Change Management Templates

This is a useful matrix for gaining self-awareness and generating inputs to the goal-setting process. When we can clearly see what we want (or want more of), along with what we have and don’t have, patterns emerge. Then we can identify small and large changes that might be effective in improving our job, relationship, or any situation we’re dealing with (or simply our entire lives).

Choose an area to focus on from your life (such as your work situation), and then add items via cards to the matrix, positioning them along the spectrums of the X and Y axes.   

X-axis: This is the spectrum from Don’t Have (any) to Have (lots). Keep in mind that with some items, it may not be a clear “Have” or “Don’t Have.” For example, take money. You probably have some money. Do you want more?  How much more?  If you want lots more money, place the card far to the right. 

Y-axis:  This is the Don’t Want/Want spectrum. It starts on the left with Don’t Want (at all) to Want (somewhat, or badly) on the right.  

What to place in each zone of the matrix:

1. Want/Don’t Have. These are potential goals to work towards.
2. Want/Have. These are things to be grateful for and to protect. As you set goals, you may want to consider these items and make sure you don’t sacrifice something valuable that you already have in the pursuit of something new.
3. Don’t Want/Don’t Have. You can ignore these items for the most part. However, when considering new options or steps to take, you can look to make sure you don’t take on things that are in this category.
4. Don’t Want/Have. When you consider changes to make or steps to take, try to design them in a way that will eliminate some of these items. 
5. Zone of Ambivalence / Ambiguity. These are things that you may want sometimes want but not at other times. This can be subtle. You may be using internal “protection strategies” to avoid wanting something that you deem yourself unable to obtain or accomplish. Take money again as an example. You may want more money, but don’t believe you can get it. Therefore, you’re afraid of wanting it. So then you tell yourself things like, “Money is not important to me.” or “I can live on very little money.” The items in your Ambivalent/Ambiguous zone are worth thoughtful attention. Reflect on them to get more clarity about what you want and don’t want.

Viewing all your items in relationship to each other can reveal new insights and synergies. For example, you might see that you would be very happy in your current job if you could just make a small change. Sometimes, a small change can remove things you don’t want (which is good!) and bring in things you do want. 

So this is a great tool to use BEFORE using the path to a desired state template.  

Cardsmith Pro-tip: Use the Zoom Slider Bar to make the background image larger or smaller in order to fit your screen.    

This board is a concept map created during the sample project’s initiation phase.

Creating a map like this can help clarify the purpose of a project, linking it to key strategic initiatives.  It can be used to help understand the company’s goals and strategies, and how these things may be supported by the proposed solution.

Having a map like this later on can also be useful in controlling scope creep. Does the added scope support the high level project objectives?  Have the objectives changed?  Having a visual tool like this can help facilitate conversations with executives and other stakeholders throughout the life of a project.

Use this team roles and bio board so that you and your team can:

1. quickly see who else is on the team and what their role is.
2. If you need a Bio for someone who is speaking, or authoring an article, you can quickly find it.

Keeping this board up to date takes only seconds every time you add a new team member, and it pays off because everyone will have this information at their fingertips.

Did you know you can link Cardsmith Boards together in a Master Dashboard?  

Every board, and every card for that matter, has a unique URL that can be used to link to and open another board.  

This board is an example of how one might use the text or link fields in Cardsmith to link a lot of different boards together. 

For example, if you have a project where there is a stakeholder register, a project milestone board, a project to company strategy board, and a kanban board, you can bring those all together for the convenience of your team and stakeholders.  

Communicate your unique process to new clients and as a Project Tracking tool during team coaching and consulting engagements.

Keep your team focused on the most important goals by month and business area.

This example was designed by our CEO and is a typical roadmap for an early or launch stage startup.

The default card in this Cardsmith board have common stakeholder interview questions.  You can customize the cards for your interviews, and use this board for tracking scheduling and completing a series of stakeholder interviews for your project.

Quick Tip:  If you change the interview questions, make sure to set the default card after you’ve added fields and removed fields to one of the sample cards before creating more interviewee cards.

Here’s what using a stakeholder register can do for your project:  

1. Provide a central location to gather and maintain details about project stakeholders. 
2. Proactively manage stakeholder communications. Not all stakeholders will need or want the same type, frequency or format of communications.
3. Help prioritize stakeholders.
4. Decrease the risk of your project failing for political reasons.

This board is handy for tracking internal project stakeholders. Categorizing people by their level of interest (or support) and their influence within the organization can help you proactively manage stakeholder communications and minimize political risk to your project’s success.

Quick Tip:  We’ve setup a default card with the fields commonly tracked during the Stakeholder Analysis process of Project Management. You can add your own fields, and then select “Set as Default Card” on the Card menu.

Gather Requirements for change management.

The information in this board will be used to determine what the key requirements of a system change needs to be driving at to ensure a successful choice of a solution.

Each column represents a business cycle that must be considered when gathering requirements about a change project that impacts the entire business.  You can easily delete or change column headings to represent the scope of your project.

The default card for this board (what is created when you click to add a card) has fields with prompts for gathering requirements related to each process step. You can change the Default Card by accessing it in the Board Menu in the upper left of your copy of this template.