Essay: Cultural Change In Boots UK Portfolio." (46 Characters)

Overview of Change and Change Management

Explain The Portfolio about the cultural change.

The portfolio is concerned about the cultural and change aspects of the concerned organization. In this case, the concerned organization is Boots UK, the company works in partnership with those entrepreneurs those who provide valuable offers to the company by offering their ground braking concepts (Boots-uk.com 2016). The company also welcomes innovators from all over the world who in turn share their expertise and experience and thereby keeps the company in a profitable condition.

As the company works with the external partners and thereby gains the accessibility to various exciting and innovative products and technologies. These products can be licensed and co-developed for meeting the needs of the company. This also helps the organization to flourish in the excessively competitive market. The organization adopts a number of strategies to cope up with the ever-increasing competitiveness in the market (Boots-uk.com 2016). The first and foremost strategy adopted by the company is the inventive strategy. Under inventive strategy, Boots UK increases its number of products and expands its business in new markets through the existing or new businesses of the company (Alliance Boots 2016). This can be explained with the help of the following Ansoff’s matrix, 

	Products
Markets		New	Existing
	Existing	Penetrating the market	New products
	New	Expanding the existing market	Diversification

 Figure 1: Ansoff’s matrix

(Source: Lozano 2012)

Another strategy is renovative strategy; it states that under this strategy an organization keeps on doing what it is doing currently. Moreover, it follows the existing strategy rather than making any strategic reform.

Boots UK also follows incremental strategy. It is believed that by following this strategy is impossible to accomplish in an effective and efficient manner because the strategic problems are complicated and are changing continuously (Teece 2012). Therefore, it is essential for the strategy to be incremental or adaptive; this will in turn help the organization to adapt to the changes occurring inside as well as outside the organization.

Change within the organization will lead to a change in this strategic framework as well as the organizational culture. Therefore, it is essential for Boots UK to identify the current strategic framework and the organizational culture along with the needs to implement changes so that the existing framework and policy could be redesigned or changed for increasing the profitability of the organization (Jiang et al. 2012).

According to Bloom et al. (2013), change plays a very important role in the context of industrial practices. However, the term change has not been defined yet in a widely accepted way. The appropriateness of organizational change management and cultural practices depend upon how the developed theories are fitted with the practice and vice versa. Author sums up these arguments in an efficient manner, such as,

• Theory is defined as the genre where everything is known and nothing works
• Practice is the genre where everything works

Concept of Organizational Change and Change Management

However, the reason is unknown,

Here theory and practices are combined and where theory and practices is combined nothing works at all and nobody knows the reason behind.

In a situation like this, it is quite unlikely that a single change model will fit perfectly to the situation. Hence, there is a scope to develop a more efficient model of change. Therefore, there is a dire need to move away from static models to a dynamic one, which stresses more on the dynamics of change rather than the contents and substances of change (Gioia et al. 2013).

Changes, which are generally small and simple, are characterized as hard problems and these changes are managed by day-to-day operational management activities (Nica 2013). These specific types of changes are not referred to as the changes made by managers and the management process of these changes are not termed as the change management.

Managers on the other hand will have to consider a number of factors, which are dynamic as well as complex in nature. These factors should be considered before making any management decisions (Lozano 2012). If these factors are considered it will affect he efficiency, efficacy as well as effectiveness of the change process and thereby ensure the sustainability of the organization.

A social process necessitating responsibilities associated with effective organizational planning and regulation for establishing the efficient operability of the enterprise. For the fulfillment of the purposes the process must include,

Proper judgment and decision-making capability for designing plans and making use of available data for evaluation the progress of the plan

The dedication, guidance and motivation of the person constituting the organization and thereby establishing its operability

As pointed out by author, the four key elements of management are planning, coordination, control and motivation. However, according to author, organizing, planning, coordinating, commanding and controlling are the five main functions associated with effective management.

While discharging their duty efficiently and well as in an effective manner managers are faced with a number of changes regularly (Klein et al. 2012). Therefore, it is essential to determine the difference between management and change management. Change can be characterized as the process of making things different. However, this thing needs mentioning actual and perceived changes explicitly. Therefore, organizational change management is defined as the path and procedure involved in the transformation of an organization (Stahl et al. 2012).

However, the human resource management personnel defines change management as, the efficient and methodical approach and application of knowledge, resources and tools for dealing with changes within the organization (Inkson et al. 2012). According to these personnel, change management depicts explaining and adopting corporate strategies, procedures, structures and technologies and thereby dealing with the changes in the external conditions as well as the environment of the business.

