How to build a change management course: a complete guide for lecturers

Central question: What is changing, why now, and how should the nature of the change shape the way it is managed?

Begin by stopping students from treating all change as one phenomenon. A technology rollout, a restructuring, a culture shift, a merger and a strategic pivot create different uncertainty, dependencies and human consequences. The teaching task is to connect the driver and scope of change to the choices a change leader must make.

What this concept covers

• External and internal drivers of change, including technology, strategy, regulation, competition and performance gaps.
• Incremental, transitional and transformational change.
• Planned change, emergent change and continuous change.
• Change scope across roles, processes, structures, systems, culture and identity.
• The distinction between a change initiative and ordinary operational improvement.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Classify a change by driver, scope and degree of discontinuity.
• Explain why different forms of change create different implementation risks.
• Distinguish a change outcome from the activities used to pursue it.
• Frame an initial change problem without assuming the solution.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Give students short change scenarios and ask them to classify each before discussing solutions.
• Use a before-and-after operating model to separate desired outcomes from implementation activity.
• Ask groups to identify what is known, assumed and still uncertain at the start of an initiative.

Case-style example

Northstar Insurance plans a new claims platform for 1,200 employees. Average claim cycle time is 6.4 days against a 4.5-day target, annual claims-team turnover is 18%, and leaders also want more consistent customer decisions. Students classify the initiative as technology, process, structural and cultural change, then choose between a narrow system rollout and a broader operating-model change. They discover that the same performance gap can justify different change scopes, each with different risks.

Where students struggle

Students often start with a favourite model or communication plan before they have diagnosed the type of change. This produces generic interventions that are disconnected from the actual problem.

Reading and a quick check

Use Cameron and Green, Chapter 3 on organizational change, then ask students to write a two-sentence change definition: what must be different, and what evidence would show that it is different.

Where a simulation fits

Use a case discussion, diagnostic workshop, role-play, implementation critique or short board memo here. The goal is to make the decision observable without forcing an adjacent simulation into a concept it does not directly teach.

Where it leads

The next step is diagnosis: even a well-framed change can fail if the organisation lacks readiness, capacity or the conditions to absorb it.

Central question: Is the organisation ready and able to make this change, and where are the constraints that could derail it?

Change readiness is not a single attitude score. Lecturers should help students diagnose strategy, history, workload, leadership credibility, local variation, capability and competing initiatives. A strong diagnosis identifies where the organisation can move quickly and where the design must change before implementation begins.

What this concept covers

• Readiness at organisational, team and individual levels.
• Change history, trust and credibility.
• Capacity, workload and change saturation.
• Capabilities, resources and local constraints.
• Diagnostic evidence from interviews, surveys, performance data and process observations.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Evaluate multiple sources of readiness evidence.
• Distinguish willingness from capacity.
• Identify local constraints hidden by organisation-wide averages.
• Recommend whether to proceed, pilot, redesign or delay.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Compare a simple readiness survey with operational data and manager interviews.
• Ask students to build a diagnostic hypothesis before seeing all the evidence, then revise it.
• Use a heatmap by business unit to show why averages can mislead.

Case-style example

Calder Manufacturing is preparing an ERP rollout across four plants. On-time delivery is 88%, overtime costs $2.4 million a year, and an employee survey shows 62% support for the change. Yet only 39% of line managers say they can release staff for training during the next quarter. Students combine the evidence, then recommend full launch, a two-plant pilot or delay. They discover that apparent willingness can coexist with a severe capacity constraint.

Where students struggle

Students often read readiness as enthusiasm. They need to separate motivation, capability, capacity and contextual risk, and to explain what intervention follows from each diagnosis.

Reading and a quick check

Use Rousseau and ten Have (2022) to frame evidence-based diagnosis. Quick check: require one scientific, organisational, stakeholder and practitioner evidence source for the case.

Where a simulation fits

Use a case discussion, diagnostic workshop, role-play, implementation critique or short board memo here. The goal is to make the decision observable without forcing an adjacent simulation into a concept it does not directly teach.

Where it leads

Once the context is diagnosed, students can map the stakeholders who can enable, reshape or block the change.

Central question: Whose interests, authority and influence will shape the change, and what sponsorship is actually required?

Change is political as well as technical. Students should be able to identify who is affected, who controls resources, who can legitimise the change and whose cooperation is needed for implementation. The aim is not to manipulate stakeholders, but to make interests and accountabilities visible enough to design a credible process.

