Resistance To Change In An Open-Plan Office: Case Study Of Cheetham And Wyne Law Firm

Reasons for Employee Resistance to Open-Plan Office Design

Question:

Discuss about the Prediction and Control of Occupant.

The situation described in this particular case study is that a fast growing law firm, Cheetham and Wyne is located in Aucklandand specializes in commercial law. The law firm was initially founded by Owen Cheetham and Jack Wyne. Then the partners’ list increased by two more lawyers who were Mark Cheetham and Cathy Wyne. With the arrival of new faces and hiring of new staff, the old premises of the office became quite small for accommodating the total number of employees, thus the entire office was shifted to a new premises that overlooked the harbor. Mark and Cathy also convinced their fathers to restructure the office design into an open plan design. This study particularly focuses upon the changes in office after the installation of the open office design and the reactions of the partners and employees in relation to this. The discussion has been presented in the form of answers in relation to the questions mentioned in the project.

There are a number of reasons for employees resisting the change to an open-plan office approach. One of the major reasons is that employees in general are resistant to change. This means that employees after working in a certain environment for a long period of time tend to get used to such environment, thus resist any kind of change. To be more specific, generally a particular individual is the most comfortable in his own house, similarly an employee is the most comfortable in the known environment that he is working in since the beginning, therefore prefers his or her old desk rather than a new table (Creemers 2014).

The founders or the senior partners Jack and Owen though did not like the idea of transforming the design of the office into open plan design they listened to their children and changed the design of the office. Similarly like Jack and Owen many of the employees think that enclosed spaces rather than open wide ones enable a person to work in a better way, thus they resist the open plan approach (Kim and de 2013).

Another reason for resisting change to an open-plan office approach is that some employees especially those among the senior staff of the law firm feel that they have lost their privacy and that they are treated a little too much equally with the other staff that is their subordinates. This is a reason of concern because in general most of the senior staff are old men who like their privacy and do not like the idea of working in open spaces. Some other employees are of the opinion that the open-plan office approach has hampered their work because earlier they could spend their little intervals of breaks in between work, just by sitting in their own enclosed spaces and chatting over the phone but now as the entire concept of walls has been demolished under the design of open-plan office approach, they are not being able to spend their leisure time in accordance to their wish. In fact this is very true and advised by experts that the smallest measure of time that an employee gets within his or her work should be quality time   spent by him or her. If this is blocked then the quality of work is ultimately hampered. Therefore this is a major reason for resisting change. Another reason is that the online booking system that Cathy had introduced for booking rooms for conducting meetings has not been a success among the employees. Even the playpen created for the relaxation of the employees is of no use as the employees use it for the purpose of chatting and wasting time. Thus the founders Jack and Owen resist the change (Hongisto et al., 2016).

Ways to Overcome Resistance to Change

Another major reason for employees resisting the change to an open-plan office approachis that, an office is the meeting point of different individuals from different backgrounds and all of them have an unique style of thinking and belong to different cultures. This may be a positive point for many but in case of working in an office where there is no option other than communicating with everyone as the work place is designed in such a way, it may be a barrier or an issue of concern for many. For an instance the topic of interest for a particular employee may not be the same for another and as the design of the office is such that there are no walls or enclosed spaces, an employee is left with no other option but to participate. This may not be a major issue of concern for others but some employees may be hackneyed by this de (Bakker et al., 2017). The most concerning issue with the concept of open-plan office is that it directly affects business. This is because a law firm handles a variety of clients and as a result there will be certain client-centric critical information that is private and should only be shared between the client and his lawyer. A design of open-plan office is such that there will be no enclosed spaces where such exchange of confidential information can take place, thus imposing a breach on the client’s data security.  Therefore these are the primary reasons for the employees posing resistance to change (Austin, Kimmons and Sigmar 2014).

The partners in order to minimize the resistance to change might have adopted a number of ways. The first action that could be taken is that along with the wide open space shared by employees there also could be the provision of meeting rooms or enclosed spaces available so that the employees could avail the option of both communicating with everyone and maintaining their privacy as and when required. The next action that could be taken on the part of the partners is that before implementing the open-plan office design, a feedback from the staff could be taken so as to plan the design in a better and competent way. This would also ensure that the needs and choices of the employees of are kept in mind while implementing anything in the office or in the process of decision making. The management of the law firm should be very keen on maintaining the privacy of client information. Client information is crucial information in the hands of the firm and should be handled with utmost care. For this purpose small, totally enclosed rooms could also be installed inside theoffice premises where lawyers and clients could meet and discuss the case accordingly. Lastly the senior staff who have been in the firm for a long time should be treated with due respect meaning personal rooms should be arranged according to their hierarchy of authority (Konis 2013).

