ARC 085: BUSINESS MANAGEMENT & APPLICATION

PHINMA – University of Pangasinan

College of Engineering and Architecture
Department of Architecture
FOR ARCHITECTURE

“BUSINESS CHANGE
LIFECYCLE”

Research Work No. 1- P3

BAUTISTA, CRISTIAN ABRAM D.

Student

AR. ELOISA T. NABOYE

Instructor
 BUSINESS CHANGE LIFECYCLE
The business analyst is a vital role in business change and improvement. An improvement
project may require many responsibilities, including stakeholder management, design,
development and deployment. The business analyst isn’t the main role performing these tasks but
does have a key impact and influence on the decisions and actions taken by the wider team. This
blog covers the business change lifecycle, which is a five-stage lifecycle that covers the key areas
of activity required to enable successful business change.

Five stages of the business change lifecycle

The life of a business owner or entrepreneur can, in many ways, be likened to that of a
parent. Both represent a part of who you really are, will be carefully nurtured over many years,
flourish to deliver a sense of pride, and will take on a life of their own when it’s time for you to
step back. The business change lifecycle is important – here’s why.

Rather like being a parent, running a business sometimes results in levels of stress that you
may never have thought possible.

It’s often said that we experience five different stages in life: birth, infancy, childhood,
adolescence, and adulthood.

Businesses too can be clearly defined into five lifecycle changes and understanding exactly
where you stand – and the transitions from one stage to another – can play an essential part in your
successes and failures.

In this blog we take a look at the five stages of the business lifecycle, identifying how you
can develop your organisation into an enduring, successful enterprise as years pass by.

Stage 1: Development/seed

Every business starts with an idea, a spark of inspiration. This genesis represents entry into the
primary stage of the business lifecycle – a stage that exists before your business does. At this
juncture, it’s important for you to invest your time in determining the viability of your business
idea such as:-

• Conduct some market research to see who is already out doing what you plan to offer
• Seek the advice of others within your industry sector
• Assess the financial foundations and level of startup capital you have available to pursue
the venture with complete confidence.

Stage 2: Startup

After finalising your business idea and establishing your company as a legal entity, your
business enters what many might consider to be the most exciting stage of them all: the startup
stage. But with excitement comes challenges and the need to persevere when the going gets tough.
As such, it is perhaps unsurprising to learn that a large proportion of startup businesses fail to
survive the first few years.

Of course, mistakes will always happen but during the early days of operation being able
to overcome adversity can make or break your business’ future. By ensuring you put the necessary
work into refining the products and services you offer, you have the opportunity to fully meet the
requirements of your target audience and drive the greatest success. Perhaps the keyword to
remember here is adaptability. From small changes to large, it may feel like a period of constant
transition and confusion but perseverance and the willingness to change will help you find the
perfect place in your market.

Stage 3: Establishment and growth

What exactly does it mean to be an established business? Well, if you’ve been steadily
generating income and onboarding clients/customers for a prolonged period of time (think two-
tothree years), you should count yourself among the few that have managed to reach such a stable
standing. Being able to continue this success, however, and grow your operations represents an
altogether tougher obstacle.
 At this particular stage in your business lifecycle, you may well be seeing your time divided
among more and more tasks. From working with your clients and customers to growing your team
of employees, handling key financial data to sourcing new business opportunities, it’s by no means
unusual to find business owners in this particular scenario working all hours and seldom – if ever
– taking a holiday.

As such it pays for the establishment and growth period of your business to embrace the
recruitment of specialists in key departments. Being able to delegate responsibilities to those with
the expertise and experience necessary to help the business flourish will not only free up your time
to focus on other key activities but also means each department works to maximum capacity.

To ensure that such development continues with the utmost success, the importance of
effective communication cannot be overstated. Ensure your recruitment department takes this key
element of working life into consideration to ensure optimum performance.

Stage 4 of Business Change Lifecycle – Expansion

So, you’ve established your place in the market, you’ve built up a team around you in order
to become more effective in your work and there is an element of routine to operations. What now?
At the fourth stage of your business’ lifecycle, you may feel the urge to capitalise on the success
and stability already in place and expand the offerings – or even the reach – of your business.

Weighing up both the rewards and the risks of any expanded venture will help determine
which direction the company should take. Continual evolution is essential, so embracing new
technologies, new markets and new opportunities needs to be measured in terms of the risks you
might face should things not turn out the way you hoped. Through careful planning, professional
advice, and the full support and buy-in of the business, you can approach expansion with a greater
degree of confidence.

Stage 5 of Business Change Lifecycle : Maturity and exit?

Overcoming the many hurdles inherent in growing and expanding a business can represent
a life’s work. Such pressures and the time and energy needed to attain a level of success will often
mean making sacrifices elsewhere; most notably in your personal life. As such, once your business
has reached maturity – i.e. it’s consistently seeing profits grow year in, year out – you may well be
looking at one of two options: continuing to expand, or looking for an exit strategy.

