HUMAN BEHAVIOR IN AN ORGANIZATION

Chapter 12

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

AND DEVELOPMENT

Submitted to:
Mr. Willy Labastida
Submitted by:
Ms. Sheena Bianca Bungcaras
 A. Give at least three main ways in which organizations may
change.

1. Individual – pertaining to change in job assignment, transfer, change in job

maturity level, promotion or re-assignment
2. Team or Group – pertaining to changes due to inefficiencies, lack of
communication, etc
3. Organizational – pertains to changes due to relocation, restructuring,
mergers, acquisitions, or change of head of office

B. Describe why people are resistant to change in

organizations and ways in which this resistance may be
overcome.

1. Threat of power on an individual level. It is more likely that managers will resist
changes that will decrease their power and transfers it to their subordinates;
2. Threat of power on an organizational level. With the change process, some
groups, departments or sectors of the organization become more powerful.
Because of that, some persons will be opposed to such a proposal or
processes where they will lose their organizational power;
3. Losing the control by employees. The change process sometimes can
reduce the level of control that managers can conduct. In such a way
managers can resist the proposed changes if the change process will require
reduction of their control power;
4. Increasing the control of the employees. Organizational changes can
increase the managerial control of the employees;
5. Economic factors. Organizational changes sometimes can be seen from the
employee’s side simply as something that will decrease or increase their
salary or other economic privileges that some workplace brings to them in
the moment before implementation of the change process. It is normal to
expect that those people who feel that they will lose the portion of their salary
will resist the change.
6. Image, prestige and reputation. Each workplace brings adequate image,
prestige and reputation that are important to all employees. Organizational
changes can make a drastic shift in these employee’s benefits. If this is the
case with the proposed change, then it will produce dissatisfaction. So,
image, prestige and reputation is one of the causes of resistance to change;
7. Threat of comfort. Organizational changes in many cases results in personal
discomfort and make employee’s life more difficult. They make a transfer
from the comfort of the status quo to the discomfort of the new situation.
Employees have the skills to do an old job without some special attention to
 accomplishing the task. Each new task requires forgetting the old methods
of doing the job and learning new things that lead to waste of energy, and
causes dissatisfaction;
8. Job’s security. Organizational change can eliminate some work places, can
produce technological excess, layoffs and so on. Job’s security simply is one
of the causes of resistance to change;
9. Reallocation of resources. With organizational changes, some groups,
departments or sectors of the organization can receive more resources while
others will lose. So, this will bring resistance from the individuals, groups or
departments who will lose some of their currently available resources.
10. Already gained interests of some organized groups in the company.
Organizational change can make new groups more significant for the
success of the organization. That’s a big threat for old coalitions that will
cause resistance to change in those groups that will become more
insignificant with the proposals;
11. Implications on personal plans. Organizational change can stop other plans,
projects or other personal or family activities. In such a way this become one
of the causes of resistance to change for those persons who will be
reached by this change;
12. Too much dependence on others. In an organization there are employees
who too much depend on other individuals. This dependence is based on
current support that they receive from powerful individuals. If the
change process brings the threat of that dependence, it will cause
resistance to change of those persons that will be threatened by this change;
13. Misunderstanding the process. Organizational individuals usually
resist change when they do not understand the real purpose of the proposed
changes. When employees don’t understand the process, they usually
assume something bad. This will cause resistance to change;
14. Mistrust to initiators of change. When employees don’t have trust to
the initiators of the process, the process will not be accepted and this will
cause resistance to change;
15. Different evaluation and perception. Different evaluation and perception
can affect the organizational changes if there are persons who consider the
proposed changes as a bad idea. Because of that they are resistant to
proposed changes.
16. Fear of unknown. Organizational change, in many cases leads to uncertainty
and some dose of fear. It is normal people to feel the fear of uncertainty.
When employees feel uncertainty in a process of transformation, they think
that changes are something dangerous. This uncertainty affects
organizational members to resist the proposed change;
17. Organizational members’ habits. Employees work in large part is based on
habits, and work tasks are performed in a certain way based on those habits.
Organizational changes require shifts of those habits and because of that
dissatisfaction from these proposals.
18. Previous Experience. All employees already have some experience with a
previous organizational change process. So, they know that this process is not
an easy process. That experience simply will tell them that most of
the change processes in the past was a failure. So, this can cause resistance
to change;
19. Threat to interpersonal relations. Employees are often friends with each other
and they have a strong social and interpersonal relationship inside and
outside organization. If an organizational change process can be seen as a
threat to these powerful social networks in the organization, the affected
employees will resist to that change.
20. Weakness of the proposed changes. Sometimes proposed change might
have a weakness that can be recognized by the employees. So,
those employees will resist the implementation of the process until these
weaknesses will not be removed or solved.
21. Limited resources. A normal problem in every organization is to have limited
resources. When resources are limited, and with the proposed organizational
changes those resources are threatened
22. Bureaucratic inertia. Every organization has their own mechanisms as rules,
policies, and procedures. Sometimes, when individuals want to change their
behavior these mechanisms in many cases can resist to the proposed
changes;
23. Selective information processing. Individuals usually have selective
information processing, or hear only something that they want to hear. They
simply ignore information that is opposite of the current situation, and with
this, they don’t want to accept important aspects of the proposed changes.
24. Uninformed employees. Often times employees are not provided with
adequate information about organizational changes that must be
implemented. And normally, this can cause resistance to change;
25. Peer pressure. Often, we utilize some kind of informal punishment for
colleagues who supports change which others don’t support. This situation
can have a large impact on increasing the level of resistance to change;
26. Skepticism about the need for change. If the problem is a not a personal
thing of employees, they will not see the real need why they must change
themselves. Those that can’t see the need for change, will have a low
readiness level of the change process;
27. Increasing workload. In the process of organizational change, employees
usually must implement activities of a new change process increasing
workloads ;
28. Short time to perform the change process. In such a way the performing
time is dictated from the outside of an organization. These situations lead to
a short time for implementation of the organizational change process and
cause resistance to change.
 In order to overcome and avoid the mentioned causes of resistance to
change, it is important that the manager or leader applies effective change
management on the project from the very beginning. While resistance is the
normal human reaction in times of change, good change management can
mitigate much of this resistance. Change management is not just a tool for
managing resistance when it occurs; it is most effective as a tool for activating
and engaging employees in a change. Capturing and leveraging the passion
and positive emotion surrounding a change can many times prevent resistance
from occurring—this is the power of utilizing structured change management from
the initiation of a project.

