Changing the Methodology behind Information Leaflet Display - Case Study Example

REFLECTIVE COMMENTARY By You Your School Data Here Here Introduction Line management approached me to take on the special project of changing the methodology behind information leaflet display and the ordering of these materials to improve efficiency and cost for the six housing offices related to the business. At first, there was no concern over this project and its outcomes, just generic concern over how to approach the internal staff members and consider how to launch this new project. Realising that there was the potential for resistance to any change to these processes and procedures, I had to determine an appropriating launching point for this improvement. The solution to the project was to first visit the six offices, gain a clear understanding of the stock levels for these materials (both old and recent) and come up with a platform for change. After having reviewed the stock process and stock levels, I considered the potential pitfalls and obstacles to a new plan of action and realised that resistance to change should become my first priority. I was then able to develop an appropriate action plan for launching the project and achieving the goals of cost, storage and efficiency. Action plan In order to launch a new leaflet production and storage system, I had to take into consideration the needs and opinions of both colleagues and superiors as well as consider the current methodology behind the leaflet system. The action plan needed to have a clear launching point and include factors related to resistance to change, human resources needs and also how to promote this project to gain commitment whilst satisfying the restrictions imposed by the current leaflet system. The action plan included: 1. Setting up a meeting with the line manager to discuss my findings, reviewing the current system as opposed to how better to streamline it and make it more efficient to gain management support. 2. Inform all front line staff that the line manager and myself had come to an agreement that my plan of action had been approved, thereby giving staff a sense of my authority. 3. Speak to the continuous improvement team to gain their insights, thus building respect for my authority, the absolute need to improve efficiency, and gain their support. 4. Build a computerized staff survey to further gain organisational commitment to project involvement and have a tangible research analysis to identify potential for resistance to change. 5. Development of a customer feedback system to gain insight into what customers believed were the benefits and disadvantages of the current leaflet system. 6. Determine the health and safety issues related with new stock systems as they might develop with a restructuring and storage process. 7. Assign individual and group priorities related to their unique contributions to the project and ensure all staff members clearly understood their expectations and roles in the project. This plan of action served as the launching point for the actual start of the leaflet revamping process and equipped me with the tools necessary to manage change resistance effectively and ensure staff-wide commitment to the special project. Encounters in the project objectives Now that the steps required to achieve success in the project had been identified, I developed a proposal that could serve as a reference tool in the event that there were problems with commitment to their assignment tasks. I understood that the root of conflict can occur when “the proposal succumbs to analysis paralysis and second-guessing” (Patrick, 2001, p.13). I had personal experience, in my organisational environment, that reminded me that second-guessing was a common organisational outcome and should be addressed with conflict negotiation tactics. Therefore the proposal took into consideration the need to create a solid vision that identified the specific strategies that would need to be put in place to realise that vision as an organisational whole (Kotter, 2009). Creating a vision, and getting others to accept that vision, is the first quality step in gaining commitment and making others understand its objectives and their roles within it. I decided that to avoid non-commitment to the project, based on possible staff perceptions that I was manipulating their other job roles or demanding too much effort, I would make use of email communications tools to facilitate the transfer of information without imposing multiple meetings that demanded face-to-face presence. Through these emails, after having reinforced that my absolute authority on this project had been granted by line management, I distributed knowledge that all future ordering of leaflets should be directed to the project manager; myself. There were some on the staff that were happy to be stripped of this previous job task related to procurement, whilst others tended to see the situation as a modest violation of their own job role authority. In reflection, I believe that this type of situation could occur in virtually any business where individuals had grown accustomed to multi-tasking and complete job role autonomy. I, again, used further email communications to reinforce that the project was designed to help minimise excess job responsibilities and thanked them for understanding that it was necessary to achieve the vision’s goals. This seemed to put some resistance to the change at ease and lessen its impact on project efficiency. “The ability to acquire necessary cooperation, collaboration, and even co-ownership (of the project) is enhanced if the change agent understands the layers of resistance that are usually encountered” (Patrick, 2001, p.2). Having had personal experience with the organisational culture and attitudes of the current workforce, in reflection I believe that I took these factors into consideration and continued to promote my gratitude, my authority in these matters, and constantly reinforce the vision statement that I had developed. I made sure that all assigned priorities to the project were put into order of priority from the highest to the lowest, thus avoiding anyone on the team getting “sidetracked into putting a lot of time and effort into an item that was considered low priority” (scoutbase.org.uk, 2004, p.2). This project had a strict timeline for completion and, without calling multiple meetings to discuss project, priority was a major issue to improving success and cost efficiency. However, there were situations where face-to-face meetings needed to be called, despite the demand on their personal job role activities. Buchar (2004) offers that the logistics behind meeting development and itinerary are important and everyone should fully understand what the expectations will be when attending meetings to avoid