After viewing the above
presentations, reflect on the following questions in a well-written post on
your Reflection Blog.
·
How do you react when
you hear colleagues using some of the excuses listed in the 50 Reasons Not to
Change graphic?
·
Do you ever use any of
these excuses yourself?
·
How can you overcome the
thinking that creates those responses to change efforts?
·
Do you agree with Seth
Godin’s concept that change is driven by tribes?
·
What can you take away
from this exercise to immediately use in your career?
Once you have reflected upon these questions,
list any other questions or insights that have come to you as a result of this
exercise.
Due to economic and political pressures,
organizations continuously face competition in their respective fields causing
them to radically change and reinvent their image, culture and processes. While
the process of change may seem simplistic at first sight, the elements and
implementation of an effective change strategy proves to be a difficult task.
Organizations today are faced with the challenge of effectively managing change
within their business in order to maintain their success. When an organization
fails to adapt quickly enough in order to survive within their market, they
risk becoming obsolete. Therefore, in order to prevent failure, organizations
must act quickly and make choices that are favorable and consistent with the
pressures of their economic and political constraints while also meeting the
needs of their consumer.
One of the biggest challenges of
change is the resistance we experience to it. In order for change to emerge,
corrective action must take place. But in order for corrective action to take
place, we must first be able to recognize the need for change and understand
the benefits of implementing an effective change strategy which will increase
the value and life span of the organization. In order to implement change we
must first accept it. In the textbook, An
Experiential Approach to Organizational Development, Donald Brown states
the following of implementing organizational change:
The single biggest reason organizational changes
fail is that no one thought about endings or planned to manage their impact on
people. Naturally concerned about the future, planners and implementers usually
forget that people have to let go of their present first. They forget that
while the first task of change management is to understand the destination and
how to get there, the first task of transition management is to convince people
to leave home. (Brown 2011).
My organization is currently experiencing an
organizational restructure to which there
has
been resistance by some members who have been uncomfortable with the recent
changes which have been implemented. Once the restructure was introduced to our
organization, members almost immediately began to list the reasons the change
would not work. Most of the reasons discussed included management and
departmental acceptance, having the personnel and the equipment for the change,
the new changes making current policies or procedures obsolete, and workers believing
that the new changes affected their jobs duties negatively, by adding unwanted
responsibilities or taking away from them.
During this restructure my department experienced a
change in management four separate times in less than three months. I was
frustrated and worried about how the change would affect my family and I admit
that at first I was reluctant to accepting the changes that continued to occur.
I was not in favor of the new changes and resisted them as best as I could.
Even when the changes appeared to work in my favor, I was unwilling to accept
them as there was a constant fear of where the change would permanently lead
me. I was dissatisfied with the change efforts being implemented and the impact
it was having on my job, my family, and my overall being. While I wanted to be
accepting of the change, the restraints to it seemed to overcome my abilities to
recognize the benefits of its execution.
In order to overcome the thinking that created these
negative responses to my organizations change efforts, I needed to first step
out of my comfort zone. I realized that one of the reasons I was so against
this change at first was because I had become complacent in my job. There was uncertainty
in change and I was forced to be a part of it without having been asked. In
order to become comfortable with this new change, I needed to allow myself to
be uncomfortable and to be okay with moving into the direction of the unknown
and allow myself to feel the discomfort of everything that was going on around
me. The organization was moving in a new direction and I could either be a part
of it, or choose to go against it. While I feared the unknown, I made the
conscious decision to take things as they would come and move forward with a
positive and open mind to new organizational norms and culture that was being
created.
Many employees of the organization feared what the
changes would bring and it became apparent to upper level management that in
order for this change to work, they would need to take the necessary steps to
quell the fears of their workers. To do this, managers and supervisors at all
levels of the organization addressed the concerns of their workers and allowed
for open communication and dialogue about what the changes would bring. They
also linked the change to reflect the issues that workers already cared about
such as job security and advancement, which made acceptance of the change less
complicated and demanding. The organization also made employees aware of the
pros and cons of the change proving their knowledge of the possible effects it
could have on its workers.
In Seth Godin’s speech The Tribes we Lead, Godin discusses how ordinary people have the
power to create change by leading those around them to stand up for what they
believe in. Godin states that most movements are created by finding those
individuals who are disconnected but already have a yearning to create change,
not those who want something they don’t have. He argues that change is created
by those who stand up for what they believe in and go against the status quo.
Godin teaches us that when culture and curiosity are challenged, commitment to
change is provoked and implemented and an effective culture of change is
created. Godin’s speech was unique and inspiring and my inspiration lies with
my agreement of his vision.
In this week’s readings, I gained tremendous
knowledge about the barriers to change and the “restraining forces blocking the
implementation of change programs” (Brown 2011). I discovered that conformity
to organizational culture and norms threatened organizational success and
disrupted the mission and vision of the changes that were desperately trying to
be implemented. In educating myself about the importance of change for an
organization, I learned that my own fears and concerns were actually
prohibiting my organization from moving forward in way that would prove to be
effective, efficient and beneficial for my own well being, if I just allowed
it. And lastly, I learned that the biggest reward of accepting change would be
my own personal growth in having the ability to overcome the resistance to change
in the future.
References
Godin, S. (2009, February). Seth
Godin: The tribes we lead | Video on TED.com [Video file]. Retrieved from
http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_the_tribes_we_lead.html
Marker, A. (n.d.).
10 StrategiesYou CanUse toOvercomeResistance to Change. Retrieved from
http://opwl.boisestate.edu/wp-content/uploads/news-A_Marker_Handling_Resistance_to_Change_v4b.pdf
Watkins, D. (2011,
August 24). 50 Reasons Not to Change by Daryl Watkins on Prezi [Video file].
Retrieved from http://prezi.com/z2v2cvo4t9tc/50-reasons-not-to-change/
Brown,
D. R. (2011). An experiential approach to organization development(8th ed.). Upper
Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
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