Barriers to Communication in the Law Firm

The barriers of communication that appear to exist in the law firm are numerous. According to the case study there has been loads of complaints from many of the staff in the law firm. The major barrier to communication is the deficiency of the use of written communication. For an instance a particular employee as mentioned in the case study comments that he had been employed as an accountant in the law firm along with loads of promise like he would be in charge of the administrative and the paralegal staff. He was further promised that he would be managing the entire staff other than the lawyers but after nine months of employment he was just managing four of the staff and even the restructuring of the firm had not taken place. When enquired, the accountant had been informed that due to shifting of the office to the new premises the restructuring was on hold and would progress once the shifting to the new premises had been done. But post shifting the needful still had not been done in the past three months. The particular employee also enrolled himself in a MBA related to law with thehope that the fees of the course would be borne by the firm as discussed with him informally via verbal communication. This as usual was not maintained on the part of his employer. The reason that was presented to him was that normally course fees amounted to $6000 per annum therefore his MBA fees that amounted to $30000 could not be borne by the company. Therefore no usage of written communication is most definitely a barrier to communication (Shahzad 2016).

Another barrier is lack of interaction among the employees. For instance there are several events that take place in office outings. The way of expressing humour by some individuals may not be the same for others. As mentioned in the case study Cathy putting ants inside the top of Pauline during the office picnic was not at all appreciated by Pauline but this was not communicated by Pauline. Had this been sat and discussed between the two then the personal grudges and complaints could be excluded. Another instance is that another employee post the process of performance review, did get only a raise of two percent. When he enquired the reason for such a low raise he was informed that he was too slow in processing contracts and his work had some errors but when further enquired about the errors he was informed that the errors were corrected and that his no further assistance was required. This is also a barrier to communication because had the doubts regarding the raise been cleared by the higher authority official then the confusion and complaint on the part of the employee could have been avoided (Chraibi et al., 2016).

Ways to Overcome Communication Barriers

There are also issues regarding the communication of the policies of the firm. For an instance a particular situation is described in the case study where a particular employee claims that he has shared certain tampered and provocative information about Cathy in the social media by addressing her with a different name. Now if the rules and regulations about sharing any kind of data related to the office over the social media could be very well communicated to each and every employee then the occurrence of such nuisance could have been averted (Vassie and Richardson 2017).

The ways in which the barriers to communication can be avoided are increasing both inter level and intra level communication. The communication issues that are highlighted in the above answer to part a clearly suggest that there has been a huge gap in communication. It is evident that the employees are not at all comfortable in sharing their complaints and grievances with the management of the firm. Either they are in fear of losing their job therefore do not take up their issues to the higher authority officials or they think complaining or putting forth their grievances will minimize their chances of getting promotion or excelling in their area of work. Thus more and more initiatives must be taken on the part of the partners to encourage the employees so that they can develop a free attitude and communicate clearly with the management (Brown 2015).

The law firm had been initially founded by Owen Cheetham and Jack Wyne. Later their children Mark Cheetham and Cathy Wyne had taken over the law firm. Cathy especially had convinced her father to restructure the firm. In fact both Cathy and Mark convinced Owen and Jack as to hire new staff, an idea which both Owen and Jack strongly opposed because they thought that not every lawyer could work had like they did. Cathy even could convince her father to change the design of the office into an open office. Thus it is evident that Mark and Cathy have much power in their hand. A further example of them exercising their power can be understood from the instance when Cathy and Mark in order to support another lawyer travelled to Hamilton. Thus it is clear that they have much power in their hands and are using it in the interest of the firm as well as the employees (Danielsson et al., 2015).

Conclusion

An influence tactic used by the partners is the concept of performance review. As mentioned in the case study there are no judgment rules or standards by which the performance of a particular employee can be measured. To be more clear many employees are of the opinion that they have no understanding of the ways in which their performance has been measured and how they are getting a low raise in their basic salaries. Another tactic used by an employee is that she did bring business for the firm but in exchange did share certain information with the client which she did hide from the office. These are some of the basic tactics used by the partners and other staff of the firm (Hongisto 2017).

It is understood from the entire study that the law firm is in a good position to prosper but the new imposed design of open-office plan has not been a much success. In fact it has become a barrier in the road to excellence for the law firm. Thus initiatives should be taken to remove employee grievances and should be encouraged in order to share the issues they are facing in the office.

References

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