What this concept covers

• Stakeholder mapping by impact, interest, influence and legitimacy.
• Formal authority and informal power.
• Sponsor roles, governance and decision rights.
• Coalitions, networks and political behaviour.
• Ethical limits of stakeholder influence strategies.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Map stakeholder interests and influence.
• Distinguish sponsorship from senior endorsement.
• Identify political risks and competing accountabilities.
• Design an engagement approach appropriate to stakeholder impact and power.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Ask students to map a change twice: first by formal hierarchy, then by informal influence.
• Use role cards to surface different objectives before any negotiation.
• Require a sponsor contract stating decisions, resources and behaviours expected from the sponsor.

Case-style example

Meridian Health employs 2,800 people and is considering a three-day office attendance policy. Sixty-four percent of staff prefer one or two office days, client response time has improved 7% since hybrid working began, and unused office space costs $6 million a year. Students map the CEO, HR, line managers, employees, clients and property team, then propose sponsorship and decision rights. They discover that the most senior stakeholder is not always the one with the greatest implementation leverage.

Where students struggle

Students frequently produce a power-interest grid and stop. The teaching value comes from translating the map into decisions about sponsorship, participation, sequencing and escalation.

Reading and a quick check

Use Burnes, Chapter 7 on culture, power, politics and choice. Quick check: ask which stakeholder can stop the change without formal veto power, and why.

Where a simulation fits

The Corporate Governance Simulation is a useful adjacent application after this concept. Its CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder roles expose competing responsibilities, evidence and approval requirements. Frame the debrief around sponsorship, decision rights and how a change coalition handles legitimate disagreement rather than presenting it as a dedicated change-management simulation.

Where it leads

Stakeholder analysis provides the context for selecting a change architecture and defining a credible direction.

Central question: How should a change be structured without turning a model into a recipe?

Students will encounter Lewin, Kotter, ADKAR, McKinsey 7-S and many other frameworks. The useful teaching move is comparison, not memorisation. Models are lenses that help organise questions about direction, participation, capability, reinforcement and systems. They do not remove context or guarantee success.

What this concept covers

• Lewin, Kotter, ADKAR and 7-S as contrasting lenses.
• Vision, case for change and target state.
• Change architecture: workstreams, sequencing, governance and feedback loops.
• Planned versus adaptive approaches.
• Model limitations, assumptions and evidence base.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Compare major change models using explicit criteria.
• Select elements of a model appropriate to the context.
• Write a change vision linked to observable outcomes.
• Design a high-level change architecture with feedback and adaptation.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Give every group the same case but assign a different model, then compare what each model reveals and hides.
• Require students to convert a vision statement into measurable behaviours or operating outcomes.
• Use a one-page architecture linking sponsor, workstreams, milestones, feedback and benefits.

Case-style example

AeroFleet wants to raise customer NPS from 41 to 55 while lifting digital self-service adoption from 28% to 60%. It has an $8 million transformation budget and twelve months. Half the class uses Kotter as the primary lens; half uses ADKAR plus 7-S. Students build a six-step architecture and identify assumptions. They discover that models influence emphasis and sequencing, but a defensible plan still depends on diagnosis, evidence and feedback rather than model compliance.

Where students struggle

Students often write “follow the eight steps” as if context disappears. Mark them on selection and adaptation: why this element, for this barrier, at this point in the change.

Reading and a quick check

Use Stouten, Rousseau and De Cremer (2018) to compare practitioner models with scholarly evidence. Quick check: ask students to name one useful question and one blind spot in their chosen model.

Where a simulation fits

Use a case discussion, diagnostic workshop, role-play, implementation critique or short board memo here. The goal is to make the decision observable without forcing an adjacent simulation into a concept it does not directly teach.

Where it leads

A change architecture becomes actionable only when leadership behaviours, coalitions and managerial accountabilities are clear.

Central question: Who must lead the change in practice, and how should leadership be distributed across the organisation?

Change leadership should not be reduced to charismatic sponsorship. Senior leaders set direction and allocate resources, but middle managers translate the change into local work, resolve contradictions and carry much of the emotional and operational load. Students should analyse leadership as a system of roles and behaviours.

