Chapter 18 - Resisting Change

Chapter 18 defines the resistance of change into 11 reasons

An individual's predisposition towards change

Surprise and fear of the unknown

Climate of mistrust

Fear of failure

Loss of status or job security

Peer Pressure

Disruption of cultural traditions or group relationships

Personality conflicts

Lack of tact or poor timing

Non reinforcing reward systems

Past success

This provides a clear understanding of the common reasons why some people simply hate change. After reading it, I know what are the main points to address when I have to be the one that issues change. Most of these feelings of uncertainty because of change can be combated with in depth information. For example, people wouldn't be that worried about the loss of status if they are well informed of it and how to combat it beforehand. The fear of change is mainly due to the lack of information.

Personally, I resist change mainly because of the surprise and fear of the unknown. There is so much that is unpredictable when it comes to change. I think that's a lot of peoples' concern as well; what is the unpredictable. You can inform someone of change to the extent of what you know is going to happen, but what you don't know is the issue that most people are afraid of. The best that one can do is throw out some educated guesses but that's it. That's my personal reason on why change can be viewed as more negative than positive.

Stress Reduction

Reducing stress improves the work environment and often leads to higher efficiency. In order to reduce stress, one needs to be able to first define stress. In chapter 18, I found a section which explains what stress is and how it affects us. The text defines stress as, “an adaptive response, mediated by individual characteristics and/or psychological processes, that is a consequence of any external action, situation, or event that places special physical demands upon a person.”
Stress and methods to reduce it varies from person to person. It is important that people research their personal experience to understand the causes and activities that aid in clearing their mind. An effective manager ensures the efficiency of their department while also setting realistic deadlines to keep stress to a minimum. Stress at the appropriate level can be healthy and encourage hard work.

Steps for Leading Organizational Change

John Kotter believes that organizational change normally fails because management has some errors. He then proposed eight steps for leading change in the workplace. This model helps managers to see how to sequence or lead the change process, not help managers to diagnose what needs to be changed. The first four steps, establish a sense of urgency, create the guiding coalition, develop a vision and strategy, and communicate the change vision, all represent the “unfreezing” stage. The next three stages, empower broad-based action, generate short-term wins, and consolidate gains and produce more change, fall in the “changing” stage. Lastly, the last step, anchor new approaches in the culture, represents the “refreezing” stage. These steps help managers shape their behaviors to successful lead organizational change.

In an article called “Five Steps to Effectively Managing Organizational Change”, there are additional ways an organization must follow to find successful change. First they recommend creating “acute awareness of how things are now and how this state of affairs falls short of accomplishing stated goals and objectives. “ Secondly, managers must cherish understanding that something must be done to change the current situation they are in. Thirdly, urgency for change is crucial in order to be accomplished. The fourth step is to “there needs to be a well-thought-out program to ensure the actual adoption of the changes in the way things are done” and rewarding those who perform accordingly. The last step is continuing to solicit feedback on the new ways established and urge further improvements through the employees job tasks.

"Five Steps to Effectively Managing Organizational Change." EzineArticles Submission - Submit Your Best Quality Original Articles For Massive Exposure, Ezine Publishers Get 25 Free Article Reprints. Web. 26 Apr. 2010. .

Lewin;s Change Model

Lewin's Change Model was the landmark work of social psychologist in which most theories of organizational change originated. The model Kurt Lewin created has three stages of planned change including how to initiate, manage and stabalize the change process. These stages are also referred to as unfreezing, changing and refreezing.
Unfreezing is that stage that focuses on the motivation to change attitudes and behaviors to it management standards. Management can begin doing this by disconfirming the usefulness or appropriateness or employees' behaviors and attitudes.
Changing is an organizational change of any proportion that is undertaking to improve the process, procedure, product, service, or outcome of interest to management. In this process you must provide employees with new information, behavioral models, processes and procedures, equipment, technology, or ways of getting a job done.
Refreezing is the stage where employees are being helped to integrate changed behavior or attitudes into their work life. It is important to give the employees a chance to use their changed ways and once they do offering positive reinforcement is a large contributing factor to Lewin's three stage Change Model's success.
The main focus is on improvement, growth and problem solving.

