Organizational Change - Essay Example

Sub Department Organizational change Organizational change involves reviewing as well as modifying business processes and management structures. Any business must adapt so as to ensure it survives against bigger competitors and so as to ensure its growth as well. In the present business world, change is inevitable. This is because more and more organizations are increasingly being faced by a changing and dynamic environment. Thus, the often heard clarion call in every organization today is “Change or change will change you.”It is apparent therefore that an organization that does not heed this call and sticks its head in the sand like the ostrich is bound to die. Surviving in the present day global economy needs an organization to be flexible in addition to adapting readily to the constantly-changing marketplace. Thus, change has therefore become the norm and it has become necessary for organizations to closely pay attention to not only social but also psychological aspects of change just as they do to technological aspects (Flood & Coetsee, 2013). Thus organizational change takes place only when the forces that facilitate it overcome those that are in resistance to it. Thus, the need for an organization to change frequently conflicts with the need for its members to maintain their sense of individual security. Therefore, organizations and individuals apparently tend to oppose change. In order to overcome this resistance and build a future that embraces combined organizational change, agents of change should assist people comprehend the necessity and desirability of change before they embrace it (Basu, 2014). Effective organizations and leaders usually promote an environment filled with positive attitude and energy toward change by expecting it and planning purposefully for the change process. Change should be addressed in a goal-oriented, intentional manner. Moreover, change is something that must be done by people and not a thing that is done to them. Generally, individuals are more at ease with change when they take part in implementing or planning for it since they acquire some sense of control which minimises their fears. There are several drivers of change An organization’s change drivers comprise of new/latest technologies, competitive environment, economic conditions, actions brought about by government policies and consumer demand. All these factors occur outside of the organisation or within the external environment of the organisation. Nevertheless, these factors, although occurring outside the organisation, usually causes change within the organisation and are for the better part beyond the organisation’s control. Such factors as resources, competition, technology, economy, social and political conditions are common external factors that can have a profound influence on a given organization. Whereas the external environment takes place outside of a given organisation, it can have a considerable impact on the company’s present operations, long-term sustainability and growth. Failing to recognize external forces would be a damaging mistake for an organisation’s management. As such, it is essential that managers continuously monitor as well as adapt to the external forces and work towards making proactive changes earlier on instead of having to assume a reactive method, which might result in a vastly different effect. Sustainability and change focuses on 3 key aspects that consist of the 3 Ps; people, planet and profit. They are also referred to as the 3 pillars of sustainability .In all this business sustainability is a key objective for most organisations. Sustainability generally makes people think about such issues as carbon footprints, ecosystems and greenhouse gases, which basically is the environmental feature of sustainability. The other two additional features are generally identified as key contributors include social factors and economic factors. These 3 sustainability factors are frequently known as people, planet and profit (Wirtenberg, 2014). Thus, sustainability is a delicate balancing act whereby business decisions take into consideration the effect they might have on the three sustainability aspects including the economic feasibility of a given business. Thus social sustainability focuses on the maintenance of mutually beneficial associations with the community, customers and employees. Such activities as these frequently are beneficial in terms of creating a positive profile as well as a community and customer support. Environmental sustainability on the other hand focuses on the effect of resource usage, emissions, waste and hazardous substances on the environment. Such activities as these might be directly beneficial to a business through reduction of costs. Lastly, economic activities focus on the efficiency, profit and productivity of a business (Fisk, 2010). Perspectives on Change There are numerous and different perspectives of viewing and reviewing change. Some of the perspectives comprise of organizational culture, power and politics as well as learning and development. Organizational culture for instance encompasses the people working in the organization as well as the practices they carry out in order to implement proposed changes. Thus the perspective of the top executives who might be feeling that a definite change is mandatory for the course of the organization’s growth may be quite different from that of junior workers who may be skeptical about the change process. Secondly the role of power and politics in organizational change endeavors has been identified as being crucial since the 1970s.Thus a political and power perspective is an approach to change in which the change agent comes up with an explicitly political strategy that starts with an absolute evaluation of all their manifest-personal power bases. Thus understanding as well as skilful use of political strategies in organizational change intervention is important. This political/power strategy involves the change agent aligning with those in power and then influencing them to start desiring and accepting changes. For a change agent to succeed in this, s/he must convince those in power that the proposed changes are to their benefit. A change agent can employ several tactics such as raising their referent power by increasing their social networks and taking lunch or coffee with influential individuals (Myers et al, 2012). Planned/emergent change Planned change can be defined as any type of modification or alteration which is done beforehand and differently for the enhancement of present position into a better or brighter one. There are several steps that make up the planned change process. These include; recognizing the need for change, developing change objectives, appointing a change agent, assessing the present climate, developing a change plan technique for implementation, implementing the plan and eventually evaluating the effectiveness of the plan at arriving at the change objectives. A good number of planned change models in organizations have been developed by many scholars. Every model is significant and has its own values. These models are basically approached that can provide a perspective about the change process. The following are some well known models; first and foremost is the Three Stage Model planned change which was advanced by Kurt Lewin in the 1940s.Lewin discusses three stages which comprises of unfreezing, changing via cognitive restructuring and lastly refreezing. The second model is Seven Stage