Organizational Change Interventions

Organizational Change Interventions

Introduction

Organizations are increasingly acknowledging the inevitability of change in the continuously dynamic hypercompetitive global market. Despite of this recognition, very few organizations are prepared to effectively manage change interventions efforts. Various studies indicate that seventy percent of change management efforts fail to realize their key objectives. In such an environment therefore, effective change management is proving to be a springboard for competitive advantage and a key success factor to all the organizations that will be deliberate and intentional in managing change.

The focus of this essay is to discuss the factors that contribute to high failure rate of change management interventions, and suggest best practices, behaviors and processes required to improve the outcome of change intervention efforts. This is accomplished by first of all examining factors contributing to high failure rate of organizational change management efforts. The last section discusses various appropriate practices, behaviors and processes for realizing the objectives of change interventions efforts.

Factors that account for high failure rate of organizational change interventions

Lack of top management competence in change management is one of the key factors that lead to high failure rate of organizational change management. Critical example of managerial incompetence in change management is in the failure of Dick Smith Electronics, a leading retailer of electronic products in the country. Many reports and press releases have blamed the management for change management incompetence and over-ambitious expansion strategies (Chung, 2016; Catley, 2016). Furthermore, eighty-eight percent of respondents surveyed by Australian Human Resource Institute (2014) revealed that managerial incompetence in change management was the main reason for failure of change efforts. In fact, a study by AIM (2014) revealed that the best CEOs and middle level managers scored an overall of seventy-two and fifty-eight percent respectively in change management.

The role of top management in change management is reiterated in John Kotter change management model. For successful change management, Kotter emphasize that a leader should create a sense of urgency for change. A leader should then create a guiding coalition, which should be supported by a vision and strategy (Beatty, 2015). The change vision and strategy should be continuously communicated and discussed to buy ownership and support.  Change management requires top management commitment to allocate resources that empower broad based action, which are able to create short-term wins (Kotter, 2012). Kotter’s model basically indicates the need for change managerial competency in initiating, guiding and motivating change interventions. Managing change is among the top responsibilities of organizational top managers and leaders. And not unless organizational change management becomes a core managerial competency, many organizations will still continue to encounter dismal results in their change intervention efforts.

Resistance to change is another factor that may hamper the success of change intervention efforts in organizations (Burnes, 2011; Ford et al., 2008). While research indicates that many managers expect to face resistance while implementing change, a few report to have taken proactive initiatives to reduce this resistance. Employees always have myriad reasons for resisting change. According to Kotter and Schlesinger (2008), employees may resist change due to fear of losing something of value. Employees may resist embrace change because they feel that they could lose their position, power or job in the organization. When change is introduced, most employees analyze it with self-interest perspective rather than the entire corporate perspective. If change seems to injure the interest of an individual even though being good for the entire organization, resistance steps in, since each individual is afraid of losing something of value. The response of employees to change is largely determined by the extent they perceive the change to harm their self-interest (Johnson& Hartel, 2014) Secondly employees might resist change due lack of trust and misunderstanding. Change might be outrightly resisted if employees do not understand its implication to their wellbeing, and also when they lack trust in the person spearheading the change. Different evaluation of the effect of change might also result into resistance. When the evaluation of change mean different things to managers and employees, for instance, managers see cost reduction, while employees see downsizing and lose of bonuses, interventions efforts are likely to be resisted.

Another reason for high failure rate of change intervention efforts as identified by AHRI is poor communication. According to a research done AHRI (2014) thirty-eight percent of respondents identified poor communication as key factor hindering the success of change management effort.  Another survey reported seventy percent of respondents having identified effective communication as indispensable ingredient of change management (AHRI, 2014). One extreme effect of poor communication when implementing change was witnessed in National Disability Insurance Agency, under the ministry of Social Service. The Agency failed to make payments to eligible groups due to poor communication and failure in its IT system (Owen, 2016). Reports into the massive failure have indicated inadequacy of information provided to end-users of the payment portal leading to errors that finally hampered the success of the project (Owen, 2016).  A survey by Project Management Institute (Hignett, 2017) further revealed that ineffective communication accounts for more than thirty percent of project failures.

