ChangeLeadership

Long Description

Resistance to Change

Change can be problematic. People often have difficulties accepting and dealing with change. As a result, organizations often have difficulty moving forward when employees do not embrace and accept required change. Resistance to change can become such a powerful force that it restricts an organization’s ability to stay relevant.

Think about some major area of change in your life that you may have resisted, or had difficulties dealing with. Think about how you overcame that resistance and how you dealt with that change.  

There are a number of reasons why people within organizations often resist change.  Unfortunately, change is often seen as a threat, and as a concerned source of uncertainty.  

Why people might resist change:

• Uncertainty
• Change of Habits
• Reduced Confidence
• Loss of Control
• Bad Timing
• Extra Work
• Lack of Purpose
• Feelings of Inadequacy.

Bringing about Acceptance: Models of Change

Effective leaders work hard and efficiently to help create acceptance to change, and to reduce organizational resistance to change. This can happen in different ways, or via different strategies. These are commonly referred to as models of change, and include top-down change, bottom-up change, integrated change leadership, as well as incremental and transformational change.

Top-Down Change

A top-down change model is one where senior levels of management make decisions regarding goals and objectives, and attempt to make changes based on those decisions. The potential problem with top-down change is that middle and lower levels of management, as well as front line employees have no say in those decisions, or reasons for change. Research suggests that a high proportion of top-down change is unsuccessful within organizations. This might be because the opinions and attitudes and thoughts of most people in the organization were not considered, even though they are the ones who will be responsible for implementing the actual changes. If top-down change is not supported within the organization, it usually always fails.

Bottom-Up Change

A bottom-up change model is really just the opposite of a top-down model. That is, the change, and associated initiative comes from any and all parts of the organization, including low level managers and frontline employees. This often requires involvement, initiative, and empowerment of all employees within the organization.  Often times the best opportunities for positive change comes from frontline employees who really know the business and the consumers the best.  

Watch the following video to explore an example of bottom-up change in action:

Integrated Change Leadership

In an Integrated Change Leadership (ICL) model, the best attributes of the top-down and bottom-up change models are meshed. The end result is usually a more healthy and balanced approach to change, and more successful organizations. Change is initiated by both the top and the bottom to help encourage a culture of positive change while ensuring everyone in the organization has ownership.

Incremental and Transformational Change

Incremental change is planned organizational change that happens slowly and constantly over a period of time. The aim of this approach is not to make too much sweeping change all of a sudden, but rather maintain change that is scheduled and rolled out with intent. The advantage here is that the change has a chance to take hold, and the organization can deal with issues and problems that might arise. Too much change in a short period of time could become very harmful to processes and fundamental goals of the organization.

Transformational change, on the other hand, is a form of radical and deliberate change in an attempt to produce dramatic and major changes to and within an organization. The difference here is that the change creates fundamental changes to the culture and purpose of the organization. Transformational change is most often delivered from top-level managers in an effort to make major shifts in the organization.  Transformational change often occurs as a result of major concerns within an organization, and often has to do with changing an organization to keep it alive.  

Examples of Transformational Change Scenarios:

1. Technology - Often, depending on industry, organizations might have to make quick, deliberate, and sweeping changes as a result of changes in technology.  Think about the print publishing industry - magazines, newspapers, etc. These organizations have had to consider very different business models as the result of huge changes in the way people consume content, and news - the result of Internet technologies.

   

2. Product Restructuring - Redefining products or a complete change of products is another way businesses could make transformational change. In the mid 1990s, when Apple was losing money and had a tiny market share, Steve Jobs was re-hired as the CEO. Jobs quickly redefined the company's product line, including the development of the iPhone, and returned the company to a great level of success.

   

3. Market Repositioning

   Sometimes companies need to redefine their position in the marketplace in order to make transformational change. In 2006, McDonald’s experienced its first ever corporate loss. Leadership knew that transformational change was necessary. The company redefined themselves with the McCafe culture, and became much more transparent with product ingredients and manufacturing processes. They repositioned themselves as a healthier, kinder, and transparent fast food restaurant.

   

Other Change Strategies

A few other ways in which managers could bring about change are through coercion, rational persuasion, or a shared power strategy.

Coercion

A coercive strategy for change is one that ultimately uses formal authority to implement change. It might also use a reward or punishment system to achieve the change within an organization. A manager might make a formal announcement that a change in procedure is happening now, and anyone who does not like it, or does not follow the procedure, will be formally punished.

