Essay #2
The inevitability of change among organizations is presently dealt with the use of a contemporary perspective of Change Management. The said paradigm is predominantly executed by the private sector in order to maintain and eventually develop as a commercial entity. However, the inescapability of changing times is also taking its toll on the public sector. Thus, the government is subjected to a several aspects of change.
Change Management The concept of change management is defined by Thompson (1967) as the task of managing change, an area of professional practice, and a body of knowledge. The first and most obvious definition of “change management” is that the term refers to the task of managing change. The obvious is not necessarily unambiguous. Managing change is itself a term that has at least two meanings. One meaning of managing change refers to the making of changes in a planned and managed or systematic fashion. The aim is to more effectively implement new methods and systems in an ongoing organization. The changes to be managed lie within and are controlled by the organization. However, these internal changes might have been triggered by events originating outside the organization, in what is usually termed “the environment.” Hence, the second meaning of managing change, namely, the response to changes over which the organization exercises little or no control. Researchers and practitioners alike typically distinguish between an automatic or reactive response and an anticipative or proactive response.
The second definition of change management is “an area of professional practice.” (Newell and Simon, 1972) There are dozens, if not hundreds, of independent consultants who will quickly and proudly acknowledge that they are engaged in planned change, that they are change agents, that they manage change for their clients, and that their practices are change management practices. In almost all cases, the process of change is treated separately from the specifics of the situation. It is the task of managing this general process of change that is laid claim to by professional change agents.
Furthermore, stemming from the view of change management as an area of professional practice there arises yet a third definition of change management: the content or subject matter of change management. (Bennis et al., 1969) This consists chiefly of the models, methods and techniques, tools, skills, and other forms of knowledge that goes into making up any practice. The content or subject matter of change management is drawn from psychology, sociology, business administration, economics, industrial engineering, systems engineering, and the study of human and organizational behavior. For many practitioners, these component bodies of knowledge are linked and integrated by a set of concepts and principles known as General Systems Theory (GST). It is not clear whether this area of professional practice should be termed a profession, a discipline, an art, a set of techniques, or a technology. For now, suffice it to say that there is a large, reasonably cohesive albeit somewhat eclectic body of knowledge underlying the practice and on which most practitioners would agree — even if their application of it does exhibit a high degree of variance.
However, success is often undermined because organizations don’t understand that the project does not end at the point the new system ‘goes live’. True change management includes the critical phases that follow going live – stabilizing the business and realizing the benefits.
The public sector is well-known for the length of its projects. The traditional hierarchies it operates often lengthen the decision-making and procurement processes, which can literally end up taking several years. The knock-on effect for change management is that the project team risks losing sight of the end benefits of the implementation and the final two phases might remain incomplete due to ‘project fatigue’. The overall cost of implementation therefore escalates because of high procurement costs.
Change Management in the Public Sector
The change management in the public sector is vaguely distinct to its counterpart in the private sector. This makes the principles of change management generally applicable regardless of the orientation of the organization. In order to achieve the maximum potential of the management of change, there are several factors that are needed to satisfy. The most important factors are effective planning, timely decision-making, stakeholder management and ensuring that the right people are available to implement change. A lack of any of these could result in delay, or even failure, of the implementation. Moreover, the issue of resourcing is fundamental to success. Getting the right mix of people often involves partnering with private sector companies and this can potentially lead to a clash of cultures. The best partnerships are built with private sector partners who can empathize with the traditional hierarchies within the public sector but are prepared to challenge constructively.
Finally, the key thing for public sector organizations to remember is that, when putting together a successful project team within the organization, it is building an asset for the future. Project team members will not only have built on their past experience but also they will have developed new skills that will ultimately further their careers. They are likely to be much more organizationally aware at the end of a project. The confidence a project gives them also means that they are keen to develop their skills and move on within the organization rather than move out. It is imperative to realize the investment in them by identifying early on the role they can move into after the project. Many will become future leaders and will have high expectations.
Pitfalls of Change
The implementation of change management in an organization is similarly not safe from failure. There are several possibilities that an organizational change might fail particularly in the public sector where an apparent imperfection on the system brought about by the political aspect of man. In a book of Chaudron (2002), he provided nine pitfalls of change.
The first is the need-technique mismatch. This is characterized as the mismatch that occurs on a larger scale. Organizations often use small-scale, incremental techniques such as Six Sigma, when instead they need to evaluate their reactions to future scenarios of a radically changed business climate. They may need to divest themselves of a money-losing division instead of pouring more money into an industry that is dying a slow death. Another is the failure to create systemic change. The management, or top level officials in the case of the public sector, must realize that to fully implement change, satisfy customers, and promote teamwork in the entire organization, often wrenching systemic changes must be made: profit sharing may be introduced; individual performance appraisals may be radically changed or eliminated; organizational structure may be realigned away from functions (production, quality, engineering) to a customer-, process- or geographic-based structure; information may be given to employees formerly reserved for senior management; and significantly more authority may be given to line employees. Otherwise, Each system (rewards, structure, information, etc.) is tugging the organization in a different direction. The result will be much struggle and confusion, but little success.
Another pitfall is the failure of providing a decision up front. Many organizations need to design the architecture of their quality effort. Among the decisions that should be made up-front, before implementing a quality efforts are: the measures of success; the degree of employee involvement; the depth and breadth of implementation; and the techniques to be used. Furthermore, supervisors and line employees have often complained that they do not receive management support for their efforts. This no management support is caused by unclear or unknown expectations.
Pitfalls of change in the public sector, or any other sector for that matter, are primarily caused by miscalculations and blunders. This is particularly due to the fact that organizations, especially those in the public sector are extremely dynamic, if not volatile, depending on the economic and political stability of a nation. This only shows that planning for any project geared towards the management of change in an organization requires a great deal of planning among its decision makers. With the proper planning, the possibility of failure due to miscalculations will be reduced.
Reference:
Bennis, Warren G., Kenneth D. Benne, and Robert Chin. (1969) The Planning of Change (2nd Edition). Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York.
Caudron, David, (2002) No More Darn Buzzwords: Key to Successful Organizational Change. Booklocker.com.
Newell, Allen and Herbert A. Simon. (1972) Human Problem Solving. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs:.
Thompson, James. (1967) Organizations in Action. James D. Thompson. McGraw-Hill, New York.
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