Level of Organizational Change

Hence, change management or managing the organizational or cultural change is simply a management control structure established with the help of applying effective management interventions that incorporates people for achieving a desired state along with predefined outcomes of performance in accordance with the strategy of the organization (O'Reilly and Tushman 2013).

In order to shed light on the concept of organizational change and managing the change it is necessary to gain sufficient knowledge about the different types of change prevalent in any organization (Ki et al. 2015). A number of models have been developed for considering these various types of organizational changes. Therefore, to gain a broader insight about the concerned topic, the level of change, size and scope of change, momentum of the change and the nature of change will be considered in this section of the portfolio (Schaltegger et al. 2012).

According to Robbins et al. (2013), there are mainly three stages of changes in an organization. The first among them is the organizational specific change. Then comes the generic organization based change programmes like business process engineering and then finally or the third factor in the generic multi organizational change programmes, such as mergers and acquisitions.

Child (2005) designed an useful model for differentiating between scope of change and type of change (Avolio and Yammarino 2013),

This model is known as the Child’s model of organizational change,

Approaches toward organizational change
	Planned	Emergent	Entire Organization
Radical	BPR	Organic development (Developing startup company)
	Departmental merger	Implementing changes in the selection process of new members as made by the teams	Partial Organization
Incremental	Annually targeted improvements	Learning in the organization	Entire Organization
	Changes associated on the performance plans of staff	Improving continuously with the help of project teams	Partial Organization

 Figure 1: Child’s Model of Organizational Change

(Source: Avolio and Yammarino 2013)

While using this model it should also be kept in mind that it is easy to define radical and incremental change and these kinds of changes can be measured as well. Often the perceived scale of change may be more important than that of the actual scale of change. These changes are observable in Boots UK; the organization evidently went through these types of changes. However, now it is necessary to determine the current situation of the organization in the competitive market and thereby implement organizational change programme accordingly (García-Morales et al. 2012).

In the case of organizational change it is normally assumed that all the changes in the organization are planned and rational along with this it also possesses efficient control over all the processes and resources. However, according to Rafferty et al. (2013), there may arise situations when a less planned but logical method can be adopted. Another argument, which is considered as parallel to this approach, is adopting an organic approach towards change against an expected mechanistic approach. It is also expected that if changes emerge, then as per one approach the management of the organization will throw a symbolical grenade over the organization and watch what will happen (Röglinger et al. 2012).

Scope and size of change

For example, it can be seen in the context of Boots UK that, the organization once had set about the rumor mongering around restructuring and job cuts. Therefore, notifying the employees about job cuts and also informs the employees formally about the fact that all jobs have been red circled and they are required to apply for new positions (Battilana and Casciaro 2012). During this time period the communication with the management is kept low deliberately. Then the management watched what happened after a period of time. Hence it is observed that the employees automatically adapted to the changed work environment without the intervention of management.

The hard elements of change are characterized as the tasks within change management, which are defined and measurable. On the other hand, the soft factors are the motivation and culture (Haslam et al. 2014). These soft factors are quite more difficult to evaluate. Therefore, the focus of Boots UK should be concentrated on the task management factors associated with the soft factors during the interventions of change. According to Symon and Cassell (2012), there are four hard factors, which are correlated with outcome of intervention of changes. These factors are time duration, dependence on the managers, commitment and dedication of the employees and the effort exerted by the employees (Galliers and Leidner 2014).

Momentum of change is the combination of sped and magnitude associated with the change. This is a crucial concept in assessing the characteristics of various types of change. It has been observed previously that it is not easy to predict the momentum of change, however t can be anticipated (Hayes 2014). Interventions for managing changes may be considered from the available options.

The following model depicts the momentum of change model,

“Planned” Large Change Slow Change	“Big Bang” Large Change Fast Change
“Smooth” Small Change Slow Change	“Bumpy” Small Change Fast Change

Figure 2: Model of momentum of change

(Source: Haslam et al. 2014)

The model above depicts momentum of change based on two key variables magnitude of change and speed of change. In the chart above, the smooth and bumpy changes are categorized as small changes relative to the others (Benn et al.  2014). These changes differ in the speed of it implementation. Smooth changes generally occur over a longer period of time compared to the latter. Smooth changes occur in a small set of steps and sometimes pointed out as incremental and are rarely noticeable in the daily business of an organization. The example of such changes is minor changes in the policy structure (Fugate et al. 2012).

