Managing Change
Upul Abeyrathne,
Dept. of Economics,
University of Ruhuna,
Matara
Kurt Lewin’s Model
• He is a social psychologist
• He developed his theory 50 years ago.
• He name it as the “Force Field Analysis”.
This model is composed of two sides
• Driving Forces: They push organizations
towards a new state of affairs.
• Restraining Forces: It maintains the status
quo.
Driving Forces
• They are of two varieties.
1. External environment
E.g. Globalization, Virtual work and changing work
2. Internal: Leaders create driving forces within organizations
so the organization anticipates the external forces.
Remember that the internally originated driving forces are
difficult to apply because they lack external justification.
Effective transformational leadership as well as structural
change mechanism are necessary to legitimate and support
internal driving forces.
Restraining Forces
• They are called resistance to change.
• It is because that employees behaviour is
something that block the change.
Stability
• It happens when driving forces and restraining
forces are roughly in equilibrium. That is when
they are approximately equal strength in
opposite direction.
What does this model emphasizes?
• Effective change occurs by unfreezing the
current situation and moving to a desired
condition and refreezing the system so that it
remains in the desired state.
What is Unfreezing?
• It is the producing disequilibrium between
driving forces and restraining forces.
• It can be achieved by either increasing the
driving forces or reducing the Restraining
forces.
Refreezing
• It occurs when organization system and
structures are aligned with the desired
behaviour.
• They must support and reinforce the new role
pattern and prevent organization from sliping
back into the old ways of doing things
Restraining Forces
• “People likes to keep things the way they are”.
Forms of Resistance: Passive noncompliance,
complaints, absenteeism, turnover and collective
actions.
Resistance is a symptom of deeper problem in the
change process.
It is better for managers to understand the reasons
for not changing the behaviour by employees.
Restraining Forces
• Direct Cost: People resists actions that result
in higher direct cost or lower benefits than the
existing situation.
• Saving Face: Some people resist change as a
political strategy to prove that the decision is
wrong or the person encouraging the change
is incompetent.
Restraining Forces
• Fear of the Unknown: People resist changes
out of fear that they could not adjust to new
work requirements.
• Breaking Routines: People are creatures of
habit. Routine makes life more predictable.
Restraining Forces
• Incongruent Organizational System: Rewards, selection,
training and other control systems ensure that
employees maintain desired role pattern. However,
organizations that maintains stability discourage
employees from adopting new ways.
• Incongruent Team Dynamics: Teams develop and
enforce conformity to a set of norms that guide the
behaviour. Conformity to the present norms may
discourage employees accepting organizational change.
Team norms conflict with desired changes need to be
altered.
What a manager shall do?
• He should increasing the driving forces and
reduce the resistance forces simultaneously.
How to create urgency for Change
• It is cliché that organizations operate in more
dynamic, fast-paced environment.
• Environment pressure represent the driving
forces for change. It pushes employees out of
their comfort zones.
• Change process has to begin by ensuring
employees feel an urgency to change: Informing
of the competitors, changing consumer needs,
impending government regulations and other
driving forces.
How to create urgency for Change
• Customer –driven change
• Urging change without external forces
Reducing the restraining forces
•
•
•
•
•
•
Communication
Learning
Employee involvement
Stress Management
Negotiation
coercion
Change Agent
• Every Organization Requires change agent.
• Change agent is anyone who possesses
knowledge and power to guide and facilitate
the change effort.
• Change agents form a vision for a desired
future, communicate it in meaningful manner
to others, behave in a manner consistent with
that vision.
Approaches to organizational change
• Action Research Approach
• Appreciative Inquiry Approach
• Parallel Learning Structure Approach
Action Research
• Pioneer: Kurt Lewin
• Action Research takes the view that
meaningful change is a combination of Action
Orientation (Changing Attitudes and
Behaviour) and Research Orientation(Testing
Theory).
• On the one hand change process needs to be
action oriented because the ultimate goal is to
bring about change.
Action Research
• Action orientation involves diagnosing problems and
applying interventions to resolve the problems.
• On the other hand, change process is research study
because change agents apply a conceptual framework(
such as team dynamics and organizational culture) to a
real situation.
• As with any good research, it involves data gathering to
diagnose problems more effectively and systematically
evaluate how well theory works in practice.
• It involves organizational learning and knowledge
management.
Action Research
• Action Research assumes change agent
originate outside the organization.
• 1. Form Client-consultant Relationship.
• 2. Diagnose the need for change
• 3. Introduce interventions
• 4.Evaluate and stabilize change.
• This approach takes a negative approach to
organization.
Appreciative Inquiry Approach
• It tries to break out the problem solving
mentality of traditional change management
practices by reframing relationships around
the positive and the possible.
• It search for organizational strengths and
capabilities
• Adapts or applies that knowledge for further
success or well-being.
Appreciative Inquiry Approach
• It highlights the importance of positive traits
and qualities of individuals and organization.
• It directs inquiry to successful events, units
and organizations and strives to make them
models.
• It increases open dialogue by redirecting the
groups attention away from its own problems
• It helps organization by way of focusing on
what is possible for better future.
Appreciative Inquiry Approach
1. Discovery: Identifying the best of “What is”
2. Dreaming: Envision “What might be”
3. Designing : Engage in dialogue about “What
should be”
4. Delivering: Develop objectives about “What
will be”
Parallel Learning Structures
• Highly Participative
• Follow action research model to produce
meaningful change.
• They are social structures developed alongside
the formal hierarchy with purpose of
increasing the organization’s learning.
Ethical Issues
• Privacy rights of individuals
• Increase managers power.
• Change undermines self-esteem
Thank You