Management Over The Organisational Process Of Change example essay topic

To fully examine this question, it would be important to first look at what forms change can take within an organisation and to establish why an organisation sets out to make these changes. The process of change can be threatening and traumatic for both individuals and groups within a company. In my opinion, managers need to encompass certain specific leadership qualities in order to reduce resistance to change, in order to encourage their employees to see change as an opportunity. Change can also be implemented through organisational strategy. A learning organisation uses the concept of change as a fundamental principle for the growth of the organisation. Within the current fast-paced, globally competitive market, the learning organisation is proving to be very successful.

Organisations such as Yahoo! , a major Internet search engine, which is creative, innovative and easily adaptable. These are essential elements needed to remain competitive within the ever-changing Internet industry. Change can affect different parts of an organisation in various ways. To describe the various areas of an organisation that could be subjected to change, Rosenfeld and Wilson suggest (90: 247), 'a power shift between management and employees, a change in organisational structure, or a change in management and leadership styles.

' The balance of power can change depending on whether the political differences between workers, groups and managers begin to cause conflict. This can happen because the level of power awarded to each of these groups is not appropriate according to their influence within the organisation as a whole. The structure of the organisation may need to change in order to survive and maintain a competitive advantage within the outside market environment. Change is a crucial capacity in this current climate of global competition. One of the main factors for achieving a competitive advantage in the global market economy is to see workers as the most important asset, Wray-Bliss (2001). If workers are essential to change then the process of change must be examined in greater detail.

However, the top-down view change as explained in Hellriegel, Jackson and Slocum (1999), suggests that change is a planned set of stages imposed on employees. In this way, change could be seen to be described as being like an 'event' which happens to an organisation. But a crucial part of organisational change lies in the need for individuals to react and adapt to new situations that occur as a result of change. As humans are involved, change could actually be seen as a process, one that is interactive, complex and uncertain.

According to Hellriegel, Jackson and Slocum, (99: 438), the process of organisational change is explained thus, Start Hellriegel and Slocum (1999) explain that in order to establish whether or not change is necessary for an organisation, the internal and external environments must both be assessed. If it is decided that the organisation could perform to a higher standard in either of these environments, then the organisation management must decide how to implement the necessary changes. Before this can occur however, the possible sources of resistance to change must be ascertained. These sources may be individuals or whole groups of workers within the organisation.

So, in turn, the management must seek to understand the causes of resistance in order to reduce the threat of change posed to employees using various strategic methods. After the organisational changes have been implemented, management must follow up the change. This is done in order to ensure that the organisation has benefited in terms of performance from the organisational changes and can make relevant changes to their goal plan accordingly. As mentioned earlier, one of the main barriers for successfully carrying out change within the workplace is resistance to change.

Many workers may feel that change is threatening or traumatic for different reasons. Rosenfeld and Wilson, (90: 247), give some of these reasons for individuals to feel threatened by change to include: 'a fear of failure, loss of status, fear of the unknown, inertia and a loss of friends. ' For organisations, R&W (90: 247), change may be seen as a threat to 'the strength of the company culture, the ridgity of the organisation structure or the strongly held beliefs of the management'. Sometimes individual workers of an organisation have a low tolerance to change because there is a lack of communication and trust between management and the workers.

This lack of interaction can lead to wrong interpretations of what the change will involve for them. If the workers do not feel as though they have the necessary skills to cope with organisational change then this could result in workers losing interest in the organisation and their work. It could also mean that workers could lose job satisfaction because they do not have the necessary skills required of their new role. As a result of this, workers may be resistant to change because they want to remain secure in their existing jobs and not risk taking on new roles when the do not possess the adequate skills needed to do the job properly. With this in mind, it would be important to elaborate on the different methods used by managers to ensure change is a success and also why change can be a great opportunity for an organisation. To do so, management must reduce resistance to change from the organisation's individuals and groups.

The management of the British Airways airline has effectively reduced the threat of change for their employees, Hellriegel and Slocum (1999). The employees saw very little reason to change their manner of working and felt secure within the government-subsidised airline, but the management of British Airways wanted the company to become the one of the best airlines in the world. British Airways offered customer training to all employees, in the form of language classes in four the most universally understood languages. As a result of this, the airline now has skilled staff who are motivated and dedicated to their jobs. This is a clear example of workers being made to feel valued by an organisation that takes care of their employees' education. British Airways, as an international company has also benefited greatly as a result of the management's decision to train staff in language skills.

