Implementing Enterprise Change Management at Southern Company
1. What type of development methodology appears to have been employed at Southern Company for the ECM project? Was this a good approach? Provide a rationale for your response.
2. Describe how Traynor could have applied Lewin’s three‐stage model of change in implementing the ECM. What would have been the advantages of applying Lewin’s three‐stage model?
3. Assess Southern ’s ECM system on the four dimensions of project success. How successful do you think this project is?
Sample Solution
Enterprise content management (ECM) is a concept that has been used by records and information professionals for at least a decade. As early as 2001, Karen Shegda from Gartner, a leading research and advisory firm, discussed core integrated document management software functionality and noted that vendors were morphing their products into content management systems (Shegda, 2001). Since then, discussions on ECM applications and implementation have been numerous and widespread throughout the world. Lewin`s three-stage model of change can be applied in implementing the ECM. Lewin`s change management model can be implemented in three ways: changing the behavior, attitudes, skills of the individuals working in the organization; changing the existing organizational structures, systems and processes; ad changing the organizational climate, culture and interpersonal style.
