Change Management from Essentialist, Constructionist, and Participative Perspectives - Essay Example

College: Managing Change (reflecting) Introduction In this module, have learnt about looking at as well as acting around objects and individuals in a rather different way as opposed to the usual taken-for-granted way. The module has indicated to the students that they need to look at objects and individuals in a more social constructionist’s way, which entails looking at objects with more depth instead of just seeking the rather taken-for-granted ways. The different lecturers instructed the students on the diverse means of social constructionist’s thinking way as well as its variation from the normal everyday thinking. After putting this into practice in the seminar activities (seminar 1 to 4 as explained in later part of this paper), the students were given the opportunity of completing practical sessions in both essentialist view (normal or everyday view) and social constructionists view. The three essay plans as well as the one full essay assisted the writer towards a further understanding of some four topics relating to social constructionists views. Social constructionists as a mechanism of examining the lives of individuals vary from the essentialists’ perception. According to the essentialists’ view, someone is perceived as “is lazy” whereas the same would be perceived as “being lazy” by the constructionist view. This implies that the essentialists refer to individuals as having a personality that is fixed, while the social constructionist on the other hand would suggest that an individual would change his or her personality depending on the circumstance or condition one finds him/herself in. The social constructionist perspective teaches people that the way in which they perceive the world ought to be unbiased. Presently, most individuals’ view about the world is biased on the grounds of their previous experiences and knowledge. In fact, what exists within the world is only what individuals perceive to be in existence. Words by themselves only imply that anything means nothing on its own until people attach a discourse to it. Q1: A. Relational or Social Constructionist Perspective The social (relational) constructionist perspective is a practical-theoretical range of understandings, which informs research, consulting and writing activities of different scholars and writers. A big number of consultants, researchers, as well as therapists perceive themselves as taking some form of social constructionist view although the concept “social constructionism” has a variety of meanings. However, all constructionists share a deep emphasis on language with communication contrasting with more emphasis being upon language as presentation. Besides, communication is perceived as constructed processes or products; in centering communal or individual construction processes; as well as in the importance given to the knower’s participation fact in those processes. Assumptions: The social constructivism and social constructionist perspectives are sociological knowledge theories, which consider the way in which objects of consciousness or social phenomena develop in the social contexts. Social construct or construction is a practice or concept, which is a particular group’s construct. When something is said to be socially constructed, focus is on its reliance on the group’s social selves’ contingent variables instead of any intrinsic quality it possesses within itself. Reality, learning, and knowledge are the key underlying assumptions upon which social constructionists perspective is typically based on. Strengths: The social constructionist view perceives all things as being social constructions; all things are metaphysical. This does not imply that the perspective views the external world as having unreal beings in a non-reality. On the contrary, it proposes that real and unreal notions are social constructs by themselves making the query of whether there exist anything real subject of social convention. Limitations: The social constructionists’ perspective falls towards the spectrum’s nurture end of the larger nurture versus nature debate. Generally, this perspective ignores the biological influences upon culture or behavior, or suggests that these are of no significance in achievement of a human behavior understanding (Sokal & Bricmont 1999, p. 17). In contrast, most social scientists and psychologists believe behavior is a highly complex interaction of cultural and biological influences. The other disciplines like the evolutionary psychology, behavioral neuroscience, behavior genetics, and epigenetics among others take an interactionism nature-nurture approach in understanding cultural or behavior phenomena (Ridly 2004, p. 35). B. Critique of Present Change Management Literature Scholars have argued that successful change management is vital to any firm or institution to ensure its survival in the present day highly competitive as well as continuously evolving global business environment. In fact, scholars agree that change is ever-present and affects all firms and organizations. Furthermore, a clear consensus have been reached implying that the change’s pace in the present world are greater than in any other time in history. Thus, successful change management is a highly needed skill. However, the approaches and theories of change management presently available to the practitioners and academics are frequently contradictory with most lacking empirical evidence as well as being supported by rather unchallenged hypotheses regarding the nature of the contemporary change management in organizations (Todnem 2005, p. 369). The organizational change management has the tendency of being reactive, ad hoc, and discontinuous in the modern era. In fact, organizational change has reported about 70% rate of failure in all the initiated change programmes (Balogun & Hailey 2004, p. 17). This may imply a fundamental lack of valid frameworks of the ways in which change management can be implemented and managed successfully since the currently literature is a broad range of confusing and contradictory approaches and