Summary Intervention and Project Management Theme A: step by step models in change management Article: Engage! Travel guide for change adventurers (change canvas) The change canvas: Shift the balance away from the traditional approach of top-down persuasion and change management toward principles of co-creation, joint discovery, learning and shared sensemaking. It is a combination of top down and bottom up. Both forms are needed for successful change. Engage! Process model: 1. Building a vision for change 2. Understanding the vision and getting people on board 3. Doing and learning 4. Embedding and anchoring (making changes that are in line with the new vision) 5. Retaining and improving (and then repeating 3 to 5 again and again). - The change canvas is a practical model that guides your thinking. It helps to make the launch pad of ideas, to kick start change at an organization. o The most fundamental ingredients get the attention they deserve o Address the most essential questions in a constructive atmosphere and in logical correlations o Enables the crew to get to know each other. Table 4.1 Diagnostic Organization Development (Lewin): positivist approach. Quality of organizational performance can be diagnosed objectively. Dialogic OD: change is something that arises as shared meaning and interpretations at organizations start to shift (language is very important). The Engage! Approach occupies a space between the two extremes. A movement always start with a small group that grows gradually. Maybe it goes a bit slow but it will produce lasting and deeper impact in the long run. The storyboard – the Why? > About how we build a clear, coherent and inspiring change story The switchboard – The How? > About crystal-clear mapping of the switches required The actionboard – The What? > About taking stock and making the adjustments needed to enable the switches Look at the images in the paper. Do you understand every block? See the summaries in the Drive Article: Unfreezing change as three steps: Rethinking Kurt Lewin’s legacy for change management They investigate how and why cats came to be understood as the foundation of change management. Lewin’s work became a ‘typified citation’ (nobody goes back to actually read the source). Lewin said that group dynamics must not be seen in simplistic or static terms and he believed that groups were never in a steady state. He saw groups as being in continuous movement albeit having periods of relative stability. Lewin only wrote unfreeze, not change and refreeze. The formation and form of cats: Underlying theory = Foucauldian genealogy, i.e. tracing the evolution of concepts/ ideas through history. Look at the table in the summary. Historical analysis of this genealogy: • Rising need for ‘normative theory’ • Need for business schools to be ‘relevant’ • ‘Scientific’ packaging, attractive look & feel • Market space left by decline of OD • Demand for an academic ‘godfather’ in the change management literature It has grown from a brief aside to a useful fragment to support other’s emerging ideas, to a way change might be thought of, to a fundamental underpinning, to an overly simplistic model that we have advanced beyond; from something that one might observe in a social group to a tool for consultants and other change agents to instigate, manage resistance and make change happen. It is a foundation only in the sense that is has hardened through a series of interpretations that have built upon each other. So many is built on cats, that the idea that the foundation is otherwise, may be disturbing for many. Maybe the questionable foundation will encourage thinking differently. Article: Successful organizational change: integrating the management practice and scholarly literatures. Aim: to develop an integrative summary of the available evidence of what is known, contested, untested and underused in change management. It identifies ten evidence-based steps in managing planned organizational change. Planned organizational change = intentional activities that move an organization from its present state to a desired future state. Identifying ways to make meaningful and sustainable planned change is a challenge because: - Scientific literature lacks consensus regarding basic change processes. Instead, change management practitioners rely on more available expert opinions from popular writers. - Difficulty of learning from experience. The heterogeneity of change makes it difficult to interpret its outcomes, feedback on which is not always easily available. Micro: individuals, change recipients Meso: interpersonal, group and intergroup phenomena Macro: organizational level phenomena Neem deze dingen in acht voordat je de 10 stappen uitvoert: Micro - Commitment (to change) is key - Individual predispositions (e.g., optimism, dispositional resistance, cynicism) play a role - Emotions / stress among change recipients (e.g., instill sense of control and acceptance) Meso - Social interactions (e.g., Fiske, 1991) and social influence are strongly underestimated mechanisms (see e.g., vd Schaft et al. , 2019). - Shared beliefs / mental models (‘what is the situation? / What is the issue?”) is a key concept Macro - Leadership competency - Trust in leadership - Nature of the change itself 10 evidence-based principles with checks for solid evidence base: 1. Get the facts regarding the nature of the problem (diagnosis) o Information for insight in the need for change o Information regarding existing conditions that might affect implementation. 2. Assess and address the organization’s readiness to change o The (change) history of the organization o The degree of stress that change recipients currently face. o The capability of senior leadership to guide and implement change 3. Implement evidence-based change interventions o Diverse array of people who have experience with the problem can help identify possible solutions o Stakeholders (employees, managers) are important source of information. o Scientific evidence may exist 4. Develop effective change leadership throughout the organization o Role models o Psychological safe environment o Training leaders in change-related skills 5. Develop and communicate a compelling change vision o Stakeholder perspective matters o Broadly shared end goal o Repetition and quality evidence. o Urgency is not scientifically supported as a reason for change. 6. Work with social networks and tap their influence o Relational ties can coopt fence sitters. 7. Use enabling practices to support the change implementation o learning, goal setting / small sprints, employee participation, fairness / justice, transitional structures/experimenting 8. Promote micro-processes, learning & experimentation in ‘safe spaces’ o Feedback and making small adjustments to broader change plans. o Small wins 9. Assess change progress and outcomes over time o modify when needed (& Keep at it!) 10. Institutionalize the change to sustain effectiveness o Integrate it in the larger system of the organization (culture, management systems). Theme B: Management Fashions Article: Management Fashion – Eric Abrahamson Fashion setters: consulting firms, management gurus, business mass-media publications, business schools. They a) sense the emergent collective preferences of managers for new management techniques and b) develop rhetoric that describe these techniques as the forefront of management progress, and c) disseminate these rhetorics back to managers and organizational stakeholders before other fashion setters. Management fashions need to be rational and progressive. (this draws upon neo-institutional theory) Management fashion is a relatively transitory collective belief, disseminated by management fashion setters, that a management technique leads rational management progress. Look at the figure. Top: norms of rationality and progress: it is a cultural phenomenon, shaped by norms of rationality and progress. (managers appear rational if they use management techniques). Progress involves innovation and improvement (subjective criteria). As a result of the four-fold process (creation, selection, processing and dissemination), fashion setters supply mass audiences