The high failure rate of change intervention efforts can also be attributed to poor planning of change implementation. For change to take place, top management has the responsibility of ensuring that change initiatives are fully supported by existing organization institutions. Kotter (2012) described this as institutionalization of change. No change intervention efforts can be successful without proper institutionalization with existing institutions in the organization. Failure by National Disability Insurance Agency to implement the new payment program can be attributed to failure to institutionalize the program with support systems and programs. The agency failed due to technical hitches in its IT department leading to errors in generation of information. Before such a program could have been implemented, it was prudent for management to upgrade the quality of its information system to ensure that it can efficiently support the new payment program. Change intervention efforts may also fail if they are not institutionalized with organizational leadership, structure, policies, and reward system.

Practices, behaviors and processes that enhances success of change intervention efforts

            The role of top management in change management cannot be underrated. The first step towards improving the outcome of change management efforts is on focusing on the skills and competency of top managers and line managers who are initiate and manage change. If the top management lacks the required skills to accept and manage change, no matter what is done with employees, change management efforts can always prove futile.  Leaders have the responsibility to inspire people for change, and create environment where people feel safe and ooze resilience throughout the change management process. To this end top management need to acquire competence in relationship management, people management, team building, two-way communication and self-management. According to Australian Institute of Management (AIM ) (2014) these skills are required across all levels of management for effective implementation of change interventions.

To overcome resistance to change organizational consultant should encourage communication and education, involvement and facilitation and empowerment. Education and communication is good practice for managers to use during the unfreezing stage of change management. Managers should invest time communicating and educating the employees the reasons for change before it is implemented. Effective communication may require one-on-one meetings, use of interactive communication platforms to disclose the reasons behind change and its intended effect (McClellan, 2011). Communication, according to Kuyvenhoven & Buss (2011) is the only channel achieving a shared vision and change objectives. Involving the people affected with change in the initiation and implementation process is also another effective way of avoiding resistance.  This should be done across all the stages of change management. Studies indicate that involvement of employees in change management efforts does not only result in compliance but also in commitment, which is important for a successful process (Kotter &Cohen, 2012). Empowering employees through training and providing room for autonomous decision-making improves productivity, reducing resistance.  Top management should also be ready to provide emotional support to all employees feeling overwhelmed by the new changes. Indeed, several studies have indicated that empowering middle managers is the central to successful change management (Kuyvenhoven &Buss, 2011; Raelin & Cataldo, 2011). Building trust among employees and those initiating change is very important to successful change management. Managers can reduce the chances of successful change implementation by giving false information about change or refusing to share information at all with affected employees. Sometimes employees only get to understand the real impact of change when they read media reports on expected job losses by anticipated changes at their organization. Johnson and Hartel (2014) observe that being truthful, accurate and realistic in the effects of change to those affected enhances trust and support.

Proper and consistent communication is an effective tool of informing the organization of impending change, and involving them in every step of implementation process. There are various ways organizations can use to communicate change intervention interventions. A survey by AHRI (2014) showed that forty-four percent of respondents preferred two-way communication, twenty-nine percent supported one-on-one communication while twenty-seven percent preferred communication by discussing the benefits of change. Whichever way that is used, management should not only endeavor to tell but also talk to employees on what they are aiming to achieve in attempt to solicit their opinion. Effective communication identifies Johnson and Hartel (2014) can be used to persuade and provide information necessary to transform behavior and motivate efforts for change implementation. Effective communication should also create mechanism of participation, support and empowerment (McClelland, 2011). This helps to increase level of trust in change initiators, decreases anxiety resulting from change and improves job security which eventually eliminates resistance. Kotter in his change model identified the importance of communicating the need for change (urgency), short-term gains and wins realized through change efforts (Kotter, 2012). Effective communication during change interventions is the responsibility of senior and middle management in an organization. Consequently, poor communication could be a result of change management incompetency on top management.