Managing resistance is ineffective when it simply focuses on the symptoms.

The symptoms of resistance are observable and often overt, such as complaining,
not attending key meetings, not providing requested information or resources, or
simply not adopting a change to process or behavior. While they are more
evident, focusing on these symptoms will not yield results. To be effective at
managing resistance, you must look deeper into what is ultimately causing the
resistance. Effective resistance management requires identification of the root
causes of resistance—understanding why someone is resistant, not simply how
that resistance is manifesting itself.

C. Define Organizational Development.

Organizational change is the activity of differentiation or modification of

the organization with the main purpose to bring improvements of overall business
processes and to bring an adaptation in relation to the ongoing changes in the
environment. It also refers to a planned systematic approach to improving the
effectiveness of a company, government department of any organization- one

that aligns strategy, individuals and processes.

 D. Describe four techniques of organizational development
and describe the effectiveness of each.

1. Survey Feedback – The feedback survey questions range from work quality,
working condition, working hours, salaries and the attitude of the employees.
In this process, organizational members complete questionnaires on various
organizational issues, receive feedback on the results, and then take
appropriate actions to address the critical needs and concerns.

2. Sensitivity Training – Sensitivity training is a type of group training that focuses

on helping organizational members to develop a better awareness of group
dynamics and their roles in the group. The training often addresses issues such
as gender and multicultural sensitivity as well as sensitivity towards the
differently abled co-workers. It is an effective technique because it ensures that
everyone in the workplace is respected and treated appropriately, regardless
of who they are.

3. Managerial Grid – The Managerial Grid is a practical and useful framework that
helps one think about their leadership style. By plotting 'concern for production'
against 'concern for people', the grid highlights how placing too much
emphasis in one area at the expense of the other leads to low overall
productivity.

4. Team Building – This technique is particularly intended to make change in the

capacity of representatives, inspiring them to cooperate. The success of most
organizations depends on the ability of individuals to build effective teams. The
main goals of team-building are to improve productivity and motivation. Taking
employees out of the office help groups break down political and personal
barriers, eliminate distractions, and have fun.