What is Change Management?
Change management is a systematic approach to planning, implementing, and evaluating changes to products, processes, and technologies throughout the product lifecycle. It involves defining change processes, assessing impacts, engaging stakeholders, and fostering a culture of continuous improvement to enhance efficiency, quality, and innovation
The role of change management
Change management ensures a structured and controlled approach to making changes throughout a product’s development and manufacturing processes. Having a structured approach to defining, standardizing, and executing change management processes from concept through manufacture, enables organizations to efficiently manage product changes and minimize disruption.
What are the benefits of change management?
Improve efficiency
Save time and money through improved efficiency by automating significant factors in the deployment of changes
Reduce disruption
Standardizing change processes helps to minimize disruption and maximize the benefits of change deployment throughout product development.
Unify processes
Implementing an organization-wide change management system reduces manual interventions and assists adaptability in the marketplace by enabling a unified, enterprise-wide change process across all impacted areas
What are the best practices for change management deployment?
The best foundation for implementing a unified change process is by using a PLM platform in conjunction with an integration framework that enables each of your enterprise systems to communicate in real-time. Here’s an example of a typical change management process using 3DEXPERIENCE.
Change actions can be created independently without being associated with a specific change order or change request. This allows flexibility in capturing proposed changes early in the process before they are formally submitted for review.
Change actions can be created and modified directly within the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, either using the native CATIA application for 3D design or the web-based 3DEXPERIENCE apps. This enables a seamless workflow where changes are initiated and documented within the same environment where the product data is managed.
Physical products and EBOM (engineering bill of materials) parts can be added to a change action as the specific items being changed. This links the change request directly to the affected product data, providing full traceability and context.
Relevant stakeholders can be assigned as reviewers or assignees for each change action. Reviewers are responsible for evaluating and approving the proposed change, while the assignee has overall accountability for ensuring the change progresses through the process. Assigning clear responsibilities helps avoid changes getting stuck.
Change actions progress through a defined workflow with statuses such as “In Work,” “In Approval,” and “Released.” As the change moves through these statuses, it is promoted through the review and approval process. The status provides visibility into where each change is in the workflow.
Assigned reviewers can take action on a change action by accepting, rejecting, or abstaining from the change. Their decision is recorded and communicated to the other stakeholders. Rejected changes are sent back for rework, while accepted changes proceed to the next step in the process.
Essential software for change management
For end-to-end PLM (product lifecycle management) and collaborative innovation.
For seamless integration of enterprise systems and data management.
For robust product data management, business analytics, and decision support.
For optimizing manufacturing processes, improving operational efficiency, and enhancing product quality.
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Need help with Change management?
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