As before, the Case for this module asks you to prepare a 3-5 page essay using the writing style, format and referencing methods describe in the course Graded Activities and Writing Guides (see the Module One required supplemental readings). There are a number of objectives for this module. First and foremost, the intent is to convince the student that he or she IS ACTUALLY an agent of change and that more IT projects will succeed when change planning is done in parallel with project technical planning. Accepting these basic premises, your assigned readings and any additional personal research will provide both the intellectual elements of change as a planned activity and a number of change designs/ techniques which you may wish to integrate into your current/ future IT project efforts. The CEO has become enamored of new knowledge management technology (KM) offered by a company whose CEO is a golfing buddy. The CIO has just given you a ''heads up'' that your organization may well purchase this KM technology. After much discussion and review, both you and the CIO have come to agreement that this technology will be a worthy asset to the organization''s competitive capabilities. In short, the unexpected ''gift'' of this new IT technology CAN be one that actually keeps on giving. The problem however, as you and the CIO see it, is that there is some expectation by the CEO that this new technology is more or less just a technical installation that will early-on begin to generate useful competitive information. Both the CIO and you are clear that this is a complex organizational change process which involves many units working cooperatively to provide centralized data, much of which is either not now collected or, perhaps worse, held very closely by some unit managers. Then, there is the issue with getting information recipients to use new information they may see as overload. And, certainly there will be other issues and stumbling blocks. The CIO has asked you to prepare a ''briefing paper'' for presentation to the CEO. This paper will review the critical importance of treating the implementation of new KM technology as a planned change process, in addition to highlighting essential change elements/ steps the company must take to ensure a successful implementation. Thus, clearly time and resources will need to be expended beyond simply technology purchase. The title of your paper might be: A Plan for Change: Ensuring Our Technology Investment is Protected and Bears Fruit In your essay you may wish to consider (but not be limited by) such issues as: • If, why and when the consideration of IT projects as organizational change is important • Is there a useful sequence or cycle to the processes of organization change to consider • If you have come to consider IT projects as change projects, how does one best convince relevant others of this • Is the social technology of planned change just good common sense or are there well understood behavioral science principles and experience supporting it • If you accept that, as an IT manager, you are an agent of change, at the end of the day what does this phrase really boil down to vis-a-vis your professional behavior Please note these issues are not questions to be lined up and answered with bullet point. They are simply things to think about as you formulate your own ideas regarding the topic. The expectation is that you will create an original paper, in narrative form, from your own unique ideas.