Page 152 - DLIS406_ACADEMIC_LIBRARY_SYSTEM

Unit 14: Change and Quality Management

14.1 Change Management: The Concept Notes

The basic definition of change management has following three important aspects (2,3):
• The task of ongoing change.
• An area of professional practice.

• A body of knowledge.
‘Managing change’ refers to the making of changes in a planned and managed or systematic
fashion where the aim is to implement new methods and systems in an ongoing organization
in a more effective manner. Now, if one thinks of internal changes induced by outside developments,
then the most familiar instance of this kind of change is the change or version control aspect
of information system development projects. Here, the events originating outside the organization
trigger these internal changes. Literally the two types of changes can be distinguished as a
knee-jerk or reactive response and an anticipative or proactive response.
Professional expertise is required to manage the changes; whether reactive or anticipative. The
process of change needs to be treated separately from the specifics of the situation. The content
or subject matter of change management consists chiefly of the models, methods and techniques,
tools, skills and other forms of knowledge that go into making up any practice.

Notes The subject matter of change management is drawn from psychology, sociology,
business administration, economics, industrial engineering, systems engineering
and the study of human and organizational behavior.

14.1.1 Types of Changes

Change can be better managed if we are able to categorize them. Changes can be broadly
categorized as:
• Provoked by pressure or necessity
• Induced by gentle persuasion rather than force

• Enforced change
• Motivation by example and evidences
• Designed according to individual needs and requirements.

14.1.2 Problems and Prospects
As discussed earlier, the problems faced during bringing about changes in any organization
have both content and a process dimension. Introducing a digital library setup has different
dimensions depending on the host organization. For instance, the user group and its requirements
of the digital library at a health university will be different from the users of a defense
laboratory library. In this situation, it is very difficult to suggest a universal change management
strategy, it needs to be defined and designed depending on the need of the organization. The
differences become more prominent in the case of organizations with international user group
with varied subject interests because the values differ, the cultures differ and at the very basic
level even the problems differ. But, as the overall processes of change and change management

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