The Finished Change Plan: One-Price Selling Across Five Dealerships, With Governance, a People Plan, a Twelve-Month Timeline and the Measures That Will Decide Whether It Worked
[Student Name]
University of Phoenix
MGT/526: Managing in a Changing Environment
Week 6 Assignment
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The dealership group, employees and figures are a composite written for a model plan.
1. Case for Change
Customers of the composite dealership group increasingly research and buy vehicles online and dislike negotiating, and competitors in the region have begun posting prices. The group's commissioned, negotiation-based sales process produces long visits, uneven customer experiences and salesperson turnover above 40% a year. A ninety-day pilot at the Hyundai store showed that one-price selling can raise volume and customer satisfaction, and also showed what must be fixed before the rest of the group follows. The environmental scan in Week 1 ranked this change as the most urgent the group faces.
2. Goals
Within 12 months of each store's launch: raise customer satisfaction scores to at least 92 out of 100; reduce average customer time in the dealership to under two hours; hold total gross profit per store at or above the prior year despite lower front-end gross per vehicle; and reduce salesperson turnover to 25% or lower.
3. Scope
Included: new and used vehicle sales at all five stores, the salesperson pay plan and roles, sales and finance manager roles, the online deal tool and trade-in appraisal process. Excluded: service and parts processes, which will be addressed separately, including electric vehicle service readiness.
4. Governance
The group president sponsors the change and chairs a monthly steering meeting with the five store general managers, the human resources manager and the digital retail manager. The digital retail manager, a new role, leads day-to-day implementation. Each store's general manager owns its launch. Peer coaches from the pilot store support each new store for its first month.
5. People Plan
Salespeople
Salespeople become salaried product specialists: $48,000 in base pay plus a bonus capped at $30,000 that rewards both volume and satisfaction scores. A six-month transition guarantee pays the greater of the new plan or 85% of each person's prior average pay. Up to four senior product specialists per store earn a $62,000 base and train new hires. Senior roles are offered before launch, a lesson from the pilot.
Sales managers
Become sales and customer experience managers, responsible for coaching, online lead management and customer satisfaction, with bonuses tied to store volume, gross profit and satisfaction.
Finance managers
Present finance products through a transparent online menu, with pay tied partly to satisfaction.
Hiring
New salespeople are recruited for customer service and product knowledge.
Before each launch, the human resources manager conducts an ADKAR assessment of the store's salespeople and managers and directs support to the barrier point, which in the pilot was desire (Hiatt, 2006).
6. Communication
Communication follows the plan developed in Week 4: small-group and individual meetings with salespeople six weeks before launch, delivered by the general manager, peer coaches and human resources; in-person briefings for managers two months ahead; short store meetings for service and office staff; website, signage and in-store explanations for customers; and briefings for each manufacturer's regional manager (Cawsey et al., 2020).
7. Timeline
Month 0: fix the online tool's finance integration and revise trade-in appraisal guidelines. Month 2: Toyota store launch. Month 4: used-vehicle center launch. Month 6: Chevrolet store launch. Month 8: Ford store launch. Month 12: full review and decision on permanent adoption at all stores. Every launch follows the pilot's pattern of classroom training followed by coaching on the sales floor.
8. Risks and Owners
Top performers leave: owned by human resources; response is early senior-role offers and monitoring departures by store.
Customers resist fixed trade-in values: owned by the used-vehicle director; response is transparent market data and a set adjustment range.
Front-end gross falls more than volume rises: owned by the chief financial officer; response is quarterly review of posted pricing against market.
Leadership attention fades after launch: owned by the president; response is monthly steering reviews through month 18.
9. Evaluation
Kotter (1995) found that many transformations faltered because leaders celebrated success before new behavior had taken root, and Buchanan et al. (2005) found that changes decay when the supports behind them are withdrawn. Evaluation is therefore planned for 18 months, not just for launch.
Baselines
Each store's baselines are taken from the 12 months before its launch: customer satisfaction score, time in the dealership, units sold, front-end and finance gross per vehicle, total gross profit and salesperson turnover.
Measures and targets
Customer satisfaction at least 92; time in the dealership under two hours; units sold up at least 5%; total gross profit per store at or above baseline; salesperson turnover at or below 25%; and an ADKAR reassessment showing average desire at 3.5 or higher by 90 days after launch.
Review
The steering group reviews all measures monthly by store. The human resources manager reports salesperson departures and exit interview reasons monthly.
Decision points
At 90 days after each launch: continue, or pause further launches if total gross profit is more than 10% below baseline or satisfaction has not improved. At 12 months: decide on permanent adoption and on whether to end the transition guarantee structure. At 18 months: confirm the change has held after support is reduced.
10. Budget
The main costs are the transition guarantees, estimated at about $26,000 for the pilot store's top earners and up to $150,000 across the remaining stores depending on how many top performers take senior roles; the digital retail manager's salary; training and floor coaching of about $19,000 per store; and online tool integration of about $60,000. The steering group will track these against the gross profit results each month, so that the cost of the change is judged against its return rather than in isolation.
11. Sustaining the Change
The salary and bonus plan, manager measures based on satisfaction and time in the dealership, the online tools and hiring profile all reinforce one-price selling. The president has already told every store that a weak month will not bring back haggling.
Conclusion
This plan converts the group's analysis into action: a clear case for change, measurable goals, named owners, a people plan built from the pilot's lessons, a store-by-store timeline and an evaluation with baselines, targets and decision points. It gives leadership the means to judge the change by evidence and to adjust it before problems become failures.
References
Buchanan, D., Fitzgerald, L., Ketley, D., Gollop, R., Jones, J. L., Lamont, S. S., Neath, A., & Whitby, E. (2005). No going back: A review of the literature on sustaining organizational change. International Journal of Management Reviews, 7(3), 189-205. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2370.2005.00111.x
Cawsey, T. F., Deszca, G., & Ingols, C. (2020). Organizational change: An action-oriented toolkit (4th ed.). SAGE.
Hiatt, J. M. (2006). ADKAR: A model for change in business, government and our community. Prosci Learning Center Publications.
Kotter, J. P. (1995). Leading change: Why transformation efforts fail. Harvard Business Review, 73(2), 59-67.
How this MGT 526 Week 6 example is structured
The MGT/526 shelf page describes the sixth week as asking for the finished change plan, with how its results will be judged. The plan is written as a working document for the leadership team: each section answers a question the team will face during implementation. Evaluation is built in from the start, with baselines taken before launch, because a change that cannot be measured against where it began cannot be judged. Students search this week as MGT 526 Week 6, MGT526 Wk 6 or MGT/526 Wk 6; all three are the same assignment.
MGT/526 Week 6 questions, answered
What does MGT/526 Week 6 usually ask for?
The MGT/526 shelf describes the sixth week as asking for the finished change plan and how its results will be judged. Many sections ask students to present a complete change management plan for their chosen organization, including implementation steps, communication, resistance management and evaluation.
What should a change plan's evaluation section include?
Measures tied to the change's goals, baselines taken before the change, targets with dates, who reviews results and how often and decision points at which the organization will continue, adjust or reverse the change based on the evidence.
How is a change plan different from a project plan?
A project plan schedules tasks and resources. A change plan also addresses the people side: why the change is needed, who is affected and how, how resistance will be handled, how the change will be communicated and how it will be sustained after launch.
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