For Change in Organization of Management - Business Plan Example

Plan for Change In a rapidly changing world, organizational success − any type of organization − requires the ability: preparedness, resources, technology, knowledge and time − to deal with change, as change could spell out either the organization’s demise or victory, because whether the organization likes it or not, change will happen. It is an inescapable part of life. Thus, “being prepared to manage change is [already] half of the battle won, [as] change is disruptive, whether you see it good or bad” (Schneider, 2007, p.4), because with change comes various risks, thereby requiring wisdom, courage and determination. And for change to better the organization should be planned, whether the change is desired or not. One service provider seeks to generate $12M to build senior care facilities in rural counties in America, as it sees the insufficient senior care facilities available to senior citizens, denying them quality life they should be enjoying during their remaining days. However, recent negative changes worldwide have led to radical changes in the priorities and financial capacities of its sponsors, adversely affecting the service provider’s target, especially so that 75% of its resource building depends solely on sponsorships. With three of its largest benefactors cutting 75% of their original commitment; three withdrawing their support citing that the project is not urgent compared with more urgent needs; two not surviving stiff competition went bankrupt; others changing their original financial support to non-monetary support; leaving the service provider only 30% of what had been originally committed, which was only 20% ($2.4M) of the target. Confronted with this problem, the service provider did conduct a review of its strategy assessing it using the SWOT analysis to measure its overall strength as against present opportunities and threats. As a result, the service provider resolved to change its strategy in resource building. The change was built on the following assumptions: (1) to gain back support and to further solicit more support, the urgency of the project should be well-established; (2) a more established source of funding should be established; (3) proving the efficacy of the project as managed by the service provider would guarantee the trust and confidence of target benefactors and clients. Thus a strategy that would put the urgent need to build senior care facilities in rural counties in America on the national agenda through an organization with established untarnished reputation for quality service would win support from confident benefactors, and involving in income-generating projects that would support the urgent need for senior citizens, would provide the organization with sufficient sourcing, thereby closing the gap between the target fund ($12M) and the actual fund raised ($2.4M). This has not been realized before because there was no strong media back-up. The urgent call or demand for the project was non-existent, so, why would people support the project? Therefore, to close the gap, resource mobilization should be improved and widened in two ways: first, by changing the organization’s strategy in resource building focusing more on a strong media & propaganda campaign that will bring to national attention the urgent need to build senior care facilities in rural counties in America, network building, installing an incentive-oriented positive feedback system and venturing to other income-generating projects; and second, this change shall be combined with the improvement in the organization’s quality service for the organization to be on high moral ground to take on the project and most importantly, for the target benefactors to be confident and to be proud to get involved with the project through the organization. If these changes would be implemented appropriately – correct process, efficient and committed workers, reliable information, appropriate technology, and timely positive feedback, the $9.6M fund gap and most probably more would be raised as more and more benefactors would surely commit to the project. As there are always risk and possible problems that would arise when implementing change, monitoring the implementation should be done religiously and honestly in order to know whether or not the desired outcome is being achieved or being foiled. These would be done using the following: a) A report monitoring board, where tasks are listed, if the task is achieved or not, if not, why, if the desired outcome is achieved or not, if not why b) A monitoring checklist for target media, big business, celebrities c) A color coded map reflecting the stand of local governments on the project d) Accounting report that would monitor the number and amount of support gained. These instruments would serve as database for the regular assessments that would be conducted monthly. This will help unify and level the organization as to the status of change, thus any adjustments made would be easily understood. So for the desired change to take place, the following plan of actions shall be executed: 1. Prepare the organization for the change. Unify the organization on the change plan making sure that the organization understood what bring about the change, and why that change? 2. Organize the organization to implement the change. Build the necessary teams with their corresponding task and significance to the overall desired goal of the change plan: (a) research team that would provide the necessary information useful to the media team, network building team, and lobbying team; (b) media team that would provide media with hot materials favorable to the project, consequentially building positive relationships with media that would result to the organization’s positive image building; (c) propaganda team that would ensure that desired information are widely spread out to useful readers; (d) network building team that would sell to big businesses, funding agencies, bureaucracies and personalities the merit of the project thereby soliciting their concrete support; (e) monitoring team that would monitor the development of the implementation of the change plan, reporting discrepancies that arise; (f) economic planners team that would study on the feasible income generating projects the organization may venture in. 3. Identify and provide the needed support for the teams to function well: knowledge, personnel, technology, finance, communication, and moral support. 