Manage Change - Research Paper Example

XXXXXXXX Number: XXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXX XXXXXX XX – XX – University of XXXXXX Managing Change Assignment 3 Description of Change: The company is noted to be undergoing a difficult time due to the economic condition. The company has lost customers. Although the financial crisis has impacted this company to such a great extent, the competition is yet strong. The company needs to work towards improving and overhauling their systems and processes and improving the overall performance as well. The change includes installing new systems in the company and to also make drastic changes to the overall processes in a number of areas of the company. The need for change has been included in the following section. Need for Change: With the changing environment and the growing competition, there is a high need for the company to implement change. This will assist the company improve itself, as well as cater to the needs of the new clientele. During any crisis period, companies evaluate themselves and work towards improving their condition to help cope up with the changing environment and also to keep up the overall performance. Similarly, here the company has evaluated the environment and is focused on developing and improving the current position by improving its internal processes and overall working. Here this is a strategic step taken by the company to meet the competition and to also manage the financial crisis period effectively. SWOT Analysis: The company’s major strength lies in the fact that it has a number of employees who are well versed and highly experienced in the field. Here it is important to note that the company has been performing well, which allows them to implement change in the current time of issue. The weakness of the company however is the lack of technical knowledge to keep up with the new clients. Here the company finds the clients systems very complicated and hence needs to follow the contract agreements. If the knowledge was a little higher here in this field, then the company could have equally participated and put down their agreement criteria as well. The threats that the company faces here is the lack of newer clients and also high competition that is being faced. Also, aspects like the uncertain future, together all these provide a major form of threat to the company. Also, in terms of the opportunities, the company has a wide range of opportunities to implement better systems and to work towards improving the overall processes of the company. Here although the period involves a low number of customers, this can be used to the company’s benefit and here the company can improve their own internal systems and processes. Cost Benefit Analysis: The company plans to implement a system for a total of approx. $60,000. Here the company is planning to spend on a system which has been found to be very un – friendly and has not received the best reviews (Buchan). The company is not only implementing a un – friendly system but is also risking the chances for high levels of resistance from the staff. Here implementing this system will lead the company to achieve the order for 1 million, however will led to loss of older employees who have been in the company for over twenty years. Barriers to Change and Minimization Strategy: There are a few barriers to change that might occur here in the case of the company: a) The employees will resist change, as the change involves the use of a new system and the employees are not very computer savvy. Here to resolve this issue, the main steps that can be taken by the company is to develop a good training program to assist the employees learn the systems and also be more comfortable with the new processes. Another step that can be adopted by the company is to change the teams and to make the individuals with better computer knowledge to come into the team where the new system is being adopted. In order not to lose the older employees they can be given different job options within the same company, in the case that they are not able to cope up with the new systems. b) The processes and procedures will be completely changed. Here to reduce any form of confusions or chaos in the company due to the changes in the processes, the company will need to document all the processes to the dot and ensure that all the employees are given the step by step processes to work on. c) Implementation of SAS can bring about a number of difficulties in the overall working for the company. The software has been known to be un – friendly and hence here a number of issues can arise. To overcome these issues, the company can either look for a better system to use instead of the SAS system, or it can use other cheaper options which have also proved to be more user friendly in nature. Employee Motivation to Respond to Feedback: In order to motivate the employees to respond to the feedback of the change process, the following will be included on a regular basis. Firstly staff survey, which help the staff provide their views and ideas and contribute to the change process. This followed by the feedback gained from the staff will help in better and smoother change process Meetings: Individual and group meeting will be held on a regular basis to allow the employees provide their views and ideas and concerns. The group meetings will be held on a weekly basis while the individual meetings will be possible at any time where the individuals need to talk to the managers. Finally, the employees will be given incentives for better performance and also smooth transition processes. A successful change management process with least resistance. Change Management Project Plan: Here for the changes that are intended by the company, the company will need to include a few resources and also will be required to also develop a new team for the overall rehauling of the processes within the firm (Beitler). Here the finances that will be involved in the overall change is high and also the human resources needed is also high. The details of the various plans involved incorporating the change will be discussed in the further sections. Communication Plan: Date The change notice will be sent out the employees within the first few weeks of confirmation from the top management. Here this needs to be done at the earliest to ease in the change and to avoid too much resistance to