Abstract:
Colossal empirical literature suggests that change management is amongst the leading
factors that determine the success or failure of a system migration. In 2006 Africa
Nazarene University Library began automating its services, however implementation
of the system experienced some challenges, the library was still relapsing back and
forth from manual and partial automated library system, implying that it had not fully
realised the benefits of an automated system. By the time of carrying out this study a
number of its functions were yet to be automated and the causes of this limited
performance of the library system had not been established. The aim of this study
was, therefore, to audit the change management process at Africa Nazarene
University library systems migration with the intention of proposing measures that
can optimize the change management efforts. To achieve this, the study sought to:
establish the reasons/drivers for migration from the manual to the automated system at
the library; examine the phases of the migration process, assess the support system in
place for the library system migration; determine staff and users perception and
response to the migration process; seek out the change management challenges
experienced by the library during the migration; and propose a strategy for successful
system implementation. Jick’s Todd 10 step model of change management was used
as the theoretical framework. A post-positivist philosophical stance embedded in a
data transformation mixed method approach was adopted. Purposive and non-
proportionate sampling methods were used to draw a sample size of 298 constituting
of library staff, ICT staff, faculty members and students from a population of 1060.
The study used descriptive and thematic analysis to analyze the data and tables,
figures, narratives, and excerpts to present the data. Resounding previous findings, the
study established that chief reason for the migration was the desire to enhance the
operations and delivery of services, notwithstanding that the new system was a
donation. The migration process was, however, unstructured and unplanned. The
study concludes that the library’s change management maturity level is considerably
low and because of the library’s contextual uniqueness, an off the shelf change
management approach cannot wholesomely be adopted. Consequently, the study
recommends that the library adopts a strategic change management plan that
addresses both continuous and discontinuous change and that outlines both strategic
and functional capabilities requirements has been developed and proposed for the
library. A framework of the suggested strategic change management plan that takes
cognisance of the ANUL context has been developed and proposed for adoption.