Change Management Concepts

Organizational Behavior - Chapter 18

• Chapter 18 covers organizational change and stress management.

• Learning Objectives

  • Contrast forces for change and planned change.
  • Describe methods to overcome resistance to change.
  • Compare four approaches to managing organizational change.
  • Demonstrate three ways to create a culture for change.
  • Identify potential environmental, organizational, and personal stress sources at work, and the role of individual and cultural differences.
  • Identify physiological, psychological, and behavioral symptoms of work stress.
  • Describe individual and organizational approaches to managing work stress.

Exhibit 18-1: Forces for Change

• Nature of the workforce: More diverse, aging population, immigration, and outsourcing are key forces.
• Technology: Faster, cheaper, and more mobile computers and devices, along with the growth of social media platforms, drives change.
• Economic shocks: Global recessions, housing market fluctuations, and financial sector collapses are significant factors.
• Competition: Increased global competition, mergers, and government regulations are catalysts for change.
• Social trends: Increased environmental awareness, evolving societal perceptions of diversity and inclusion, influencing organizational culture.
• World politics: Political upheavals, globally fluctuating markets, and geopolitical shifts influence organizations worldwide.

Contrast Planned vs. Change

• Change: Involves making something different.
• Planned change: A deliberate, strategic activity to make changes and improve organizational performance.
  • Two key goals are adapting to environmental changes & influencing employee behavior.
• Change agents: Individuals responsible for managing change activities.

Exhibit 18-2: Resistance to Change (Individual & Organizational)

• Individual Sources: Include factors like habit, security needs, and economic concerns. Selective information processing can also create resistance.
• Organizational Sources: Structural inertia and limited focus of change can limit organizational adaptability. Existing power structures may also complicate changes.

Overcoming Resistance to Change

• Communication: Essential to minimize resistance.
• Participation: Involving those influenced by the change can reduce resistance.
• Building support & Commitment: Creating a sense of safety & security surrounding the change.
• Develop positive relationships: Establishing trust and effective interpersonal communication.
• Implement changes fairly: A transparent and equitable approach to the change can reduce resistance.
• Manipulation and cooptation: Managing resistance through less-than-open methods.
• Selection: Carefully choosing people who accept change.
• Coercion: Enforcing the change through threats or intimidation.
• The Politics of Change: Indicates that change is a political process involving different stakeholder groups within an organization. Those outside and those less invested in the status quo are more likely to promote change.

Approaches to Managing Organizational Change

• Lewin's Three-Step Model: Unfreezing, movement, and refreezing.
• Kotter's Eight-Step Plan: Establish urgency, form coalition, create vision, communicate, empower, create short-term wins, consolidate improvements, and reinforce change.
• Action Research: A process using data collection, feedback, action, and evaluation to drive change.
• Organizational Development (OD): Improving organizational effectiveness focusing on collaboration and inquiry. Focuses on how employees' perception of their work environment shapes change.

Creating a Culture for Change

• Managing a Paradox: Management is inherently about managing change.
• Stimulating a Culture of Innovation: Embracing new ideas to improve products, processes, or services based on incremental changes or radical breakthroughs (Ex: electric cars)
• Sources of Innovation: Organizational structure, contingent rewards, slack resources, and inter-unit communication.
• Innovative Cultures & Characteristics: This includes encouraging experimentation, rewarding successes and failures, celebrating mistakes. Managers recognize that failures are common.
• Key Actions for Innovative Cultures: Actively promote training, offer job security, and support the growth of change champions.

Exhibit 18-6: Characteristics of a Learning Organization

• Shared vision and agreement.
• Discarding old routines, thinking of all organizational processes as interconnected.
• Open communication across the organization without fear or criticism.
• Personal self-interest and departmental fragmentation are subordinated to the organization's shared vision.

Stress at Work

• Exhibit 18-7: Work is a significant source of stress for many.
• Sources (Exhibit 18-8): Environmental, Individual, Organizational factors, and Personal factors (Exhibit 18-8).
• Consequences: Physiological, psychological, behavioral symptoms (Ex: illness, anxiety, productivity decrease)
• Model of Stress (Exhibit 18-8): Conceptual framework to illustrate how factors relate to experienced stress, and its outcomes.
• Cultural Differences: Research indicates differences in stressors in different cultures.

Managing Stress at Work

• Individual Approaches: Time management, exercise, relaxation training, and stronger social support.
• Organizational Approaches: Managing organizational factors causing stress, such as modifying task and role demands.
• Strategies: Better selection and placement, goal setting, redesigning jobs, employee involvement, organizational communication, employee sabbaticals, and wellness programs.
• Selection and Placement: Considering experience and control orientation impacting stress.
• Goal-setting: Motivation and less experienced individuals.
• Redesigning Jobs: Improved responsibility, autonomy, greater control over work.
• Employee Involvement: Increasing management control, employee involvement in change, reducing role stress, and making decisions.
• Communication: Improve organizational effectiveness, reduce ambiguity and stress from conflicts.
• Sabbaticals
• Wellness Programs

Implications For Managers

• Change Agents: Managers need to be change agents, role models, and supportive in shaping organizational change cultures.
• Adaptability: Management policies/practices define organizational learning/adaptation to environmental shifts.
• Balancing Good Stress: Some stress is healthy when balanced by positive aspects such as autonomy and responsibility. However, negative stressors (bureaucracy, interpersonal conflicts) should be addressed and eliminated.

Explore the fundamentals of change management with this quiz. Understand the dynamics of planned change, resistance factors, and models like Kotter’s and Lewin’s. Test your knowledge on how organizations navigate change and the psychological aspects that influence it.