Many have heralded the new role of HR as the driver of organizational change, whether it be a restructuring, merger, acquisition or shift in corporate culture. If HR is to be successful in engaging employees through transitions and new initiatives it needs to embrace the role of change champion.

Too many organizational change projects fail because they fail to address the people aspect. Employees don’t buy in to the changed organization and performance suffers as a result. Here, Bill McCarthy of human capital consultants Penna, addresses six common reasons why organizational change...

Andrew Dyos, HR director at Genesis Communications, explains how a unique board development program helped the company unite its leaders behind a new corporate vision and values.

In 1999, JT International was comprised of over 100 disparate companies. A global ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system was vital to transform the company into a modern multinational. Find out how HR and the change management team focused on the “people” side of change to ensure the...

Team briefings have long been used to engage employees in change. Alan Thomas, Henkel’s staff resourcing and development manager, describes how the company used the process when merging four sites into one.

A radical restructure at legal information provider LexisNexis Butterworth left employees with low morale and in need of a new vision. HR director Richard Eastmond describes how the company is using the “customer voice” to re‐energize employees and create rapid change at a critical time in...

In January 2005, Stephen Kelly, BT Global Services’ president of people and organizational change, began leading a major global transformation program ‐ “Connected World”. Here, Kelly shares his experiences during his secondment to the program and describes what lessons HR can learn.

Following a number of management team changes, WH Smith Travel wanted to establish how its employees viewed the company’s organizational culture. Here, Gareth English, senior consultant with business psychology experts, OPP, explains how conducting workforce surveys helped to gauge the impact...

The Environment Agency needed to identify key areas of its communication processes for improvement in order to engage employees in major change. Summit‐IMM senior consultants Clive Hicks and Rory Gear explain how simplifying processes and introducing workshops helped align service strategy...

Tom Bartridge, a change management consultant and previously team leader on the GASCO 21 merger project, shows how GASCO actively involved its employees in all stages of a major change process, resulting in an established brand, engaged employees and a successful, long‐term merger.