Stories of Change: Hewlett-Packard, IBM, KODAK, and McDonalds - Essay Example

Stories of Change Hewlett-Packard, IBM, KODAK, and McDonald’s Stories of Change: Hewlett-Packard, IBM, KODAK, and McDonald’s In today’s global and growing economy, which is greatly influenced by globalization, organizations (both domestic and multinational) are struggling hard to attain their most favorable market share. For this reason, the business professionals and the management of the organizations try to work towards a common goal and to attain it as fast as they can. Merger and acquisitions are among those effective tactics that allow organizations to experience immediate change and growth. With the help of this paper, the change stories of Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Kodak, and McDonald’s will be discussed. Furthermore, with the help of Kotter’s model, the paper will highlight the main errors that were by these companies during the change along with some recommendations. Hewlett Packard Hewlett Packard (HP) is one of the leading IT corporations in the world. In 1999 when Carly Fiorina was recently appointed as the CEO of HP, the company was facing serious competition in the computer industry and therefore needed guidance. The market share of the company was at stake because of its rivals such as Dell, etc. Fiorina wanted to change the functions and operations of the company. She believed that it could be changed by ‘going back to the roots of the place’. She restructured the company into front end and back end departments. Many opposed the merger that took place between HP and Compaq in 2002 however Fiorina did not lose hope and stayed focused. The merger made HP the biggest personal computer manufacturer in the world. However, the sales did not grow, and the company lost half of its share. The CEO was fired and was replaced by Mark Hurd. Mark incorporated some new strategies and in 2007 HP claimed its highest sales for seven years (Gruver, Young, & Fulghum, 2012; Palmer, 2005). Although Fiorina restructured the company and divided it into quadrants the major reasons behind its failure were quite prominent. As according to Dr. John Kotter, 70% of major change efforts fail in organizations. According to Kotter’s model, Fiorini was unable to develop a sense of urgency within the workforce therefore majority of the workforce was not in agreement with Fiorina’s decision. Secondly she was unable to create a guiding coalition. For this reason, she was failed to develop a change vision effectively (Palmer, 2005). If the CEO of the company would have engaged the entire top management of HP and have attained their concerned the change policy would have worked in an effective manner. It is recommended that in order to effectively implement the change, a new strategy that would have allowed the engagement of employees should be followed as it will be more productive and better results oriented (Herold & Fedor, 2008). IBM The change story at IBM is different from HP and started during the 90’s. The top management did not initiate the change or led it; it was initiated by one of the computer programer Grossman and his colleague Patrick. Although Grossman and Patrick were successful in establishing internal support within the organization and Grossman effectively became a ‘relentless campaigner’. It was due to the efforts of these individuals that they received support and expertise from various departments of IBM however the sad part was that the revolution was not official (Palmer, 2005). Being an unofficial part of the organization there was a lack of financial back up for the change project for these individuals because of that they were unable to create long term wins and strategies. Furthermore according to Kotter, the error was also in the minimal use of credibility to change the system and structure by reinvigorating new projects and themes in IBM. Thirdly this collectively resulted in the failure of incorporating the changes into the culture of IBM. The change became official and prominent when Samuel Palmisano was appointed as the CEO of IBM in 2002. He then adopted some influential key strategies for change management and IBM finally became stronger with time and can face future challenges (Palmer, 2005). IBM must have designed a policy that should have allowed the employees to mark their voices and comments. Since the company did not allow Grossman to revolutionize the idea officially therefore it faced major issues. It is recommended that workforce should be considered as a part of the company and their feedback should always be welcomed (Yaeger & Sorensen, 2009). Kodak Kodak, on the other hand, completely changed its operation and entered into digital production. The change story of Kodak is one of the biggest turnarounds in the corporate history of the US. Although the company had been producing traditional film cameras for more than a century but in September it decided to cut this line of production. Such an enormous change had a huge impact on the investor and the staff. The company had to sell its assets while 30,000 employees were fired globally. This change plan did not workout effectively for Kodak. It should be noted that according to Kotter’s model there were few errors that led to the failure of this change plan. The first one being that the company was unable to establish a sense of urgency within the organization. Secondly, they also failed to generate short-term wins. While the empowerment of the broad-based action was also absent in their change plan (Palmer, 2005). Kodak took a long jump and was not ready for it at that moment. It did not think of its investors, shareholders and employees and therefore faced serious issues. They should have strategized the change in an effective manner and should have taken that step with an agreement of the top management and the workforce as it would have allowed them an edge to implement it in an effective manner (Lambert, 2008). McDonald’s McDonald’s faced external pressure because of the health issues that created challenges for the fast food industry. McDonalds in this regard had to revise its policies and change its operations and strategies throughout the world. After the documentary Supersize me, the company seriously focused in going ‘back to basics’ and decided to decrease the expansion of its stores. The company included salads and healthy menu in order to address the negative reviews on the company. It revised its advertising campaigns and focused more on healthy products. However, the change policy and strategies did not completely work out for McDonalds but it helped them to a large extent (Palmer, 2005). Although McDonalds took bold steps to counter the negative feedback that was coming its way, it was not completely successful in doing so. The strategy was strong and powerful and they took help of effective advertising and marketing tools to create a positive image. However, it should be noted that the company should continuously focus on bringing healthy food options for every age group and should start eliminating food that is unhealthy, only in that way the company will be able to do good and experience a sound change and positive feedback from its customers (Yaeger & Sorensen, 2009). Reference List Gruver, G., Young, M., & Fulghum, P. (2012). A Practical Approach to Large-Scale Agile Development. New York: Addison-Wesley. Herold, D. M., & Fedor, D. B. (2008). Change the way you lead change : leadership strategies that really work. Stanford : Stanford Business Books. Lambert, D. M. (2008). Supply chain management : processes, partnerships, performance. Sarasota: Supply Chain Management Institute. Palmer. (2005). Managing Org. Change. New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill Education. Yaeger, T. F., & Sorensen, P. F. (2009). Strategic organization development : managing change for success. Charlotte: Information Age Pub. Read More