What this concept covers

• Executive sponsorship and visible role modelling.
• Guiding coalitions and distributed leadership.
• Middle managers as translators, sensemakers and implementers.
• Leader alignment and behavioural consistency.
• Escalation, accountability and local discretion.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Design a coalition with clear roles and decision rights.
• Evaluate whether leadership behaviour reinforces or contradicts the change.
• Identify the information and support middle managers need.
• Recommend how leadership should adapt across phases of change.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Ask students to audit the senior team calendar and governance agenda against stated change priorities.
• Create a RACI or decision-rights map for change leadership.
• Use a manager cascade exercise in which local constraints force adaptation.

Case-style example

Pinebridge Retail plans to remove three regional management layers across 220 stores, saving $14 million annually. Thirty-eight middle-management roles are directly affected, while store-manager vacancies already stand at 4.8%. Students design the guiding coalition and decide how much of the redesign should be co-created with middle managers. One view prioritises speed and confidentiality; the other prioritises implementation intelligence and trust. Students discover why excluding managers can make a formally elegant restructure operationally fragile.

Where students struggle

Students may treat middle managers only as “resistors.” Stronger analysis recognises their dual role: they are recipients of change and a critical part of the implementation infrastructure.

Reading and a quick check

Use Nieto-Rodriguez (2026) on leaders modelling transformation. Quick check: ask for one leadership behaviour that would make the stated change less credible.

Where a simulation fits

After this concept, the Corporate Governance Simulation can make leadership accountability and competing executive duties concrete. Use the debrief to examine whether a coalition can reach a proportionate collective decision when each role is measured against different priorities.

Where it leads

Leadership creates the conditions for communication and sensemaking, but messages only work if employees can interpret what the change means for their work.

Central question: How do people make sense of change, and how should communication create dialogue rather than simply transmit messages?

A communication plan is not a list of channels. Change communication should help people understand why the change is happening, what is known and unknown, what it means for their work, and where they can ask questions or influence design. Students should connect communication to trust, local interpretation and feedback.

What this concept covers

• Change narrative and case for change.
• Sensemaking and local translation.
• Message consistency across leadership layers.
• Two-way communication, voice and feedback loops.
• Channel choice, timing, repetition and audience needs.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Write a concise evidence-based change narrative.
• Design a communication cascade with feedback loops.
• Identify contradictions between central messages and local reality.
• Evaluate whether employee voice can influence meaningful decisions.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Compare an all-staff announcement with a manager conversation guide.
• Give different stakeholder groups the same message and ask what each would infer.
• Require students to specify how feedback changes a decision, not merely how it is collected.

Case-style example

Helix Pharma is rolling out a new CRM to 950 sales representatives. Training emails have a 92% open rate, but weekly active use is only 46%. Twenty senior managers describe the purpose differently in team meetings, and field staff say the new process adds duplicate data entry. Students write a 150-word change story and a manager cascade with two feedback routes. They discover that high message reach is not the same as shared meaning or usable implementation information.

Where students struggle

Students often confuse communication activity with communication effectiveness. Ask what changed in interpretation, behaviour or decision quality because of the communication.

Reading and a quick check

Use O Morain and Aykens (2023) on change fatigue. Quick check: ask students to identify one message that should be consistent everywhere and one that should be adapted locally.

Where a simulation fits

Use a case discussion, diagnostic workshop, role-play, implementation critique or short board memo here. The goal is to make the decision observable without forcing an adjacent simulation into a concept it does not directly teach.

Where it leads

Communication creates a basis for participation, but it also surfaces resistance, concerns and interpersonal risk that must be interpreted rather than suppressed.

Central question: What does resistance reveal, and how can participation improve a change without turning every decision into consensus?

Treating resistance as irrational opposition is one of the most damaging shortcuts in change teaching. Resistance can reflect loss, workload, identity, weak evidence, poor design, low trust or a legitimate conflict of interest. Students should learn to diagnose the signal, choose an appropriate participation mechanism and create conditions where concerns can be raised early.

What this concept covers

• Sources and forms of resistance.
• Participation, involvement and co-creation.
• Psychological safety, voice and interpersonal risk.
• Change fatigue and cumulative load.
• When leaders should listen, adapt, negotiate or hold a boundary.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Diagnose competing explanations for resistance.
• Design participation matched to the decision that is genuinely open.
• Identify psychological-safety risks during change.
• Recommend a response that distinguishes valid concerns from preference conflicts.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Give students quotes from affected employees and ask them to code the underlying concern before proposing action.
• Run a red-team challenge to a change design.
• Ask groups to specify what is non-negotiable, what is consultative and what can be co-created.

