Causes of Changes in Organizations and How They Are Approached - Coursework Example

The Running Head: Change Management In Organizations (Your Name) (Your Institute) Introductions. The management system of any organization will determine the success or failure of an organization in future. This is because the leaders are the ones who are responsible for making all the day-to-day decisions in these organizations. Therefore any business firm should ensure that it has competent leaders that will enable it to perform well. The leaders of these organizations should ensure that they are always updated of the organizations performance to enable them make informed decisions on management issues of these organizations. (Smith2005b) Causes of Changes in Organizations And How They Are Approached. The Change process in organizations is a common phenomenon. The cause of these changes varies from one organization to another. Changes in organization can result due to a new business process or technologic changes. These changes can arise when a company changes its strategy plan for success, removes or introduces a major section or practice the change can also result when a company decides to change its method of operation. Examples of such changes in organizations include cases where companies changes the products or services they offer. It can also happen when two or more organizations merge or when organizations joins or separates two or more of its departments. For organizations to have a success change process the managers or leaders of these organization should be conversant with the various approaches to the change process. These approaches include those that are planed, structured and clear while others are mainly natural, unfolding and implicit. Some of these changes that take place in organizations works from the future to the present. An example of such a change is a change that involves a vision. Such a change begins with a vision and then a plan for achieving this vision is developed. There are those changes that works from the present to the future such changes include changes when leaders identifies organizations priorities which can be organizations’ goals or issues that need to be addressed. After the realization of these priorities a plan is established to address these needs of the organization. For leaders to be success in change management they should ensure the following; The leaders or the change agent should be conversant with the management and leadership of their organizations. This includes the structures and cultures of these unions. Organizations can adapt one of the following management systems; (Smith2005b) Top-down structure-In this structure directors or managers of an organization are the one who are responsible for making all the decisions pertaining to any changes in these organization. The ideas and suggestions from the other workers of the company are not taken into consideration. The leaders make their own observations on how the company is running and if the company is not performing according to their expectations, they make changes on the operations of the business. Before introducing these changes in the organization they do not consult the other workforce on what should be done to improve performance in the organization. The involvement of the other people can help leaders to make better decisions as the people on the field are aware of their problems at their place of work and can offer good solutions on how to overcome these challenge which will then help to boost the performances of these organizations. (Woodward1965) Down-up structure-In this structure all the parties concerned are involved in the decision making. The directors and managers encourage their work force to forward their problems at their place of work. They also respect and honor the recommendations they forward if they see they can work to promote the performance of the organizations. The leaders, managers or the change agents in organizations should know that the success of the change process lies on their hands. They should be able to identify the nature of the structure of their organizations to be successful in implementing these changes in their organizations. They should also understand themselves well that is, they should know how they manage conflicts, respond feedbacks, make their decision, and solve their problems also be aware of their skills and limitations. This will help them in the process of their preparation before approaching the change process. This preparation can either be putting the team to oversee the change process in place or putting the other resources for use in the change process in the right place. In these processes the leaders perception of the time factor is very important in change management. Leaders and managers have different perception to the past, present and future. Leaders who are so much inclined on their past will always boast of their past and will hence oppose change. Those leaders whose focus is on the present will see needs for a change in their organizations but will do nothing since they do not have solutions to the prevalent problems in their organizations. Those leaders that are able to see through a successful change in their organizations are those leaders whose focus is on the future of their organizations. The solutions to the problems in their organizations are not temporal but these leaders look for lasting solutions for their organizations. They do not address the symptoms but the underlying causes regardless of the effort required. (Woodward1965) The leaders who are familiar with the organization culture will mostly manage the change process successfully. The culture of an organization involves the way rules are shared, people attitude and their behavior in these organizations. In organizations where people are trusted there is a big social values and this makes such people to trust and have confidence in their companies. Changes in such organizations do not face stiff resistance as people involved accept the changes, which assist to facilitate a quick transition of the change process. In those organization that do not trust their people the change process is very difficult as it comes through a lot of opposition. This is because the approach to change is seen by the people as the failure of the leaders. This makes the managers to use coercive approach to change management. This spoils the people’s attitudes towards the change process and their participation in this process becomes passive. In such organizations the change process does not succeed since active participation of all the people in the organization is vital for successful change process to occur. (Woodward1965) The leaders should learn to stay in communication in their organization. They should encourage sharing of information either through the print media such as letters and company’s magazines or through the verbal means that can involve the use of telephone or face-to-face talk. This enables the employees to be updated on the organizations happenings and can assist them to be prepared for the changes in the organizations. Change Strategy Change is an ever-present factor in the life of organizations. Therefore it is very necessary for leaders to understand the cause of the needs for changes in organizations. They should also make sure that they determine the effect and extent of these changes on the organization. They should know how much the changes would affect the employees’ behavior patterns in their place of work. This will be necessary, as it will help the managers to develop a program to oversee these changes in the organization. The program developed should support the employees as they undergo this process of embracing