HRM 601 Organizational Behavior

Session 14

Organizational Change & Development

The Need for Change in Organizations

• Change as a survival tactic -- if the organization does not keep pace the changing technology, consumer demands, and effective business processes, they will lose their competitive edge.

The Learning Organization

• Organizations that acquiring and applying knowledge to help cope with and adapt to change.

• Knowledge acquisition

• Information distribution

• Information interpretation

• Organizational memorization

Planned Change

• Changes in products or services

• Changes in size or structure

• Changes in administrative structures

• Changes in technology

Unplanned Change

• Government regulation

• Economic competition

• Performance Gaps

Areas of Organizational Change

• Goals and strategies

• Technology

• Job design

• Structure

• Processes

• People

The Change Process

Unfreezing(Facing the

Problem)

Moving(Creating a New

State)

Refreezing(Maintaining the

Change

Status Quo

New State

Individual Barriers to Change

• Economic fears

• Fear of the unknown

• Fear of social disruptions

• Effort

• Fear of loss of power and autonomy

• Commitment to the old position

Organizational Barriers to Change

• Structural inertia

• Work group norms

• Threat to existing balance of power

• History of change efforts gone wrong

• Boards of Directors

Overcoming Resistance to Change

• Informing about pressures for change

• Pointing out discrepancies between current state and desired one

• Convey positive expectations for change

What is Organizational Development?

• It is the application of social science techniques to plan change in organizational settings for the purpose of enhancing organizational effectiveness and the development of individuals.

Underlying Values

• Concept of people

• Concern for science

• Democratic principles

• The helping relationship

Potential Conflicts with OD

• Conflict with profit making

• Conflict with managerial prerogatives

Organizational Level Diagnosis

Inputs

General Environment

IndustryStructure

Transformation

Strategy

Design Factors

Culture

Outputs

Performance

Productivity

Satisfaction

Group Level Diagnosis

InputsOrganizationDesign Factors

Culture

Strategy

Transformation

Group Design Factors

Outputs

Team Effectiveness

Productivity,Satisfaction

Individual Level Diagnosis

InputsGroupDesign Factors

PersonalCharacterist-ics

Transformation

JobDesign Factors

Outputs

IndividualEffectiveness

Productivity,Satisfaction

After Diagnosis

• Feeding back the information

• Choosing interventions

• Managing change

• Institutionalizing change

Team Building

• Improved group processes

• Communication• Goal clarification• Role clarification• Task orientation

Survey Feedback

• Small meetings to feedback survey results

• Meetings used to formulate change

• Managers conduct meetings to indicate commitment

Employee Involvement

• Quality of worklife• Quality circles• Total quality

management

Re-Engineering

• Job redesign• Teamwork• Work performed by

most appropriate person

• Advanced information technologies used

OD Effectiveness

• More impact on organizational than individual outcomes

• Works better for white collars than blue collars

• Works better if multiple techniques are used

• Technological change shows more positive outcomes

Measurement Problems

• Difficult to isolate cause of outcomes since OD efforts often involve multiple changes

• May be the result of Hawthorne effects

• Change may be due to maturation or passage of time and not intervention

Ethical Issues

• The role of the OD practitioner

• Who’s values

Continuing Issues

• Importance of learning and knowledge

• Impact of technology

• Managing the remote work force