Chapter 18: Model of Change

In chapter eighteen the idea which resonated with me the most said, "Prespective og organizational change is based on the notion that any change, no matter how large or small, has a cascading effect throughout an organization. Therefore, a model is introduced which offers managers framework or model to use for diagnosing what to change and for determining how to evaluate the success of a change effort.

An organizational change is a difficult experience. As posted by a student in her blog, change can be a difficult thing to adapt to; especially when individuals are so used to the same routine. It takes time for someone to get used to a change in the way something is run or organized. It’s difficult and not always pleasing to adjust. It is hard to catch up with the new way of work. This can all prove very disconcerting and sometimes downright depressing. If an individual becomes anxious about the new changes and misses the old customs, it can be emotionally challenging as well.

An article which is titled "The Check, Connect, and Expect Program: A Targeted, Tier 2 Intervention in the Schoolwide Positive Behavior Support Model" by Cheney, Douglas, speaks about the effects of a type of feedback loop for those going through an organizational change. This feedback is necessary when faced with changes and it helps in order to adapt to them. This correaltes with the model change because it helps to diagnose what to change and how to evaluate changes in order for success to take place.

Source: Cheney Douglas. "The Check, Connect, and Expect Program: A Targeted, Tier 2 Intervention in the Schoolwide Positive Behavior Support Model"

Executive Compensation

While reading chapter 18, I came across a section which discussed executive compensation and how it is causing outrage amongst some shareholders. Executive compensation has gotten carried away and some companies are looking to their shareholders to approve the executive-pay practices before putting them into effect.

Because shareholders essentially own a small stake of the company, it is important to recognize their opinions. The price of their stock is dependent on upper managements ability to perform and if they are unimpressed, upper management would receive a less significant bonus.

It is my opinion that executive compensation is way out of control. In this recent recession we witnessed executives receive bonuses for "hard work" even though they ran the company into the ground. By giving shareholders a voice in compensation practices, I believe it will encourage management to earn their bonus rather than wait for them.

Easing Change

An important section highlighted in Chapter 18 talks about characteristics that are related to resistance towards change. These personal traits include: the employee's commitment towards change, their resilience towards change, their level of self-concept, their tolerance of risk, and their levels of self-efficacy. These characteristics may stem from the "obstacles within the work environment" (Kreitner 537).

In the article, "The Relationship Between Charismatic Leadership, Work Engagement, and Organizational Citizenship Behaviors," Babcock, et. al. study the relationship between charismatic leadership and employee perceptions. Their results suggested that there is a significant and positive relation between charismatic leadership and work engagement.

Charismatic, positive leaders can help pave the way for change by easing their employees into the idea. Great leaders can build trust within the workplace, thus possibly removing the antichange attitudes that may once have existed.

Source: Babcock-Roberson, Meredith Elaine, and Oriel J. Strickland. "The Relationship Between Charismatic Leadership, Work Engagement, and Organizational Citizenship Behaviors." Journal of Psychology 144.3 (2010): 313-326. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 26 Apr. 2010.

What are the strengths of Du Pont's approach to managing change?p534

-       The chairman of DUPONT was very reactive toward the bad economic situation: he asked the managers to participate to a new way of management, due to the current crisis. Thus, the managers are aware of the company’s situation and of its will to face it.

-       The company was not afraid of cost cutting, because it realized that it was for its own good.

-       The immediate reactivity in reducing the costs is another strength for this company: it enables the company to act in the good way as fast as possible. The strength lies in the fact that the managers are aware of the situation and do not want to be blind; they know what will help their company to survive the crisis.

-       The deadline of two or three months shows that the leaders want fast actions.

-       The involvement of Holliday in the change management is so good that is becomes ‘contagious’: all the employees usually behave as their manager, and such a manager is a good way of developing change.

