You're considering or have decided to become a Google Workspace school. You must be enthusiastic about security, teaching, and learning possibilities and can't wait to roll Workspace out in your school. Making the decision is a huge hurdle. Once you decide, changing platforms is a big undertaking; undoubtedly, where to start is the biggest question.
Embarking on such a change requires a change management plan. Your change management plan is the process you will take to prepare your organization before moving to Workspace, the strategy for leading the move to Workspace across your schools, and then actually implementing Workspace. In that plan, technology administrators assume the role of agents of change.
Administrators should design a change management plan where teachers and staff feel invested. For that to happen, create your plan around enabling and empowering teachers. You'll want to engage teachers in their learning so they can engage their students.
Here, we'll look at change management and some resources for change management methodology and success with Google Workspace.
Change management as defined by Google
In an organization, school districts included, change is any initiative that disrupts how people do their daily jobs. Because change can be risky and meet resistance, it requires a plan. Many change management models are available to help organizations implement change, but only some focus on change in education. In recognition of migration challenges, Google and its Google Workspace community came together to discuss change management strategies. The result is the change management methodology for Google Workspace. This plan focuses on migrating any organization to Workspace, education institutions, and businesses.
See the Google blog: Change Management Methodology: The Journey to Long-Term Success with Google Workspace for the full methodology.
In summary, this methodology breaks down the change journey to long-term success into four phases:
- Excite
- Enable
- Expand
- Embed
Consider this your timetable for migrating to Workspace. It is the when for the activities in the plan.
The methodology then defines the key workstreams for managing change:
- Sponsorship
- Organizational Analysis
- Communications
- Training
The items in this list represent the actions or activities you’ll take during your change journey.
The result is the following essential activities and communications at each phase in the change journey and within each workstream.
Note: Go-live happens between Enable and Expand.
For questions about leveraging the power of Google Workspace for Education at your school for the success of your administrators, teachers, students, and parents and guardians, connect with a Google Customer Success Specialist.
Additional resources:
K-12 storage readiness guide (PDF)
Get the most out of Google Workspace for Education, K-12 Blueprint (PDF)
Higher Education storage readiness guide (PDF)
Getting started with Workplace (CDW Amplified for Education Help Center)
Document Version | Date | Description of Change |
1.0 | 3/18/2024 | Updated HE storage readiness PDF |
1.1 | 3/19/2024 | Added link to K-12 blueprint PDF |
1.2 | 9/6/2024 | Minor text edits, reverify |