Where project management is all about achieving the project objectives, change management is all about getting humans to adopt, utilize and engage.

It’s not hard to understand that a wonderful deliverable is useless if the intended audience refuses to use or benefit from it. I see project and change management as two sides of the same coin; you really cannot have one without the other.

When change is overlooked in a project (even a project that may have qualified as a success), I’ll guarantee it could have had a higher ROI if structured change management had been applied. I’ve seen strong change management save a likely to fail project and I’ve seen outstanding projects fail because change was ignored. Every project needs change management incorporated throughout its life cycle and ongoing reinforcement after delivery to maximize benefits.

Danielle VanZorn, PMP, SPHR