with a limited set of innovations that are candidates for becoming mass fashions. These may or may not become mass fashions depending on the demand of the followers. Creation: the new fashion doesn’t have to be better, it has to be different. Old wine in new bottles. Selection: setters select the ideas they invented themselves or have rediscovered. Other setters imitate that. New sociopsychological and techno economic forces external to the fashion setting market create new demand for particular types of management techniques. There is a reciprocal relation between what fashion setters select and what fashion consumers prefer and demand. Processing: elaboration of a rhetoric that convince followers that a fashion is both rational and at the forefront of management progress. Dissemination: for example in mass media publications. The bottom explains the timing of MF swings, the direction of the trends and when business schools might effectively intervene in the shaping of management fashions. Read the propositions !!! Sociopsychological: each follower is vulnerable to fashion setters because of 3 states. - Frustration - Boredom and striving for novelty - Striving for status differentiation Individuality and novelty on the one hand and conformity and traditionalism on the other. Techno economic theory: (macro) Economic, Political, and or Organizational forces opens gaps between actual and desired performance. Scholars could intervene in multiple points in the process. Article Customization or Conformity – Westphal, gulati, shortell Early adopters implement practices for efficiency gains. Rational Later adopters implement the normative forms of practices for legitimacy. Normative Institutional perspective. Normative pressures contribute to isomorphism (similarity) or the emergence of common organizational practices over time. Aim: examining institutional and network effects on innovation adoption. Social network ties either facilitate customization of the practice in response to internal efficiency needs or promote conformity in response to external legitimacy pressures, depending on the stage of institutionalization and the attendant motivation for adoption. Institutionalization: social process by which structures, policies and programs acquire ‘’rule-like status’’ as legitimate elements of the organization. The question is not whether organizations adopt the practice, but how? Institutional theory suggests that the norm emergence process is built, ironically, on the efficiency motives of early adopters Read the hypotheses. Late adopters conform more than early. Positive relation between time of adoption and conformity increases as network connectedness increase. Motivation to adopt shifts over time from internal efficiency concerns to external legitimacy concerns. From technical to social benefits. Article: Management Concepts as Means and outcomes of Identity Work Examine the tension and congruence between agent’s orientations towards that concept and how they see the broader organizational engagement with it. We show how through four different types of translation as identity work (externalizing, professionalizing, rationalizing, and proselytizing) both the concept and the agent are constructed simultaneously. Externalizing: tool/consultant Professionalizing: method/expert Rationalizing: project/project manager Proselytizing: imperative/servants Three attributes of identification: Salience: way in which agents enhance or diminish the importance of the concept in relations to the goals of organizations. Transience: brings temporal quality to the concept in terms of construction [ short lived or persistent Valence: intensity of meaning Theme C: Change Capacity Article: Organizational Path Dependence: opening the black box Aim: explaining how organizations get path dependent. > self-reinforcing mechanisms that are likely to lead an organization into a lock-in. History matters Singular historical events > which may under certain conditions transform themselves into selfreinforcing dynamics > and possibly end up in an organizational lock-in. Phase 1: Preformation Phase (broad scope of action, consequences cannot be predicted) Small events may cause unintended far reaching consequences. Unforeseeable effects. Phase 2: Formation Phase (dominant action pattern is likely to emerge_ Positive feedback. Self-reinforcing processes with increasing benefits. The whole process becomes more and more irreversible. But choices are still possible. Phase 3: Lock-in Phase (further constriction which lead to lock-in, decision pattern is fixes, bound to a path). Predominating social influence, leaving some scope for variation. Accompanied with potential inefficiency. Rigidity. It is a problem, when there are change requirements. Organizational Path Dependence: a rigidified, potentially inefficient action pattern built up by the unintended consequences of former decisions and positive feedback processes. Self-reinforcing mechanisms: Coordination effects (rule-guided behaviour. The more actors comply, the more efficient) Complementarity effects (two or more element are interconnected so exploiting the synergies) Learning effects (the more often performed, the more efficiency will be gained) Adaptive expectation effects (individual preferences vary in response to the expectations of others). It is about legitimacy > mainstream practices. Escaping through unforeseen exogenous forces, insidious change in organizational demography or the incomplete socialization of new organizational members. Path breaking starts with the understanding of the social mechanisms driving the path process. Article: Institutional complexity and organizational change: an open polity perspective It is about the role of political dimensions of organizations when they adapt to institutional complexity. Politicla dimensions influence adaptation processes in a path-dependent rather than deterministic fashion. Unitary Unfreeze: translating external pressure into the interpretive and decision calculus of the elites (making sense for them). Transition: little internal conflict, but struggle between elites and external constituents. (potential scandals make elites to stand open for external logics. Refreeze: decrease in external pressure, elites become invested in the new logic on the basis of instrumental reasons. Coalition Unfreeze: importation of new external logics generates conflict between elites Transition: mobilization and countermobilization takes place internally and at the top. Refreeze: resettlement of power balance among diverse groups in the coalition. Negotiation. Federation Unfreeze: when elites in semiautonomous subunits are expected to adopt a consistent stance toward a new logic and the latent conflict between elites becomes activated. Transition: cross-unit mobilization is difficult (separated). It depends on the network structure Refreeze: stabilizing depends on local support across units. Refreezing mostly involves the deactivation of incompatibilities across units (by providing a frame). Fellowship Unfreeze: practical interests that led the to drift toward a new logic that contrasts with their organization’s traditional one. (demand of customers for example). Transition: because of decentralized authority it takes time to notice when practices are not aligned between units. It takes longer for countermobilization to come up. The pro’s have the time to argument why the new logic has to be implemented. Refreeze: convince other elite groups by providing practical solutions as to how the divergence between new and traditional logics can be overcome. Linking with traditional logic. Conceiving of organizations as polities with distinct internal political structures and some degree of openness to external influence emphasizes how historically evolved polity features mediate the relationship between organizations and their contemporary institutional environments. Conclusion: organizational elites in organizations with different political constellations encounter newly emerging logics in distinct ways, leading to qualitative differences in the process of change when an organization’s environment promotes new logics