resistance. I categorised these meetings, when they were necessary, with an agenda that described whether they would be simply information-sharing meetings, decision-making groups, or meetings to facilitate implementation of chosen project objectives, as described by Buchar. This seemed to bring much success and, in most cases, guaranteed positive attendance records since they understood its expected duration and were given time to prepare discussion or bring with them their own project solutions. This avoided wasted time and seemed to prevent group individuals from being unprepared to take the floor effectively with relevant project discussion. One large-scale problem that I encountered during the project, despite my efforts to gain commitment and motivation, came directly from the health and safety officer regarding space allocation for the new leaflets. This particular individual who was directly involved with performing tasks associated with the project was rather uncooperative in relation to meeting deadlines imposed by the project leader. The health and safety officer did not want to allocate appropriate storage facilities for the leaflets, due largely to the fact that it would have required reorganisation of other stock. I believe from his particular viewpoint, this would have represented high levels of planning and labour and simply did not want to put the efforts forward to assist in meeting objectives. This individual, more than once, informed me that he would have a plan of action developed within a week, but the project leader would have to go in pursuit of the officer only to discover that no plan for space allocation had been developed. The storage allocation was a major consideration for the plan, as the new system that I was developing absolutely required new storage space and processes. In this case, I drew on my knowledge of what acts, often, as the foundation for resistance and attempted to appeal to his needs by relating that I understood the modest burden it would place on his job role. However, despite my efforts, this manager failed to meet deadlines on more than one occasion, which put the project on hold and began to lead to cost issues. I heard, through a third party in the organisation, that the health and safety officer was outraged that I had been given authority over his position for the duration of this project and he felt that his seniority in the business took precedence over any requests that I was making. Faced with this knowledge, and faced with ongoing disruption to the project’s completion, I had to decide how best to handle the situation without harming future colleague relationships and ensure even higher levels of resistance. I decided first to draw on my academic knowledge related to negotiation proposed by Lewicki, Saunders, Minton and Barry (2003) regarding enlightened self-interest as a negotiation strategy. Under this theory, an individual that is causing disruption pursues only outcomes related to their own interests and completely negates consideration of the needs of others, which is what was happening in this situation. To settle the conflict, I chose to appeal to his self-interest by proposing a future exchange as essentially one favour for another to see if I could gain cooperation and remove these thick layers of resistance. Rather than going to the line manager or the operational director for support, which would have likely damaged future colleague relationships, I asked the health and safety officer to accept my deadline and allot the appropriate space. In exchange, I made the promise that I would make one of his future projects my top priority and could call on my expertise and expect full cooperation even if to sacrifice my own short-term job responsibilities. Though this was not an ideal cooperative strategy, it produced the necessary space allotment and the project was taken off of its hold position. In reflection, I genuinely believe this was the proper solution and, essentially, the only solution that would have gained cooperation without management intervention. Conclusion Because I had put together a solid plan of action on how to launch the project, outlining the responsibilities clearly and minimising wasted effort from scheduling multiple face-to-face meetings, the project met its objectives and came in almost 100 percent on target to the original proposal date. At the personal level, despite my own priorities in personal and academic life, I was able to gain commitment and motivation for meeting task assignment objectives and most deadlines effectively. I believe that recognising potential resistance to change prior to actually beginning each task assigned was the reason why this project was considered a success in meeting cost and efficiency objectives. My reward, at the organisational level, tends to reinforce that my efforts were successful as I was made the KHT leaflet champion and now I find line managers coming to me with assistance on my thoughts regarding change implementation when these things had not occurred prior to the project. I feel that I have gained a new respect from my superiors for being both efficient and with the ability to manage multiple employee groups. During the course of the project, I maintained a diary of my experiences that I can use in the future to identify errors in my strategy and develop them more effectively, which I believe will be a quality reference tool. In the future, because of my personal ambitions, I would like to be a homeless officer within KHT and transfer these project learning lessons to an environment that is gratifying financially and emotionally. I learned a great deal about how to improve organisational job satisfaction and how to negotiate with individuals that are strongly resistance to change. I believe these learning lessons will improve my human resources abilities and improve my future possibilities for rapid promotion as a leader who knows how to get the job done. References Buchar, F. (2004), Stifle yawns: wake up your meetings. http://www.humanitarianinfo.org/hic-pakistan/documents/StifleyawnsWakeupyourmeetings.pdf (viewed August 2, 2010). Kotter, J. (2009), Leading change: Why transformation efforts fail, Harvard Business Review, p.2. http://www.bravacorp.com/leadershiphbr11change.pdf (viewed August 3, 2010). Lewicki, R., Saunders, D. Minton, J. and Barry, B. (2003), Negotiation: readings, exercises and cases, 4th ed, London: Mc-Graw Hill Irwin. Patrick, F. (2001), Taking advantage of resistance to change (and the TOC thinking processes) to improve improvements (part 1). Focused Performance, pp 2, 13. http://www.focusedperformance.com/articles/resistance.html (viewed August 2, 2010). Scoutbase.org.uk (2004), Managing change. http://www.scoutbase.org.uk/hq/pri/docs/machange.pdf (viewed August 2, 2010). Read More