About the Change Management Plan Template
A change management template will help you make a plan—a clear roadmap that addresses everyone affected by the change and enables organizations to absorb more change faster and better.
Our Cascade Change Management Plan template will give you a tested and proven process so you can connect your workforce with the change or transformation strategy and give them a clear guide for execution.
Using this template, you’ll be able to set clear objectives and goals, milestones, and key performance indicators (KPIs) to monitor change implementation.
What You’ll Get In This Change Management Plan Template
This template is pre-filled with examples, which you can use as inspiration for your own change management plan.
Within seconds of setting up your template, you’ll get immediate access to:
- 4x Change ManagementFocus Areas
- 12x Change ManagementObjectives
- 21x Change Management Projects
- 28x Change Management KPIs
Once you have set your template, you can also create up to two dashboards for real-time performance monitoring.
And yes - you get free access with no credit card required. ✅
Note for Cascade users: If you already have a business plan in Cascade, you can easily link your change management plan to the company’s overall strategic plan and show how your activities contribute to the business outcomes.
Who Is This Change Management Plan Template For?
This template is perfect for HR, IT, the PMO, or a dedicated change management/transformation team that needs to implement change initiatives faster than ever.
How Do You Use A Change Management Plan Template?
Cascade’s strategic planning tool is a great way to develop your change management plan. Get started by selecting this change management plan template. This simple template will help you build your change roadmap in real-time and takes only minutes to set up. You can adjust pre-filled fields or enter your own data. A completed plan can be exported, or you can bring in your team to collaborate on shared goals.
To give you an idea of how you can build your own change management plan using our template, here’s a quick summary of key steps:
Step 1: Identify what needs to change and who will be affected
You need to lay the groundwork before you start populating your template. Get a comprehensive understanding of the change components and the effects of the proposed change on your stakeholders. You’ll also need to identify who needs to be involved in your planning process so you can uncover possible risks before the plan rolls out.
If you need help analyzing the current state and identifying the future state, you can use the Mckinsey 7S Model - a change management model that will help you identify organizational gaps, perform a stakeholder analysis, and set a baseline for your planning.
Step 2: Develop a roadmap with key elements to drive implementation
Our change management plan templates include all key elements that will help you set goals, give your team context, and hold them accountable for progress:
- Focus areas: This can involve areas of business that will be affected or that need to be changed.
- Objectives: Objectives in Cascade represent the outcome you want to achieve with your change initiatives.
- Actions: These are specific tasks, project plans or action plans that will help you roll out and implement the change.
- Metrics or KPIs: Any highly-effective plan will involve metrics that will help you evaluate the progress and effectiveness of your change actions.
- Milestones: These are short–term indicators that demonstrate progress toward your change management strategy success.
- Risk management: You can add risk to each objective, KPI, or action.
- Owners: These can be business units or local leaders who will own the change initiatives and be accountable for executing them for their team.
💡Using the Cascade template, you’ll already have some prefilled examples, so you can start customizing your plan right away.
Step 3: Add all the information in your template and start executing
You’ve done the heavy lifting; now it’s time to document and execute your plan. Put all your information into the template and start delivering results. You can use Cascade’s governance features, which will help you manage risks, monitor progress, and drive execution across your organization:
- Dashboards with chart widgets and graphs that have real-time data, allowing you to evaluate the performance of your change initiatives across all organizational layers.
- Reports to create in-depth progress reports with an executive summary or commentary so you can ensure everyone understands the context.
- Integrations with your favorite business apps and project management tools so you import data from almost anywhere and visualize it in one place.
Getting started with your Change Management Plan Template only takes 20 seconds.
What Are The Benefits Of A Change Management Template?
✅ It creates a structured approach to the planning process: This template will help you to quickly lay out your change roadmap with all crucial elements and align stakeholders around priorities. No need to spend time crafting the perfect plan; with Cascade’s template, you can change and adapt whenever needed.
✅ It helps you connect key stakeholders with on-the-ground execution: If you want to lead a successful change, you need to create tighter alignment with your teams. Using this template, you’ll be able to communicate the plan, educate stakeholders on the overall plan, and empower them to develop their own actions to support change initiatives and business outcomes.
✅It helps you to stay on top of change implementation and monitor risks: As a change leader, you need to have full visibility into the progress of change implementation. With all of the data and key metrics in one place, you’ll be able to ensure the change is delivering on its priorities, monitor risks, and change direction if needed.
✅ It saves you time: Bring in your team members and get regular progress updates on your change initiatives without wasting time in another meeting. You won't have to switch between different spreadsheets and data sources to get real-time insights. You’ll be able to pull all the information you need and build powerful reports for your change control board with just a few clicks.
Note for Cascade users: If you already have a business plan in Cascade, you can easily link your change management plan to the company’s overall strategic plan and show how your activities contribute to the business outcomes.
Build And Execute Your Change Management Plan With Cascade 🚀
When introducing multiple change initiatives simultaneously, it is hard to keep track of progress and assess the cumulative impact of all the changes. The siloed approach makes it difficult for change leaders to see the bigger picture and mitigate the risks that could derail change success.
That’s why it’s critical to have the right tools and a bulletproof change management plan to help guide your team, ensure all stakeholders are on the same page, find potential risks and issues early on, and adapt as fast as possible when changes occur. This is where outdated and static tools like Excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint presentations simply don’t cut it anymore.
Put your change management into action with Cascade’s strategy execution platform, and you’ll be able to:
- Provide fast and accurate data to the change control board for data-driven decision-making.
- Build a standardized process for change execution across divisional units and functional areas.
- Align your key stakeholders and create an organization that is able to adapt fast to changes in its environment.
- Create a single source of truth so you’ll have full visibility in performance and a better ability to juggle multiple change initiatives at the same time.
Whether you need a tool to track KPIs, assign owners to key initiatives, or make faster reports to support management decision-making, Cascade is the answer for you.
Other Free Templates In Our Library To Support Your Change Management Process:
Internal Communications Plan Template
Consistent communication is a critical component of implementing change and is by no means a one-person task. This template will help you make a plan for communicating with the different people who will be affected by the change. This will help you bring your project teams together and create an effective communication plan for each group.
Business Transformation Strategy Template
Do you need to translate a high-level business strategy into a clear roadmap with milestones? You can use this business transformation strategy template which will help you align teams around shared goals and track success.
Project Execution Plan Template
You can use this project execution plan template to build individual activity plans like a training plan or resistance management plan. Using this template, you can streamline the project management process, control each phase of the project, and create a standardized approach to tracking and reporting progress. You’ll be able to create a detailed project management plan that includes projected costs as well as actual budget spend.
FAQs
Is Cascade change management plan template free?
Yes - you can use this template for free and forever! And that’s not all—you can bring in your team to create an effective change management process. The free forever plan is suitable for teams with up to four members.
How do you write a change management plan?
Write a change management plan by including these key elements: focus areas, objectives, an action plan, KPIs, and owners.
What are the 7 R's of change management?
The 7 R’s of change management is a checklist of the most important points to consider in the change management process:
- Who Raised the change?
- What is the Reason for the change?
- What return is Required from the change?
- What are the Risks involved in the change?
- What Resources are required to deliver the change?
- Who is Responsible for implementing it?
- What is the Relationship between this and other change initiatives across the organization?
What are the four main components of a change management plan?
The four main components of a change management plan include strategy and planning, clear objectives and goals, a governance system, and stakeholder engagement.