Making Changes within your Organisation? – Maybe you need to
assess the extent to which your organization is ready.
Organisational sustainability and change go hand-in-hand. Many
organisations introduce change, or initiate and plan for change, in response to
a wide range of internal and external triggers. For some it could be the result
of key staff departures providing the opportunity to review and potentially
refresh the organizational structure. For others it could be the result of difficulties
with the external environment necessitating changes to long standing business
models that have not been previously challenged.
Such changes can be viewed in many different ways by the staff
within the organisation. Some will view these potential changes as opportunities
by virtue of embracing the unknown whilst improving whatever the shortcomings
of the existing position may have been.
Others will view them as threats by virtue of being uncomfortable with
the unknown and the sense of possible loss of position, control, influence or
power.
Research in this field of change management and specifically in
the area of “organizational readiness for change” has been extensive over the
years. Some have contested that the lack of change readiness may be a key
reason for organisations failing in their attempts to manage the changes that
are introduced. Others have suggested that organisations that display high
levels of internal flexibility and a change ready culture are far better able
to adapt and absorb changes as they come up.
A further approach has been to suggest that the management of
change may in fact be more successful if continuous change is the norm within
the organisation, rather than focusing on specific changes at particular
moments in time. This implies a more fluid approach to change rather than an ‘episodic’
approach characterised by piecemeal changes as and when they are perceived as being
needed.
Alongside this recognition regarding the readiness for change, is
the associated research regarding change resistance, which in many ways
represents the two sides of the one coin, in that the more ready the
organisation is to actively and positively work with change, the less change
resistance and therefore the more likelihood of successful change outcomes.
Currently, my own PhD research being undertaken in the
Not-for-Profit hospital sector reinforces this duality of change readiness and
change resistance and highlights a broad range of characteristics which shape
change readiness. Whilst skill and care may be applied to change management via
effective project management, this latter activity does not recognize the
emotional aspects of change as felt by those that are experiencing the
change. As such, good project management
does not equate to good change outcomes. Understanding your staff responses to
change must represent the other side of the ‘mechanistic’ aspects of change.
In response to this research, OPTIMUM NFP
has developed the ‘CARC Program (Cultural
Assessment for Readiness for Change)’, a process for evaluating change
readiness within your organisation, using a range of qualitative research
techniques to assess your organisations readiness to work with, and absorb,
proposed changes. Information gleaned from this process can then be incorporated
into the change program to effectively reinforce the process and achieve better
change outcomes.
Happy to hear from organisational managers wishing to further discuss the process by which this research at your organisation can deliver positive outcomes witih regard future change management outcomes. Contact David Rosenbaum at OPTIMUM NFP
for a no obligation discussion on how the CARC
Program can be economically applied to your organisation – before
the next change!
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