In any business, change is inevitable especially when the company is undergoing restructuring. Successful change management depends on the effective leadership style. Organizational change is a management practice that involves realigning business practices to meet the changing market demands including enhancing service delivery and capitalizing on various business opportunities. To evaluate organizational change, the management needs to understand multiple change models since they reveal compelling forces of change, what is likely to happen, and how it would happen. In most cases, it is hard to determine a model that fits an organization. Nonetheless, using any of the change models is beneficial as they offer guidelines to follow and predict the presumed results of the change initiative.
Question 1
Employees are considered the greatest organizational asset. Therefore, increased employee turnover leads to the negative performance of the organization and consequently profitability. The management needs to be concerned about the needs of the employees, but since the senior managers have failed to determine the common organizational problem, change in the management practice is inevitable (Mind Tools Editorial Team, 2014). Change needs to run through the organization regardless of the size. According to Lewin’s change model, the management needs to prepare for the future events and plan to manage the transition. Lewin denoted that motivation for change should be generated before the changes occur. The model involves a series of stages: unfreezing, changing, and refreezing. Unfreezing involves accepting that there is a need for change; thus, the managers should focus on breaking the status quo before building a new method of operating. The business cannot run with the rising employee turnover and low profitability.
The solution of the problems relies on challenging beliefs, behaviors, attitudes, and values influencing employee performance. Change is the second stage, which involves resolving uncertainties and looking for new ways of operating. The employees and management should believe and support the needed change direction. However, it is notable that the transition takes time. When employees do not understand change, the resistance could occur. People take time to embrace new ideas, direction, and participate proactively in the needed change (Mind Tools Editorial Team, 2014). Nevertheless, these practices require an understanding of the benefits, adequate time, and communication. According to Lewin, refreeze is the final phase. Refreezing involves realigning the new methods with the objectives by developing a stable institutional chart, ensuring consistency in the job description, and assisting employees to internalize and institutionalize the changes. By refreezing, the management ensures that changes are continually and integrate in various institutional activities. These practices would ensure that the needs of the employees are considered in the management practices.
Question 2
In the case, employees do not understand that planned changes have more benefits than costs. Training is vital for the professional development of the employees. However, the employees failed to realize that the market is increasingly changing and to remain relevant in the market and enhance efficiency, change is inevitable (Kotter, 2007). Based on John Kotter’s eight model of change, employees often support change after the management convinces them of the need for change. The model involves a series of change. The first phase is increasing urgency, which involves exciting the employees the support change by providing external evidence on the significance of change. The second phase is building the guiding change by assembling the workers. However, the workers should be committed, energetic, and powerfully working as a team to drive the needed changes. Creating the right vision is the third phase through which strategic initiatives are developed to created the visionary change to meet organizational objectives.
The fourth stage is communicating the need for communication. At this stage, the company should consider using practical examples and stories for sustaining change alignment and engaging the employees. Communication is essential to ensure that employees understand organizational direction. The fifth stage involves empowering the employees with the ability to change (Kotter, 2007). By enabling the workers, the business would be removing the obstacles working against the needed organizational change. The sixth phase is creating short-term business objectives; this is achievable through continually tracking, evaluating, recognizing, and reward both small and large change accomplishments. Resistance is often common when implementing change. Hence, the seventh phase is staying persistent, which involves sustaining change acceleration through continually reinforcing the enhanced behaviors associated with change. The eight-stage is ensuring that changes are permanent through anchoring all the implemented changes in each aspect of the business.
Question 3
Each organization aims to increase its market share by generating products and services that meet the quality needs of the customers. The CEO is responsible for critical organizational success. However, it is impossible to achieve success without the input of the employees. To remain competitive in the market, the business much changes its practices to accommodate the changing needs of the customers. Action research theory is a change model that involves collaborative activities in which the management consider inputs from those affected. The model includes a cycle of reflection and action, which are broken into various phases such as planning, acting, observing, and reflecting. Planning is an essential phase while generating ideas. While considering to implement change, the CEO needs to examine the concept using facts, especially those associated with market competition. Moreover, the CEO should consider new insights while developing and planning the required change.
Action research often stems from an organizational problem in the practitioners find themselves. During the reflection phase of the model, the business needs to refine the problem sufficiently and ensuring that the focus is on improving organizational productivity and performance in the market. According to the Center for Education Innovation, the success of change depends on proper planning (n.d.). Thus, there is need for plans for observing and monitoring the proposed changes and to achieve this, the CEO should gather sufficient factual data on the performance of market dynamics. After planning, the business puts the identified recommendations into actions. Nevertheless, there is a need to record any deviations from the initial plan and realign business practices with the needs of the market to increase the institutional competitive advantage. Observation enables the business to assess the effects of the actions.
Conclusion
From the analysis, it is evident that a change in business cannot be overstated. Enterprises are increasingly battling with challenges associated with the ever-changing internal and external forces which directly affects the performance of the organization. The best change model is Kotter’s eight-step since it presents a series of steps which are easy to follow and implement; it focuses on preparing and accepting change; and it offers the easier way to transition from the other models. The least support model of change model is the five stages of Action Research since it involves complex processes, which are difficult to understand.
References
Center for Education Innovation. (n.d.). Stages of an Action Research Project. Retrieved from http://cei.ust.hk/files/public/ar_intro_stages_of_an_action_research_project.pdf
Kotter, J. P. (2007). Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail. Harvard Business Review, 85(1), 96-103.
Mind Tools Editorial Team. (2014). Lewin's Change Management Model Understanding the Three Stages of Change. Retrieved from https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_94.htm
