What is a Change Agent?

What is a change agent?

A change agent is a person from inside or outside an organization who helps an organization, or part of an organization, to transform how it operates.  They can be thought of as a catalyst for change, a person who can make changes happen by inspiring and influencing others. A change agent will promote, champion, enable, and support changes to be made in an organization. Change agents focus on people and the interactions between them. A change agent inspires and influences individuals to make the changes necessary for the transformation, including changes to their desires, attitudes and behaviors.  A change agent can also be involved in initially influencing key individuals in an organization so that they want to make a transformation. Change agents fulfil one of the critical roles in the discipline of organizational change management (OCM), which is important to ensure the success of any business change. The terms ‘agent of change’ and ‘change advocate’ are synonymous with the term ‘change agent’. A ‘change champion’ has a similar role to a change agent. However, a change champion can be just a figurehead whereas a change agent often works ‘behind the scenes’ to achieve success. Change agents are not directly involved in the IT service management (ITSM) change management process, as this process focuses on specific changes to systems and services.

How do change agents differ from other roles in organizational change management?

There are many roles involved in making changes within an organization, a change agent is just one of the required roles. Here are some contrasts with other key roles in OCM:

How do change agents differ from other roles in organizational change management?

Agents of change can help to reduce resistance to change by those affected by it and involved with it. A change agent takes a particular role within a transformational initiative by acting as a support of the change, and a trusted conduit between leadership and the rest of the organization. A good change agent will help to ‘sell’ the idea to them for why the transformational change is required. Getting buy-in to what is wrong with the current situation, and painting the vision of what the future following the change could look like, are the first two critical stages of any transformation where the use of change agents is vital. In any project, there will always be some people who don’t agree with the need for change, but the transformation will be difficult to achieve and sustain unless a significant majority support the change. Engaging change agents early in any transformation is essential, as they can help to avoid and address any issues well before they affect implementation.  Use of change agents can create a ‘snowball’ effect:  as a change agent successfully influences an individual to support the transformation, that individual can in turn help to influence their colleagues, effectively acting as a change agent themselves. This can rapidly increase the number of people acting as agents for change, helping to ensure the success of the transformation. Good leaders can also be change agents, but the best leaders also inspire, encourage and empower others to be change agents, thereby building a culture of leadership and learning. As an example of this in practice, consider the rapid growth and spread of the world’s major religions. Each religion started with one leader that was also a change agent, successfully inspiring and influencing a small number of others to support their particular transformational objectives by becoming change agents themselves.  They then influenced more individuals, who themselves became change agents, and so on.

What activities does a change agent perform?

The activities performed by a change agent can be very varied. A change agent needs to perform whatever activities they believe can help to deliver the required outcome of getting people aligned with the change. These should align with the personalities and drivers of the individuals that need to be inspired and influenced, and can change according to many factors including what’s happening with the individual outside of the work environment, what’s just happened to them in the work environment, and what’s happening with their colleagues. A good change agent has to realize that every individual is different, take the time to understand their needs, desires, and drivers, and tailor their change agent activities to suit. Activities undertaken by change agents can, however, be placed into these high-level topics:

• Visibly and actively communicating why the transformation is a good idea for both the organization and individuals 

• Enthusing about and supporting the transformation 

• Actively engaging with individuals

• Listening to others, gaining and acting on feedback

• Understanding how different people may react and developing appropriate approaches

• Dealing with specific individuals who don’t seem supportive

• Encouraging and supporting others

• Answering questions about the transformation

• Identifying and leading other change agents

• Providing feedback and reporting issues to the OCM lead

The twelve principles behind the Agile Manifesto are

The responsibilities of a change agent are closely related to the activities that they need to carry out. It is important to ensure that a change agent has sufficient capacity to enable them to carry out their role. Expecting change agents to also have responsibilities associated with other roles, either within the transformation or as part of the normal running of the business, can give challenges when prioritizing change agent related activities. It can be difficult to estimate the time and effort required for fulfilling the responsibilities of a change agent. This is because of the need for change agents to interact with and influence people, each of whom will have different views and opinions, requiring different approaches and effort.  Change agents should be allocated general responsibilities related to their role, focusing on the desired outcomes. While it is important for transformation management to be kept apprised of a change agent’s activities and progress, the associated reporting is a lesser responsibility than ensuring that the individuals in the scope of the change agents influence actively embrace the changes necessary for successful transformation. Typical responsibilities of a change agent include:

• Understanding the needs of the staff in their scope of responsibility

• Understanding the aims of the transformation

• Understanding how their area of the business operates and contributes to the overall organization  

• Explaining the reason for the transformation and the expected benefits

• Visibly advocating the changes required for the transformation 

• Determining appropriate influencing strategies

• Disseminating information

• Influencing and persuading staff in the change agents’ scope of responsibility 

• Identifying and coaching new change agents

• Liaising with other change agents

• Anticipating and dealing with areas of potential dispute or disruption

• Obtaining feedback to share with leadership and management 

• Advising stakeholders and impacted individuals

• Acting as a mediator

• Reporting on progress and issues

What are the characteristics of a good change agent?

All good change agents have the following personal characteristics, qualities, and skills:

• Enthusiastic and passionate

• Leads by example

• Easy to get on with

• Patient but persistent

• Pragmatic

• Good at getting ideas over

• Well respected by those who know them

People that identify with these are likely to make good change agents but may require training on influencing, persuading, and negotiating skills.

How do you identify someone that could make a good change agent?

It is important to recognize that, good change agents are born, not made. In some organizations, senior managers are expected to be change agents but, unless they have the appropriate personal qualities required of a change agent, they are unlikely to be effective. Senior managers can also struggle to relinquish the command and control nature of their management role and instead use the influence and persuasion approaches associated with good change agents. The activities to implement any transformation will take place at a local level, hence success is more likely if there are change agents at every level. Staff should be identified in each area who have the right mix of skills, knowledge, and respect from their colleagues to be used as change agents in their area of the organization. Stakeholder analysis can be useful to help with this identification. It is good practice to use a network of change agents, identifying one or more in each area of the business. Change agents in the network should come from various positions within the organization, their precise role in the organization’s management hierarchy is not important provided that each change agent is well-respected by the individuals in the area of the organization that they are expected to influence. Each change agent should also understand their area of the business and where it fits in the organization, and have strong working relationships with their colleagues.

Which is better – an internal or an external change agent?

Change agents can be existing staff in an organization (internal), or brought in from outside (external). In organizations that have no staff with the skills and experience required to be a change agent, then using an external change agent is often the only option. If this approach is used, it is important to assign someone internal to learn from the external change agent so that they themselves can become a change agent. Long term it is more beneficial for change agents to be internal. Internal change agents can be more effective, as they will have in-depth knowledge about the organization and its people, and have the time to build long lasting and trusted relationships with staff. Internal change agents are also always available for use within the organization, whereas with external change agents there is always a lead time to procure and onboard them. There is a risk when using external change agents that the organizations own staff will see the change agents as a threat and unconnected with the organization. External change agents are unlikely to be there to deal with any issues that arise after the transformation has completed. Many transformations take a year or more to complete, the costs of employing external change agents for long periods can be expensive.

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