Culture and Change Management is a form of organizational transformation that is, at times, a radical and fundamental form of change. It involves the changing of basic values, norms, and beliefs among stakeholders in order to improve organizational performance. Companies today understand that improved processes can lead to better performance also need to understand cultural barriers that may exist that keep change from taking place. Unless companies identify and repair cultural barriers along with process barriers true organizational transformation cannot take place.
Barriers are often hidden and embedded in a company culture, for example; how many people must sign off on a decision and what is the amount of time allotted for a reasonable reply? Organizations may ask who is the real owner of a process, particularly when it crosses five functional groups. New product development, faces culture change problems if an engineer, presented with a breakthrough idea from the outside, is stonewalled because they can not take credit.
The Thomas Group culture change agents use Process Value Management to allow and the organization to determine if a barrier is related to a subject matter, process, or cultural position. Once identified, the company needs to be very clear about what changes and new behaviors are required throughout the change management process through an implementation plan.