There are five key steps involved in change management process development, namely:
- Filtering Requests for Change (RFCs) – To specify the details of needed change program and submit it to the Change Advisory Board (CAB) for consideration. CAB is an entity, which includes representatives from many divisions, such as the server and network operations, security authority, application development and database management. Other members may represent legal, operations and administrative departments. Change program must be evaluated and studied for its practical effect and feasibility to avoid any duplication of efforts or vain implementation.
- Assessing the Impact of Changes – After we have the list of requested changes, we need to prioritize the change requests by assessing the cost involved, benefits, perceived risks and possible impacts of the change request.
- Authorizing Changes – Business partners are normally engaged in the process, we may use their expertise in evaluating the impact of the whole changes program. The CAB must advise deeper insights to the change manager before the changes programs are approved and scheduled.
- Reviewing Changes – We can review the entire process to point out those things were done very well and not so well after the changes have been implemented. This practice helps us to revamp the change management process and gain better improvement. Back-out procedures is always needed if applied changes do not perform as expected and create negative results.
- Closing Requests for Change (RFCs) – Finally the change is reviewed and accepted by the user who has submitted the Request for Change, the RFC should be closed. All configuration changes should be properly and systematically documented, and all approvals, comments, testing plans, back-out plans and other workflow-related documentation should be kept according to company policy.
