Organizational Resistance
Organizational resistance means that the change is resisted at the level of the organization itself.
Managing Planned Change
A planned change is a change planned by the organization, it does not happen by itself. It is affected by the organization with the purpose of achieving something that might otherwise by unattainable or attainable with great difficulty. Through planned change, an organization can achieve its goals rapidly. The basic reasons for planned change are:
–To improve the means for satisfying economic needs of members.
–To increase profitability.
–To promote human work for human beings.
–To contribute to individual satisfaction and social well being.
In introducing planned change, the basic problem before management is to handle it in such a way that there would be necessary adjustment in various forces. For this purpose, the manager who has to act as the change agent, has to go through a particular process. The planned change process may comprise, basically the following three steps :
1.Planning for change
2.Assessing change forces
3.Implementing change.
1. Planning for Change
The first step in the process of change is to identify the need for change and the area of change as to whether it is a strategic change, process oriented change or employee oriented change. This need for change can be identified either through internal factors or through external factors. Once this needs is identified, the following general steps can be taken :
(i) Develop New Goals and Objectives : The manager must identify as to what new outcomes they wish to achieve. This may be a modification of previous goals due to changed internal and external environment or it may be a new set of goals and objectives.
(ii) Select an Agent of Change : The next step is that the management must decide as to who will initiate and oversee this change. One of the existing managers may be assigned this duty or even sometimes specialists and consultants can be brought in from outside to suggest the various methods to bring in the change and monitor the change process.
(iii) Diagnose the Problem : The person who is appointed as the agent of change will then gather all relevant data regarding the area or the problem where the change is needed. This data should be critically analysed to pinpoint the key issues. Then the solutions can be focussed on those key issues.
(iv) Select Methodology : The next important step is select a methodology for change which would be commonly acceptable and correct. As the human tendency is to resist the change, employees’ emotions must be taken into consideration when devising such methodology.
(v) Develop a Plan : After devising the methodology, the next step will be to put together a plans as to what is to be done. For example, if the management wants to change the promotion policy, it must decide as to what type of employees will be affected by it, whether to change the policy for all the departments at once or to try on a few selected departments first.
(vi) Strategy for Implementation of the Plan : In this stage, the management must decide on the ‘when’, ‘where’ and ‘how’ of the plan. This includes the right time of putting the plan to work, how the plan. This includes the right time of putting the plan to work, how the plan will be communicated to the employees’ in order to have the least resistance and how the implementation will be monitored.