that are at odd with the prior political arrangements inside the organization. Polity types evolve over time. Polity types create a form of path dependence. External demands interact with historically evolved polity constellations to produce organizational responses. Organizational polity is a mediator. Article: Absorptive Capacity: A review, reconceptualization, and extension. Distinguish between potential capacity and realized capacity. Absorptive capacity (ACAP): a dynamic capability pertaining to knowledge creation and utilization that enhances a firm’s ability to gain and sustain a competitive advantage. PACAP: knowledge acquisition and assimilation capabilities. RACAP: knowledge transformation and exploitation. Dynamic capabilities focus on organizational change. They define the firm’s path of evolution and development. ACAP has four dimensions: Acquisition (identify and acquire externally generated knowledge) influenced by intensity, speed and direction of the firm’s effort. Assimilation (routines and processes of the firm that allow it to analyze and interpret the information obtained from external sources). Transformation (capability to develop and refine the routines that facilitate combining the existing knowledge with the newly acquired and assimilated knowledge. Combine two different sets of information. Exploitation (routines that allow to refine or extend existing competencies or create new ones by incorporating acquired and transformed knowledge into the operation. PACAP and RACAP have separate but complementary roles. Both fulfil a necessary but insufficient condition to improve firm performance. Efficiency factor = RACAP / PACAP The model highlights external sources of knowledge and experience as key antecedents of ACAP. Read the propositions. Internal and external triggers induce or intensify a firm’s efforts to seek external knowledge. The source of the trigger is likely to influence the locus of technological search. RACAP helps in achieving competitive advantage. PACAP helps sustaining that competitive advantage. One factor that can affect a firm’s sustained competitive advantage is the regime of appropriability that dominates the industry. It is the norms if the industry that affects the ability to protect the advantages of a new product of process. Theme D: Leadership Article: An investigation of champion-driven leadership processes The research produced a new, three-phase conceptual model of champion-driven leadership. To explain the way champions are more effective than others. Champions are emergent leaders who are centrally involved with effecting transformations within organizations or broader institutions. The key leadership activities of champions are primarily the result of intrinsic motivation and commitment rather than their formal role description. A champion is effective at driving a leadership process to effect change. Models of leadership that can help to understand champion-driven leadership: - Transformational leadership: behaviour that transform and inspire followers to perform beyond expectations while transcending (overstijgen) self-interest for the good of the organization. - Distributed leadership: leadership as a process of influence that occurs within groups and involves more than one leader. It is one form of collective leadership. - Complexity leadership: (draws on complexity theory). Leadership is an emergent phenomenon that is an outcome of relational interactions between agents, and may occur as top-down, bottom-up or lateral process. (administrative leadership, enabling leadership and adaptive leadership). Tandem model of championship: champions at executive and project levels collaborate to promote change that involves innovation. Executive champions as enabling leaders and project champions who are involves with adaptive leadership processes. Project champions differ from non-champions in three ways: 1. They emerge as leaders because of intrinsic motivation rather than role description 2. They were highly effective at exercising influence across management levels and lateral organizational boundaries. 3. They had a distinctive set of personal attributes. Personal characteristics (openness to experience), demographics (high professional mobility), types of power (high personal power), social networking features (strong strategic networks), and leadership behaviours (frequently questioning the status quo). ‘ Champion-driven leadership can be captured in a three-phase model. 1. Initiation phase 2. Endorsement phase 3. Implementation phase The figure describes emergent leadership processes that initially drive change from the bottom up. - Relevance transformational leadership: All champions high in inspirational motivation. (Demonstrating enthusiasm and confidence). Especially transformational leadership in the initiating phase. Because, project managers are more visible in the initiating phase as individualistic leaders. Project champions become less visible in the rest of the process when more leaders are involved. - Relevance distributed leadership: During the endorsement phase it is critical to be able to gather political and managerial support. During endorsement and implementation phase the project champions have to work closely together with more diverse groups of leaders. Initiatiting phase: individual leadership, endorsement: tandem with executive, implementation: coordinated distributed leadership, collaborate with diverse leaders. - Relevance of complexity leadership: Administrative leadership important during the endorsement phase. Enabling leadership helped to facilitate all three phases. Executive champions enable Pr. Champ. Adaptive leadership most prominent in the implementation phase. (forming social networks). The research indicates that champion-driven leadership processes evolve, different forms of leadership emerge, and different theoretical models of leadership become relevant at different times. Article: Organizational change and managerial sensemaking: working through paradox. Transforming paradox from a label to a lens, contributing a process for working through paradox and explicating three organizational change aspects – paradoxes of performing, belonging and organizing. Change managers are responsible for sensemaking, but this is difficult especially when change may foster intense cognitive disorder for middle managers. Sensemaking is an effort to create orderly and coherent understandings that enable change. Yet dynamic contexts intensify experiences of complexity, ambiguity and equivocality (dubbelzinnigheid). Managers play a key role in facilitating subordinates reframing but they often struggle to make sense of change themselves. Sparring as the interplay of sensemaking and interventive questions. See the figure. Closure did not signify a solution or endpoint, but a more manageable mess from which managers might work. Indeed, paradoxical understandings denoted a core change in their framing. Manager’s issues subsumed within paradoxes of performing, belonging and organizing. See examples in table 1. Mixed messages top>middle>bottom. Acceptance of paradox denotes a new understanding of inconsistencies, conflict and ambiguity as natural working conditions. Such awareness is empowering, reducing tendencies to blame executives and shifting power responsibility to the managers to find means of living with tension. Acceptance enables a degree of comfort with contradictions ingrained in the organizing process. Shifting the notion of paradox from a label to a lens helps sensemaking. Paradox may serve as a means for managers and researchers to consider other perspectives, alter their assumptions and explore issues in fundamentally different ways. There is also a reciprocal interplay between the three paradoxes. Linear questioning > circular questioning > reflexive questioning > strategic questioning Mess > problem > dilemma > paradox > workable certainty Article: What type of leadership behaviours are functional in teams? Relation between leadership behaviours and team performance outcomes. Leadership functions: 1. Information search and structure 2. Information use in problem solving 3. Managing