Essay on Resistance to Organizational Change

Many types of risk are created – risk to the project, to the organization, to the employees involved and to the individuals supporting the change.

43-45). Top-down change process provides prescription that has only been developed by top managers and given to lower cadre employees down the ranks to consume without their input. According to Bovey & Hede (2001, p. 540) resistance occurs at the individual level, where employees are motivated by psychological factors to change that include resentment, frustration, low motivation and morale, fear, and feelings of failure. At the same time, earlier publication by Yilmaz & Kilicoglu (2013, pp. 17-18) identified four factors that motivate employees to resist changes in the organisation: employees focusing on self- interests as opposed to those of the organisation, having inadequate understanding of

Resistance to change is an expected reaction of human nature. We are not accustomed to change, as it is possible to lead to failure; however, there are also ways to manage the resistance within the company.

Agocs, C. (1997). Institutionalized resistance to organizational change: Denial, inaction and repression. Journal of Business Ethics, 16(9), 917-931.

Changes are very critical to enhance organizational effectiveness. An organization needs to implement changes to stay productive, competitive as well as avoiding calamity in the case of aviation sector. Changes are the process of instilling new attitudes, values, norms and behaviors within an organization to support the way of doing work. However, the implementation of changes is a task that requires adequate planning and design since changes are not always welcome and could lead to individual's resistance to change. (Agboola,& Salawu,2011). The identification

Personal impact and fear of change are not the only causes of resistance by individuals during a change to business practices. The lack of respect and negative attitudes can also lead to employees resisting business change. If an employee lacks respect or has a negative attitude towards a person or department leading the change, then there are more likely to oppose the new ideas being implemented. Poor communication greatly impacts individuals’ accepted to new practices in a company. Typically if an employee is given new behaviors to adopt, but is given no reason, then that employee may reject the change. Upper management must effectively relate the value, need and benefit of the change to help get employees on board with new changes. The lack of individual input can also lead to resistance. Some individuals feel the need to be included in new ideas. When employees are not asked to be involved in changes, they may lack the vision of importance or will to change. A heavier workload can also cause opposition among employees. Employees may not embrace more systems and requirements needed

In addition, Lewin recognized that change is almost always met with resistance. More importantly, he identified the behaviors and environments that stimulate resistance. Thus, careful consideration of behavioral and environmental impacts must occur in the Unfreezing stage of Lewin’s Unfreezing-Changing-Refreezing Model prior to implementing the change. This will prepare the leaders of the organization to meet the resistance with the correct leadership and management style.

Change starts with the perception of its need, so a wrong initial perception can be the first

In these instances, change is seen as evil and not "healthy". Change is not looked on as a positive opportunity and thus is rejected by the individuals in a company, which may result in incohesiveness within the organization and eventual collapse. Personal instances of resistance like those stated above often hold companies back because of their conservative views as they often result from lack of individual confidence in oneself to be creative. Stemming from personal instances of resistances is the occurrence of group resistance to change. Sources of group resistance to change include: Conformity to Norms (Inertia), Vested Interests, Sacrosanct, Rejection of Outsiders, Overdetermination, and threatened power. Vested Interests is probably the most interesting source of resistance because how can interest in being the best be a resistance? Vested Interests can be a resistance because it often promotes conformity to norms, as workers are less likely to contribute their ideas to the advancement of innovation and as a result the company suffers as past new ideas become old, and new ideas are needed to survive in the ubercompetitive business world today. Rejection of Outsiders can be looked on as positive or negative, but more negatively, thus placing it as a resistance to change. Rejection of Outsiders might cause more cohesion within a group to rely on each

Suggested reasons for resistance include: loss of control, shock of new, uncertainty, inconvenience, threat to status, competence fears. It is important to try to diagnose the cause of employee resistance as this will help determine the focus of effort in trying to reduce/remove the issue.

Lisa Quast of Forbes (2012) states “Many people like to joke that the only constant in business is change, change has an interesting way of affecting people that can often result in resistance” (“Overcome the 5

Poorly managed organizational change can increase risk, budgets and damage reputations. Organizational change typically educes strong emotions because change interferes with the sense of security, as well as produces feelings of uncertainty (Barabasz, 2016). Employee’s reactions to imposed change, which can range from high turnover, low morale, an assiduous reduction in productivity, to wildcat or other strikes, perplexes many leaders. Leadership that develops strategies to manage the active and passive resistance can mitigate risk and minimize additional costs. In this paper, I will discuss a case study that focuses on how employee resistance to a poorly managed change

To identify the key elements of the resistanceto change described in this situation, one may make use of the six Change Approaches of Kotter and Schlesinger.[1]The model prevents, minimizes or descreases resistance to change in organizations. According to Kotter and Schlesinger (1979), there are four reasons that why people resist change, three of which are applicable to this case:

A need for growth in any organization to stay a viable entity must occur. Organizational change is inevitable. Just like anything in life, markets and cultures change which require constant attention and preparation. In order to be successful in any market, an organization has to be able transform itself to the needs for the market. CrysTel is no stranger to change. CrysTel is a telecommunication company with over 2500 employees and a gross income of approximately $200 million a year. Products included in there list of services include data cables, wireless solutions, and network development. The product profile is data cables, wireless solutions and network development. Because of the nature of

Leadership trainings that I have attended have emphasized the psychological model of resistance, putting me in the perspective of the change protagonist. Reading Challenging “Resistance to Change” has afforded me the perspective of the “enemy”, which I have come to realize is no one; is everyone. I find the chain of qualitative evidence consistent and convincing. Nevertheless, my ability to achieve results with my “bankrupt” psychological construct leads me to crave some quantitative evidence for full conviction. In the shoes of present-day academics involved in organizational change, I may be inclined to accept the relationship between my model and Lewin’s model only as far as the similarity of terms. In the absence of data to support the superiority of this construct, I would feel more comfortable with my existing