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MANAGING STRATEGIC CHANGE ON EXCEL IMPACT SERVICES

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MANAGING STRATEGIC CHANGE ON EXCEL IMPACT SERVICES

Introduction

As change is unavoidable in all aspects of human life, so it is also in the business world.
If changes are handled and implemented in a proficient and effective manner, they can
result in enriched performance and value-added staff sense of fulfillment and ultimately
innovative evolution. These changes may be brought about in the firm's leadership, and
organization structure or in the way activities are carried out in the firm. They include in
the reorganization of employees roles in the firm, introduction of new merchandise on
the firm, towards a specific initiative, or in the budget used to fund the operations of the
firm. The change management enshrines a structured line of handling the changes to
ensure the process culminates in successful results.

A strategy is basically an action planned to achieve a detailed and explicit objective or a

series of objectives within a firm framework. When describing Strategic Management, it
can be termed as the ongoing process of constructing capabilities that allow an
organization to create and add value for its shareholders, society, and customers when
still functioning in the competitive market world. The process constitutes analyzing,
monitoring, and assessing both the internal and external economic situations of an
organization to maximize the utilization of the available resources in regards to the firm's
goals and ambitions to realize success. To implement a strategic management plan, it
relies on the firm's size and the propensity to modify the firm's business environment.

Changes in the management strategy are critical in helping the employees to be well
versed with what expectations the firm has on them and what they should expect when
working under the firm. This lays down a portfolio of what a firm is committed to
achieving as well as reassuring and preparing the employees to brace themselves for
the impending corporate management changes. Strategic changes are crucial to an
organization since they provide a mitigation process through which a corporate firm is
able to maintain its status quo with the ever-changing, competitive, social and
technological market world. Constant assessment and changes in the governance of a
firm actualize success.
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Changes in the organization of any corporate society occur often, and it solely relies on
the management of the firm to ensure the organization's future is safe and prosperous.
These changes alter the basic operations carried out in the firm. There are different
approaches and ethics at disposal that offer structural guidance as to how to conduct
and implement organizational changes. The most critical change component is
managing how the staff base reacts and internalizes the proposed changes. The most
appropriate approach is to facilitate the staff's behavior and attitude to ensure they cope
with the recommended changes and win their approval and cooperation.

In the case study of Excel Impact Services (EIS) and Mega holdings, it can be deduced
that the EIS underwent massive and significant changes after it was separated from
Mega Holdings, which was its parent company. This was carried out at the brink of the
2007/2008 banks' financial crisis, a turbulent economic period that led to Excel Impact
Services being adversely affected after its clientele base withdrew up to 20% of its
entire savings overnight despite a successful run of 5 years where it had enjoyed
national and local limelight, recognitions and awards for its prolific performances which
attributed to a 5% growth rate annually. The 'new' firm had an upheaval task to carry out
crucial changes as a means to rebrand itself, be independent of its parent company,
Mega Holdings Limited, and chart the way forward as an individual business entity. This
essay details the change features applied and the strategy utilized by the firm to
mitigate the tasks it had so as it can stand on its own and be a profitable venture. The
Excel Impact services applied a collaborative change strategy and implemented the
change processes via the Kotter's change model. This shows that the hypothetical
models, strategies, and processes can be practically applied and implemented to
enable a firm to mitigate through significant changes. The essay also analyses the
process to indicate that there is a need for frequent evaluation and improvements to be
amended by an organization through linkage of theory and practice.
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The Justification for Change

EIS (Excel Impact Services) was a constituent company of Mega Holdings ltd before the
change came into effect. The EIS specialized in service delivery within healthcare
amenities. The entity was performing well under the umbrella of Mega Holdings with a
workforce of 8000 members and accolades to showcase its exemplary work for its five
years period. However, due to the unprecedented financial crises witnessed in the
2007/8 period, public spending was the most affected sector, leading to plummeting
Mega holdings limited revenue by an astonishing 20%. A decision was reached to
disassociate EIS from Mega Holdings limited since it was viewed as a probable source
of risk to the whole company. It was agreed that the IES be an independent entity under
a different identity and management to enable it to source for its income to facilitate its
production cost and achieve its objectives.