personnel resources 4. Managing material resources. Facilitating conditions that leaders can create: 1. It has to be a real team with a team task, clear boundaries and stability 2. Clear strategy 3. Good basic structure 4. Supportive organizational structure (reward, information and trainings) 5. Provide expert coaching By combining the functions and conditions, we can see how leadership can impact team performance. Task-focused leadership: transactional. Initiating structure (minimization of role ambiguity and conflict), and boundary spanning (collaborating with other outside the team, negotiating resources for the team). Person-focused leadership: transformational, consideration (close social relations and group cohesion), empowerment and motivational. The use of task-focused behaviours in moderately related to perceived team effectiveness and team productivity. Transactional – not related to – perceives team effectiveness Initiating structures – related to > perceived team effectiveness Boundary spanning – related to > perceived team effectiveness. Initiating structure – related to > team productivity Person-focused behaviours are related to perceived team effectiveness, team productivity and team learning. Transformational – positively related to > perceived team effectiveness Consideration – positively related to > perceived team effectiveness Empowerment – positively related to > perceived team effectiveness All types of person-focused behaviour – positively related to > perceived team effectiveness Empowerment – positively relate to > team learning Task interdependence may be a moderator for team effectiveness. Both task as person-focused leadership behaviours explain variance in team performance outcomes. In team productivity person-focused behaviours are more important than task-focused. They are equally important in team effectiveness. Theme E: The (org.-level) change process Article: Sensemaking and sensegiving in strategic change initiation The paper develops a new framework for understanding the distinctive character of the beginning stages of strategic change by tracking the first year of the change through four phases. Envisioning, signalling, re-visioning, and energizing. CEO’s primary role in instigating (uitlokken) the change is sensemaking and sensegiving. Strategic change: change current modes of cognition or action to take advantage of opportunities or to cope with environmental threats. CEO first develop a sense of the organization’s internal and external environment and define a revised conception of the organization (sensemaking), then sine abstract vision of the changed organization evolves and is disseminated to stakeholder and constituents (sensegiving), CEO is now advocating his vision for the stakeholders (sensemaking by the stakeholders), round of negotiated social construction is likely. The stakeholders try to negotiate revisions in the proposed vision (sensegiving from stakeholders to management) >> adjusted and push for realization. The initiation of strategic change can be viewed as a process whereby the CEO makes sense of an altered vision of the organization and engages in cycles of negotiated social construction activities to influence stakeholders and constituents to accept that vision. Interpretive approach: human understanding and action are based on the interpretation of information and events by people experiencing them. > strategic action derive from the framework of meaning ascribed by the organization’s members. Envisioning: CEO has a vision based on prior work experience. Signalling: public declaration (verklaring) of the strategic change effort. It injected ambiguity into a heretofore stable university. CEO can now show his interpretation > ambiguity by design was intended to symbolize the reality of change. Re-visioning: The CEO was a vivid symbol for change. Questioning of the status quo had to change at all. In the case there were multiple interventions. Because the interventions affected other stakeholders there was no united front to resist the change overall. Energizing: more stakeholder involved. Wider commitment and stronger impetus for the entire change effort. Sensemaking: meaning construction and reconstruction by the involved parties as they attempted to develop a meaningful framework for understanding the nature of the intended strategic change. Sensegiving: the process of attempting to influence sensemaking and meaning construction of others toward a preferred redefinition of organizational reality. See the figure. The initiating phase involves a cognitive re-orientation of existing interpretive schemes. By a lack of crisis, ambiguity by design can help to challenge the status quo. Strategic change is a negotiation process. Article: Resistance to change: the rest of the story Change agents contribute to the occurrence of resistance through their own actions and inactions and resistance can be a resource for change. Resistance is a self-serving and self-fulfilling label, given by change agents attempting to make sense of change recipient’s reactions to change. - Expectation effects/self-fulfilling prophecy. When agents expect resistance, they get it. - Take credits for successful change, blame other factors (resistance) for problems. Change agents contribute to the occurrence of the reactions they label as resistance through their own actions and inactions. Resistance is a function of the quality of the relationship between agents and recipients. - By breaking agreements both before and during the change and by failing to restore the loss of trust (injustice > resistance). When agents restore trust, less likely to face resistance. - By communication breakdowns (failure to legitimize change, misrepresentation – oversell the positive and undersell the negative, no call for action- especially conversation for performance). - Resisting resistance (change agent may be resistant to ideas, counteroffers from change recipients > vicious cycle in which resistance begets resistance). Resistance can be positive contribution to change. - Existence value of resistance (resistance helps keep conversations in existence). - Engagement value of resistance (may reflect a higher level of commitment than acceptance and has a longer-term effect. Absence of resistant can be a sign of disengagement). - Strengthening value of resistance (improve the quality of the decision and participant’s commitments to the implementation). Reconstruction of resistance to change as a dynamic among three elements: 1) Recipient action, 2) agent sensemaking, 3) agent-recipient relationship. Recipient resistance is public: observable recipients actions are the triggers for agent sensemaking, and it is these actions that are the basis for the label resistance. (in between agent – recipient) Agent sensemaking is determinant: the actions are not resistance unless change agents assign the label resistance to them as a part of their sensemaking. Recipient may not intent to resist, when agents label actions as resistance they are more ‘’justified’’ to act more aggressively. Overcoming resistance: this is agents managing effectively the agent-recipient relationship. Agents taking more responsibility for their own role in occurrence of resistance. A counteroffer by a recipient is a move in a conversation by someone who is willing. The quality of the agent-recipient relation is very important in the early stages of change. Article: A quantum approach to time and organizational change Most theories see organizational evolution as a linear progression of a past that moves to the present that moves to the future. But this offers little insight in the unpredictable events that change the course of history. Quantum approach to time and change as a framework for understanding organizational complexity and the common decision-making errors that lead to organizational failures within uncertain environments. We advocate to mentally reverse the arrow of tie to emphasize a future that flows into the present. The future offers many potentialities, which we define as alternative states and possible outcomes that could occur but have not yet occurred. The start is an unstrained