Case-style example

Riverbend University wants to centralise timetabling for 620 lecturers. The new process is projected to reduce scheduling errors by 30%, but a pilot adds two hours a week to department coordinators and 57% of surveyed academics believe local autonomy will fall. Students classify the resistance, then design participation and escalation mechanisms. One group argues for faster implementation to capture benefits; another pauses to redesign coordinator workload. Students discover that resistance can contain operational data the original business case missed.

Where students struggle

Students may assume participation means giving everyone a veto. The stronger distinction is between voice, influence, consent and decision authority.

Reading and a quick check

Use Warrick (2023) and Edmondson and Bransby (2023). Quick check: ask students what evidence would make them change their view of the resistance.

Where a simulation fits

The ESG Simulation is useful as a later adjacent application because four stakeholder roles must challenge proposals, model consequences and reach shared approval. Frame it as practice in structured disagreement and voice under interdependent constraints, not as a generic lesson that all change needs consensus.

Where it leads

Resistance and participation often expose deeper cultural and identity patterns, which the next concept addresses directly.

Central question: Which norms, incentives and identities must shift for the new way of working to become real?

Culture is often invoked when leaders cannot explain why behaviour is not changing. Lecturers should make it concrete: stories, routines, status, incentives, symbols, leader behaviour, informal norms and system design all shape what people do. Students should connect desired cultural attributes to specific behavioural and organisational levers.

What this concept covers

• Culture as shared assumptions, norms, routines and symbols.
• Identity and perceived loss during change.
• Behavioural specification: what people need to do differently.
• Incentives, metrics, systems and role modelling.
• Subcultures and local variation.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Translate cultural aspirations into observable behaviours.
• Diagnose reinforcing systems that sustain current behaviour.
• Evaluate identity threats created by change.
• Design mutually reinforcing culture and system interventions.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Ban words such as “agile” or “innovative” until students define the behaviour they mean.
• Map a desired behaviour against incentives, workflow, manager routines and peer norms.
• Compare organisation-wide culture statements with subculture evidence.

Case-style example

Solara Foods wants a “zero-harm, continuous-improvement culture.” Its recordable incident rate is 4.2 per 200,000 hours, employees submit only 0.8 improvement suggestions per year, and 70% of supervisor bonus is tied to production volume. Students redesign three levers and choose whether to prioritise values workshops or operating incentives. They discover that culture language is weak when formal rewards and daily routines continue to signal that output matters more than safety and learning.

Where students struggle

Students often propose communication or training for a culture problem. Require them to identify which organisational systems make the current behaviour rational.

Reading and a quick check

Use Cameron and Green, Chapter 8 on culture and change, plus Edmondson and Kerrissey (2025) for a contemporary psychological-safety critique.

Where a simulation fits

The Corporate Governance Simulation can support discussion of how governance standards become embedded through safeguards, oversight and accountability, while the ESG Simulation can support discussion of how incentives and operating choices shape behaviour. Neither should be presented as a dedicated culture-change simulation.

Where it leads

Once behaviours are specified, students can design an implementation approach that tests assumptions and adapts as evidence changes.

Central question: How should the organisation sequence, test and adapt the change while still maintaining accountability for outcomes?

Change implementation is where strategy meets operational reality. Students should be able to build a plan with dependencies, decision points and feedback, while recognising that large transformations cannot be fully specified in advance. The course should contrast rollout discipline with experimentation rather than presenting them as opposites.

What this concept covers

• Milestones, dependencies, workstreams and critical path.
• Pilot design and testable assumptions.
• Minimum viable change and progressive scaling.
• Agile ways of working and feedback loops.
• Decision thresholds for scale, redesign, pause or stop.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Build an implementation roadmap with dependencies.
• Specify what a pilot is intended to learn.
• Define evidence-based scale and stop criteria.
• Balance speed, learning and operational risk.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Give students a pilot result with mixed evidence and force a scale-or-redesign decision.
• Use a dependency map rather than a simple Gantt chart.
• Ask students to identify irreversible decisions and preserve optionality where possible.