If it’s the former, you will need to reinvest your time and efforts into sourcing suitable
opportunities and measuring risk as per Stage 4. In the case of an exit strategy, meanwhile, there
are a number of options available. Whether it’s a full or partial sale of the business to a third party,
an Initial Public Offering, a management buyout, or even simply removing yourself from day-
today activities and remaining a silent partner or director, leaving behind the legacy of your
business will help set you up for a more relaxing future.

The Business Change Lifecycle–Implementation and Realisation

The business analyst is a vital role in business change and improvement. An improvement
project may require many responsibilities, including stakeholder management, design,
development and deployment. The business analyst isn’t the main role performing these tasks but
does have a key impact and influence on the decisions and actions taken by the wider team. This
blog covers the business change lifecycle, which is a five-stage lifecycle that covers the key areas
of activity required to enable successful business change.

These five stages are:

1. Alignment

Any new project and software development should ensure that it matches the organisation’s
objectives and strategy, any proposed changes should meet internal policies and legal
requirements.

This is a key stage when process mapping, the To-Be process needs to be compliant with the
policies and legislation of the process. This can mean that proposed changes might not be possible
due to these factors.

Aligning the Organizations to External and Internal Environments

 External Environment includes:

- Customer Habits
- Economy, Political, Legal
- Social, Environmental
- Technology, Competitors

 Internal Environment includes:

- Culture, Values

2. Definition

The definition stage focuses on defining business change proposals in order to uncover the root
cause, analyse the situation and define the requirements.

 Current ( as is/ baseline)

 The Desire ( To be/ Target) Future State  Business Case
Showing:

- Options to transition from current to future state (Holistic)

- Costs and benefits of options
 - Goals and objective

3. Design

The design stage covers the design specification, development and testing of the solution, including
the business processes and software needed.

Eliciting requirements

 Across the entire business system

- People
- Process
- Systems
- Organization

 Working with the business

 Aligned to the business needs
 Consideration for testing

4. Implementation

Implementation covers the planning and preparation for the deployment of business change.

5. Realisation

Realisation is the review of the predicted business changes to identify which have been met and
which need investigation. For example, through the use of the Engage Process Modeler an estimate
time and cost-saving can be produced broken down by role. This can then be investigated to see if
the time saving has been realised by the new process and or product.

This series of blogs is going to uncover the business analyst’s role across these five stages. This
blog will cover the implementation and realisation stages.

Implementation
The implementation stage covers the design specification, development and testing of the solution,
including the business processes and software needed. Therefore, there is a great deal of planning
and preparation required in this stage. The key factor to consider as a business analyst in this stage
is the impact on the staff effected by the change. It is vital to get people onboard, through means
such as using service area lead transformation. The impact on staff members can be split into five
sections based on the SARAH model.

The first stage is Shock, which is the initial reaction to the change proposed. This is usually
due to a lack of awareness and communication about the proposed changes prior to
implementation. This then moves to the second reaction of Anger as they come to the realisation
of how the changes will impact them and their current role. This anger is usually focused at senior
management and the business change team. If someone is unhappy about the changes they might
move to Rejection, this is where the person is angry about the changes and therefore tries to reject
the ideas and direction being set. Eventually, an acceptance of the proposed changes is developed,
this may not mean they are confident in the changes, but at least believes in the positive impact is
can have on the service and role. Finally, Hope. People begin to see the positive impact and benefits
available with the transformation and believes in its success.

In conclusion, not keeping staff informed about the transformation project is an easy way
for staff to fall into these categories. Therefore, use of service area lead transformation is an
effective way to combat this. A good way of achieving this is to use a visual process mapping tool.
The Engage Process Modeler is a visual BPMN based tool that can be used to facilitate workshops
so that the service area can see it being built in the workshop and has impact over how the new
processes are designed.

Realisation

For benefits to be realised effectively, the proposed changes have to be designed, planned and
managed effectively. It is common for the majority of the team’s effort to be spent defining,
developing and delivering the solution, and less on how the expected business benefits are going
to be achieved. Therefore, a complete benefits plan is vital to achieving the projects goals.

A benefits plan outlines the following sections: Context and vision, Benefits profiles, Benefits
dependency network, Responsibilities and Tracking procedures.

Some of these sections can be made easier by using the Engage Process Modeler, which is an easy
to use process mapping tool that can be used in a workshop and has the capability to capture and
calculate process timing and costings. Find out more about
REFERENCES:

 Ingle, M. (2022, February 13). Business change lifecycle – which stage is your business

at? THP Chartered Accountants. Retrieved October 5, 2022, from

https://www.thp.co.uk/business-change-lifecycle-what-stage-are-you-at/

 Sandford, A. (2022, March 17). The Business Change Lifecycle–Implementation and

Realisation. We Are Lean and Agile - Making Improvement Easier for You. Retrieved

October 5, 2022, from https://weareleanandagile.com/project/the-business-

changelifecycle-implementation-and-realisation/

 undefined [Transforming Ninja]. (2016, May 15). Business Change Lifecycle. YouTube.

Retrieved October 5, 2022, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy6ARGK0it4

 Kaur, R. (n.d.). Business change lifecycle and Business Process Reengineering. Retrieved

October 5, 2022, from https://www.slideshare.net/RinkleKaur/business-change-

lifecycleand-business-process-reengineering