This meant that the new firm was obliged to start a change process since it no longer
relied on Mega Holdings for its operationalization. The most difficult hurdle was to
change the mentality of the employees who were already used to how Mega Holdings
carried out its activities by bringing on board the new strategies meant to run EIS.
Usually, when changes like these take place in a working environment, the employees
react in different ways. When changes are effected, the firm must respond and analyze
the situation to ensure collaboration and cooperation (Will, M. G., & Mueller, J. 2019).

THE CHANGE PROCESS BY EXCEL IMPACT SERVICES

Emotional Reaction to the Changes

Employees' reactions to changes form the basis of that firm succeeding or being a
failure. Emotional reaction determines how the other steps and measures will be
incorporated in the change process. According to Neves, P. et al. (2018), how staff
reacts emotionally to changes in an organization can be depicted in stages; in the first
stage, the employee loses focus due to shock caused by the change. These reactions
are attributed to concerns of the employees feeling uncertain about the future of their
jobs (Hussain, S. T., 2018). For instance, the financial crisis that occurred in 2007/8 was
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not anticipated. This led to an emergent nature (a change that happens unexpectedly,
mostly due to unpredictable events that are difficult to foretell) of change.

The second stage is usually described by repudiation and euphoria, subsequently

followed by resentment; at this stage, the employee is in dire condition. If the situation is
not contained at this phase, it yields unwanted outcomes, commonly being resignation,
according to Stouten, J., 2018. When anger occurs, it slows the change process hence
the firm should put measures to ensure the workers accept the changes and they fully
abide by the process.

How changes are issued and implemented differs from one organization to another;
however, the process usually relies on the experience and expertise of the leader in
charge in leading the organizational change. For a change to be effectively incorporated
in the operational structures of a new firm, there is supposed to be a change process
framework via which actions and activities pertaining to the change are clearly
explained. This means that several processes, strategies, and models are used. In the
following section, the strategy of change applied by Excel Impact Services is explained.

Change Strategy

A change strategy can be labeled as an approach issued by a firm concerning the

shareholders engaged in the process, the criteria of the engagement, strategies applied
in the communication, and the synchronization of the events and activities. The most
common strategies of change are; collaborative, directive, coercive, and consultative.

Collaborative strategy is regarded as a strategy that is involved with vital consultations

between the staff and other investors of an organization in the decision-making process
over a looming change towards the institution. The directive strategy comprises of the
senior management being the key decision-makers. Coercive change is characterized
by imposing changes on the staff without applying any persuasive measures to try win
their approval. Consultative strategy requires a limited engagement of staff in the
decision-making process (Brouwer, S., & Huitema, D. (2018).

The above descriptions of strategies show that Excel Impact Services applied the
collaborative change strategy. This is evident, bearing in mind the number of employees
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that were engaged in the process. The firm's change process constituted 240 team
managers, grouped into 24 groups, with ten members. Each team was tasked with
ascertaining and make a diagnose problems that EIS was facing and give concurrent
resolutions to address the change.

This showed how the change process trickled from the senior officers to the juniors
mutually (appendix). Generally, the Collaborative strategy is widely used since it
positively impacts the change of management in an organization. According to Ansell,
C., & Gash, A. (2018), collaborative strategy has the ability to persuade employees
effortlessly to view the management change in a bigger picture so as they can
subscribe to the idea. They also elaborate that this strategy ensures sustainable,
cooperative, frictionless adoption and smooth transition of new changes in the
management. The success in the change of management of the EIS can be credited to
implementing the Collaborative change strategy.