Case-style example

VeloGrid is moving product teams to a new operating model. Average launch cycle time is 34 weeks against a 20-week target. Three pilot teams reduced cycle time to 22 weeks, but defects rose 18%. The transformation budget is $3 million. Students decide whether to scale, extend the pilot or redesign quality controls, with explicit go/no-go thresholds. They discover that a successful pilot must test the whole value proposition of the change, not just one headline metric.

Where students struggle

Students can mistake “agile” for low discipline. Strong plans state hypotheses, measures, responsibilities and decision rules, then adapt when evidence changes.

Reading and a quick check

Use Hagl et al. (2024) to discuss change-management interventions as context-sensitive choices. Quick check: ask what the pilot must prove before the next investment is released.

Where a simulation fits

The Startup Creation Simulation can support this strand when the course includes innovation-led change. Students iterate a proposition, business model and pitch under uncertainty. Use it to discuss experimentation, evidence and implementation of new initiatives, while stating clearly that it is an entrepreneurship simulation rather than a dedicated organizational-change simulation.

Where it leads

Implementation creates new skill, role and support requirements, which need explicit capability and transition design.

Central question: What do people need to know, practise and be supported to do before the new operating model can perform?

Training is only one component of capability. A change may require new knowledge, skills, decision rights, manager routines, job design, coaching and time to practise. Students should also distinguish organisational transition support from individual emotional adjustment without turning either into a simplistic stage model.

What this concept covers

• Capability gap analysis.
• Training, practice, coaching and job-embedded learning.
• Role redesign and transition support.
• Manager enablement and reinforcement.
• Knowledge transfer and learning loops.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Diagnose capability requirements from future work.
• Design learning beyond one-off training.
• Estimate capacity needed for transition activities.
• Connect skill development to performance measures and manager support.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Start from a future-state task and work backwards to knowledge, skill and practice.
• Give students a training completion dashboard that hides poor proficiency.
• Build a transition plan for people whose roles are changing materially.

Case-style example

Harbor Bank is automating operations work. Six hundred roles are affected, 240 roles will be redesigned, and 420 employees are offered reskilling. The programme forecasts 70% course completion, but only 52% of managers say they can protect four learning hours per employee each week. Students design capability and transition support across training, job shadowing, manager capacity and proficiency checks. They discover that completion targets can look strong while the work system makes real skill transfer impossible.

Where students struggle

Students often measure learning by attendance or course completion. Ask what employees must be able to do differently, and how the organisation will observe proficiency in the job.

Reading and a quick check

Use Cameron and Green, Chapters 1 and 2 on individual and team change. Quick check: ask students to replace one “training” action with a practice, coaching or workflow intervention.

Where a simulation fits

Use a case discussion, diagnostic workshop, role-play, implementation critique or short board memo here. The goal is to make the decision observable without forcing an adjacent simulation into a concept it does not directly teach.

Where it leads

Capability supports adoption, but lecturers also need a governance and measurement system that can distinguish activity, adoption and realised benefits.

Central question: How will leaders know whether the change is being adopted, whether it is working and when intervention is required?

A change can be delivered on time and still fail to create value. Students need to distinguish implementation completion, adoption, proficiency, operational performance and benefits. Governance should link these measures to decisions: continue, intervene, reallocate resources, redesign or stop.

What this concept covers

• Change governance and decision forums.
• Activity, adoption, proficiency, performance and benefits measures.
• Leading and lagging indicators.
• Benefits ownership and accountability.
• Dashboards, thresholds, escalation and course correction.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Design a balanced change scorecard.
• Separate adoption from outcome measures.
• Assign benefit ownership to operational leaders.
• Define governance thresholds that trigger action.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Give a “green” project dashboard with poor adoption data and ask whether the initiative is actually healthy.
• Require every metric to have an owner, frequency and action threshold.
• Compare reporting for sponsors, managers and employees.

Case-style example

Crown Logistics has deployed a warehouse-management system across 15 sites. Go-live adoption is 73%, picking errors have fallen 11%, but the business case targets a 20% cost reduction and six sites still use local workarounds. Students design a scorecard for adoption, proficiency, process compliance and benefits, then decide whether the programme should declare success or intervene. They discover that project completion and business benefit are separate claims requiring different evidence.

Where students struggle

Students often propose too many metrics or choose measures that cannot drive a decision. A useful dashboard is selective and has explicit thresholds and owners.

Reading and a quick check

Use Rousseau and ten Have (2022) to reconnect governance to evidence. Quick check: require one leading indicator, one adoption measure and one benefit measure for the same change.