On the other hand, bumpy changes are easily noticeable as these changes are fast and for this these changes requires quick response on the part of the managers as well as the employees who are dealing with this change (Cummings and Worley 2014). The example of these types of changes would be the organization going through crisis and needs significant amount of investment.

Now, in this section it will be discussed why the organization needs to implement change. The changes within an organization are determined by a number of push and pull factors. Sometimes organizations are faced with choices between they are forced to change or they are willing to change (Boot‐Handford and Smyth 2013). In some cases, the organizations are forced to change because of some legal factors. In the case of Boots UK the needs and rationale for implementing change is necessary to determine. This will help the company to find out the actual trigger for change. In order to determine the strategic change in the Boots UK a number of factors are identified which may act as the trigger for initiating change,

• The company faces challenges regarding growth, especially in the global market
• The recent economic downturn and complicated condition for trading
• Strategic reform
• Technological redesigning
• Competitive pressures including mergers and acquisition
• Pressure for learning various organizational skills and behaviors
• Legislative and government initiatives

According to Beirne (2013), it is necessary to understand change in the context of a changing organization. This puts a number of simultaneous adaptive pressure on the employees. Boots UK decided to implement changes based on the external drivers as well as the internal drivers.

In order to examine the external drivers for change in Bots UK, PESTLE analysis can be used. The PESTLE analysis is used shed light on the political, economic, sociological, technological, legal and environmental framework that can affect the strategic as well as cultural change in the organization.

Implementing PESTLE analysis on Alliance Boots GmbH UK, the PESTLE analysis is based solely on the study conducted by Leal-Rodríguez et al. (2015).

• The recent government policy of drug pricing is the key political factor that affects the Boots UK.
• There are occurrence of parallel import as well as attitude to grey market
• Presently monopoly investigations are taking place at national level as well as the European Union level, associated with the perfume distribution.

• During the time of recession the demand for customers with prescription remains the same
• The demand for products of the company which are generally used as gift giving items is affected during recession

• The pressure of fashion and lifestyle acts as an important stimulus for increasing r decreasing the demand for beauty products
• The involvement of media in encouraging preventive medicines is acting as a stimulus in the market.
• As the travel activity is increasing it is also increasing the demand for travel elated products, such as sun cream etc.

• An increasing trend of online buying is compelling the organizations to change the technological framework for supporting the buyers with improved buying experience.

• Some environmental factors are also impacting on the company externally, such s the packaging issue that is affecting the environment adversely
• The environmental and ethical market initiated niche retailers such as the body shop; these are now emerging in the main stream market as well.

• It is necessary for the company to follow proper legal framework and guidelines strictly, such as the labor law and employee safety act.
• It is also important to increase spending on research and development.

This PESTEL analysis provides a very efficient and useful analytical framework for analyzing the external factors that play significant role in shaping up the external environment of the organization. When PESTLE analysis is combined with SWOT analysis, an evidence-based approach helps in designing the strategic decisions (Moore 2012). The SWOT analysis mainly classifies the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The factors identified in the PESTLE analysis can be used in this framework as the strengths and weaknesses and these are broadly the internal factors of the organizations, which can be used against the external organizational factors such as opportunities and threats. In this looking-out and looking-in, approach provides an internal-external organizational analysis and helps in the strategic management process if carried out in an efficient and purposeful manner (Moore 2012).

            The SWOT analysis is also an analytical tool that tests the internal as well as external factors affecting the organization.

• The key strength of the company is that it possesses a strong distribution network of the pharmaceutical products.
• Strong marketing as well as rebranding strategies that helps to gain competitive advantage.
• The wide range of products helps the company to improve its business

• The market is concentrated specifically and this is increasing the risk factors

• Developing partnership with other organizations will improve the market positioning of the organization
• Again growth in different geographical locations will help the organization to improve its global reach
• Collaborating with Welgreen made the country able to become the first global wellbeing industry led by global pharmacy.

• Increased competition in the market may decrease the profit margins of the company
• Stringent rules and regulations within the organization is another potential threat before the company.

Based on the SWOT and PESTLE framework taken together it can be seen that though Alliance Boots UK is in a good shape and situation it also faces a number of difficulties. Again, in order to flourish in the increasingly competitive market it is also required for the Boots UK to implement certain changes in its partnership policy, employment and retention policy and in some other sectors as well (Alliance Boots 2016). In order to cope up with the competition the company can also adopt certain unique strategies. These strategies may include development of high-end products and which is also differentiated from the existing products in the market. Expectedly, this advanced change in the strategic framework will help the organization to flourish in near future. This is in the context of external analysis, in order to find out the rationale behind implementing change it is also necessary to take into account the analysis of internal drivers as well (Alliance Boots 2016).

