Phase 1 – Taking Inventory for Change

Yesterday I introduced change. Change has been around for a long time. I am sure that change was met with great enthusiasm by cavemen when they came home from hunting and their cave wives had moved all of their cave furniture. In my last post I wrote that there were three phases to change, today I am going to write about the frist phase – taking inventory for change.

If you have been reading my previous series about calculating cost, we worked a lot with a process map and finding all the steps in the accounting process. It is important to know that the process map as far as change is concerned is important, but it is not the type of inventory that I want to write about. The inventory I am writing about has to do with looking inside your organization to find how willing your company is to change. It is a very unfortunate situation where an accounting professional desires to help their organization by adding automation, only to find out in the final stages of the decision-making process that the organization (as a whole) would rather push the paper than put out the effort to change. There are a few questions you can ask about your organization that will tell you how willing they are to change… asking the questions and getting the answer is the inventory.

In my book The 8 Ptifalls I created a worksheet that walks you through the questions to ask. At the end of the questions you will be able to create a score that will allow you to know if you can (as Michael Jackson says) make that change. Here is a sample of some of the questions:

1. Has your organization gone through an accounting system conversion (going from one system to a new system) within the last 3 years?
2. Was the conversion on time?
3. Was the conversion under budget?
4. Did employees retain their employment with the company due to that conversion (no one fired or quit)?

Just by looking at the sample above the types of questions that will help you create your inventory are based mostly on experience. They aren’t too difficult questions, but it will get to the heart of your organizations ability to change.

If you want the entire worksheet fill out the request form at the bottom of the page… If you purchase the 8 Pitfalls the worksheet  is on page 57.

Tomorrow we are going to talk about the 2nd phase of change which is on communication. Stay tuned.

Buy the book – The Argument to Automate – How Innovation Can INSPIRE Not Fire – click here to buy

(Also) To get your copy of The 8 Pitfalls of Accounts Payable Automation – click here to buy