Organizational Change

Often viewed as the best part of the job by managers. Making the organization better. Putting a person stamp someplace. Having an impact.

Managers careers often based on making positive changes.

Examples of change topics

Financial—Lots of companies and overstating profits.

Strategic--changing strategic goals (turnaround). Address IBM and EK

Organizational (higher levels) Developing policies and procedures New product development

Implementing a new customer service program such as phone courtesy

Technology development ISO certification Adopting a common MIS platform

across departments

Continuous improvement and learning organization

Mandates change. In the age of hyper-competition, the firm that remains the same will not exist unless it has a monopoly.

External forces are immense Technology Market changes

Continuous improvement is

Buzz word—but buzz word that conveys something very important.

Hong Kong vs the US. This gives the US a competitive

advantage.

As a manager you will be responsible for leading change efforts. Leading is complex.

Urging the troops on or providing support for employee generated change

Creating changes as a process.

Most important advice about creating change. Its often political. Within a department it may be less

political. Example, reorganize jobs. Between departments it highly political. Culture wars.

Two aspects of Politics

Power (all people involved with change have some power)

Self-interest (all people involved with change have some self-interest) Some cases differentiation and sub goals.

To create change you need to manage power issues and self-interest issues.

Important to not only gain acceptance but gain commitment to the change.

Following Waremart through Change Growth No Frills grocery store. Low prices, low costs, high volume. Decentralized Decision Making. Gunslinging culture. Grew to need warehouse. Minutely planned and tight control.

Conflict

Differentiation--different goals and different cultures between retail and distribution.

Vendors would play them against each other.

Ideally gain commitment through changing perceptions.

Or Kotter’s model

Establish a sense of urgency

Usually identifying a gap and preparing for a change. Motivational. We have a problem and change is required.

Bad news is good news for change. Opportunity seeking--changes in

strategic orientation.

Waremart

Consultants Both sides new there was a problem but

blamed others. Examined communication patterns. No

compromise in building new distribution center. All alternatives got shot down.

Gridlock. Everyone new unacceptable

Forcing in conflict resolution was the dominant mode. Compromise was not showing on the “radar”.

Resistance to change

Personality—One of the big 5 traits. Fear of the unknown Climate of mistrust (organizational

politics) Fear of failure—Change of work

procedures Loss of status or job security

Peer pressure (coalitions) Disruption of group dynamics Personality conflicts Timing and manner of creating change No rewards for change

Think of leadership style

Kotter

Build a coalition Establish a vision Communicate the vision Remove obstacles Create short term wins

Waremart

Focus on disaffected managers and gaining their support rather than the dominant in fighters. As change occurred these people supported needed changes.

Education on building of culture. Actually use of it in discussion.

How is this related to leadership style

Issues of Power

Power of resistors to change Power of those with competing agendas Power of those with compatible

agendas.

Kotter

Make long term changes in infrastructure. HR policies need to change, Management practices need to change.

Anchor in the organizational culture

This is the execution.

Controlling issue. Monitor progress. Early identification of problems. Helps to share successes

waremart

Differences in cultures. But work to bridge the differences. Cultural training. Some old guard supervisors who could not adjust were let go.

Example In teams

Sexual Harassment Policy Different ways to do it.

How do you manage change.

What would you do? Sources of resistance? How would you overcome those

sources.

Short note on organizational development Comprehensive effort to improve

organizational adaptability and flexibility. Change is constantly needed

Bottom up change

Top down change is often reactive. Adaptive organizations need bottom up

change. Research clearly shows that bottom up

change is about 10 time more likely to be successful than top down change.

Think about Lewin’s stages

Unfreezing, changing refreezing. How important is each in the following stages.

Extremely important (5), very important (4), important (3), somewhat important (2), unimportant (1).

Leadership, power, group dynamics, personality and emotional intelligence, communication, conflict management, motivation (extrinsic and intrinsic).

Summary

Managing change most demanding and challenging (in positive sense) part of the job. If you like this, excellent chance you will be a successful manager.