Chapter 18

This chapter discussed how to manage changes and stress in the workplace. The one part of the book that I found really interesting was about the alternative strategies for overcoming resistance to change. This was interesting to me because I believe that change is constant and it is common for people to refuse to accept any changes. This part of the chapter talked about dealing with that refusal to change—especially if the change would be something that would affect the workers negatively. According to the book, there were four things that a manager should do to be able to ease the workers into taking in the new changes.

(1) Providing as much information as possible
(2) Inform the employees about the reasons/ rationale for the change.
(3) Conduct meetings to address the employees’ questions
(4) Providing employees to discuss how the proposed change might affect them.

In a way this reminded me of the case study we were doing in class last week. These are the four tasks that Roberta should do to be able to appease her workers—after finding out, of course, more information about the changes.
This particular subject was more discussed more in an article I found. According to the article, these where what the manager should do when change is about to occur in the workplace.

“* First, take internal measures including, i) attaining a good understanding of the change situation, 2) ensuring optimal involvement and 3) openness to feedback, and 4) remaining honest to the entire workforce.

* second, focus on mutual issues by using i) fair and honest communication in order to 2) motivate all parties involved, 3) nurture a climate of trust, 4) ensure agreement on the change and the path toward realizing it, and 5) instate a solid plan toward implementation.

* Finally, focus on operational strategies that facilitate the change process, such as i) providing training to optimize implementation of the change; 2) maintaining a climate of creativity to respond effectively to unfore seen challenges; 3) ensure optimal performance, including possible attraction of external consultants; 4) determine the formulation and review of several options (scenario planning) to possibly follow; 5) keep an eye on the budget; 6) remain friendly but alert on those who exit the organization; 7) establish leverage points to motivate workers toward better performance; and 8) maintain flexibility when sudden alterations in plans need to be made.” (Marques)


Source: Marques, J.. "Making the Best of the Inevitable: Change. " Journal of Global Business Issues 2.2 (2008): 33-42. ABI/INFORM Global, ProQuest. Web. 25 Apr. 2010.

Managing Stress

Stress is usually considered a negative factor in people's lives. My mom always taught me that stress was a sin since sin was anything that was not healthy in a person's life. Therefore, I tend to get ahead on my work and never wait till the last minute to complete assignments or make plans. However, some forms of stress are unavoidable, such as the stress that comes from change. Some people are able to deal with stress better than others. It oftentimes takes practice. The more change that one experiences in one's life, the more one is able to figure out techniques to adapt quickly. Such experience also teaches people that whatever happens, life goes on and they will be able to deal with it.

The book discusses how stress can also be a positive factor, which I had never considered before.. Stress is the body's way of dealing with pressure and pushes people to pin point the worst cause of their stress and start seeking solutions for it. It helps them improve because change only comes when something forces it to occur.

"Organisational change can be a stressor, sometimes to an overwhelming extent, but it can also offer creative opportunities for dealing with the stress that accompanies it (McDermott 2002).

Workplace stress and personal stress are not mutually exclusive phenomena. Each has direct and indirect effects on the other, and, while ways to address stress in each environment differ, they can also overlap" (Hurley).

By recognizing this, people can start to deal with their stress through meditation, organizing their problems and choosing to address them. Just breathing deeply for a few moments has been found to have a calming effect on a person since more oxygen is taken into the body. This helps to clear a person's mind and make them mentally ready to take on whatever is next.

Source:
Hurley, Mary. "Managing stress in the workplace. (Cover story)." Nursing Management - UK 14.3 (2007): 16-18. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 24 Apr. 2010.

Chapter 18

Lewin’s Change Model helps to explain how to initiate, manager, and stabilize the change process. The underlying assumptions about change in this model are that it involves learning, it needs motivation in order to have change, it requires individuals to change, there’ll be resistance, and effective change requires reinforcing what they’ve learned. The first stage in this model is unfreezing, where motivation is created to change by encouraging people to replace old habits with new desired ones. A method would be to make employees unhappy with the old habits of operating. When business is bad because of the old habits, it encourages employees to change those habits to improve. Benchmarking also is helpful because it compares the company with others to see where they stand in performance. This encourages people to adopt successful companies’ systems and habits or create new and better methods. The second stage is changing, where the actual change occurs by providing employees with new information and instructions, such as, sending managers to leadership training programs or installing new information technology. Change should be targeted towards a desired end-result with actions that are designed to reach that goal. The last stage is refreezing. In this stage, support and reinforcement are utilized to implement the new change into their normal ways of operation. Employees are given a chance to learn and demonstrate this change, which is then followed by reinforcement or coaching.

