ground continue to use old methods, the technological investment could go to waste.

The role of Change Management in Data Analytics is to help an organisation action the business issues that analytics can solve. It’s encouraging to see these themes continually develop and be recognised by a few organisations paving the way. It is nonetheless a work in progress.