Change processes in the EIS using Kotter's Model

Kotter's eight change model suggests that changes in a firm can be effectively attained
through its eight steps module; creating urgency, form a powerful coalition, create a
clear vision, communicate the vision, empowering people towards the vision, creating
short-range wins, building on the change and bestow the changes in corporate culture.
The aforementioned steps are discussed below with their relevance to EIS.

Creating Urgency

This step forms the base of the Kotter's Model as it the fundamental reason for a
change. It sets the tone for the urgency of incorporating the proposed change into an
organization's operations. In the case study, it was obvious that a change was urgent
owing to the financial crisis experienced and the implications it would have yielded if EIS
was to remain to be a part of Mega Holdings.

Moreover, the company was being left to operate independently in the middle of an
international financial disaster. This made it a must to initiate new strategies as a
mitigation measure to create revenue and sustain its operation cost (Appendix 1). The
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organization's survival was based on the adoption and implementation of the new
changes hence the need for urgent action. The leadership of EIS saw the essence of an
expert professional CEO to ensure the workers adopt the new change for the firm to
achieve its objectives.

Form a Powerful Coalition

This step echoes directly on the change strategy being suggested by the organization. It
is in this phase where the firm decides to whether the change will include the staff or it
will be pushed forward by the leadership management using the other strategies (Rajan,
R., & Ganesan, R.2017).

In EIS, the change implementation was centered on the collaborative strategy since
most employees were engaged in the process (Appendix 2). The need for engaging
employees was to brand the change as appealing and friendly as possible.

Create a clear vision

This step develops a shared vision of the change process. It entails the selected team
members explaining in a detailed form the proposed change (Rajan, R., & Ganesan, R.
2017). The inaugural meeting that was held in the second episode was meant to
discuss the change and the implication it had on the new firm.

Communicate the vision

After three, the changes are supposed to be communicated to all the other pertinent
stakeholders. In this step, team leaders are required to communicate the deliberations
of the vision by the team members in their respective teams. In the EIS, this phase is
outlined in episodes three to ten. The communication was a strategy to win approval
and backing from all the relevant firm's stakeholders.

Empowering people towards the vision

In this phase, resource allocation is carried out to the different team leaders to facilitate
them to act on the firm's vision. In the EIS case, this is displayed in episode 9, where
the change team was tasked with selecting future change team leaders who were to
carry on the implementation phase in episode 10.
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Create Short-range wins

These wins are a result of the implementation of the change proposed. In the EIS case,
the short-range wins included the re-engineering business processes that worked
parallel to the change process. This enabled the workers to adapt to new change,
culture, and independence of the firm.

Building on the change

This second last step of the change model suggests building on the gains obtained so
far since the change came into effect. In the EIS case, this phase is displayed in
creating a network of leaders to implement the re-engineering process and the setting
up of the Visio software as the firm's mapping gadget. Fifty mapping workstations were
initiated by the change leaders (BPR).

Bestow the changes in corporate culture

This being the last step of the model, it aims to sustain the change formed in the
business. It lets the firm keep constructing and prospering from the positive gains
obtained due to the implementation of the change. In the case of EIS, this step is
critical, bearing in mind that the firm is executing a new arrangement and culture as an
individual entity without any aid from Mega Holdings Ltd. Bestowing these changes on a
venture would sustain its distinctive identity. The EIS was able to accomplish this by
integrating a local change board which was tasked with an oversight role to facilitate
and coordinate all the activities pertaining to the change process, as described in
(appendix 4)

RECOMMENDATION

From the successful implementation of change in the EIS and the gains obtained as a
result, it can be reasonable to deduce that the change process was the power behind
the employees adapting the new arrangement. Below are recommendations to
strengthen the new niche.
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- It would be vital to have a secretariate oversight of the 24-project team since it

operated independently regarding identifying and creating to solution other
processes within the firm. The purpose of the secretariat will be to document the
changes for future references.
- It would be prudent if a clear communication structure was laid down to evade
copying and interruptions experienced in the communication procedure. This
would stipulate the roles of project team participants.