theories. These approaches and theories are mostly falling short of empirical evidence and they are often based upon unchallenged hypothesis concerning the contemporary nature of change management in organizations. Applying the three classifications of change as advanced by Senior (2002), the current theories and approaches of change management attempt to underscore the urge for pragmatic and new change management framework. Thus, construction of such a framework calls for further exploratory studies on change’s nature as well as the means of conducting change management (Todnem 2005, p. 378). C. Social Processes Involved in Organisational Change Change processes in organizations are affected by institutionalization of power as well as the interest group’s behavior around and in firms (Mintzberg 1983, p. 28). Over the last decade, both the processes and power embedded within the organizational structures and the prevailing organizational arrangement have changed dramatically. Pressures of global deregulation and competition have fostered many firms and institutions to look for new organization forms as well as varied models of managing individuals. Firms become leaner, flatter, as well as functionally oriented. The management levels are increasingly being eliminated with the numbers of the corporate staff being reduced occasionally. Most of the social processes involved in organizational change include accessibility to information, resources control, and the formal authority’s role. Responsibilities, accountability, and power are continuously being channeled to the executives holding charge of organizations. New employment relations forms are being developed with the roles of work councils and labor unions changing (Boonstra & Gravenhorst 1998, p. 98). The political and institutional systems and processes play key roles in such organizational change. The prevailing power balance changes with the fundamental changes in organizations (Greiner & Schein 1988, p. 17). The forces within or around organizations try maintaining this balance can limit such changes while other forces can enhance processes of change. Power is utilized by the CEOs, change managers, top managers, work councils, employees, consultants, and the other interest groups in organizational change. The objective of such groups is managing as well as influencing the process of change by use of power and the influence tactics. In the traditional views of management, actions adopted to influence as well as challenge organizational processes of change by the other groups other than management seemed as change resistant forces because such actions fall off the legitimate change program activities. Thus, organizational change, power, and resistance concepts are closely related. Consequently, since power concept entails exercise of power over other people or person, use of power has a high likelihood of leading to resistance. However, not all the influence attempts lead to resistance. Power and influence in the processes of change can equally result into commitment or compliance to/with the efforts of change (Boonstra & Gravenhorst 1998, p. 98). D. Application of Participative Organizing Styles to Practical Change Situations Participatory or participative management encourages involvement of all the stakeholders at all organizational levels in analysis of problems, implementation of solutions, as well as development of strategies for change management. By participative change management, all employees (or stakeholders) are called over to participate in the process of decision-making of the organization through being permitted to participate in such activities as determination of work schedules, setting of goals, as making suggestions. Participative change process allows the practical involvement of the employees in shaping organizational change and may include such activities as increment of employees’ responsibility; forming of quality circles to monitor change, forming self-managed change teams, or forming quality-of-work-life committees; as well as soliciting feedback from surveys (Coleman 2004, p. 297). The participative change management involves more than permitting the employees and other organizational stakeholders in taking part in the process of decision making. It also entails the treatment of suggestions and ideas of the employees with respect and consideration by the organizational management and leadership. In change management, four processes play a key role in influencing participation. The main aim of these processes is creation of employee engagement as change is pushed downwards to the lowest organizational levels. The first process is sharing of information, whose main concern is keeping the employees informed concerning their company’s change and economic status. The second process is training in which the employees’ skill levels are raised and development opportunities are offered to allow them apply new skills in making effective change decisions concerning the whole organization. Thirdly is the employee decision making process, which assumes a number of forms such as determination of work schedules, and deciding on processes or budgets. Finally, organizations can use rewards processes in which reward should be pegged to the ideas and suggestions, and performance (Coye & Belohlav 1995, p. 5). Q2: Reflection on Seminars Seminar 1: The first seminar entailed examining the implications of both essentialist or entitative and the social constructionist or relational perspectives. In the essentialist perspective, the seminar helped me understand that personality is fixed and permanent while learning is a personal activity. Essentialism is the perspective in which certain classifications such as racial groups, women, etc. have an underlying true nature or reality, which cannot be observed by people directly. Actually, essentialism is the common-sense perception of issues and things by individuals or groups of people. Thus, essentialism entails speaking in ways, which to some extent indicate the reality of abstract things in the mindset of the target groups. Some of the abstract notions in essentialism include gender, personality, health, emotions, and