Rational Persuasion

A rational persuasion change strategy attempts to get all employees on board with the change through careful and deliberate evidence to support the change. This persuasion generally comes top-down. This might employ elements of expert knowledge, research, data mining, etc., in order to persuade. The goal is to demonstrate a real need for change, and that the need is not simply based on someone's, or a group’s own personal opinions. The real goal of rational persuasion is to persuade all employees that the change is essential.

Shared Power

A shared power strategy is one that attempts to identify the need for change, and guide that change, through a collaborative approach, involving all levels of management and employee groups to identify change and plan for change. This type of change strategy is typically slow, but often leads to the most supported levels of change.

It is important to understand that there isn’t just one right change strategy that works all the time. All of the strategies have their inherent advantages and disadvantages.  The most appropriate change strategy that will work best really does depend on the unique situation and overall context.

Read this article, It's Time To Change The Way We Think About Change from Forbes (Original article)

Organizational Forces of Change

We have examined that people often resist change, and the reasons for that resistance. We also explored models of change. Now, it's time to delve into what actually forces change within organizations, that is, the elements that bring about change. The following five forces of organizational change are often considered internal forces of change, that is, change that is brought about by factors inside the organization itself.

 

Other Organizational Challenges

Elements that might bring about change from outside the organization are usually called external forces of change. These are often viewed as organizational challenges, and they usually spearhead some element of change to organizations.

Major organizational challenges, or external forces of change often include:

1. Technology
2. Internet
3. Globalization
4. Political Environment.

Legal Considerations for Change

Lastly, another major external force of change for organizations is the presence of laws and rules in society. How might the legal environment (laws and societal rules) create the need for change within organizations? Think about things such as workplace safety standards, equal access for people with disabilities, pay equity, labour laws, etc. (all things discussed earlier in this course), and how they might require changes to and within organizations.

Review Quiz

 

1. This is not a typical reason why people resist change.
   1. Poor timing
   2. Reduced workloads
   3. Change of habits
   4. Uncertainty
   5. Reduce confidence
   Answer

   b. Reduced workloads.

2. A more balanced approach to change.
   1. Bottom up
   2. Top down
   3. Incremental
   4. Transformational
   5. Integrated Change Leadership
   Answer

   e. Integrated Change Leadership.

3. Organizational change that could involve changing the entire product line.
   1. Top down
   2. Incremental
   3. Transformational
   4. Bottom up
   Answer

   c. Transformational.

4. Incremental change.
   1. Major sweeping change
   2. Only happens from top-down
   3. Only happens from bottom-up
   4. Small, deliberate, planned change that occurs systematically
   Answer

   d. Small, deliberate, planned change that occurs systematically.

5. An internal force of change might be
   1. Legal considerations
   2. Globalization
   3. Political environment
   4. Organizational culture
   Answer

   d. Organizational culture.

6. This is not a legal consideration for change.
   1. Pay equity
   2. Workplace safety
   3. Technology
   4. Access for people with disabilities
   Answer

   c. Technology.

7. An example of an Internet-related force for change might be
   1. Social media
   2. E-commerce
   3. Increased competition
   4. All of the above
   Answer

   d. All of the above.

8. An organizational change that requires a change of leadership, is considered
   1. An internal force of change
   2. An external force of change
   3. A technology related change
   4. A tasks related change
   Answer

   a. An internal force of change.

9. Changing the way in which the organization is configured (e.g., departments and chains of command), is considered
   1. An external force of change
   2. A structure force of change
   3. A task related change
   4. A people related change
   5. A legal force of change
   Answer

   b. A structure force of change.

10. Adapting a new billing software would be an example of
    1. An Internet related force of change
    2. A people related change
    3. An external force of change
    4. A technology related force of change
    5. A culture force of change
    Answer

    d. A technology related force of change.

11. Transformation change
    1. is planned and slow
    2. is most often delivered from top-down
    3. is often collaborative
    4. is an example of bottom-up change
    Answer

    b. is most often delivered from top-down.

12. A change strategy that uses expert knowledge and data mining, for example.
    1. Rational persuasion
    2. Coercion
    3. Shared Power
    4. Incremental change
    5. Internal change
    Answer

    a. Rational persuasion