CONCLUSION

The EIS case study was a successful illustration of how changes should be
implemented in an organization. There was irrefutable conformity between the
practical application and the existing change models and theories. EIS utilized the
collaborative change strategy, and all the processes that occurred were one way or
another relating to Kotter's organizational process
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REFERENCES

Will, M. G., & Mueller, J. (2019). Change Management: The Organization as a Micro–
Macro System. In Management for Scientists. Emerald Publishing Limited.

Neves, P., Almeida, P., & Velez, M. J. (2018). Reducing intentions to resist future
change: Combined effects of commitment‐based HR practices and ethical
leadership. Human Resource Management, 57(1), 249-261.

Hussain, S. T., Lei, S., Akram, T., Haider, M. J., Hussain, S. H., & Ali, M. (2018). Kurt
Lewin's change model: A critical review of the role of leadership and employee
involvement in organizational change. Journal of Innovation & Knowledge, 3(3), 123-
127.

Stouten, J., Rousseau, D. M., & De Cremer, D. (2018). Successful organizational

change: Integrating the management practice and scholarly literatures. Academy of
Management Annals, 12(2), 752-788.

Brouwer, S., & Huitema, D. (2018). Policy entrepreneurs and strategies for
change. Regional Environmental Change, 18(5), 1259-1272.

Ansell, C., & Gash, A. (2018). Collaborative platforms as a governance

strategy. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 28(1), 16-32.

Rajan, R., & Ganesan, R. (2017). A critical analysis of John P. Kotter's change
management framework. Asian Journal of Research in Business Economics and
Management, 7(7), 181-203.
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APPENDICES

Appendix 1
4. EIS case study - part 1
 
External Change Consultancy Company
The MD appointed a Change Partner from an external consultancy service to;
1. Diagnose the culture in use
2. Advise on a Business Process Re-engineering approach
3. Advise on rebranding and associated marketing plans
4. Relate the established culture to the new strategic direction unfolding
5. Identify cultural ‘blockers’ and ‘enablers, from the cultural audit, that either
blocked or enabled strategic success
6. Build a corporate report entitled “The Case for Change” that recommended
interventions
7. Build-in consultation with management a change programme that would span 3
years.
8. Collaborate on the implementation of the content of the change program
9. Evaluate its ongoing success
10. Run a series of educational and developmental change management workshops.

 Appendix 2
 
6. EIS case study - part 3
Episode 2: The inaugural team meeting
The next episode was the meeting of change leaders and their team members. This
was the start of the team-building process. At this meeting, the case for change was
strengthened. The following agenda items were covered:
 A general discussion of the change process.
 Agreement of a team name to aid the development of group identity.
 Development of an outline set of team rules for meetings.
 Establishment of a contact list and a communication plan.
 Agreement on roles for all team members.
 A process for taking a record of the meeting and agreed action points.
 To agree on who should chair future meetings.
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 The linking of discussions to both the change objectives and the core values of
the organisation.

Episode 6: Win over key stakeholders

The team would complete the feasibility plan and the business case. They would then
draft a presentation which:
 Defined the change problem.
 Argued for the case for change.
 Illustrated the resources required to deliver the changes.
 Determined the benefits of the change investment to the organisation.
The benefits of the change project were to be clearly defined in a wider sense than
simply financial savings. The return on investment could be in monetary terms or it
could be in cultural terms such as improved teamworking, innovation and
communications. The team prepared for the next episode – a key stakeholder
presentation.

 
Episode 7: Present change plan and the feasibility study to key stakeholders
This episode involved the full change team. From the perspective of stakeholders, there
was a need to ensure that appraisal was not unduly harsh and was a constructive
review of the change proposal, its feasibility plan and business case. The change leader
and his or her team would be expected to record all feedback and, following the
presentation, the team would refine their presentation and supporting documentation.

