Management Transitions and Organizational Reform
Companies frequently go through management transitions for a variety of reasons. Organizational reform is intended to increase firm productivity. Most businesses welcome change in order to obtain a competitive advantage in their industry. Changes are necessitated by factors both within and outside of an organization. Many businesses implement the transition to strengthen current employer-employee ties, strengthen operations, and encourage learning and development. Resistance to change is something I've encountered when working in an organization. Opposition to improvements may come from middle-level management or personnel at lower levels, because these employees are accustomed to routine operations. Change requires them to alter their way of doing their jobs. Employees may be required to attend trainings in order to cope with the new changes. Some employees may be retrenched to pave the way for adoption of automation of operations. For example, for a bank adopting internet banking, its customers will access their banking services through online platforms. The change may force the company to retrench or change roles of the current employees. Organizations have failed change management in their operations. Communication strategies, used to effect changes to staff, are the primary reasons for failure in the adoption of the change in an organization. The upper management often communicates changes to operations and expects employees to adapt to the new changes within a short period. The drastic change in operations makes the employees feel left out in the way the changes were made and communicated to them. Introduction of new policies in an organization without proper consultation may lead to resistance to the change. Effective change management strategies must be put in place to ensure smooth transitioning during the implementation of organizational change. ( McLean, 2005)
Hiring External Development Consultants for Organizational Change
Companies often resort to hiring external development consultants to help manage the transition to new operations. External consultants have advantages over the internal consultants. They have no preconceived notions about the organization and are respected by the employees because of their reputation. These consultants give their view and reject change if they feel the organization is not ready to adopt it. Organizational change has to go through organizational development stages to ensure change is appropriately adopted.
The Organizational Development Process
First, the company finds a qualified consultant. The aim of intervention and roles to be played by the client and stakeholders are then defined. Equal participation is encouraged at this point. The critical part of this process is fact-finding. The consultant assesses how processes, systems, skills, technology, communication, and practices will need to be adjusted to meet the desired change. Research is done through conducting interviews, surveys and analyzing data. The client and the expert then come up with the action plan to effect the change and present it to the concerned departments. The action is implemented by communicating over time to staff and carrying out evaluations on the implementation of reforms. (Weiher, 2014).
Challenges Faced by Consultants
Consultants face challenges as they execute the development changes in organizations, especially at the fact-finding stage. Problems often occur when the majority of the employees do not want to cooperate in the provision of information and data required for effective change implementation. Additionally, consultants face challenges in the implementation of the action plan stage. The problem is exhibited when an organization fails to implement the action plan as designed by the change consultant. Failure is often caused by the management's eagerness to implement the changes within a short time. It can also be caused by a higher resistance to adopt the change by the employees.
References
McLean, G. (2005). Organization development: Principles, processes, performance. Berrett-Koehler
Publishers.
Weiher, A. (2014). Artifact: Organization Development.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9iLMsogoR0