In a book exert from the online website, ChangingMinds.Org, it gave an overview of Lewin’s Change Model, however, it touched on some important points not mentioned in our book. One point Straker brings up is that people have a natural tendency to find context that they feel a sense of safety and control and that talking to people about the future doesn’t help to ‘unfreeze’ them. To ‘unfreeze,’ a push strategy should be implemented to initiate the change, and a pull strategy to motivate people to continue making the change. Some people are ‘change ready’ while others take longer to accept the need for change. In the transition or changing stage, time is essential because change is often a journey rather than a single step. A good leader should help to coach their followers so that everyone can follow through with the change. Initiating change can also be hard because it’s the 1st step. To move past this, a slow initiation of change or preparation will help to ease the uncertainty. Another problem is that often people purposely stay in the transitioning stage rather than reaching the desired change. People become comfortable with the temporary situation where they’re not held accountable for their actions, and replace real action with just talking about change. Instead of completely unfreezing, Straker writes that it’s ideal to be in an inbetween stage where freezing isn’t fully reached so that the next unfreezing will be easier. However, the problem with that is that people experience ‘change shock,’ where they perform ineffectively because they anticipate a new change. This website is helpful in realizing other points about the Lewin’s Change Model.

Works Cited
Straker, David. Lewin's Freeze Phase. 23 April 2010 (http://changingminds.org/disciplines/change_management/lewin_change/lewin_change.htm).

Stress

Stress means something different to every individual. However, managers need a working definition so the book defined stress as "an adaptive response, mediated by individual characteristics and/or psychological processes, that is a consequence of any external action, situation, or event that places special physical and/or psychological demands upon a person." This seems very complicated and confusing but it basically means the following: "environmental demands that that produce an adaptive response that is influenced by individual differences."

Recently, more people have become more stressed because of the recession. The father of the concept of stress, Hans Selye, stated that both positive and negative events can trigger an identical stress response that can be beneficial or harmful. He defined positive stress as eustress. He emphasizes that efforts need to be directed at managing stress, not at somehow escaping it altogether.

The article "Define Stress" re emphasizes this point of managing stress. It states that "Managing stress and symptoms of stress is important because stress and health are related to each other." That is why it is important to know what stress is and what your personal stressors are and how you can you manage them, which may be by seeking professional help.

"Define Stress." Manage Stress. 23 April 2010. http://www.aboutstressmanagement.com/stressrelief/stress-management/define-stress/define-stress.htm

Chapter 18

In chapter 18, I felt that I had a real world connection with the “Real World” section. This chapter was all about managing change, the world is changing rapidly and is we don’t keep up with it technologically and socially, we will be left in the dust. This section talks about how Amgen inc. took an unusual approach of asking shareholders what they thought of their compensation plan. It was the first of its kind, a 10 question, online survey which shareholders could participate in. This set trends for other firms in the industry to do the same.
I directly related to this in how John asked his students what they thought of the syllabus, and what changes they would make. In doing this, the students felt like they were valued and respected. No matter how small your roll is, it feels good to be a part of something and to contribute. It also makes the students accountable for their actions when they mess up. Just like it’s easy for you to complain about a president which you didn’t vote for, it’s easy for students to hate a syllabus which was thrown at them. However, if the students write the syllabus, there is not much they can complain about.
I did some additional research on shareholder involvement and found that it is now the norm to involve the shareholders to a certain extend. The biggest factor however, is how large the share. Someone who owns .002% of Nike doesn’t have as much say in the direction of the company as Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods. However, there are meeting, conferences and polls that any shareholder can participate in in many companies.
http://connectedresearch.wordpress.com/2009/07/16/walker-report-calls-for-greater-shareholder-involvement/