            A number of internal factors such as the leadership techniques, human resource management policies, structural framework, business plan along with job structure etc. determine the structural change implementation in the organization.

The most popular model for change management is the Lewin’s three-phase model. This model is the most widely used model for managing the changes within the organization.

The three stages for managing changes are unfreezing, movement and refreezing. At the unfreezing stage resistance towards change is lowered for recognizing and accepting the need of change (Leal-Rodríguez et al. 2015). In the next stage that is movement stage; new attitudes are developed for encouraging the behaviors which are essential for the occurrence of change. In the last stage, that is in the refreezing stage the organization performs stabilizing, supporting and reinforcing activities for helping the new changed conditions.

This model depicts a systematic approach towards management of change by describing a sequence if processes which are well defined. The model is based on the context that by identifying and understanding the key steps involved in the process of change; the likelihood of occurrence of change management is increased (Leal-Rodríguez et al. 2015). Managers do this by making improved and enhanced decision and determine which interventions should be used for the effective management of change.

The developer of this model also gave rise to force field analysis technique for determining the forces for and against change. At different points of time there are a number of forces that will act for the change and some factors will act against the change (Teece 2012). When the sum the factors acting for and against the changes are equal then these forces cancel each other. Hence, when the forces driving changes are greater than that of the forces which are against changes, change will take place and the organization will move to a newer place.

In the case of Boots UK the forces acting for driving the changes, such as changing the human resource practices, increasing competitiveness of the market and partnership policies are greater than that of the forces acting against the changes such as the current policies of the organization, success in the present market, and increase in the current market share. As the force acting in favor of change is greater, hence, change will take place and the organization will be at a new place (Beirne 2013).

Therefore, as per this model in the first stage Boots UK will determine the initial problems within and outside the organization (Beirne 2013). That is the issues with external environment of the company along with the internal policy and strategies of the organization. Then the organization will collect data regarding these issues and try to diagnose the problems.

In the movement stage, the organization will perform an action planning in accordance with the diagnosed problems and implement this action plan (Lozano 2012). Then the effectiveness of these strategies will be verified.

Then at the last stage, assessment of these strategies will be done and the organization will be able to learn from the process as well.

While implementing the change programme the organization were faced with a number of difficulties. At first, the behavior of the employees became a prior challenge as acceptability of the employees towards change is a prior challenge (Lozano 2012). On the other hand, the efficacy of the company while implementing the change program is another crucial factor that should be taken into account (Nica 2013). The organization should be concerned about the environment of applicability of these changes. Again, another challenge faced by Boots UK while implementing the change programme is the readiness of the targeted customers of the company. Moreover, whenever a change is implemented the experience of a year old employee becomes obsolete, therefore, it is quite evident that they will also oppose change implementation.

In the context of end results it is observed that the implementation of appropriate strategies gave rise to the successful outcome of the Boots UK. The company is a leading pharmaceutical company in United Kingdom. The initial objectives of the change implementation programme have been met (Boots-uk.com 2016). With the help of this programme a number of operational improvements have been implemented. A number of great results have also been obtained by implementing the strategic change programme.

• It is found that the engagement scores of the employees increased significantly at each site.
• The service delivery process has been improved significantly with the help of implementing this process and the delivery processes at the stores have also been improved.
• The retention rate of the employees has also been increased and this have used the supervisors as the key resources (Boots-uk.com 2016).
• It has made the organization to become able to make it sure to deliver the necessary intangible resources.

Conclusion:

In order to conclude it can be said that the portfolio has met all the requirements as stated in the question quite evidently. In order to conduct the assignment a rigorous review of literature has been conducted in this regard. With the help of the knowledge gained by this literature review answers have been provided to the questions. The Boots UK a leading pharmaceutical manufacturing farm had been planning to implement change process. Throughout the study the overview of the change process, needs and structure of the change process have been stated. It also takes into account the rationale of implementation of change process in the concerned organization. Thereby, the challenges faced by the organization as well as the result of implementing these changes have been stated efficiently. As concluding remark, it can also be said that though the position of the Boots UK is quite good and the company is in a god shape and condition, however it will also need to implement change programme to flourish in the competitive market in near future. Because implementing change has become an inevitable factor in the present era of competitive market. 

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