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1 

The degree to which the leaders can break from previous ways of working.

2 

The significance and comprehensiveness of the change.

3 

The extent to which the head of the organisation is actively involved in the change 

process.

To achieve the unfreeze stages different staff can be identified for different roles by the pro‑

ject manager:

● 

System sponsors are senior managers or board members who have bought into the digital 

business initiative, are committed to major change and want to achieve success. The spon‑

sors will try to fire up staff with their enthusiasm and stress why introducing the system is 

important to the business and its workers.

● 

System owners are managers in the organisation of key processes such as a procurement 

manager or marketing manager who will use the digital business system to achieve ben‑

efits in their area.

● 

System users. These are staff in the different areas of the business who are actively involved 

in making the process happen. They could be a buyer in procurement or a brand manager 

within the marketing department.

Special types of system users can be identified, and it is important for the change manager to 

try to influence these staff to help achieve commitment amongst other staff. The three main 

types of system users that should be influenced are as follows:

● 

Stakeholders should be identified for each of the process areas where change will be intro‑

duced. These will be staff who are respected by their co‑workers and will again act as a 

source of enthusiasm for the system. The user representatives used in specification, testing 

and  sign‑  off are key stakeholders.

● 

The legitimiser protects the norms and values of the system; they are experienced in their 

job and regarded as the experts by fellow workers; they may initially be resistant to change 

and therefore need to be involved early.

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Chapter 10  Change management

● 

Opinion leaders are people whom others watch to see whether they accept new ideas and 

changes. They usually have little formal power, but are regarded as good ideas people who 

are receptive to change and again need to be involved early in the project.

For digital business implementation these roles will need to be identified for each implemen‑

tation project as well as the overall change.

A more detailed change model proposed by Jay and Smith (1996) identifies four phases: