Although there should be an individual or small team of individuals who are dedicated to managing OCM
activities, the key to the success of organizational change management is that the work of OCM is never
confined to a small group. Every person on the project team must be trained on OCM and appreciate that
proper communication, audience assessment, and training contribute to the success of a project.
The management accountant’s role in system implementation activities should be one of the most important
contributing roles of OCM. A management accountant should provide insight and expertise as a subject
matter expert in addition to guidance and leadership as a project sponsor and/or champion. Throughout each
phase, the management accountant should be espousing the change and actively participating in the communication
to ensure that appropriate channels are aligned with the new direction of the company and that it’s clear how
the change will affect each individual, ensuring that everyone will embrace the change once it is implemented.
Additionally, while outside of the realm of OCM activities, it’s important to note that a management accountant’s
role in the project extends to ensuring that adequate internal controls will remain in place after the new system
is implemented. Monitoring the control issues of a project is a direct responsibility of the management accountant,
and it’s imperative in order to mitigate significant risks to any operational change implementation.
Technology development is growing faster than ever. As workplaces increasingly adopt new systems to transform
and automate their business processes, the need for dedicated change management not only increases,
but so does the need for the entire business to understand the necessity of change management and how
it works.