Change Management (Essay Sample)

READINESS FOR CHANGE MANAGEMENT By Student Name Course code + name University name City, name Date Introduction One of the topics that have received more reflection and study in recent past is the concept of change and change management. Organizations undergo change from time to time, and the manner in which the leadership in these organizations manages the process of change determines whether the impetus for change will result into the intended goals. Change within an organization may be in the form of structural, operational or behavioral change (Vakola and Nikolaou 2005). No matter what he type of change, an organization should manage the entire process in a way that minimizes resistance to change. In order to ensure that the change process is well-executed, manages should adequately prepare organization members for the anticipated change. This essay reflects on the concept of readiness for change and discusses various aspects of change management that organizations experience while anticipating change. Though this lens, the essay shall discuss the circumstances under which an organization implements change, components that are being changed and attitudes of individuals who have to implement the anticipated change. In discussing these elements, this essay shall use the Kuwait Airways as a case study. The company anticipates privatization and thus employees should be well-prepared for change. Context of the Change The context in which this essay discusses elements of change is preparedness or readiness for change in a public company. In order to prevent resistance to change whenever an organization is implementing change, members of the organization should be adequately prepared for change. The more employees are prepared for change, the higher the success of the change will be and thus will be quicker in meeting the new goals and targets of the organization. One of the key factors that determine how sufficient an organization is prepared for change is assessment. Assessment is one of the steps in a model that was devised by Armenakis, Harris, and Mossholder (1993), to assist managers in preparing their organizations for change. As argued by the theorists, assessment enables the management to identify gaps existing between their own expectations about the change and those of other organizational members (Armenakis, Harris, and Mossholder, 1993). If gaps between management and member expectations about the change are established, but the management fails to take any action to fill these gaps, then the organization should expect resistance to change and thus a threat to change implementation. Kuwait Airways is anticipating a major change as the company is preparing for privatization. This would entail the transfer of ownership from a public sector, which is mainly owned by the government, to the private sector (Vakola and Nikolaou 2005). This implies that the organization will cease being controlled by the government and start being influenced by individual shareholders. As such, Kuwaiti Airways will have new ownership structure, which may affect its mode of operation and management structures. The management of the company should not only determine whether the employees are ready to embrace the change, but should also establish whether they (management) are also ready for the shift of ownership. Change in company ownership is often characterized by many management challenges, especially when a public company is being privatized (Gilley, Gilley, and McMillan 2009). The context of this change, therefore, reflects on the current environment within which the employees of an organization are operating. State corporations and other public companies are often characterized by long bureaucratic organizational structures that inhibit change. Currently, the employees of Kuwait Airways are used to doing things in a certain manner, and they would do anything to maintain their status quo. Preparing the employees for the anticipated change would involve a comprehensive implementation of several actions that would change their attitudes and enable the employees embrace the change. Therefore, readiness for change outlines the extent to which individuals are cognitively and emotionally inclined to accept, embrace, and adopt the given change and thus alter the strongly held status quo. Generally, the process of preparing an organization for a major change, like the one being anticipated at Kuwait Airways, entails several dimensions namely: change process, change context, change content, and individual attributes to change (Vakola and Nikolaou 2005). The change process entails the steps taken by individuals, such as active participation in change activity, while implementing a change. The second dimension is change context, which has been addressed in this section. The third dimension is the organizational change content, which involves the technological, procedural, and structural characteristics of an organization undergoing the change. Lastly, individual attributes of employees establishes the willingness of individuals to embrace the change. Due to differences between individuals within an organization, there are individuals and groups within an organization who are more willing to change than others. The individuals willing to embrace change can be used by change managers to act as change agents. Change Content We have established that change content involves the technological, procedural, and structural characteristics of an organization undergoing the change. This dimension, thus, studies what is being changed within the organization. There are several aspects that will be changed during the process of privatization. Employees will thus be expected to embrace new ways of doing work. Among the changes that the organization will undergo includes structural change, process change, and cultural change. The structure of the company is expected to change because of the change in the ownership, and consequently the management, of the company. A public company often has its management being appointed by government officials. This implies that the appointment if the leaders often organization may be influenced by the politics of the day. However, the management of a privately owned company is selected though a rigorous process of recruitment and selection. Therefore, structural changes occur when there is an alteration in the organizational structure of a company (El-Farra and Badawi 2012). The managers and employees of the company expect the change to bring about more stringent operational procedures. The new ownership of the company, shareholders, will require rapid growth and expansion of the organization, which would result into more profits and thus growth in revenue. Research has indicated that privatization of public corporations result into improved efficiency with which the new management conducts business operations. The airways industry is highly competitive and thus the organizational structure of the company will be changed in order to align the operations of the company to the dynamic market. Such a change elicits mixed expectations from organizational members and the management. While some managers will be excited about the opportunity to increase their efficiencies, some will be skeptic about the new changes and may anticipate lay-offs of employees. This might be a reason for resistance to change. However, a proper preparation of the organization for the structural change will make different individuals ready to embrace the change (El-Farra and Badawi 2012). Following the change in organizational structure, the operations of the organization will also have to change in order to align to the new requirements. Procedural changes are implemented by companies to improve their efficiencies. For instance, this may occur through alterations of product creation, marketing activities, distribution, and how service is delivered to customers. Changes in the way Kuwait Airways will operate after the privatization could also elicit reaction from organizational members. Given the industry in which an organization operates, changes in the structure of the management will, most probably, result into installation of new systems especially networking systems. With the change in these systems, all members of the organization will be required to have skills relevant for the new systems. This involves change. Lastly, cultural change is the least tangible of the changes that the organization will experience, yet the most significant factor in change management. In order for the organization to be successful in implementing the new changes, its culture must be altered and be aligned to the post-privatization organization. There is a big disparity between the culture of publicly-owned companies and private companies. Changing the culture of an organization may be the most difficult part of change implementation, and is often the factor that determines the success of a change (Gilley, Gilley, and McMillan 2009). The organization will have to change its set of shared assumptions, norms, values and beliefs. An organization with prototypical culture, such as a public organization, is often characterized by strong bureaucratic, top-down structure in which standardization and stability in operations are valued. Therefore, a change in the culture of the organization will lead to alteration of relationships between managers and employees. Employees will thus have to change their individual attitudes towards the required change in order to minimize resistance and make the entire change process a success (Gilley, Gilley, and McMillan 2009). Individuals' Attitude Organizational change is often characterized by introduction of new working and organizing arrangements. The success of any organizational change depends on the ...