MNGT3011 – WEEK 3 NOTES:

Textbook Chapter 1 Summarisations:

Organisations -> way of working  structured or unstructured with goals and purposes. Interactions
of people  members of an org  implies structuring of their activities  organisational roles;

Subsystems and components are part of the wider system in organisation- subsystems  formal
and informal  Formal  strategy formed by one or group of leaders in a group / BOD / Top mngt
group.

Other components  goals and the procedure of achieving through services and product; The
organisation as a system;

Clear from any examination of complex systems such as organisations the some kind of structuring of
activities is required  Child (!973) drew attention to the role of other  far more intangible
elements of organisational life.

External triggers

 Changing customer requirements and changing demand for products/services

 Regulatory changes
 Trade Union Activity
 Actions by competitors
 Business performance (falling incomes or revenues)
 Economic climate
 Advances in technology that affect production systems or products;
 Production costs (materials, labour);
 The growth of e-commerce and use of the Internet;
 Competition from other countries;

Political:

 Government legislation
 Government Ideology
 International Law
 Universal rights
 Wars
 Local regulations
 Taxation
 Trade Union Activities

Economic:
  Competitors
 Suppliers
 Currency Exchange rates
 Employment rates
 Wage rates
 Government economic policies
 Other countries economic policies
 Lending policies of financial institutions
 Changes from public to private ownership

Sociocultural:

 Demographics trends
 Lifestyle changes
 Skills availability
 Attitudes to work and employment
 Attitudes to minority groups
 Gender issues
 Willingness and ability to move
 Concern for the environment
 Business ethics

Technological:

 Information technology/the internet

 New production processes
 Computerization of process
 Changes in transport technology
 New ways to generate energy
 Waste management and recycling

Internal triggers of a need of change:

 Appointment of a new chief executive or other senior managers

 Falling organisational performance
 A new version and mission statement.
 High employee turnover, low employee morale;
 Recognition or de-recognition of a union
 Relocation and/or redesign of a factory or office layout
 The adoption of new technology
 Takeover, divestment or merger and acquisition;
 Labour shortages or surpluses.

The pace and scope of change (Model)

Grundy’s three types of change make intuitive sense, but they are somewhat simplistic;

Balogun and Hope Hailey’s types of change (2008)

Proposed a model of organisational life that consists of ‘periods of incremental change, or

convergence, punctuated by discontinuous changes’.

Two types of converging change – Fine tuning and incremental adaptation. Both these types of
change have the common aim and maintaining the fit between organisational strategy, structure and
processes.

Predictable Change:

Change could be viewed as neither wholly emergent nor planned. Griener was taken with Quinn and
Camero – used to describe the stages organisation go through to develop and grow. Griener
maintains that, as organisations mature and grow in size, their activities go through five phases.
Evolution and revolution stages are implemented to describe a typical life cycle pattern that is
completed by Clarke (1994) useful organisation of the characteristics and crisis points associated with
phase of growth.
The linear paradigm reflects the influence of Lewis’s well known three stages model of change (!948(,
which encompasses the following points:

Unfreezing: a stage within which those involved come to recognize that something must change.

Moving: a stage during which new ideas are tested and new ways of working emerge.

Refreezing: a stage within which new behaviors, skills and attitudes are stabilized and commitment to
change its achieved.  Being unitary in focus - linear in approach;

ENGAGEMENT, A ROLE FOR LEADERSHIP IN CHANGE.

Interactions  with stakeholders  decisions weighted? - concerned with safety and

environment?  both pragmatic and ethical issues  dramatic impact on the stakeholders.

More importance  to an employee; in it and inputs, systems, and output deals with everything.

Hodges (2018) argue - success in org change  high dependent  advocacy of stakeholders; Org
change  MULTIDIMENSIONAL AND EMOTIONAL PROCESS - and the employee experience of
change represents and important decision with an ongoing commitment with the organisation.