In today's international market, where social transformations are constantly taking place, linguistic skills are often seen as invaluable asset. For an international airline, language training for employees would give an unmistakable competitive advantage in the global market, helping, British Airways become one of the best airlines in the world. Education of employees is therefore one method used to reduce resistance to change in the workplace. There are however other possible methods that may be used to lower the threat of change to employees, management and to the organisation itself. For employees, active participation and negotiation are key factors to ensuring successful change, Hellriegel and Slocum (1999). If employees participate and negotiate with management over the organisational process of change then this could increase the chances of profitable change in several ways.

There would be a reduced chance of employees wrongly interpreting the change because they would have played a more active role alongside the organisation management throughout the implementation of the fundamental changes. Being more involved; workers are more likely to feel interested in the company and the changes it is making. This in turn is more likely to produce better results for the changes, as a motivated workforce tends to work more consistently when they are made to feel like an essential part of the organisation. In order to reduce resistance from a manager's perspective, it is important to recognise the importance of managerial qualities such as adaptability, spirit of inquiry and flexibility, Glover (2001). These qualities help to identify, select and develop managers who are able to understand cultural influences within their managerial tasks.

Change could be dealt with more efficiently if managers are able to develop these qualities. If a manager was adaptable for example, according to Glover (2001), then they would have the readiness to change and compromise and the ability to adapt easily to new situations. As managers do not have total control over the process of change due to the uncertain human element, the attribute of adaptability is especially important because managers are then more able to deal with different situations, which may arise from this human element. The other two qualities of a manager that could help to reduce resistance to change in the workplace are a spirit of inquiry and flexibility. Both of these qualities could be said to be especially helpful to managers seeking change within international organisations. A manager with a spirit of inquiry may have heightened logical reasoning and good systematic methods of observation, Glover (2001).

The fact that a manager is able to observe situations in a logical manner would mean that the change process would be conducted in a more controlled manner, which may make the workforce feel more at ease with the organisational changes. The third quality recommended of a manager in these circumstances according to Glover (2001), is flexibility. This managerial attribute could also be important for global organisations because as Glover points out (2001), flexibility in this context is the ability to monitor the organisation's internal and external environments, and the capability to have a variety of skills that can be adapted to many diverse situations. A manager being able to deal easily with different situations within the organisation or in the external environment during the change process could reduce resistance to change by being able to deal with problems as they arose, be they concerning individuals or the whole organisation. The last method that I shall discuss concerning the managers' opportunity to reduce resistance to change is the practice of selecting an organisational strategy that allows for change to occur more easily. One strategy that an organisation may wish to adopt in order to enable change to take place is to become what is known as a learning organisation.

The culture of the learning organisation focuses on empowering individuals through continuous learning and building a sense of community, Hellriegel and Slocum, (99: 431). It is also very keen to establish a team-based network that holds no boundaries for individuals within the company, H&S (99: 432). The main strategies of the learning organisation are to remain customer focused and to have long-term perspectives, H&S (99: 432). One example of a current learning organisation is Yahoo! , which today is one of the most successful Internet search engines. At Yahoo! , 'managers and employees alike have steadily absorbed and applied lessons from an industry involved in explosive growth', H&S (99: 457). This company is constantly reinventing itself in order to remain profitable within this ever-changing industry.

This has attracted workers who are extremely self-motivated and who are willing to work with change in order to meet demanding schedules, H&S (1999). By applying the strategies of the learning organisation, managers could help to encourage the process of change as employees have a clearer focus of what they were working for in terms of organisational goals and customer needs. Wider communications within a team-orientated environment would mean that the employees might feel more valued as a member of the company and more motivated to work to the best of their abilities for their organisation. In conclusion, I have tried to show what is actually meant by the process of change, which is essentially human-orientated and therefore interactive, complex and uncertain. Change can often pose a threat to individuals and the organisational structure itself. Overcoming resistance and seeing change as an opportunity can be done using several different approaches.

Managers can adopt certain qualities or organisational strategies to the company in order to encourage workers to be more receptive to change. Change as a concept is constantly developing and reacting to the external environment. I think to describe change in absolute terms however, would not be possible due to this very nature of continuously adapting to new situations within the internal and external environments of the organisation.

Bibliography

Hellriegel, Jackson and Slocum; Management, (1999), Southwestern College Publishing.
Rosenfeld and Wilson, Managing Organisations, (1996), McGraw Hill International UK Limited.
Dr Edward Wray-Bliss; Organisational Culture, (21/3/2001), Managing Organisations Lecture Notes, University of Stirling.
Dr Ian Glover; Globalization II: International HRM, (4/42001), Managing Organisations Lecture Notes, University of Stirling.