As a wise man once said "nothing is constant except change". Learning to manage it is another thing, as most people are surprisingly resistant to any kind of break from the norm. In a typical job with set tasks and hours, it's hard to manage a significant change in workload or job balance - and even if you work in a fast paced, forever changing environment - how it affects others is worth taking note of.

The smaller changes

Small changes, although not normally considered to be difficult or challenging, can still alter the dynamics of your working relationships. If one person leaves, then that might not be considered a massive change, since the "show will go on". However, what if that person is a veteran of the business, with long service stretching over 30 years? Changes will be noticed - whether it's the thing they did automatically every day that nobody else knows how to do, or the fact they always organised the Christmas party without being asked... the smallest absence can create a domino effect of change.

There are other small changes that can cause disruption. The move from a traditional office to paperless ones is becoming more and more common, but asking someone to conduct a small change - not using paper - can have a big effect. Whether it's monitoring how much people print out, (or maybe they should start doing it double sided?), or preventing people from posting letters when they should be writing emails, these are all small changes that need managing for a smooth transition. Hotdesking is another small office-related change that can cause problems. If someone has cuddly toys, tarifolds, family pictures and their own desk drawer to put things in - hotdesking will remove all this. It will no longer be "theirs". It might cause more disorganisation, (people losing documents that they were so used to shoving in a drawer) and people getting proprietorial about "my" desk.

The bigger changes

There are some changes in business that are inevitable and very painful. If you're a manager, how will you feel when the company says you have to make 20% of your workforce redundant? You might need coaching or other training to make such a selection - and some good friends and colleagues to lean on in order to help the emotional impact of making such a change. This will also affect staff morale and happiness - knowing the axe is about to fall is a big, negative change in mood for any office.

Similar changes include relocation. Whether the company is closing down a call centre to move it to India or if the head office is going to move to cheaper headquarters somewhere else in the country, relocation can be a huge change. People have families, communities, schools and ties to an area and that's before they even think about the implications of a new job in a new town.

To conclude, though, let's not dwell on the negative changes. There are positive ones to think about. Promotion can be a huge change of responsibility, a greater pay package, and more benefits, so who could argue with that kind of change? When your company implements changes that means the profit share is bigger and the share prices go up - that's a great change to have in the workplace. The trick is to take the bad with the good, but ultimately, to acknowledge that change will always happen - it's your attitude and handling of it that will resonate long after the change has taken place.