future with many possible outcomes and realizing that its flow into the present can be influenced by many individual, collective and environmental factors that guide unfolding, organizing processes. Humans are able to forecast what will/can happen. They do this by memories out of the past, but they neglect what might have happened. They only look at what has happened. Organizations can not foresee market conditions, economic trends and societal factors that may influence the survival of one subsidiary over another. This shows the argument that events unfold probabilistically in the future in ways that forward-based prospection cannot explain. See the figures. Figure 1: probability waves are characterized by a high degree of uncertainty in knowing where X will be when in moves through space. Future psychological and physical phenomena do not emerge from a single past. Rather that are selected from an infinite set of potential realities that are best represented by probability waves. Superpotentiality (or superposition) state: in which many possibilities are in an indefinite state but have the potential to occur when influenced by a specific context. Alternative pasts could have easily happened had any of these elements (individual, group and organization systems) been different. QATC: the future flows toward the present and eventual past as a wave of interacting potentialities – most of which are not directly experienced and are only realized through careful retrospection, such as counterfactual thinking. Counterfactual thinking = reconsidering the past and examining how situational factors or one’s behaviour could have been different, leading to different outcomes. Organizations must use counterfactual thinking to understand how a present is selected from many different potential alternatives that once existed in the future, rather than how the past leads to one future state. Because it emphasized potentialities in the future, QATC perspective implies that radical nonlinear change should be a common, unavoidable occurrence. But organizations are also resisting change, which helps explain why many potentialities are never pursued. There are constraints at different levels. Higher level constraints generally channel emergent lowerlevel processes in one direction or another, thereby allowing some potentialities to develop while others never materialize. Internal and external constraints acting at multiple levels set limits on the way processes emerge at a particular level. Weak constraints foster gradual, incremental change. Whereas strong constraints promote stability and periodic discontinuous change. Figure 4: as times moves from the distant future to the present, some constraints become solidified as different context are experienced, which causes the surface of the probability wave to evolve continuously, becoming more definite based on the presence of specific contexts and the constraints in these contexts. Potentialities become restricted to more likely states. The present is created from a superpotentiality state as it is conjoined with a particular context. There is a greater flexibility in how the future will unfold than many people realize. Theme F: The (ind.-level) change process Article: Perceptions of organizational change: A stress and coping perspective The paper addresses two questions. 1. What are the salient dimensions of organizational change that individuals perceive in their workplace? 2. How do perceptions of change characteristics influence individual outcomes? Change characteristics: - Frequency of change o When change is frequent, no clear begin and end so, people feel that change is highly unpredictable. - Impact of change o Transformational change: individual’s perception regarding the extent to which change involved modifications to the core system of an organization. o Periods of transformational change are experienced as highly novel as people have to act in completely new ways and adopt new values. - Planning of change o Perception that preparation has occurred prior to the implementation. o Planning reduces novelty and uncertainty. Uncertainty is a critical cognitive appraisal resulting from change. The study identifies three characteristics of change events that influence individual’s response to change and, ultimately, their job satisfaction and turnover intentions. Supportive leadership is important in all three characteristics. Less frequent change, less transformational change and more planned change. And also, less psychological uncertainty. Senior positions experience more planned change and more frequent. > more likely to be involved. Article: letting go and moving on: work-related identity loss and recovery Work-related Identity (WRI) losses require surrender of the current meaning of self and realignment to a new meaning. A WRI loss involves a liminal (being in between) state between letting go of the old and moving on to a new identity. Period in which there is an absence of a self defining connection to a social domain. Individuals struggle to establish a new normal. Who I was, who I am becoming? When there is no successful traverse > identity instability. More ideally is identity development: coming out stronger. Purpose to present a theoretical model that articulates processes occurring during the liminal period. The state of liminality depicts three phases. 1. Septation – detaching from the old sense of self 2. Transition – resolving ambiguity inherent to this intermediate state 3. Reincorporation – establishing a new sense of self Identity work = efforts to craft the self Grief literature: Loss involves a dynamic process of loss orientation and restoration orientation coping in which individuals move fluidly between these two planes. Loss orientation: efforts to deal with the stressor of the loss Restoration orientation: realignment to address secondary stressors that accompany the loss. Application of these lessons to the identity arena suggests two points: (1) an individual in loss orientation is cognitively and emotionally consumed with “who I am” in relation to the loss itself, whereas understanding “who I am in a post-loss world” dominates in restoration orientation; (2) it is the dynamic interplay between these two orientations, not a staged identity transition, that defines the identity development process. Identity equilibrium is interrupted when an event triggers a change to the current WRI such that individuals perceive an increase in the negative discrepancy between the current self and their ideal (who I would like to be) or ought self (who I should be)-guides The goals in the liminal period are to establish “who I was” (loss orientation) and “who I will be now” (restoration orientation). 1. The more a Work-Related Identity loss event increases the distance between the current self and desired self-guides, the stronger the loss-related emotion will be. 2. WRI loss events that increase distance from ideal self-guides are more likely to trigger dejection emotions (sadness) and those that increase distance from ought self-guides are more likely to trigger agitation emotions (anger). 3. The dominant type of emotion influences the range of information considered in narrative development such that promotion-related emotions are associated with consideration of a wider range of identity information and prevention-related emotions are associated with consideration of a narrower range of identity information. 4. The dominant type of emotion influences the breadth of social information sought when identity narratives are enacted such that promotion-related emotions lead individuals to seek social information broadly whereas prevention-related emotions lead individuals to seek social information more selectively. 