Organizational Change Experience - Essay Example

Reflective Essay My Organizational Change Experience: From Theory to Reality Introduction As a member of a team tasked by our mentor to accomplish an organizational change project, my experience validated my assumptions that students participating in such exercise tend to believe their roles and contributions to be challenging and meaningful. This paper then attempts to discuss how our group addressed the challenges at hand – setting of goals and rewards guidelines, group task perception, our individual behaviors and attitudes, lack of a leader figure, and the arrival of a newcomer – and our motivation in completing our projects. I will also explore how our group achieved the stage when each one of us have bonded and cohered as one team using Tuckman’s Four-stage model of group development. Coming together for the first time Members of our group, with three out of the supposed four members initially, experienced on the first week of our meeting the feeling of unease and discomfort. Such I believe is but normal in such situation; hence, echo the social identity (Tajfel & Turner 1986) and self-categorization models (Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell 1987; Turner, Oakes Haslam, & McGarty 1994). These models claim that members of a work group will aim to interact with those with similar interests and aspirations among members. According to these models, one’s ideas may sometimes be met with rejection or approval, depending on whom the group find acceptable or not. To overcome this pitfall, we agreeed to turn the challenges by coming up with a better alternative. Also, on account that we are just three, there is no real threat that our group will fail due to disruptive behaviors among ourselves. Setting a group goal, reward and resources On the first day, we have successfully set a goal for our forthcoming activities despite the difficulty of deciding for lack of a leader. During our goal setting, we agreed to be more open and fair by constantly interacting among one another. In setting our guideline for rewards, we agreed to reward ourselves once we have accomplished our project. Given these group structure of task and reward system, Tjosvold (1986) noted that these are key factors in promoting perceptions of a superordinate goal. Observations and Perceptions about Completing the Project We consider the very tight deadline for us to submit the project, our physical distance and the availability of everyone of us in communicating and holding meetings as limitations for us to accomplish the project. Agreeing to work on the Open Channel Change project, we believe this is an entirely new realm that is worth exploring but may be challenging. This project requires focus and unity among us to achieve the goals we set for ourselves to achieve. I perceived this project will entail hardwork among my teammates due to the numerous limitations and risks, along with the lack of a leader and the lack of additional member. This lack of leadership figure is quite hard a challenge for our group in dealing with problem solving and may drag on us as we work on our project I have observed. The tendency and risk of not having a leader whom we will look up to for inspiration, for rendering expert skills and for advice in the initial phase of our group work is that we lose some valuable time agreeing on the best option available for us. Should there have been a leader during our first meeting, we may have progressed ahead of other groups because he or she may have moderated or settled the early interaction difficulties during our brainstorming session in coming up with a team goal and rewards guidelines. A leader, if available, would have been an authoritative figure who will manage our group’s early interaction processes. The researchers Maier and Solem (1970) suggest that solutions are arrived at if a leader actively protects minority views from social pressure and encourages the group to consider opposing perspectives. Their research also made an informed conclusion that disagreements in a group can serve as either a stimulus for innovation or a source of conflict, depending on the attitude of the leaders. Apart from deciding who will lead us as one of the biggest challenges we have, the very long wait for a new member to be assigned us was another factor that slowed our group works. I have observed that there is a psychological burden that this void posed to me and my peers because it then became an invisible excuse for not worrying or hastening our completion of the project eventhough we never actually tell this feeling among ourselves. However, as we progresssed and work out the project during the ensuing weeks, the actual experience and the surrounding limitations that surmount our performance of our respective roles and functions did validate my initial perceptions toward this project. Somehow, the actual work is more difficult than projected initially. Thankfully, if not with the Team Charter form that we signed to bind our commitments together to do our best in coming up with a good project, the challenges that grew each day will not be overcome. The Stages of our group development Framing on the Four-stage model of group development formulated by Bruce Tuckman (1965), this model may apply also to how our group started and then eventually accomplished our goals. On the first phase of group development or Forming, this is when the three of our group’s members first come together as assigned by our mentor then get to know ourselves. On the Storming phase, although we have not individually aspire to each vie for a leadership role, however, we passed through this stage when we trialled some processes about our interactions and relationships. On our second week, the group is slowly reaching some agreement on how we will operate or the Norming stage. On this stage, we started setting up meetings, communications, rewards guidelines and arrived at a group goal on how we will operate during our completion of our project. Then as the group practices and undertakes its project, and gradually becoming effective in meeting its objectives, we have finally reached the Performing stage. However, after a decade of this model, Tuckman added the fifth stage of his group development theory: the Adjourning. In this stage, our team have already embarked and successfully completed our project. Thus, the very moment that we decided to reward ourselves with a lovely dinner together may fall under this stage, the letting go of the structure we established and then moving on. During our first few meetings, which we may consider this stage as the formative phase, our group works actively to achieve its task goals by elaborating, enacting, monitoring and modifying the patters of interactions established during formation. At the start of our group’s life, our composition is a significant initial condition that can have an enduring effects on various processes. Then as a consequence of our team development, we become more coherent and bonded with one another. We found the studies by Levine & Moreland (1998) ring true in our case because as we develop rapport among ourselves, I observed that we become more active in participating and enjoying team activities, remain on our team and resist team disruptions. Cohesion increase conformity to team norms and punishment of those who deviate from these norms. It would not be surprising, then if members of cohesive teams tended to resist innovation efforts on the part of a newcomers, as Levine and Moreland (1998) noted. Conclusion In their studies about team motivations, Ekvall (1987, 1996) and Turnipseed (1994) said that the energies and attention of such groups are focused on the creative problems or challenges at hand and intrinsic motivation is allowed to flourish. More importantly, we observed that when arguments and friction do occur, we center the discussion on ideas, and not people. Personal antagonism does not seem to have any room in our group during the course of our completion of the assignment. In sum, since we agreed to achieve the qualities of a supportive group goal than by operating as individual each. everyone believe each one’s role is challenging and relevant for the completion of our project. As a result, we all feel free to search for information and to seek the support of others, and the air of openness and trust that pervade among us and a psychological sense of security soon prevail even without the presence of a leader or someone with expert skill to be dependent on and serve as the authority in deciding when something is asked about such subject. References Arrow, H, McGrath, JE and Berdahl JL 2000, Small groups as complex systems: Formation, coordination, development and adaptiation, Thousand Oaks Ca: Sage. Ekvall, G 1996, Organizational climate for creativity and innovation, European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 5, p. 105-123. Ekvall, G 1987, The climate metaphor in organization theory, In BM Bass & PJD. Drenth (eds), Advances in organizational psychology, p. 177-190, London: Sage. Levine, JM, & Moreland, RL, & Ryan, CS 1998, Group socialization and intergrop Relations, In C Sedikides, J Schopler, & CA Insko (eds), Intergroup cognition and integroup behavior, p 283-308, Mahwah, MJ: Erlbaum. Tjosvold, D 1986, Dynamics of interdependence in organizations, Human Relations, 39, p 517- 540. Turnipseed, D 1994, The relationship between the social environment of organizations and the climate for innovation and creativity, Creativity and Innovation Management, 3, 194-195. Wood, J Zeffane, R Fromholtz, M and Fitzgerald, J 2006, Organisational Behaviour: Core Concepts and Applications, Wiley: Brisbane. Read More