Where a simulation fits

The ESG Simulation can support this concept by making the consequences of an agreed package visible across financial, operational and stakeholder outcomes. The Corporate Governance Simulation also supports discussion of future safeguards and governance design. Use platform outputs as evidence for debrief, not as a substitute for academic judgement.

Where it leads

Measurement helps a change reach its target state, but the final question is how gains are sustained and how the organisation remains able to change again.

Central question: How should organisations embed gains, learn from the change and respond ethically when transformation has uneven consequences?

The final concept brings together institutionalisation, learning and ethics. Sustaining change is not simply “refreezing.” Some routines should stabilise, while the organisation also needs capacity to adapt again. Students should consider who benefits, who bears costs, what promises were made and how learning is carried into future change.

What this concept covers

• Institutionalisation through systems, routines, leadership and incentives.
• Post-implementation review and organisational learning.
• Continuous change and regenerative capacity.
• Ethics, fairness, voice and just-transition considerations.
• Exit criteria for the change programme and transfer to business ownership.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this concept, students should be able to:

• Design reinforcement that survives programme closure.
• Evaluate ethical distribution of change costs and benefits.
• Plan a post-implementation learning review.
• Recommend how temporary change governance becomes business-as-usual ownership.

Supports the course learning outcomes through progressively more evidence-based diagnosis, design and judgement.

How to teach it

• Ask students who loses from a “successful” transformation.
• Run a post-implementation review that separates delivery lessons from benefit lessons.
• Require an explicit handover from programme sponsor to operational owner.

Case-style example

EverGreen Energy is shifting $500 million of capital toward low-carbon assets. Twelve percent of roles will change and 300 contractor roles may disappear; employee trust in senior leadership is 61%. Students recommend how to institutionalise new investment criteria while measuring a fair transition. One view prioritises speed and financial targets; another adds redeployment, contractor support and stakeholder metrics. Students discover that sustained change depends on legitimacy as well as process compliance.

Where students struggle

Students can treat ethics as a final paragraph rather than a design constraint. Require them to identify distributional consequences before recommending the implementation path.

Reading and a quick check

Use Cameron and Green, Chapters 9 to 12, then ask students to write a closure test: what has to be true before the temporary change programme can end?

Where a simulation fits

The ESG Simulation provides a useful capstone discussion of environmental, social, governance and financial trade-offs. Its four-role approval requirement lets students debate legitimacy and stakeholder consequences, but it should be positioned as an adjacent responsible-change exercise rather than a full change-management simulation.

Where it leads

This closes the course by connecting diagnosis, design, leadership, participation, implementation, measurement, ethics and learning into one defensible change recommendation.

10-week course structure

A 10-session course should compress without losing diagnosis, participation, implementation and sustainment. Combine related topics rather than deleting the people or benefits side of the lifecycle.

14-week course structure

A 14-session version creates room to separate model critique from architecture, give leadership and communication more space, and add a richer simulation debrief before final integration.

The Corporate Governance Simulation is the closest Finsimco fit for the stakeholder, power and leadership strand of a Change Management course. Students confront a live conflict-of-interest problem involving a successful CTO who holds a financial interest in a competing company. CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder teams analyse the same situation from different responsibilities and then negotiate both an immediate resolution and future governance safeguards.

Why it fits here

By Session 5, students should already be able to map stakeholders, distinguish formal authority from informal influence, identify sponsor and governance responsibilities, and explain how a coalition handles disagreement. The simulation gives those ideas a decision context where no single role can impose the final answer.

What students do

• Work first in CEO, CTO, CCO and Shareholder stakeholder teams.
• Review the Analyst Coverage Extract, Internal Compliance Memo and Governance Agency Note.
• Build an evidence-based opening position on disclosure, restrictions, divestment, oversight and accountability.
• Enter a four-role negotiation group and challenge competing stakeholder proposals.
• Agree both the current CTO resolution and future safeguards for similar conflicts.
• Reach final approval only when all four stakeholder roles accept the package, then compare outcomes and role-specific results.

Recommended course placement

• At the end of Session 5, after stakeholders, sponsorship and change leadership.
• Across Sessions 5 and 6 if the lecturer wants a full negotiation plus written debrief.
• Before a summative change-leadership memo so students can convert the negotiation into an evidence-based recommendation.