5. The breadth of social information sought when identity narratives are enacted will influence the degree of goal-congruent feedback received such that when social information is sought from a selectively chosen audience, goal-congruent feedback will be more likely than when social information is sought from a broader audience 6. Goal-congruent feedback is more likely to lead to a stabilized loss orientation identity narrative 7. Goal-incongruent feedback is more likely to prompt reappraisal of work-related self-guides In loss orientation, narratives are focused on the past, putting to bed the lost self (retrospective); in restoration, individuals are forward looking, striving to determine who they will become (prospective). The absence of identity stability in the loss plane complicates identity work in the restoration plane, and the key reason for this is the existence of emotion residue. Loss orientation identity instability necessitates return to the loss plane so that identity work there can be completed. 8. Uncomplicated progression: When emotion residue is not carried into restoration orientation, individuals can more easily achieve identity stability because less emotion regulation is required 9. Progression with emotional residue: When emotion residue is prevention focused, selectivity biases facilitate identity stability in restoration orientation; when emotion residue is promotion focused, repeated cycles of identity work facilitate identity stability in restoration orientation Oscillation can be beneficial when individuals progress to restoration orientation with emotion residue. 10. Oscillation that involves strengthened negative emotions will decrease the likelihood of identity stability in loss orientation; oscillation that involves competing emotions will increase the likelihood of identity stability in loss orientation. Identity stabilization occurs when individuals successfully exit the liminal period but have not experienced significant personal change as a result. Adaptive identity development represents individuals who experience identity growth from the loss experience In sum, WRI losses have the potential to be experiences of significant growth and positive identity development or to be experiences of depression and self-stagnation. The model proposed here provides a foundation for understanding and predicting these experiences. Article: The influence of social interaction on the dynamics of employees’ psychological contracting in digitally transforming organizations To explore the influence of social interaction on the dynamics of psychological contracting throughout organizational change. Collective focused interactions in stale contracts Transactional interactions following psychological contract disruption Relational interactions in psychological contract repair. Social interactions play an important role in the dynamics of psychological contracting. PCs are dynamic in nature such as their interaction partners. There are phases in the PC process; creation, maintenance, disruption, renegotiate and repair, returning back to maintenance or dissolution. Changes trigger people to re-evaluate their implicit employment relationship. Change recipients experiences are more concerned of changes on a local level. When they actually face change. Three levels of PC exist. Individual level, Level of direct consensus between colleagues, and a collective level as a shared mental model. To capture the mechanisms in social exchange that lead to individual, team and collective dynamic psychological contracting, we look at Solinger’s normative-contextual framework. While at low levels of institutionalization psychological contracting results from personal exchange (“I agree to…”), through normative exchange over peer-to-peer interactions (“We agree to … ”), it will gradually evolve into a dominant social reality, that is, an institution (“It is….”). Fiske: Four elementary forms of sociality by which (groups of) people shape interaction in social life. Market pricing: exchanging motivated by self-interest. Equality matching: ‘’I do something for you, you do something for me.’’ Perceived fairness. Authority ranking: status and linear rankings forms fundaments for interaction. Communal sharing: groups interest prevails. Loss of separate person identity. The frameworks of Solinger and Fiske are complementary. Both scholars describe a shift in locus of accountability from interior to exterior with exchange being focused on long-term relationships and continuous interactions, and with individual contributions dispersing or transforming into a shared notion of collective gain. (1) How does the dynamic phase model of psychological contracting reflect in employees’ perceptions of organizational change? Especially the feeling of being heard had a positive influence on the restoration of trust, so also the PC restoration. The main result on this research question is that: Employees (based on experience and interactions over time) changed their perceptions regarding inducements that could be expected, and which investments should be made in return (2) How do specific social interaction mechanisms affect the currently known phases of psychological contracting? The central point in the 2th research question is: social interaction creation phase: It is seemed very important for individuals to better understand what others invest and receive in order to make sense of their own experiences and the perceived fairness of the accompanying personal gains and losses. Maintenance phase: this phase is characterized by employees change stories. People start to copy the attitude of others. -> strong shared consensus in the teams. repair phase: the exchange process is focused on local internal environment, colleagues. In repair phase the social atmosphere became under pressure. The results show that there is a lack of collegial cooperation and collegial trust seemed to drive employees responses in repair. Thus, the social interactions interfered with the individual’s dynamic PC re-evaluation process. Change recipients were seeking external validation in their attempts to renew their PC. So, throughout psychological contracting, PC re-evaluation involves an interesting mix of individual and social processes, characterized by individual-level considerations and direct consensus between colleagues and shared mental models (3) How do these social interaction mechanisms evolve over time throughout dynamic PC processes in organizational change? The interaction pattern evolved from collective orientation in stable contracts (the change did not directly influence the individual. ‘’It is…’’) to individual orientation following disruption (what does this mean for me? Self-focused) and to relational orientation during renegotiation/repair and restoration of maintenance (build up new team-based relational norms and to form social bonds ’’getting back together’’). See figure 4. More specifically, our data suggest that PC maintenance is strongly social in nature and that employees experience shared PC notions within the broader social network. Transition from this collective orientation to a self-focused orientation was triggered by PC disruption, to be subsequently followed by a period of relational discord in the renegotiation and repair stage. Finally, a return to constructive resonance and alignment with others was noted while returning back to PC maintenance The restoration of one’s personap PC is tied to that of others. As the article was based on what was already written about PC and what still needs to be added. It can be concluded that social interactions, that is seen as a key focus in social exchange theories, seem to play a more prominent role in employees re-evaluation processes than was previously theorized in most literature. Next to that this study shows that social interaction, forming and shaping working relationships is an important mechanism to understand how employees deal with contemporary large-scale organizational challenges on day-to-day micro level. Theme G: Project Management Article: In search of project classification: a non-universal approach to project success factors Project success factors are not universal for all projects. Different projects exhibit different sets of success factors. Three classifications: Pure software vs. hardware projects Project scope (or complexity) Project outcome (product improvement, new system, etc.) The pre-contract activities, the involvement of the customer follow-up and project control are very important factors in the success of all types of