P CH8 Implementing Change: Change Management, Contingency, and Processual Approaches

Question 1

Change Management and Contingency Approaches

Answer 1

• director image (associated wit the work of many large consulting companies)
• series of steps that need to be followed

Question 2

Change Management Approaches

Answer 2

• provide multistep models of how to achieve transformational change

Question 3

discontinuous change

Answer 3

occurs in static environments

- multistep models have to be applied including al the steps

Question 4

continuous change

Answer 4

occurs in dynamic environments

- staff here already is accustomed to change and therefore the models don’t need to be applied step for step

Question 5

3 elements to be managed in transformational process

Answer 5

• need to manage org. power
• need to motivate people
• manage the transition itself

Question 6

3 transformational change phases

Answer 6

• rationalization (streamlining company operations)
• revitalization (leveraging resources and linking opportunities across the whole organization)
• regeneration (managing business unit operations and tensions, while collaborating to achieve peformance)

Question 7

utility of normative steps (critique)

Answer 7

(read not learn)

• practice and implementation varies according to the particular change maker
• multiple changes may be in progress so the “past” is difficult to determine
• change commandments need to be tailor to needs of each org.
• communication should include allowing different voices to be heard
• action is not always possible by the change manager, so the change manager has to be prepared to react to opposition
• there may be multiple leaders not only one as in many normative guides
• sometimes not a controlling change but experimentation and risk-taking are required

Question 8

What does Kotter acknowledge about his 8 step framework?

Answer 8

• it is a simplification
• even successful change efforts are messy and full of surprise
• but is steps have to be taken in sequence

Question 9

Has change management supplanted (replaced) OD?

Answer 9

• change management has a broader scope(considers human performance and relates it to technology, operations, strategy)
• change management consultants operate with technical knowledge and as part of a team consisting of skill sets that cover a range of strategy and org. areas.
• structural changes lead to new behaviors (not changes individual attitudes and ideas like in OD which then lead to wider structural changes)

Question 10

Contingency Approach

Answer 10

• still underpinned by director
• offers an alternative to change models which show “one best way” of producing change. Although it is often not clear which of the various models to chose.
• contingency models argue that change depends on the scale and the receptivity of the members engaged in the change

Question 11

Dunphy/Stace Contingency Model of Change

Answer 11

Scales of change:

• developmental transition
• task-focused transition
• charismatic transformation
• turnarounds
• Taylorism

-> as different paths of change the org. might adopt at different periods of time

Question 12

developmental transition

Answer 12

• situation with constant change

- leadership style is consultative (coach)

Question 13

task-focused transition

Answer 13

• directive

- may be more consultive by managers further down in org. implementing the change

Question 14

charismatic transformation

Answer 14

• where people accept the org. needs change

Question 15

turnarounds

Answer 15

• frame-breaking changes
• change leaders as commanders
• used where there is little staff support or time

Question 16

taylorism (least successful)

Answer 16

• fine-tuning

- charismatic transformation or turnaround should be used at some stage to reinvigorate

Question 17

Huy and categorization of change

Answer 17

• commanding
• engineering (medium-term)
• teaching (longer term)
• socialization (long term, participative experiential learning)

Question 18

Why are contingency approaches not as dominant as the change management approaches?

Answer 18

• fitting on org. to type of change is not easy
• contingency approaches are more ambiguous
• might be less attractive to senior management to adopt a particular style of leading
• employees may see senior management as not sincere when their actions change all the time (depending on the situation)

Question 19

Processual Approaches

Answer 19

• underpinned by Navigator image
• share the assumption with contingency approach that change unfolds differently over time
• they view change as continuous and not linear
• change is best understood as a complex interplay btw. content, process, and context.
• different groups in org. have different rationalities, all of which influence how org. change occurs
• political and cultural view of change
• change is likely to challenge the dominating ideology, culture, and systems of meaning and interpretation

Question 20

Who provides the backdrop to the processual approach?

Answer 20

Pettigrew and his study of the chemical industry

Question 21

What timeframe does the Processual Approach take?

Answer 21

• long-term conditioning

Question 22

external context

Answer 22

economic, political, and competitive environment

Question 23

internal context

Answer 23

• strategy, structure, culture, power relations

Question 24

What does context provide managers with? (processual approach)

Answer 24

opportunity and constraints of change

Question 25

Stages to engage in the processual approach

Answer 25

- problem-sensing - development of concerns - acknowledgement and understanding of the importance of the problem - planning and acting - stabilizing change