the change. The developed program should then be implemented and monitored for its performance. It should be modified appropriately to enable it integrate well in the origination system. (Smith2005b) For any change to be effective it should be implemented strategically. A strategic management team should be put into place to oversee these changes. The team will be responsible for designing of the program to administer the changes necessary in the organizations. The team will also be responsible for communicating this visional change to the rest of the workforce and organize them for ready for the changes. The process of implementation of the changes is faced with a lot of opposition. There is a lot of resistance from many workers in an organization. The leaders should therefore ensure that they introduce these changes very strategically to avoid the workers developing bad attitudes towards the company, which can lower their performances. (Smith2005b) Resistances of Changes in Organizations A change is accompanied with uncertainty and therefore resistances to changes in organizations cannot be avoided. These resistances can either be meek or very severe. The cause of resistance to change can be due to the nature of the changes themselves or the approach taken to address these changes. Therefore it is important for the leaders to determine the nature and the reason of the resistance to the changes before impending the change process. This will help them to address these resistances to the change process effectively instead of wasting a lot of time trying to fight them. This can be realized if the leaders and the team to oversee the change process communicate to the people affected by these changes their importance. They should avoid the coercive approach to the change management. Instead they should listen from the people affected by the changes and in cooperate some of the suggestions of these people in the change process. In this way it will help in changing the situation to a positive one. This process will help the organization to build a good relationship between the leaders and other people, which will guarantee a healthy organization in the future. The ability of the leaders to listen to the peoples affected will help in convincing the people to accept the changes and be involve in the change process. Leaders that genuinely engage themselves in serious debates with those people who are opposing changes build good moral authority to the team charged with the implementation of the change. The holistic approach to change advocates the leaders to use authority and power to those people that forcefully oppose the organization change process. This is because they hinder an organization to achieve its goals. (Perren1996) Examples Of Companies That Have Gone The Change Process And Their Approach The Yin Company. When the Zygot Company purchased the Yin the CEO of the Zygot Company assured the employees of Yin Company there would be no change that will take place in the near future. This was not true because there was a need for change in the Yin Company. This is because there were several similar functions in these two companies. Therefore there was a need to reduce the number of employee in the Yin company due to the overlapping functions of the two companies The management team met and selected the team that was to be left in the Yin company and were officially informed. Then all the employees were given some forms to fill and afterward the announcement of the change to all the staff was made. The Yang Company The Yang Company realized that it was experiencing a hard time and decided to cut its cost down. It was established that for the company to be able to cut down its cost it must stop some of its major projects. This resulted to the need for it to reduce the number of staff in the company. The CEO communicated this issue to all the staff and advocated for any contributions from the employees. Some employees suggested their salaries to be reduced to help the company manage to retain its entire staff. Some of the contributions of the employees were considered and implemented in the change process. Some workers were retrenched, others left to look work for work in more stable companies while the rest remained in the company. Effects on the companies The failure of the Zygot CEO to tell the employees the truth contributed greatly to its loss of most of its key employees. Therefore it is very important for leaders to communicate to the employees the truth. This will help the organization to build trust and confidence in the organization. This assists to ensure successful changes takes place in such organizations since people will accept changes easily. Those organizations that do not tell the employees the hard truth makes their work force loss trust and confidence in them like the case of the Zygot Company CEO. On the other hand the ability of CEO of the Yang Company tell the employees the hard truth and him able to involve them in the change process ensured that all the employee were happy since they were told the truth and involved in the change process. (Pascale1990) Conclusion. Effective change management in organization is important. This is because it will enable an organization to evolve from one stage to the next as it grows and develops with time. Organizations should therefore look for those leaders that are able to manage changes successfully to help improve the performance of their organizations. Leaders should inform the other people of the impending changes in their organizations. This will help them to prepare on how to tackle the uncertainty that accompanies these changes. This also helps the leader to cultivate trust and confidence from the people that reduce the resistance of the people to these changes. They should also involve the other people in the change process by genuinely listening to the complain of the people affected by the changes. They should organize brainstorming sessions with people to help them determine the nature of the changes and the approach to be adapted in change management. The leaders should in cooperating some of the suggestions and recommendations of the people affected by the changes in the organization. Thus cementing the leaders people relationship. (Perren1996) The leaders should learn to be effective in the process of managing the opposition to change. This will be ensured by them listening keenly to the complain from the people in the organizations and then trying to explain to them the importance of the change process to the whole organization and them in particular. In this way they will be successful in turning this resistance to be the advantage of the organizations. Otherwise the leaders and managers should avoid the use of coercive approach to change as they it will make the attitude of the people worse towards the change process, which can contribute greatly to the failure of the leaders in their mission of implementing these changes. If the leaders and managers in organizations consider the above factors in the change process, they will always have successful change process. (Perren1996) References Perren, L. (1996), Resistance to change as a positive force: its dynamics and issues for management development Oxford Publishing Press: London Pascale, R. 1990, Managing on the Edge: How Successful Companies Use Conflict to StayAhead, Viking Penguin, London Smith, I. (2005b), Achieving readiness for organizational change Management, Chicago University Press: Chicago. Waddell, D., Sohal, A.S. (1998), Resistance: a constructive tool for change Prentice Hall Publishers: New York. Woodward, J. (1965), Explaining Development and Change in Organization London, Oxford University Press Read More