projects. They use two success dimensions: the perceived benefits to the customer (e.g. measure of customer satisfaction) and the success in meeting design goals (refers to the contract that was signed with the customer). we find that pre-contract activities, the involvement of the customer follow-up team, project control (schedule and milestones, budget utilization, etc.), and management policy are highly influential in all types of projects Article: Complexity, uncertainty and mental models: from a paradigm of regulation to a paradigm of emergence in project management. Complex and uncertain projects require newer methodologies based on understanding; the modelling approaches. By understanding the levels of complexity and of uncertainty in a situation, project managers can adapt their decision-making approach in order to maximize performance. Distinguishing in project efficiency (project implementation performance) and project success (project benefits performance). Two perspectives: Project Management and Management of Projects Two paradigms: deterministic paradigm (phase models) and non-deterministic paradigm (complex projects). There is no clear way for project managers to understand how to position themselves in relation to these paradigms. Complexity and uncertainty can both be categorized into three levels. Each of these three levels suggest a specific managerial way of addressing situations: algorithmic, stochastic or nondeterministic. Managers interact with projects through decision models (mental models) to make their managerial decisions. The created framework helps managers to select the appropriate management approach. Complicated systems > outcomes are predictable. Complex systems > outcomes are unpredictable. Uncertainty appears when decision-makers cannot consolidate past observations to form a subjective probability or relative frequencies for the future. In the non-deterministic paradigm, emergence is the result of the incapacity of the management subsystem to produce a good model of the production sub-system, as the production sub-system itself is unstable over time. Uncertainty is a characteristic of the management sub-system. Complexity is a characteristic of the production sub-system. Understand the figure Article: Understanding team adaptation: a conceptual analyses and model Collectives (teams) have a broader repertoire of capacities, experiences and networks to draw on when engaging in performance change. The model illustrates a series of phases unfolding over time that constitute the core processes and emergent states underlying adaptive team performance and contributing to team adaptation. Team adaptation is defined herein as a change in team performance, in response to a salient cue or cue stream, that leads to a functional outcome for the entire team. Team adaptation is manifested in the innovation of new or modification of existing structures, capacities, and/or behavioural or cognitive goal-directed actions. Learning is an essential but insufficient condition for team adaptation. Although learning typically takes place before team adaptation, it can also be a consequence of adaptation, as in the case when teams learn competencies as a result of adapting. Team innovation is seen as a process not an outcome. Adaptation is an outcome potentially resulted from innovation. Team adaptation is the dependent variable. adaptive team performance typically emerges as team members engage in different tasks and display different types and amounts of actions during performance. Therefore, the emergence of adaptive team performance is best captured by a patterned emergence model. In sum, adaptive team performance emerges from a series of cognitive and behavioural actions carried out by team members The model in Figure 1 illustrates the role of (a) cues, (b) individual characteristics, (c) job characteristics, (d) individual- and team-level adaptive interaction processes, and (e) emergent states in promoting team adaptation. The model graphically depicts a theory of team adaptation, which at a broad level is composed of two categories of distal inputs (i.e., job design characteristics and individual characteristics) and two components of adaptive team performance (i.e., processes in the adaptive cycle and emergent cognitive states). The variables subsumed in these four categories directly and interactively determine team adaptation. Emergent states describe the cognitive, motivational and affective state of the team. Situation assessment: gathering information. Minimal one person in the group scanned the environment in search for cues that could affect the success of the team. Cue recognition and then meaning attachment. Meaning is assigned by comparing cues to existing knowledge and the communication of that meaning to the rest of the team. This result in shared mental models and team situation awareness. Plan formulation: team situation awareness is positively related to plan formulation. Team psychological safety enables individuals to speak up and offer contributions to the plan development. Plan formulation serves as an input for shared mental models. Plan execution: there are individual-level (i.e., mutual performance monitoring, backup behavior, communication, leadership) and team-level (i.e., coordination) processes that provide the basis for adaptive plan execution and thereby team adaptation. - Mutual monitoring: keep track of the fellow team members’ work while doing their own. - Backup behaviour: providing feedback, coaching and help - Communication: clearly exchanging information. - Leadership: they serve as coordinators of operations, as liaisons to external teams or management, and as guides for setting the team’s vision - Coordination: the above was individual, coordination is a team phenomenon. There are also inputs that affect plan execution: shared mental models, situation awareness and psychological safety. Plan execution is positively related to: shared mental models, team situation awareness and psychological safety. Team learning: ongoing process of reflection and action. Psychological safety function as a moderator of the extent to which team learning occurs. Self-management moderate the relation between team situation awareness and plan formulation as well as between shared mental models and plan execution. The individual characteristics are all positively related to situation assessment. Team adaptiveness needs to have a functional outcome for the whole team, not just for an individual. It is functional when it is used to contribute to the maintenance or development of a larger whole. Practical implications: training in solve novel problems or team adaptiveness training. Theme H: Projectification Article: the art of continuous change. Many firms compete by changing continuously. Especially in dynamic environments Purpose of this paper is to explore how organizations continuously change and thereby to extend thinking beyond the traditional punctuated equilibrium view. Results: Successful managers combine limited structure with extensive interaction and freedom to improvise current product. Second, successful managers explore the future by experimenting with a wide variety of low-cost probes. Third, successful managers link products together over time through rhythmic transitions from one project to the next. Semi-structured (also cross-project communication). There are well defined responsibilities and priorities, but other aspects of the design process were not specified. Thus, limited structure and extensive communication (also cross-project). o Because: motivating, sensemaking, improvise. Probing into the future (instead of planning or reacting). Have a good sense of the future. Balance between rigidity of planning and chaos of reacting by probing the future using a variety of low-cost lenses (experimental products, futurists, strategic partnerships and frequent meetings. o Because: gives options, anticipate, learning Evolving from present to future (managing the transition between the present and the future). Shift from (human) resources from the one to the other. Predictable time intervals between the projects and choreographed