The ethical dilemma

Large scale organisations  19th century - began to employ profession people; Move forward to
hospitals - with employed professionals; Became bureaucratic and specialized; - Extently emerge
to lose purpose by focusing on quantity rather than quality; Moral issues starts to surface in the
decision-making process; Leaders are not subjected or expected to see between right or wrong but
rather between two rights? In many ways, this is the most challenging of leadership dilemmas
because the understanding of how leaders come to choose alongside with vision, strategy, and skills.
Clarke and Clegg (1998) argue that paradigm underpinning management knowledge is changing.
The relational perspective

Stewart (1982)  3 elements: Demands, Constraints and Choices; The leadership is shaped by the
interactions of the demands and choices applied or to available in the organization; Demands 
derive through environment and key stakeholders, the governance and regulatory arrangement
within the organisation operates  colleagues aspirates of goals and ambitions;

Conversely  constraints provide the boundaries within which leaders operate - Constraints
create routines, including cultural routines. Routines provide stability and order and therefore pre-
dictaility. Routines are part of psychological contract between employees and the company.

FIVE PRINCIPLES IN ETHICAL LEADERSHIP

 Respect Others
 Seek to serve others
 Be fair and just in dealings with others
 Be honest;
 Seek to build a sense of purpose and community.

Exchange theory  Northouse uses of Graen (!995)  ‘Phase model of leadership making’

Leader and follower relation  Stranger, Acquaintance, and partner;

In the latter ‘partner’ phase, the roles (of leader and follower) are negotiated, influence is reciprocal,
exchanges are high quality and interests are group focused.

“Adaptive Leadership” involves the leader being willing to take responsibility for creating the ‘space’
within which people can come to terms with tough decisions. Creating space?  In essence, the
leader creates “space”  leader will use his or her own authority and credibility to “buy time”.
When tough choices are to be faced, there will always be pressure for choices and action.

Leaders manage or cope with that pressure  focus on leadership or relational process  forced to
face a reality that many leadership models tend to minimize.

The Force Field Analysis model is a model of system wide change that helps change agents diagnose
the forces that drive and restrain proposed organisational change.

UNFREEZE  move  FREEZE

LEWINS  Change process involves the “unfreezing” the current situation, moving to the chosen
condition and then “Freezing” the system so that it remains in the chosen state

 Freezing … where the change agent produces

 Disequilbrium between the driving and restraining forces
 Refreezing  where the systems and conditions are introduced that reinforce and maintain
the desired behaviors.

DIAGNOSING  IDENTIFYING OR DELIVERING A PROBLEM

Positive Change model:

Overcomes deficit models

 Fundamentally different to other two change models because the focus is NOT on what is
not working but on WHAT IS WORKING
 Uses an approach known as Appreciative Inquiry
 Everyone is involved in creating the ‘positive vision’ and so is more motivated to be
committed to making the change happen.

Comparison of planned changed models

Similarities  Change is preceded by diagnosis or preparation; All involve organisation members in

the change process; All have an evaluation at the end of each process

Differences -> the role of the ‘change agent’; Fixing problems vs building on strengths approaches;

Diagnostic – data => The choice of diagnotistic model must be carefully chosen

i) To squarely address the presenting problem; and

ii) To provide a comprehensive approach to the many features of reality.
Open systems Model:

Input -> Human and other resources acquired from the external environment

Transformation -> The conversation of inputs to outputs, as part of a production/operations and

comprising social and technological components

Outputs -> Goods and services resulting from the transformation process;

BURKE-LITWIN MODEL:

Diagnosis: Data collection and analysis

The diagnostic relationship -> The quality of the data depends on the nature of the relationship
between the data subjects and the data collector

 Goals of data collection will be:

1. Obtain valid information (honest, reliable and complete)
2. Initiate collaborative relationship – building between change leader and employees for
the purposes of change.
3. Energise for constructive change.

Characteristics of a successful feedback process:

 Aim is to get members to own the data and engage in the change process
 The focus should be on the process ie how the data is fed back to the organisation.
 The typical feedback session comprises a ‘meeting’ which allows discussion of data but these
are often filled with anxiety, defensive behaviours unless the change leader manages the
environment successfully.

Nadler identified five characteristics of successful feedback:

 Motivate everyone to work with the data.

 Structure the meeting for focus and ensure clear effective communication of the message.
 Ensure appropriate membership.
 Be clear about what can be changed and what cannot.
 Use effective process skills to support positive outcomes Nadler (1977)