4. Devise an incentive-oriented internal and external feed-back system to further encourage positive results. In planning the change top level management down to the team leaders should be involved for the following reasons: (1) greater number of responsible organizational leaders form varied levels would result to a much broader perspective, thus making the plan more acceptable, and acceptability of the planned change is crucial in its successful implementation; (2) the more the leaders are involved in planning the more they associate themselves with the plan, thereby the more they hold on to the change plan. In implementing the plan, the whole organization shall actively get involve focusing on their specific task. The organized and systematic involvement of the whole organization to the change plan would naturally level the organization in understanding the status of the change plan, thus making communication smoother which is very important to the success of the change plan. And in sustaining the change, the managers, leaders and employees should get involve, since to sustain change different levels of expertise are needed. Since the change depends greatly on the projection of the issue – that the need to build senior care facilities in rural counties in America is as urgent as the issues in global crisis, global warming, etc, what would hinder the change is the lack of real life stories or situations that would attest to the validity of the issue, because although it may happen that data could be manipulated to fit in the desired picture to be projected, this will not last, and even very risky to the organization, because once the truth comes out, the whole thing will turn out to be a scam even if the elderly truly benefit from the senior care facilities built, thereby ruining the reputation of the organization that may even lead to its revocation of registration and permit for operation. So what will drive the change is a competent research team, because here lays the crux of the matter – a well-research condition of senior care in rural counties in America that would merit media coverage and national attention. To make the issue more acceptable, it would help to organize the old people in rural counties in America, and with them assess their condition to validate the claim that indeed there is an urgent need for the project. This could also be used as hard evidence to lobby policy change for this issue. In order to facilitate the change the organization has no choice but to invest in time, knowledge, personnel, technology, finance, communication, and moral support. Research alone is expensive, as it requires time, capable personnel, and efficient tools, yet it is essential for the desired change outcome because it is the basis of change. Also, since bringing an issue on the national agenda and soliciting support for $9.4M from organizations, personalities and bureaucracies is never an easy job, then efficient leadership is very much needed to uplift the morale of the organization, which is essential in this change plan because it is the moral authority of the people at work that inspires them to work determinedly enabling them to work at their best withstanding the possible negative impacts of the change plan. The change plan will be implemented following a timeline as illustrated by a Gantt chart below: As illustrated above, the change plan shall be implemented for five years, with the initial year laying the necessary preparation and foundation for the change, that’s why it is closely monitored into months. Phase 2 would be characterized by a strong media and propaganda campaign to project the issue convincing the nation that building senior care facilities in rural counties in America is indeed an urgent need to be addressed and the influx of supports. The dark green colored years would mean the emphasis during that year, while the lighter color only implies continuity. And lastly, Phase 3 would focus on building facilities as it is assumed that by that time the target $12M fund is already raised; then, venturing into income generating projects to augment the sources of fund. To further inspire the people working hard to achieve organizational goal, reward and recognition shall be given to best performers, best motivators, best team achiever, and best team leader. In the same way, people outside the organization who had been significantly instrumental in the achievement of the desired change shall be given public recognition as a way of thanking them and the same time as a way of informing the public on the positive outcome of the change, which most likely will further stir positive reaction to change, thus the desired outcome. Given the growing concern of the world today on human issues, specifically to the most vulnerable sections of the human race: children, women and elderly, it is most likely that with the correct strategy to stir the consciousness of the nation on the need to provide senior care facilities in the rural counties in America, a growing sympathy would be created, which in turn would prompt local governments to confront the issue, especially so that it would be bad for the international image of the US, a super power, that its elderly is dying miserably due to lack of quality senior care facilities in rural counties; it will also persuade big companies, who are also seeking positive public image, to support the organization; until it will be a chain of positive reaction. So with a correct material, plus a good design, and good product marketing strategy, this change will be successful and sustainable. Although, it would also be incorrect to say that everything is answered in planning the change, as there is nothing perfect in this world, and with an inter web like dynamics of relationships, not everything can be predicted. For example, one of the questions left unanswered in the plan but remained a recognized gray area is: What if the government itself recognizing the political significance of the change decided to establish partnership with big business to build senior care facilities on its own, what would happen to the organization? Although, this was not answered it is a consideration that the organization has to take seriously. Reference Schneider, Henry. (2007 September 4). Managing Cultural Change. Process and Product Quality Consulting,LLC. Available at http://www.scribd.com/doc/2374547/Managing-Cultural-Change (Accessed on 15 November 2009) Read More