sexuality. The definition of such abstracts is political and optional. For the social constructionist or relational perspective, the seminar revealed that individuals adopt different negotiated positions, with learning being perceived as just a social act. Emphasis was on these sociological knowledge theories, which consider the way in which objects of consciousness or social phenomena develop in the social contexts. Thus, the seminar indicates that social construction is a practice or concept, which is an artifact or construct of a specific group. The relational perspective thus claims that there is no reality, boundaries, or individuals, and argues that there is positioning as one viable alternative. The perspective counters intuitive, challenges the taken-for-granted as well as commonsense stances among individuals and groups. Seminar 2: Seminar two commences with a strong indication of failure of the efforts of finding cure for a fatal brain disease as a result of the CJD being hampered by a feud between 2 academic teams. The two academic teams, which have failed reaching an official consensus, are the prion unit of the Council of Medical Research located in London’s Institute of Neurology and the Edinburgh’s CJD surveillance unit. The main challenge of these teams is reaching an official consensus concerning the way in which they should work harmoniously after a number of years of negotiation. Due to their bitter feud, it has been hard to get a cure for CJD. Numerous attempts have been made in bridging this divide but most people end up reaching their end before resolution due to the fact that the feud dates back to over ten years ago. I agree with Sir Lain Chalmers that this feud is very disappointing and frustrating and thus the public needs to begin getting angry concerning it to ensure that their interests are looked into effectively. The change in the variations in such teams could be solved by first establishing that their disagreement is not on personal grounds. In fact, emphasis should be on working together as a real issue. The CJD surveillance is indeed a critically important team to the UK. Therefore, the seminar calls for careful examination of anything, which could change or interfere with the process of uniting the teams. This implies that the teams need to change in their standpoints to pave way for creation of an accord, which is to the well-being and interest of the public. Seminar 3: This case centers on Jim Bristow, who is as a fresh university graduated got some work in a company but did not stay there for long. First, this implies that Jim had to adjust to different environments immediately after his university life. He was to face a greater challenge after being recruited into the Deputy Director for Buildings’ position by Mac Trewall. This presented a challenge in that Jim had to be oriented into the college, a process, which say him meet a number of his colleagues in diverse areas whom he noted to be older and experienced than him. Thus, Jim had to adjust his perception of age and understand that he was their senior. Actually, Jim was troubled by the age differential but Mac had hired him to bring up-to-date computer-supported management techniques in order to facilitate operations and planning. However, he proceeded with his assignment with considerable speed, fostered by understanding his role in the college. As time moved on, Jim started interacting with his colleagues and made a number of friends who saw sense in his computer-supported programs. As his assignment progressed Jim noted that productivity was low with most of his staff being lazy and lacking interest in his efforts. This provoked his close supervision to ensure productivity. This was further complicated by the desire of Barney Larkin, one of Jim’s reliable engineers, to seek for a shift for a new opportunity of work. Jim had the dilemma of replacing him and this happens in most organizations every time they lose their competent employees. Although Jim’s accomplishments won the support and appreciation of the top leadership, his main concern is how to improve the Building Department’s management. Thus, he had to adopt changes and manage them to be more competent in achievement of the organizational change. Seminar 4: Seminar four is a case study in which the approaches to communications in international aircraft customers and Haagen-Dazs ice cream customers are compared and contrasted. First, both are purchased by some targeted customers. The Airbus airplanes’ customers are the leading global airlines such as British Airways, Lufthansa, American Airlines, Singapore Airlines, Air France, etc with cost-efficiency and technical safety being their general requirements. On the other hand, ice creams’ customers purchase largely standardized product. Such customers’ demand is usually shaped by their personalities through association with advertising and other modes of promotion. In addition, an adult appeal and high-quality ingredients shape the buying patterns. Consequently, communications of the Airbus emphasize on the safety, global and technical performance nature of products. Contrary, ice-cream emphasizes on the ice cream’s adult overtones in an original and striking way, which differentiates the product from claims of being normal or boring. They also differ in their corporate advertising and strategies. Advertising is just but a small portion of Airbus corporate strategy while it moves beyond conveyance of the basic information of the product for Haagen-Dazs (Lynch 2000, NP). Q3. Organizational Stories Members of organizations face some greater levels of complexity in the present day environments of work. Traditionally, the programs concerning employee training have been utilized in enabling their adaptation to organizational uncertainty and change. However, such an approach has failed the promotion of learning, which either corresponds to the real employees’ experiences or allows flexibility in application. One of the things I found out in one organization in my study and interaction with leaders was the use of stories in the workplace. Such stories were told in meetings and leaders