There is a growing consensus that any healthy company does not stand still but develops and grows. This means change in terms of organisational development (Luthians, 1989) or as problem solving (Wilson, 1984). Change to any established system or way-of-life is perceived as a traumatic experience

Change management should start with a holistic analysis of the status Coe and the desired outcome of the change process regarding the following:

• Major stakeholders and their interests
• Emotions about the change
• All relevant economic aspects
• Potential risks and their likelihood
• Operative consequences of the change

Ensure Change Management Capabilities

Whether a company should develop change management competences internally or find an external vendors to support the company.

Consider the basic things such as the company’s IT infrastructure and the operating space the company is operating from.

The effects of employee productivity and morale are very much influenced by the management team in an organization. During times of change in an organization, Kotter believes that managers need to be leaders. He states that “leaders are different from managers. They don’t make plans; they don’t solve problems; they don’t even organize people. What leaders really do is prepare organizations for change and help them cope as they struggle through it” (as cited in Cameron, 2009, p. 144).

Paul Strebel (1996) states that managers and employees view change differently. Top-level managers see change as an opportunity to strengthen the business by aligning operations with strategy, to take on new professional challenges and risks, and to advance their careers. For many employees however, change is neither sought after nor welcomed because it is disruptive, intrusive, and upsets the balance.

HR can never be a completely independent facilitator, neutrally analysing different stakeholder perspectives, because HR is also a stakeholder and has certain interests within the company.

Reference:

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4899-0265-8_116

https://ebrary.net/26363/management/change_management

Click to access download.php

There are many ways of managing change and there is a strategy in every form of change that takes place in an organisation. Kurt Lewin has defined the next 3 step as the steps that can be used in managing change:

1. Unfreezing- Changing to overcome the pressure of both individual resistance and group conformity.
2. Movement – A change process that transforms the organisation from the status quo to a desired end state.
3. Refreezing – Stabilising a change intervention by balancing driving and restraining forces.

The existing conditions have an influence that can impact change both negatively and positively, below are the two forces that have and can sway the change:

1. Driving forces – forces that direct behaviour away from the status quo.
2. Restraining forces – forces that hinder movement from the existing equilibrium

The restraining forces are more of a description of the resistance to change and they requires a form of a strategy to manage them and influence the driving forces. Below are the recommended methodologies that can be used to manage resistance to change:

• Education and communication – setting clear communication methods that educates the employees on the change and the reasons for change.
• Participation – having focus session to let the employees contribute to how the organisation can change its current status. Collect ideas and implement the relevant once.
• Building support and commitment – provide the employees with support “including counselling” and train the new skills that might be required after change implementation. Reassure the employees in all possible manner.
• Develop positive relationships – building trust with your team
• Implementing changes fairly – the change should not be seen as punitive but necessary, every step should be fair and transparent.
• Manipulation and co-optation – making the change look good and withholding information to ensure buy in, it also recommend partnering with the resisting team to make it look like the organisation has their best interest at heart.
• Selecting people who accept changes – change is link to personalities, there are people that see change as a positive thing and they will always see the good in every situation.
• Coercion – application of direct threats or force on the resistance.

In the forever changing industry always be ethical about the methods you choose to implement when managing change.

Additional online read:

https://www.prosci.com/resources/articles/tips-for-managing-resistance-to-change

Reference:

Robbins, S., Judge, T., Odendaal, A. and Roodt, G. (2016). Organisational behaviour – Global and Southern African Perspective. 3rd ed. Cape Town: Pearson Education

https://www.prosci.com/resources/articles/tips-for-managing-resistance-to-change

Change is one of the activities that occurs in many places and it is influenced by various reasons. We often deal with change in our own different ways and some people turn to have a certain level of resistance to change. Resistance to change in a work place is when employees react negatively to the change and it may reflect in the following manner:

• Not thinking about it, moving on with daily activities as per normal
• Ignoring the change, acting like nothing has changed. For example some will even work in their old work station after they have been informed that they are changing departments
• Increasing the use of sick leave, coming to work late, leaving earlier that they are supposed to leave or even resignations

Resistance to change can be seen as a positive reaction depending on how the leadership team respond to it, the leadership can have focus session where the employees are able debate about the change and contribute to the change.

Resistance to change does not reflect easily as people respond differently to change the flowing are the different methods of reaction:

• Overt * shown openly they don’t hide anything
• Implicit * suggested though not directly expressed
• Immediate * instant reaction
• Deferred * postpone reaction.

With the above mentioned it easier to manage change with the overt and the immediate reactions and the possibility of open discussions are high, however the implicit and deferred reactions are not easily liked to the change and at times they are not resolved until they have created a bigger challenge.  

Below is an interesting article to read – there is a section on spotting employee’s resistance to change.

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/what-is-resistance-to-change-1918240

“Some employees will publicly challenge the change, why it was needed or how it is unfolding. An employee who has a higher position and more seniority may be more resolute in his or her resistance. Less well-positioned employees may resist collectively in ways such as a work slowdown, staying home from work, misunderstanding directions, and, in rarer cases, organizing the workplace to bring in a labor union.”

Reference:

By: SUSAN M. HEATHFIELD  Updated December 10, 2018 How to Spot Resistance to Change in Your Companyhttps://www.thebalancecareers.com/what-is-resistance-to-change-1918240[Accessed 13 Aug. 2019].

bbins, S., Judge, T., Odendaal, A. and Roodt, G. (2016). Organisational behaviour – Global and Southern African Perspective. 3rd ed. Cape Town: Pearson Education.

The world is changing everyday: the population is changing, customer trends are changing, technology is changing and the economy is changing. Businesses that fail to clinch on to change can easily wind up as dinosaurs – “out of touch and unable to compete under current trading conditions.” We are moving into autonomous (paperless) environment and part of it requires a lot of changes in the business world and the industry will face some challenges, one of them being resistance to change.

Resistance to change is the act of opposing or struggling with amendments or adjustments that changes the mandate. Employees put up a wall when they are poorly introduced to changes by management and the communication often not clear or introduced as an open discussion. The change often affects how the employees work and at times they don’t see the need for the changes yet it is implemented.

They also experience resistance when they’re either not involved in the decision making process or if they’re left out of the procedural aspects of the process.

When employees believe their input was considered, they are less likely to experience resistance to change. Smart employers recognize this is a given before employees are asked to make any changes.

References:

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/what-is-resistance-to-change-1918240

Robbins, S., Judge, T., Odendaal, A. and Roodt, G. (2016). Organisational behaviour – Global and Southern African Perspective. 3rd ed. Cape Town: Pearson Education