Holistic Change Management: Importance and methodological challenges

Various researchers and practitioners have identified a range of problems and deficiencies with existing change-related frameworks, while each framework can include unique valuable elements in its people/process/technology aspects and theoretical foundations. In such a setting, we have adopted a holistic approach through examining an armada of existing frameworks and methodologies. Several decades of combined intercontinental experience of the authors (and much more from their academic/practice network) in the field of change management is culminating in development of a novel overarching framework referred to as Total Change Management (TCM). In the three years course of establishment of TCM, a variety of methodological research and practice challenges were encountered which we report here. While the necessity of such a holistic viewpoint towards change management, which borrows from existing proven frameworks and standards, can be well argued, obtaining the statistical expert opinion (or statistical practice results) needed to substantiate the hundreds of decisions taken in the integrative approach to form a holistic novel framework (such as TCM) requires much resources including time. This process can be expedited through a meta-framework we discuss here, which includes community building and a design, then test (practice) and then evolve pathway by such community, which is reminiscent of the Design Science, which looks expensive and yet (we argue) important for the advancement of the field.