ensured they gave the moral lessons at the end of such stories. One outstanding story I listened to was about a regular business traveler known as Dave, which was told by a departmental leader. Dave had travelled for a crucial meeting with his clients in Atlantic City after which he found himself with some ample leisure time and thus went to enjoy a drink form a local bar. After finishing his drink, an attractive lady came up to him and offered to buy him another drink, a request to which he consented to. After his first sip, Dave fell unconscious only to wake up later and find himself lying in a bathtub, disoriented, and submerged in ice. In efforts of figuring out how he got himself in that mess, Dave looked around frantically and spotted a note written: DO NOT MOVE. CALL 911. He obeyed and the operator seemed familiar with the situation and informed him that one of his kidneys had been harvested by a ring of some organ thieves operating within the city. Dave was also informed that paramedics were on their way and he should not move till they reached him. The story aimed at cautioning the employees who get overseas assignments to handle all their operations with care as such evil acts could get to any of them. I witnessed learning via the use of the organizational stories as an alternative method of organizational learning. I explored the approach using the complexity theory in order to foster a better understanding of how the employees build up complex understandings of the safety issues in organizations. My interest was in two elements of the complexity theory, which I investigated. First, the support for claim that stories of organizations are rather complex adaptive systems became evident through examination of the way in which stories displayed five main features of the complex adaptive systems: embeddedness, interdependence, nonlinearity, adaptation, and dynamism. Secondly, I found the organizational stories as exhibiting self-organization process. Support for this view was demonstrated via identification of some simple rules, which guided telling of stories. They were also demonstrated in that the stories of organizations exhibited properties- aggregation, nonlinearity, diversity, and flows- as well as mechanisms-tagging, internal models, and building blocks of self-organizing systems. I found out that storytelling in organizations is an emerging subject in the management, organizational studies, and strategy’s study. As such, the discipline is a highly contested ground, with a number of scholars and writers describing it as an essential tool for use by the business persons. Others describe it as a means of understanding as well as interpreting the life of an organization. I also found out that all those who perceived organizational storytelling as a powerful tool of management view it as an essential key for leadership competency in the current 21st century. Thus, leaders need to know and understand the way in which they should deliver a story more effectively combined with knowledge of the right story for telling to the organizational members. This ability is a powerful communication and influencing skill and thus plays a crucial role in managing and influencing organizational change. I also noted that organizational storytelling can be utilized in connecting the employees to strategies through provision of belief, understanding, and finally motivation in the individual contribution, which the employees can make. In fact, a number of articles and books have covered this perspective, indicating that it is an imperative field of study. In addition to being a crucial leadership competency for leaders, organizational storytelling is also a very powerful change management and communication technique. Conclusion Scholars have argued that successful change management is vital to any firm or institution to ensure its survival in the present day highly competitive as well as continuously evolving global business environment. The paper has looked at change management from essentialist, constructionist, and participative perspectives. The essentialist perspective advances that personality is fixed and permanent while learning is a personal activity. Actually, essentialism is the common-sense perception of issues and things by individuals or groups of people. For the social constructionist or relational perspective, individuals adopt different negotiated positions, with learning being perceived as just a social act. The perspective counters intuitive, challenges the taken-for-granted as well as commonsense stances among individuals and groups. The participative perspective allows all the organizational stakeholders to play a role in the change process. They are considered as the main source of change ideas as opposed to being the implementers of planned change. References Balogun, J & Hope Hailey, V 2004, Exploring strategic change, 2nd edition, Prentice Hall, London. Boonstra, JJ & Gravenhorst, KMB 1998, Power dynamics and organizational change: a comparison of perspectives, European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 97-120. Coleman, PT 2004, "Implicit theories of organizational power and priming effects on managerial power-sharing decisions: an experimental study," Journal of Applied Social Psychology, Vol. 34, no. 2, pp. 297-321. Coye, RW & Belohlav, JA 1995, "An exploratory analysis of employee participation," Group and Organization Management, Vol. 20, no. 1, pp. 4-17. Greiner, LE & Schein, VE1988, Power and organization development: mobilizing power to implement change, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA. Lynch, R 2000, Corporate strategy, Prentice Hall, London. Mintzberg, H 1983, Power in and around organizations, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Ridly, M 2004, The agile gene: how nature turns on nurture, Harper, New York. Senior, B 2002, Organisational change, 2nd edition, Prentice Hall, London. Sokal, A & Bricmont, J 1999, Fashionable nonsense: postmodern intellectuals’ abuse of science, Picador, New York. Todnem, R 2005, Organisational change management: a critical review, Journal of Change Management, Vol. 5, No.4, pp. 369-380. Read More