4 steps to understanding change and its impact

Change can be unpredictable, but how you understand change and its impact doesn’t have to be.

Whether we proactively want to make changes to improve our personal lives or change is being thrust upon us in a professional context, change can have a huge impact on our well-being. Positive change can improve motivation, drive creativity, and generally improve our sense of self, whereas negative change can have the opposite effect—increasing stress and anxiety. 

On some level, all change requires a leap into the unknown, especially when you are not the instigator. But even if you are proactive, stepping away from the status quo can raise a number of uncertainties and still be nerve-wracking. So, how can you better understand change and its impact for better results and a smoother transition?

Making positive change or mitigating its negative impact requires an understanding of the full picture, or the system that the change is part of, and the various component parts that make up the whole. 

Here are four steps to understand change and its impact.

1. Understand your current situation

The first step in truly understanding change is to understand your starting point. I’ve previously covered understanding the problem in relation to better decision-making, and the same principle applies here. 

Map out everything you know about where you are now: the status quo, the catalysts for change, the stakeholders involved, etc. For example, you may feel that a career change is on the horizon, but you’re unsure about what direction you want to take. Do you want a new career for more financial stability or a better work-life balance so you can spend time with your children? By identifying all the parts that make up your current position, you build a working model on which to base further analysis.

2. Identify the end goal

What do you want to achieve by making changes? And if you haven’t instigated the change, what could be the best possible outcome? For example, this could be to better understand your customers´ behaviors. Identifying the end goal not only gives you something to work towards, but also gives you a better understanding of the current problem. What is it about your current system that prevents you from tracking customer behavior, for example?

At this point, you should also identify the variables that could impact your progress toward the end goal. If you implement a new tech solution, will you have to retrain your employees? Does it integrate with your existing tech stack? With an idea of the variables, you can start building an understanding of the change's ‘moving parts’.

3. Design your path

How do you get from your current position to the end goal? Plan out the steps and resources needed to get there. Do you need external help, for example? Now is the time to determine where that may come from. 

Consider how the identified variables impact the steps as you progress. Once you start adjusting one variable, it’ll likely have a knock-on effect elsewhere. Make sure you’re aware of the possible consequences, especially for those whom the change affects. 

One tip for making sure you’re on the right path is consulting with your stakeholders at this stage. Speaking to the people involved, allowing them to understand change, and getting their feedback on your suggested path forward may allow you to consider its impact from another perspective. 

For more information about how human-centered design helps build business resilience, check out Mika Raulas’ blog.

4. Implement the change

You have your baseline and where you want to go, and you have all the steps in between. It’s now time to implement. As you progress with implementation, monitor the other components you’ve already identified to see how they develop in line with your changes. 

You may find that it’s plain sailing, but as we all know, change is unpredictable, so keeping an eye out for unintended consequences means you can react quickly and precisely to mitigate any adverse effects. Luckily, having mapped out the system that the change is part of, you can understand the change in a way that enables you to assess its impact and adjust your approach for the best possible outcomes.

Hunome Sparkmap on ´Change for the better´

Above are some perspectives about making positive changes. Come add your own to help build a multidimensional understanding of change, and other important themes.