Management of Change - Essay Example

Emergence Service Agencies (EMAs) across the globe provide vital emergency services to millions of citizens in the world. The agencies are tasked with provision of essential disaster management services such as hazard identification, disaster prevention, preparedness, response and ultimately recovery services. Victoria State Emergency Service (SES) is tasked with control of flood, storm, tsunami and earthquake that may occur in Victoria. The agency aims at planning and educating the residents on potential disaster and collaborates with Victoria Police in the search and rescue operations during the bushfire responses.

However, several environmental changes such as global climate change and demographic changes pose greater risks to the effectiveness of Victoria State Emergency Service. There is an increasing shortage of volunteers. Increased demand for work, increasing costs of labor and diversification of the emergency management services. Victoria State Emergency Service will have to undergo change in order to attain comprehensive, coordinated and integrated emergency management capabilities. The agency must use innovative, professional and progressive approach to emergency management by ensuring high preparedness and excellent disaster mitigation services especially in the response and recovery cycle.

The critical factors that have triggered change at the agency include the external environment that requires a change in the mission, leadership, operational strategies and culture of the emergency management agency. The current scenario at the organization has the likelihood of causing a decline in overall performance, poor emergency services and conflict in the organization. Burke-Litwin Model of organizational performance and change can be used in diagnosing the need for change and making essential recommendations for the change at Victoria State Emergency Service.

The model contains 12 organizational dimensions that determine how the performance of an organization is influence by the external and internal factors. The 12 dimensions include the external environment, mission and strategy, leadership, organizational culture, structure, systems, management practices, work unit climate, tasks and individual skills, individuals’ needs and values, motivation and finally individual and overall organizational performance (Burke, 2008). Some external drivers of change in the external environment include the changes in demography, technological changes, economic changes and climate change.

Apart from the vision, Victoria State Emergency Services lacks clear mission and strategy to support all hazards in ensuring effective emergency management and safe communities. The agency has no role models and transformational leaders who can guide the overall strategic direction of the organization while the cultural norms, shared values and customs do not contribute to the overall organizational performance (Burke, 2008). According to the organizational structure, there are poor communication channels due to high hierarchy while the existing systems such as disaster management procedures and policies are not well documented and understood by the staff and volunteers (Burke, 2008).

The management practices do not foster integrated and comprehensive disaster preparedness due to poor employee training, development and motivation. The agency has experienced poor working relationships and constant interpersonal conflicts due to negative perceptions of the staff since the organization has failed to meet their expectations of between wages, training opportunities and better working equipments (Burke, 2008). Accordingly, the individual tasks and skills do not match the job roles.

There is low motivation due to low wage rates, lack of safe working environment, poor training and lack of excellent promotional opportunities. Lastly, Victoria State Emergency Service has attained low individual and overall organizational performance due to low skills capacity, lack of disaster preparedness policies, poor leadership, and poor management practices. The dimensions will provide a framework to assess the environmental and organizational factors that are critical to successful change and demonstrate the how the 12 dimensions will be linked in order to attain change in Victoria State Emergency Services performance and organizational culture.