Institutionalizing change intervention efforts to existing institutions is a necessary step during the moving stage of change management. To institutionalize is to ensure that the existing ‘institutions or structures’ fully support change intervention efforts. First of all, organizational consultancy agencies should encourage firms to align their change interventions efforts with its leadership. Implementation of change can be cost-efficient is top managers are willing to inspire the vision, craft strategy and act as role model to other employees. If the existing leadership is not able to provide such guidance, there may be needed to recruit new transformational leaders. Maxwell() strongly affirmed that sometimes, changing the direction of an organization may require change in leadership. Secondly, the favorable organizational culture should be built to encourage change management efforts. For instance, oftentimes, change requires timely, open sharing of information. A culture that discourages open sharing of information and teamwork may not be appropriate for supporting change interventions.

Conclusion

            While organizations are increasingly facing circumstances that require them to reinvent and change the course of their direction, they are multiple factors that are stifling their efforts. Top among these factors is lack of top management competency in change management, resistance to change, lack of proper communication during change intervention and poor planning. These factors, though varied as they are, organizations can begin to improve the outcomes of change intervention efforts by improving top managerial competency in change management. A strategic and visionary leadership is able to guide the organization through the other factors, delivering desired results in circumstances that are hard to believe. A focus on improving leadership competence in change management, however, ought to be the first and not the last step in improving change intervention outcomes. Improving communication, institutionalizing change intervention efforts to organizations institutions, and involvement of employees in change management are other appropriate practices organizations need to implement across all stages of change management to boost success rate. Such efforts are justified because effective change management is becoming a key success factor and a source of competitive advantage in the global market.

 

 

References

Australian Human Resource Institute (AHRI) (2014). Driving sustainable change in the Australian workplace. Retrieved from: https://www.ahri.com.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/39324/Workplace-Change-Insight-Report.pdf

Beatty, C. (2015). Key Success factors of planned change Projects. Retrieved from: http://irc.queensu.ca/sites/default/files/articles/key-success-factors-of-planned-change-projects.pdf

Burnes, B. 2011. Introduction: Why does change fail, and what can we do about it? Journal of Change Management, 11: 445-450.

Catley, C. (2016). Poor strategy to blame for the failure of Dick Smith. Retrieved from: https://www.strategyblocks.com/blog/poor-strategy-to-blame-for-the-failure-of-dick-smith/

Chung, F. (2016). Former director unleashes on Dick Smith Management. Retrieved from: http://www.news.com.au/finance/business/retail/former-director-unleashes-on-dick-smith-management/news-story/73b696510764fed1fcb05e0ff75c75e8

Ford, J.D., Ford, L.W., & D’Ameleio, A. 2008. Resistance to change: The rest of the story. Academy of Management Review, 33(2): 362-377.

Hignett, T. (2017). Poor Communication leads to Project failure one third of the time. Retrieved from: http://www.coreworx.com/pmi-study-reveals-poor-communication-leads-to-project-failure-one-third-of-the-time/

Johnson, M. & Hartel C. (2014). Engaging middle managers for positive organizational change. Discussion Paper: October AIM Research. Australian Institute of Management. Retrieved from: https://managersandleaders.com.au/wpcontent/uploads/2016/12/MIddleManagersDiscussionPaper2014.pdf

Kotter, J. P. (2012). Leading Change, With a New Preface by the Author. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.

Kotter, J. P., & Cohen, D. S. (2012). The heart of change: Real-life stories of how people change their organizations.

Kotter, P.J. & Schlesinger, L. A. (2008). Choosing strategies for change. Harved Business Review. Retrieved from: https://hbr.org/2008/07/choosing-strategies-for-change

Kuyvenhoven, R., & Buss, W. C. 2011. A normative view of the role of middle management in the implementation of strategic change. Journal of Management and Marketing Research, 8: 1–15

McClellan, J.G. 2011. Reconsidering communication and the discursive politics of organisational change. Journal of Change Management, 11(4): 465-480.

Owen, M. (2016). IT glitch, failure to communicate hurt NDIS launch: report.  Retrieved from: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/health/it-glitch-failure-to-communicate-hurt-ndis-launch-report/news-story/afec656e4fd48f287cdd7ee5163d0b94

 

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