Organizational change (page 1 of 2)

But the million dollar question is how can the workforce be encouraged to support change initiatives?

During September's Middle East HR Summit in Dubai I had the opportunity to conduct a workshop on Engaging Employees in Change. During my workshop I provided information on why successful change initiatives take the workforce's attitudes, beliefs and desires into account.

Before starting any change program it's important to understand what drives your staff so that you can engage their talents and abilities to move the change process forward.

Organizations that are not prepared to change risk being overtaken or even driven out of business by their competitors in today's global environment. The needed changes may be small incremental steps or an organization may need enormous strides in order to stay in business but all changes, big and small, require courage and commitment!

Whatever changes your company faces, there are 6 basic fundamentals that you need to be aware of before attempting any change initiative:

1. Management & employees have different views of change

2. Change efforts are going to upset the status quo

3. Change increases employees' anxiety & stress levels

4. There will always be resistance to change

5. Successful change efforts are driven by continual communications

6. The time/resources needed to secure change is usually underestimated

So what do these 6 fundamentals mean to you? Let's start by looking at the different views management and employees have regarding the workplace. Once you understand that each party has different concerns then you can start to bridge the gap between them. Successfully bridging the gap will help ensure any changes introduced will have a positive and lasting affect on your company's future!

If you think of these differences as two sides of a coin it will be easier to understand - the management team and staff may have different views but they are connected as summarized in the following table:



This diagram is an attempt to show that each "side of the coin" looks at things differently and for the organizational change drivers to make progress you'll need to show employees why the changes are necessary and point out how the changes will have a positive effect on them.

By showing the proposed changes can increase the company's stability, growth and future it becomes easier to show the direct impact on employees. Stability and growth affect things that employees are concerned about; job security, training and development opportunities and better working conditions.

Now let's look at the next issue - dealing with the status quo of the company. Again, the role of HR professionals (and others involved with the change efforts) must anticipate, identify and address "people problems" because change is always intensely personal. Unfortunately, it's easy to underestimate the internal conflict and soul-searching that goes hand-in-hand with breaking away from the status quo.

One of the best tools for changing the status quo involves rewarding the type of behavior you're trying to promote because it will have an enormous impact on the workforce's behavior! Recognition of those that are supporting the change efforts also has a positive influence on the success of the change initiative.
Of course during any change process the employee's are going to experience anxiety and stress.