 
Episode 8: Board-level presentations
This part of the process was very important, akin to a military passing-out ceremony.
The team would receive the approbation of the most senior people in the organisation.
Most of the change team members had never had the opportunity to present to the most
senior people in the organisation. If done properly this offered an opportunity for
establishing motivational vitality with long-lasting impact on the team members. The
opportunity for recognition and positive feedback had long-term motivational effects and
led to a stronger and more positive identification with the organisation and the work it
does on the part of the employees. The board would agree to adopt the change initiative
for implementation.
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Episode 9: Change team selects future change leaders
At this stage the change team would start to formally disband. Part of this process
would be selecting the team member best suited to lead the next phase of change
project teams. The change leaders from the pilot stage would take up a mentoring role
to the nominated change leader. This established relationship ties between managers
from very different parts of the business and a network of mutual respect that
encouraged other positive relations throughout service teams. It also encouraged a
culture of teaching, support and openness to personal and group learning.

 
Episode 10: Review the change process
The review process did not only occur at the latter stage of the change process. There
were interval assessments of an unofficial nature called ‘bus stop tests’. There were
also two short surveys and a team focus session, which involved the change leaders,
the change facilitator and the change teams gauging how they were experiencing the
change programme. There would be a mixed-methods approach applied to the review
process involving:
 Focus groups hosted by a senior director with the change teams to listen to their
views on what they felt worked well and not so well;
 Survey instruments that aimed to select anonymous views from change
participants;
 360-degree assessments of team leaders on the part of change team members.

 
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Appendix 3
 
5. EIS case study - part 2
 
The EIS change network
The principal technology employed to change the organisation identified by the
diagnostic process was a network of change teams made up of 240 managers. The
managers were clustered into 24 change teams, each with a designated change leader.
The teams had the freedom to diagnose a ‘problem’ at EIS and then set about
developing a change intervention to address it. The idea that underpinned the initiative
was that each member of the change network could ‘influence’ the motivation of their
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broader team members towards the achievement of the goals.  What was required was
a device that would legitimise The EIS Way as a transformational change project. The
device that was introduced was the concept of ‘team selected change projects’ and so
there would be 24 specific change initiatives aimed at improving sales, productivity and
strategy.
The change team structure
The EIS change project involved management representation from all parts of the
organisation. A process was developed to select the change project team members and
to communicate the rationale behind the selection process to those selected. Each
change team had a change leader. EIS avoided having teams that had a group of
managers of similar rank or from the same occupational groups to break down the silo
tribalism that permeated the organisation.
Change leaders
The role of the change leader was a critical part of the change programme. However,
rather than one leader, what was required was a network of change leaders all working
on the change initiative. This was accomplished through ‘The Change Network’, a
change leadership model that encapsulated all managers within the organisation.
 
 

Appendix 4
7. EIS case study - part 4
 
Meta Episode: Business Process Reengineering at EIS
Running parallel as a meta episode with the above project team network program was
an intensive Business Process Reengineering project which was reviewed in session 7
of the course. The EIS BPR project was called ‘1 Business’. This project involved the
following core change management activities:
 A Network of BPR Internal change leaders created
 A SAP partner identified and approved
 A BPR 1 Business project board established
 Visio software selected as key mapping tool
 A Schedule of mapping session established across the departments
 Each BPR 1 Business change leader facilitated over 50 Process Mapping
workshops of as is and to be processes
 Each department formed a local change board
 The local change boards then approved localised 1 Business change project to
actualise the new ‘to be’ processes’
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 Each department then implemented the change plan and for a time ran with both
‘as is’ and ‘to be’ processes.
The ten key change management initiatives that organised the BPR change process
were:
1. Setting up a project team
2. Establishing a plan, a vision and a purpose
3. Establishing a training programme for all key collaborators
4. Defining target business processes
5. Mapping business processes
6. Identifying improvement opportunities
7. Designing future state processes
8. Composing a change plan
9. Trialling future state changes
10. Evaluating new process success