Organizational Change

Forces for Change

 Nature of the Workforce

 Greater diversity
 Technology
 Faster, cheaper, more mobile
 Economic Shocks
 Competition
 Global marketplace
 Social Trends
 World Politics

30/11/09 Organizational behavior 2

 Planned Change

 Change
 Making things different
 Planned Change
 Activities that are proactive and purposeful: an
intentional, goal-oriented activity
 Goals of planned change
 Improving the ability of the organization to
adapt to changes in its environment
 Changing employee behavior
 Change Agents
 Persons who act as catalysts and assume the
responsibility for managing change activities
30/11/09 Organizational behavior 3
 Resistance to Change

Resistance to change appears to be a natural and positive

state
Forms of Resistance to Change:
 Overt and Immediate
 Voicing complaints, engaging in job actions
 Implicit and Deferred
 Loss of employee loyalty and motivation, increased
errors or mistakes, increased absenteeism
 Deferred resistance clouds the link between source
and reaction

30/11/09 Organizational behavior 4

 Sources of Resistance to Change

30/11/09 Organizational behavior 5

Tactics for Overcoming Resistance to Change

 Education and Communication

 Show those effected the logic behind the change
 Participation
 Participation in the decision process lessens resistance
 Building Support and Commitment
 Counseling, therapy, or new-skills training
 Implementing Change Fairly
 Be consistent and procedurally fair
 Manipulation and Cooptation
 “Spinning” the message to gain cooperation
 Selecting people who accept change
 Hire people who enjoy change in the first place
 Coercion
 Direct threats and force
30/11/09 Organizational behavior 6
 The Politics of Change

 Impetus for change is likely to come from outside

change agents, new employees, or managers
outside the main power structure.
 Internal change agents are most threatened by
their loss of status in the organization.
 Long-time power holders tend to implement
incremental but not radical change.
 The outcomes of power struggles in the
organization will determine the speed and quality
of change.

30/11/09 Organizational behavior 7

 Lewin’s Three-Step Change Model

 Unfreezing
 Change efforts to overcome the pressures of both
individual resistance and group conformity
 Refreezing
 Stabilizing a change intervention by balancing
driving and restraining forces

30/11/09 Organizational behavior 8

 Lewin: Unfreezing the Status Quo

 Driving Forces
 Forces that direct behavior away from the
status quo
 Restraining Forces
 Forces that hinder movement from the existing
equilibrium

30/11/09 Organizational behavior 9

 Action Research

 A change process based on systematic collection of

data and then selection of a change action based on
what the analyzed data indicates
 Process steps:
1. Diagnosis
2. Analysis
3. Feedback
4. Action
5. Evaluation
 Action research benefits:
 Problem-focused rather than solution-centered
 Heavy employee involvement reduces
resistance to change
30/11/09 Organizational behavior 10