change. If the changes are not made in the company at present, this could lead to the closure of the company and also loss of jobs for all employees within the company (Dooley). Hence to ensure that this is not happening, the company plans to implement the changes. It is also important to note that the competition is slowly becoming fierce and there is a need to be able to sustain the name and reputation of the company, hence bringing about this change will allow all the hard work of over the years to be retained and will also permit the company to still compete in the markets with pride and dignity. The plan will be communicated to the employees once the new systems are in place and the documentation for all processes is completed. Before this only the individuals participating in the development of the plans will be kept in the loop Audiences The key audiences of the message include all employees within the company. The main audiences of this plan will be the individuals who will be affected by the implementation of the SAS systems and also the change in the processes and work flows. What is the Reason for Communication The main objective of this plan is to spread the word of the change throughout the company to every employee. Here the aim is to ensure that employees are aware of the issues that are being faced and are also aware of their role in the company. The employees will be targeted to detail the benefits of the changes that the company is planning. Risk Hence here with the changes, the main aim is to help sustain the present situation and if possible to improve from the current situation. Activities The communication plan will be circulated to the employees of the company using memos and also formal mails. Here the plan will be sent to the managers and team leaders of the teams who will be responsible to communicate the same to the employees. Key Messages Here the CEO of the company will firstly provide a speech to the employees to draw their attention towards the benefits. The benefits of the change that will be discussed in the speech include the following: The company is presently being faced with major issues and is also confronted with a difficult time. Generally It will be the responsibility of the Human resources team to communicate the changes to the managers and the team leaders. Activities to Deliver the Communication Plan: In order to deliver the communication plan, firstly a speech by the CEO will break the news to the employees. Second, memos and official mails will be sent out to the managers and the team leaders to communicate the activities to them and they in turn will be required to pass on the details to the teams (Beitler). Here the managers will be responsible to pass on the detailed instructions to the employees and to ensure that the communication is clear and open. Also, the managers will also be responsible to develop the groups for the training and development as well. Risk Management Plan: The risks involved in the change that he company is adopting is a major investment into the software and the overall changes in the plans. The risk here is whether or not the intended investments will provide the returns (Dooley). This is a highly likely issue and is a constant possibility of error here. To minimize the risk, the company adopts a temporary plan with SAS before actually invest $ 65,000. This can be a trial period which the company can use, and it will allow a clearer idea if the plan is working out effectively or not. Also, as discussed earlier, the issues that might arise like the employees resisting change, and also the loss of the experienced employees, here this is a highly likely event to occur in the company and in every company, when change is planned, resistance comes along with it. In order to ensure that the experienced workers of the company are not lost, the company can develop plans to shift employees within departments and to provide jobs to people in positions which they are either comfortable or which they can cope up with, considering the loyalty of the employees (Beitler). Evaluation and Review Cycle: Every change needs to be evaluated and reviewed at a regular basis to ensure that the plans are in line with the intended change. Here an approach similar to an Action research will be adopted by the company. A continuous cycle of the evaluations will be held and each time an evaluation is complete all the areas which need change will be conducted. This will help refine and improvise on the plans on a regular basis and will also permit the company to refine the overall processes to meet not only the client requirements but also work in accordance with the needs of the employees of the company (Dooley). The main reason that a continuous cycle proves to be beneficial here for the evaluation is that the company has already faced a major downfall with the Global financial crisis. Hence here the company needs to be able to, if not improve the current situation, at least work towards sustaining the position at what it was before the financial crisis. The evaluation will assist the company do so and to some extent will also help in keeping up with the needs of the human resources within the company as well. Action research has been explained as “This process creates new patterns of collegiality, communication, and sharing. Contributions to the body of knowledge about teaching and learning may also result” (Ferrance). Hence as has been explained about action research, the continuous evaluation and the cyclic approach will help in improving the communication, sharing and overall effectiveness of the teams and the company as a whole. The evaluations will for the first year be held once every month, following which the next year the evaluation will be reduced to once every three months. This will help stabilize the company after which the evaluations can be held once every six months. Works Cited Abrahamson, Eric. Change Without Pain: How Managers Can Overcome Initiative Overload, Organizational Chaos, and Employee Burnout . Harvard Business Press, 2003. Beitler, Michael. Strategic Organizational Change. Practitioner Press International, 2006. Buchan, Mark. The Number One Mistake Leaders Make When Managing Change. 26 July 2010. 8 February 2011 . Dooley, Jeff. Cultural Aspects Of Systematic Change Management. 2010. 9 February 2011 . Ferrance, Eileen. Action Research. 2000. 21 February 2011 . Read More