Knowledge students should have before the simulation

• Stakeholder mapping and competing interests.
• Power, sponsorship and decision rights.
• Basic governance and ethical accountability.
• How to use case evidence to defend a recommendation.

Delivery format

Suggested debrief questions

• Which stakeholder had the most implementation leverage, and was that the same as formal authority?
• Which evidence changed your position rather than merely supporting it?
• Did the final agreement solve only the immediate conflict, or also strengthen the governance system?
• Where did role incentives create productive disagreement, and where did they create distortion?
• How would the same coalition behave if this were a restructuring, technology implementation or culture change?

The ESG Simulation places students in a live stakeholder negotiation where environmental, social, governance, financial and operational decisions are interdependent. Management, Investor, Regulator and Union teams analyse role-specific evidence, model possible packages and negotiate terms covering production, pollution controls, ESG expenditure, investment, compensation, wages, workforce numbers and an ESG Policy Statement while keeping the company financially viable.

Why it fits here

For Change Management, the value lies in stakeholder alignment, employee voice, negotiation, trade-offs, governance and the consequences of implementation choices. Students have to move beyond a generic “engage stakeholders” recommendation and decide what each party can accept in one connected package.

What students do

• Prepare first within Management, Investor, Regulator or Union teams using role-specific documents, financial data and Data Room evidence.
• Use the modelling area to test how production, ESG expenditure, investment, management compensation, wages and employment choices affect performance.
• Build an opening position with priorities, evidence and realistic concessions.
• Negotiate connected terms with the other three stakeholder teams.
• Develop a shared ESG Policy Statement and maintain the case requirement that EBITDA remains above $20 million.
• Finalise the agreement only when all four teams approve the package, then review outcomes and compare approaches.

Recommended course placement

• After Session 8, as an application of participation, culture and competing stakeholder priorities.
• After Session 11, as an application of governance, metrics and benefits trade-offs.
• As an optional capstone before Session 12 where the final debrief extends into ethics and sustaining change.

Knowledge students should have before the simulation

• Stakeholder interests and influence.
• Participation, voice and negotiation.
• Basic interpretation of financial and operational consequences.
• Governance, ethics and trade-off reasoning.

Delivery format

Suggested debrief questions

• Which stakeholder concern was easiest to dismiss at first, and what evidence made it material?
• Where did a financially attractive proposal create a social or governance problem?
• Which concessions improved the total package rather than simply transferring value between roles?
• How did the EBITDA constraint affect the legitimacy and feasibility of the agreement?
• What would be different if implementation occurred over 18 months rather than in one negotiation?

Simulation outputs can support academic judgement, but do not treat a team score or outcome as an automatic grade. Combine platform evidence with a rubric, written/oral reasoning, moderation and individual attribution where required.

Grading with the Corporate Governance Simulation

Students analyse a conflict-of-interest case as CEO, CTO, CCO or Shareholder teams, build an evidence-based position and negotiate an immediate resolution plus future safeguards.

• Use of case evidence to justify the role position.
• Quality and proportionality of the governance/change decision.
• Ability to recognise competing stakeholder duties rather than maximise one role.
• Design of future safeguards, oversight and accountability.
• Individual board memo or oral defence explaining concessions and assumptions.

Grading with the ESG Simulation

Management, Investor, Regulator and Union teams model and negotiate one connected ESG package, balancing environmental, social, governance, financial and operational consequences.

• Evidence-based stakeholder reasoning and materiality.
• Quality of trade-off analysis across connected decisions.
• Financial and operational consistency of the negotiated package.
• Quality and coherence of the ESG Policy Statement.
• Individual reflection on what evidence changed the student position and how the agreement would be implemented.

Grading with the Startup Creation Simulation

Use Startup Creation only where the course includes innovation-led change or experimentation. Startup and VC teams develop, test and defend a venture proposition through market sizing, business-model design, pitching and funding negotiation.

• Clarity of the problem and testable assumptions.
• Quality of evidence behind market and business-model choices.
• Ability to adapt the proposition under questioning.
• Implementation logic linking learning to the next decision.
• Individual reflection connecting experimentation to organisational-change principles rather than entrepreneurship performance alone.

The platform evidence should be interpreted alongside lecturer-defined criteria. Team decisions, negotiated outcomes and comparative results do not establish which individual student made which argument, so use an individual component where the assessment requires attributable marks.