Essay: Change Management - Issues & Solutions" (50 Characters)

Identifying Issues with Change Management

Question:

Discuss about the Change Management for Journal of Intellectual Capital.

Focus of this paper is to identify the issues related to change management and obstacles brought up by these at the time of conceiving, planning and implementing change in an organisation. At present time, organisations over industries are facing challenges in their operation that requires to be altered for gaining greater performance by developing greater workplace environment. These issues are further hindering in the process of change implementation. Hence, the research primarily developed on the ground of identification of the issues holding the organisation from implementing change. The important contributor in this field are Chapman and Ferjola, Bolman and Deal, and Kreitner and Kinicki, who’s work will be of primary sources of knowledge.  Moreover, several change management models available can be implemented for actualising systematic change in the organisation. Hence, the paper further evaluates the change management process and identifies the most effective change management model applicable for bringing change.

Different scholars over time contributed in identifying the issues that are restricting the organisations from conceptualising, planning and implementing change. They proposed various perspectives on the issues and viewed it from different angles. Chapman and Ferolja Chapman (2001) argued the issue is a result of poor learning that develops imperfect mental model, which ultimately leads to their utilisation in the hazardous situation. The authors further pointed out that development of flawed mental model is comprised of the experiences gathered from the world. This can be compared with the abstract of the world’s experience. This again restricts the individuals to identify common issues in the organisation. The example of Moura Mine disaster used by the authors helps shedding light on the influence of mental model where the workers failed to identify the issues in the mines that resulted in the accident. Further focus has been given on the poor education received that contributes in development of flawed mental model. Kuipers et al. (2014) supported the impact of mental model in manager’s decision-making process. The managers’ attitude towards the change greatly influences the change planned. Hence, the change in the organisation is the direct result of manager’s perception. Possibility remains that the change brought in the organisation might be flawed. In other words, the change perceived by the decision maker with flawed mental model is likely to hold no rational and the actual need of change. Hence, the direction of change itself might be flawed in tat case. Additionally, the change necessary in the organisation is often overlooked due to the less experience of the managers. This concludes the validity of Chapman and Ferolja’s perception and influence of mental model in change management.

Different Perspectives on Issues with Change Management

Bolman and Deal (1991) on the other hand denied the concept of mental model and its impact on change management. According to their concept, experience acquired by the managers may not always be proportional with the quality of decision made in change management. They commented that highly experienced managers could also overlook the issues in the organisation. This is further related to the cluelessness. The managers might think of some issues as common factors that might have greater implication in reality. Ramazani and Jergeas (2015) opposes the idea and communicates that the greater experience brings greater visibility to identify success as the experience gained helps the managers in identifying and comparing issues from a multiple perspectives. However, Bolman and Deal (1991) in their four-frame model highlighted the influential factors that influence thinking pattern of the managers. They are structural, human resources, political and symbolic factors. Structure is the focus of a manager in prioritising organisational structure in the process. Manager considering human resource on the other hand focuses on understanding of people involved in the organisation. Political on the other hand helps focusing on the views the competitive areas of the organisation, and lastly the symbolic factors focus on the meaning and faith. Hence, an experienced manager requires to has greater understanding and consider the entire mentioned factor in identifying requirement of change, as well as planning and implementation of change required. Hence, manager with experience in particular frame is likely to fail making necessary decision that hinders the change management process.

Kreitner and Kinicki (2006) further related the issues in change management and individual development. These individuals can be both managers and employees. Hence, success of a change depends on both the parties involved. The authors identified six individual perceptions that resist change in an organisation. These factors are adaptability to change, fear of change, and fear of failure, job insecurity, peer pressure and success. These factors have greater influence over the change conception, planning and implementation. Negative perception in these factors can potentially hinder in organisational change.

Number of scholars has proposed various models for implementing and managing change in the organisation. This provides opportunity for the organisations to adopt necessary change management strategy according to the organisational need. The models that are widely use by the management of contemporary organisations are namely Lewin’s model, Kotter’s Eight Step model and Organisational Development model. Lewin’s model on change identifies three primary stages of change that an organisation undergoes during the change process. The stages as mentioned by Lewin are unfreezing, changing and refreezing. The firs stage identifies the need of change and formulates the idea of change the organisation will be directed towards. Change is the second change in Lewin’s model, which is the planning and actualisation stage of change. Lastly, the change is stabilised in the freezing stage where the management marks the benefits being achieved for stabilising he change and make it permanent (Shirey 2013). However, scholars like Hossan (2015) criticises Lewin’s model of change due to its over-simplified structure. According to the author, the model proposed by Lewin hardly identifies the necessary phases of change and puts them under three broad phases that barely defines he change in the organisation. The second common model of change prioritised by the organisations is the Kotter’s eight-stage model of change. Many scholars like Neumeier (2013) recognises this model of change as the modified Lewin’s model of change. The stages recommended by Kotter through which an organisation goes are building urgency, creating guiding coalition, development of vision and strategy, communication of change vision, empowerment broad-based actions, generate short term wins, consolidate gains and produce greater change, and lastly to finalising new change in the organisation. The model proposed by Kotter provides greater understanding to the management of an organisation and helps them in recognising actions required to bring change in the organisation. Last important model of change available and mostly utilised by the organisation is the organisational development. This is the most complex change management model, which interests the organisation. This is comprised with four inter related stages. They are diagnosis, intervention, evaluation and feedback (Kreitner and Kinicki 2006). The feedback is again associated with every single stage of the organisational development model. The diagnosis stage identifies the problem prevailing in the organisation, which is followed by the feedback. The next stage is to identify the change required in the organisation that will satisfy the need. This is again evaluated in respect to the diagnosis conducted earlier. The last stage is the evaluation that recognises the effectiveness of change implemented in the organisation, which again undergoes feedback to recognise its synchronisation with the earlier stages.

Both the Kotter’s model and organisational development model shows high level of efficiency in bringing and managing change. However, the complexity and cost of implementation of organisational development model is comparatively higher, which makes Kotter’s eight-stage model more preferable to the organisations.

Conclusion

The argumentative discussion conducted above can conclude that there are various hindrance, which significantly influence change in the organisation. The issues can distract the management from identification of the change required and mislead the operations. However, implementation of Kotter’s model can successfully guide the organisation in implementation of change starting from the identification of the change required that is compromising the performance.

Reference

Bolman, L.G. and Deal, T.E., 1991. Reframing organizations.

Chapman, J.A. and Ferfolja, T., 2001. Fatal flaws: the acquisition of imperfect mental models and their use in hazardous situations. Journal of Intellectual Capital, 2(4), pp.398-409.

Hossan, C., 2015. Applicability of Lewin’s change management theory in Australian local government. International Journal of business and Management, 10(6), p.53.

Kinicki, A. and Kreitner, R., 2006. Organizational behavior: Key concepts, skills & best practices. Columbus, OH: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Kuipers, B.S., Higgs, M., Kickert, W., Tummers, L., Grandia, J. and Van der Voet, J., 2014. The management of change in public organizations: A literature review. Public administration, 92(1), pp.1-20.

Neumeier, M., 2013. Using Kotter's change management theory and innovation diffusion theory in implementing an electronic medical record. Canadian Journal of Nursing Informatics, 8(1-2).

Ramazani, J. and Jergeas, G., 2015. Project managers and the journey from good to great: The benefits of investment in project management training and education. International Journal of Project Management, 33(1), pp.41-52.

Shirey, M.R., 2013. Lewin’s theory of planned change as a strategic resource. Journal of Nursing Administration, 43(2), pp.69-72.