transition procedures. Thus, link present and future through predictable time cycles and managed transition processes. o Because: decoupling between present and future, creating a rhythm/flow, and aligned with market cycles. Successful multiple-product innovation involves improvisation of current projects through limited structures and real-time communication, experimentation into the future with a wide variety of low-cost probes, and rhythmically choreographed transitions from present to future. These practices form a core capability for creating frequent, relentless, and endemic change that is associated with the success of firms in high-velocity, competitive settings. Article: From projectification to programmification Review of the phenomenon of projectification four basic organisational structures – functional, lightweight project, heavyweight project and project-based – for NPD. In the first two structures the project managers tend to be junior to the functional managers with little or no direct control of resources. In the heavyweight project structure, although functions tend to be coordinated across projects by managers, the project managers have high status and directly control financial resources and people for the project. In the project-based structure there is no formal functional coordination across projects – the whole organisation is dedicated to one or more projects while business processes are coordinated within the individual projects. extend these four into six ideal types: the functional, the functional matrix, the balanced matrix, the project matrix, the project-led organisation, and the project-based organisation. Consistent with this analysis, PMI [28] define the last two categories in one as ‘the projectised organisation’. Projectification allows for direct (horizontal) communication instead of hierarchical. The attraction of projectification seems to lie in its promise to deliver controllability and adventure. An upside of projectification is learning by doing. On the other side, a challenge is the adaptation of the rest of the organization and its supply networks to the new structures (corporate memory and the role of departments). will consider ‘organisational projectification’ to be ‘a change in organisational and governance structure to increase the primacy of the processes of projects within a central organisation and its supply networks’. Key conclusions: 1. What constitutes a project? The term ‘project’ gives rise to multiple challenges: a. Temporality. Most project definitions talk about a finite task, but when a project lasts many years, there is little to say in favour of it being temporal. b. Uniqueness. Most project definitions talk about a certain uniqueness to a project. Although outcomes may be unique, the same set of capabilities and routines are required to establish this outcome. c. Level of pre-determinism. Most project definitions talk about that projects start welldefined about what is to be achieved, what is the timescale and what are the resources. This puts a strain on individual autonomy and creativity, and task flexibility. 2. Projectification is not a remedy. The outcome of projects may not be reliable or guaranteed. Organizations are willing to turn to projects in order to have beneficial outcomes, but it is questioned if these outcomes will always be so positive. 3. There is a movement towards programme management, a process called programmification. Issues when dealing with multiple projects goes way beyond issues when dealing with a single project. Programme management appears to involve the co-ordinated management of a series of interconnected projects and other non-project work, for the delivery of a specific package of benefits. A programme can’t be considered complete until the benefits from the product or service have been realized. Some organizations are running portfolios pf programmes. See table 3. The three main findings from this discussion concern the definition of the unit of work (the project), questioning the value of projectification and the recognition of the phenomenon of programmification. Article: the project-based organisation: an ideal form for managing complex products and systems Aim: to identify some of the features of the PBO by looking at how CoPS projects are managed comparing within a functional structure. CoPS: complex high value products, systems, networks, capital goods and constructs. Tailored-made for specific customers. High degree of direct user involvement. Product complexity, task complexity. Project management competencies are critical. Project often used form of coordination. Non-routine tasks. In some cases, these challenges have led firms to re-organise their entire business activities along project-based lines, leading to project-based organisational (PBO) structures. Within PBO the project is the primary business mechanism for coordinating and integrating all the main business functions of the firm. Project managers typically have very high status and direct control over business functions, personnel, and other resources. Project is temporary and therefore PBO is flexible. PBO used for non-routine activities and complex tasks (R&D, NPD). PBOs organise their structures, strategies, and capabilities around the needs of projects, which often cut across conventional industrial and firm boundaries. When markets change, risk and uncertainty increase, the project form grows in importance. See figure 1. A-C are not suitable for CoPS. Paper identifies some limits of the PBO: the PBO is weak where the functional matrix is strong: in coordinating resources and capabilities across projects, in executing routine production and engineering tasks, achieving economies of scale and meeting the needs of mass markets. Paper identifies a modified form of the PBO, the project-led organization. To overcome some limits of the PBO. In which the needs of projects outweigh the functional influence on decision-making and representation to senior management, but some coordination across project lines occurs. In the pure PBO there is no formal functional coordination across project lines. Difficulties PBOs face in capturing and transferring project knowledge with pressures, structures, and routines crowding out learning from one project to another. Direct control over resources and team personnel, strong and direct representation into senior management. In functional no team identity and confused relations with their client (who is responsible FM or PM). Less risk control due to lack of team coherence. The lack of regular reporting into senior management created tensions between project progress and corporate-wide goals. With learning, functional outperformed the project based. Learning was centred on the functional departments. In PBO no formal structures or incentives for cross-project learning. In PBO, senior management felt that control was difficult. The aim was to ensure consistency in project approaches, to share best practices more widely and to keep senior management at HQ better informed through improved reporting procedures. This amounted to a step ‘back’ to a project-led organisation, but fell short of a project matrix (a shift from ‘F’ to ‘E’ in Fig. 1.) Figure 2: Functional have many lines of communication. Project-based internal coordination becomes much easier and strong external communication. PBO has economic advantages (resource allocation, knowledge management, design optimisation, quality). And also, innovation advantage. PBO is a high innovative form. Centred around special needs of the specific product. The PBO is probably best suited for large, risk-intensive projects, where resources have to be combined and shared with other firms in the project. On the negative side, the PBO is inherently weak in coordinating processes, resources and capabilities across the organisation as a whole. Project can go their own way. In choosing the organizational form the nature of scale and complexity of the product must be considered. More generally, the paper indicates that the changing nature, composition, and scale of products have an important bearing on appropriate organisational forms.
