Humans are creatures of habit.

Maybe somewhere back in our evolutionary history we learnt straying from the well-trodden path had dire consequences but, whatever the reason, we become comfortable in our habits and tend to find change hard.

In business, this can often result in people preferring to stick to a process that produces a known result for a known effort.

By asking your business partner to change the company's business model, you're asking them to take a leap of faith and change something they may have been doing for years. And that requires change management.

There has been a lot of research published on the process of change and many researchers have produced change models.

These models can essentially be distilled down to three steps - Preparing for change, implementing and managing change, and reinforcing and evaluating change.

Before you implement anything, you need to prepare the business and importantly your business partner for the change.

Preparation is more than simply working out the logistics of the change; you need to prepare the business culturally.

Start with communicating the need for the change - the team needs to know why things are changing.

What problems are you trying to solve? What are the expected results of the change?

Who will be the key stakeholders in the process and lead the change?

The key people in your business need to be engaged in the process and understand your vision before you can move onto the physical implementation.

The preparation phase can often be difficult but getting it right can result in a lot fewer headaches down the line.

And by proactively implementing change within your business, rather than waiting for external industry or economic issues to force it, you can plan for, control and implement a change program that is much more likely to be a smoother process and generate a better outcome.