Model which was advanced by Ronald Lippit and Associates. This model is an expanded version of the 3-stage model and has seven stages; developing need, changing relationship, clarification, alternative routes, transformation, generalizing and terminal relationship. Models of planned change by Warner Burk and Liwin. The two scholars designed two order changes, first order change and second order change. Last but not least include Models of Jerry Porrars and Peter Robertson. These two scholars proposed a model having 6 basic steps which are environment, organizing arrangements, vision of the organization, physical setting, technology and social factors (Rosenblum & Louis, 2013). There are numerous advantages of planned change which are as discussed as below; first and foremost is increased productivity-thus planned change may assist in increasing productivity as well service ability. Secondly is improvement of quality which actually determines the condition of success in the organization. Planned change also assists in facing competition in that if the change process begins in a planned manner, it can assist in facing competition effectively. Fourthly, planned change can assist in technological change in addition to enhancing customer satisfaction. Finally planned change can assist in the expansion of market and boosts compliance with the existing regulations (Rosenblum & Louis, 2013). Some of the limitations of planned change comprise of the fact that most managers are unfamiliar with the complexities of the whole process, cynical of the prospects of its success as well as apprehensive of potential damaging effects (Rosenblum & Louis, 2013). Emergent change can be described as being based on the supposition that change is open-ended, unpredictable and continuous process of aligning as well as realigning an organization to its shifting environment. The following are models of emergent change; change occurs in a tentative context, and unlikely to expect outcomes to be close to plan. As you plan, so must you also be ready to change. Thirdly success is dependent on adapting to changing situations, managing interest groups and learning as much as one can as the project is going on. Some of the advantages of emergent change comprise of the fact that emergent change can be designed to tackle problems, even though it can also be utilized in capitalizing on unanticipated marketing benefits. Thus, capitalizing on emergent change can assist your organisation into latching into a new idea before the competition does. Secondly emergent change is critical as far as advancement of technology available in the marketplace is concerned. Thus whenever organizations refine as well as develop their own products, they always search for the newest features to offer; which permit their products to appear unique from the competitors. An organisation therefore employs emergent strategy in order to capture the development of the project that could assist it become a leader in technology. One of the most obvious disadvantages of emergent strategy is the failure of some organizations to properly plan for it as well as the damage it can bring to the organizational structure (Weick, 2012). The 21st century organizations are more suited to use emergent change approach. This is due to the increasing speed in the business landscape, fuelled by the fast cycling of technical innovation and consumer interests, indicate that acceptance for emergent approach might need to become intrinsic for every business. Boeing is an example of a company that failed to effectively consider the impact of emergent change on sustainability, ethics as well as CSR. In an attempt to keep with the Airbus, Boeing embraced outsourcing enthusiastically, from both local and international suppliers, as a technique of accelerating development and lowering costs. This strategy was aimed at reducing the Boeing 787’s cost of development from $10 to $ 6 billion and development time from 6 to 4 years. However, the final result was the opposite and the project ran into billions of dollars over budget in addition to being 3 years behind schedule. Thus, the company’s project almost became unsustainable and was nearly called off, tainted Boeing’s reputation and image and even broke the trust and loyalty of the company with its major customers(the airlines).Boeing’s profits were also threatened. The second company that almost faced a similar situation to that of Boeing is BP Shell. It has been nearly 5 years since BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster occurred in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 people and becoming the biggest oil spill in the history of the world. This crisis let loose a torrent of criticism against BP, with the company being accused of gross negligence and reckless conduct. The anger over the role of BP in the disaster successfully eroded the progress the company had made on corporate responsibility fronts, 10 years earlier. Though a key crusader of corporate responsibility, the Gulf of Mexico disaster completely eroded any goodwill and luster the company had enjoyed before into a freefall. The company’s gas stations suffered declining sales and BP Shell became President Obama’s administration punching bag. In the light of the above incidences, business executives and owners should find a need of remaining cautious as far as reading emergent approach into behavior patterns is concerned. This is because shifts in an organisation’s strategic position because of mid-level decisions might occur because of uninformed or poor decision-making at that stage (Flood & Coetsee, 2013). In conclusion, there are numerous issues that are involved as far as change implementation is concerned. The time span for instance, that is needed in implementing the change is important. Frequently, the project team tasked with the change implementation is not given off their normal duties to execute the change program. Another big factor is cost, with the cost estimates constantly changing during the stages of implementation. Change expenditures must be estimated carefully for the change to be approved by the top management as well as tracked throughout the entire change period. It should be noted that the cost of the change must not exceed its advantages. A diversified functional team for change implementation brings about a common sense of responsibility cutting across every level of the organization, resulting to effective implementation (Brown & Osborne, 2012). List of references Basu, C.2014 "What Is the Meaning of Organizational Change?" Demand Media : p1-8. Brown, K.& Osborne,S.2012 Managing Change and Innovation in Public Service Organizations. New York: Routledge. Fisk, P.2010 People Planet Profit: How to Embrace Sustainability for Innovation and business growth. New York: Kogan Page. Flood,P.& Coetsee,J.2013 Change Lessons from the CEO: Real People, Real Change. New York: John Wiley & Sons Inc. Lawrence, P.2014 Leading Change: How Successful Leaders Approach Change Management. New York: Kogan Page. Myers,P., Hulks,S. & Wiggins,L. 2012 Organizational Change: Perspectives on Theory and Practice. London: Oxford University Press. Sheila, R, Karen, L. 2013 Stability and Change: Innovation in an Educational Context. New York: Springer, 2013. Weick, K.2012 Making Sense of the Organization, Volume 2: The Impermanent Organization. New York: John Wiley & Sons Inc.. Wirtenberg, J.2014 Building a Culture for Sustainability: People, Planet, and Profits in a New Green Economy. New York: ABC-CLIO. Read More