Using ADKAR to

Implement Change

Organizational Development
Winnipeg Regional Health Authority
 Session Goals
• To promote and support large organizational
change while minimizing the impact on the daily
operations.

• To help leaders assess the current response to

the change and identify actions to support
individuals to move through the change process
safely and professionally.

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 Agenda
Today, we will:
• Review the dimensions of change
• Introduce the ADKAR model
• Identify strategies to build each component
of the ADKAR model
• Begin creating action plans to support
individuals through the transformation

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• Self Aware - aware of own assumptions, values, principles,
strengths and limitations
• Manage Themselves - take responsibility for own performance
and health
• Develops Themselves - actively seek opportunities and
challenges for personal learning, character building and growth
• Demonstrate Character - model qualities such as honesty,
integrity, resilience, and confidence

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As the LEADS in a Caring Environment framework
reminds us, to be effective we need to begin with
self.
• Complete the ADKAR Assessment
considering your perspective (pg. 1-2)
• Rating Scale: 1=lowest, 5=highest

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What are you hearing
about the change from
individuals on your team?

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 What is ADKAR?

ADKAR is a:
• Goal-oriented change management model to
guide individual and organizational change
• Research-based model by Prosci
• Series of milestones that an individual needs
to achieve in order to move through change

Prosci.com 7
 Why use ADKAR?
ADKAR helps leaders to:
• Make sense of the people side of change
• Support employees’ transition through change
• Understand employees’ response to change
• Measure progress
• Identify gaps and support required
• Develop action plans to support people

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 Benefits of ADKAR
ADKAR provides:
• A simple framework for everyone in the
organization to think about change
• Clear goals and outcomes for change
management activities
• A common language to discuss change for
employees, managers and senior leaders alike

Prosci.com 9
ADKAR

Prosci.com 10
 Personal Transition Through Change

* Adapted from the Change Curve attributed to psychiatrist Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, resulting from her work 11
on personal transition in grief and bereavement.
 Awareness
Includes a person’s understanding of:
• The nature of change
• Why the change is being made
• Risk of not changing
• Information about internal and external
drivers for change
• The benefit of the change to the person

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 Factors Influencing Awareness
Factors influencing awareness include:
• A person’s view of the current state
• How a person perceives problems
• Credibility of the sender of the message
• Circulation of misinformation or rumours
• Contestability of the reasons for change

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 Building Awareness
• Building awareness is a process
• Awareness is not built by sending a message
rather by how the message is received and
internalized by each person
• Interactions and feedback are required to
measure awareness

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 Strategies for Building Awareness
• Use multiple types of media to communicate
• Share the Executive’s messages of the rationale for
change and the risk of not changing
• Coach employees to help them translate the
organizational change into personal change
• Review information about organizational performance,
best practices, trends, research
• Ensure people know where to go for more information
• Answer any questions that come up

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 Desire
Desire to change:
• Represents the motivation and personal
choice to support and engage in the change
• Is not awareness - Common mistake is to
think that building awareness will build
desire

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 Factors Influencing Desire
Factors influencing desire:
• The magnitude of the impact on each individual’s work
• Individual’s trust in the organization
• Individual perception how the environment will change
• Each individual’s personal situation
• The alignment of the change with an individual’s values
• The organization’s history of handling change

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 Creating Desire

• Actions and words of leaders have a significant

influence on creating desire for change
• Creating desire is more than “managing
resistance”
• Be positive and proactive in creating energy
and engagement around the change

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 Strategies for Creating Desire
• Engage senior leaders to address the hard questions
and concerns
• Resolve your own issues, questions about the change
• Demonstrate your support of the change
• Communicate the benefits of the change
• Have the right conversation with your team
• Understand employees’ objections and concerns
• Engage employees in the change process
• Align incentive programs

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 Knowledge
Represents how to implement change, including:
• Training and education on the skills and
behaviours needed to change
• Detailed information on how to use new
processes, systems and tools
• Understanding the new roles and
responsibilities associated with the change

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 Factors Influencing Knowledge
Factors influencing knowledge:
• Current knowledge of an individual compared
with the required knowledge
• Capability of a person to gain new knowledge
• Resources available for education and training
• Access to or existence of the required
knowledge

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 Developing Knowledge
• Adult learning principles are foundational for
developing knowledge
• Adults want to know why the learning is
important and relevant to them
• Appling the new knowledge to an immediate
problem help with learning retention

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How do you
change the
world?

Awareness
Desire
Knowledge

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Strategies for Developing Knowledge
• Analyze the gap between what people need to do
today and what they will need to do tomorrow
• Ensure training programs are properly designed
and delivered – multimedia, hands-on, in-time
• Use job aides such as checklists and templates
• Provide one-on-one coaching to support training
• Encourage peer learning through peer-mentors,
user groups, forums, super-users
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 Ability
Ability represents the:
• Demonstrated capability to
implement the change
• Demonstrated achievement of the change
• Act of doing
• Change in a way that is visible in action and
measurable in effect

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 Factors Influencing Ability
Factors influencing ability:
• Psychological blocks
• Physical abilities
• Intellectual capabilities
• Time available to develop the needed skills
• Availability of resources to support the
development of new skills

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 Fostering Ability
• Knowing how to do something is not the same
as being able to do it
• We need to decide what level of ability is
needed at each stage of the change process
• Individuals develop ability at different rates
and need different supports

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 Strategies for Fostering Ability
• Coach to uncover gaps in an employee’s ability
• Create a safe environment to practice new skills and
job roles and receive feedback
• Enable access to subject matter experts
• Measure results and assess performance in order to
know where the change is and is not succeeding
• Integrate role plays, simulations, and hands-on work
into training
• Provide feedback to improve performance

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 Reinforcement
• Any action or event that strengthens and
sustains the change
• Builds momentum during the transition
• Without ongoing reinforcements there is a
risk that people revert to old behaviours
• With reinforcement an organization's
readiness and capacity for future changes
increase

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Factors Influencing Reinforcement
Factors influencing reinforcement:
• The degree to which reinforcement is
meaningful to the individuals
• Association with demonstrated progress or
accomplishment
• The absence of negative consequences
• An accountability system to reinforce the
change
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 Building Reinforcement
• Reinforcement lets people know the change is
still important
• Social pressure can reinforce others to
implement or reject the new behaviours
• Reinforcement goes on after the “project
plan” activities are completed

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Strategies for Building Reinforcement
• Recognize and express appreciation - publically or
privately, formally or informally
• Celebrate as a group with fun activities, events
• Invite the change sponsor to express their appreciation
• Ask employees how they are doing with the change
• Conduct formal assessments and review performance
data to see if the change is taking hold
• Build accountability into other systems such as annual
performance conversations

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 Action Planning
Review the list of sentiments you are hearing from
your team.
• Which ADKAR stages are represented?

Create an action plan for each of the stages reflected

on the lists.
• What factors needs to be put in place?
• How will you accomplish this?

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 Keep in Mind….

Action plans are living documents

– Keep them updated by recording the impact of completed
items and adding new actions as required.
Individuals will need different support at different stages
– Keep open lines of communication. Their concerns will
indicate when to move to the next element in your plan.
Your peers are a valuable resource
– Share the actions that were helpful for your team and solicit
suggestions to address remaining concerns.

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What questions do you have about

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