Chapter 17 Organization Change and Stress Management

Three ways to unfreeze

- Increase driving forces - Decrease restraining forces - Combining the first two

Organizational factors

- Task demands - Role demands - Interpersonal demands

Six Forces for Change

- The changing nature of the workforce - Technology - Economic shocks - Competition - Social trends - World politics

Potential sources of stress at work

- Environmental factors - Organizational factors - Personal factors

Challenge stressors

Stressors associated with workload, pressure to complete tasks, and time urgency.

Hindrance stressors

Stressors that keep you from reaching your goals

Lewin's Three-Step Model

Successful change in organizations should follow three steps: - Unfreezing the status quo - Movement to a desired end state - Refreezing the new change to make it permanent

Paradox theory

The theory that the key paradox in management is that there is no final optimal status for an organization.

Survey feedback

The use of questionnaires to identify discrepancies among member perceptions; discussion follows and remedies are suggested.

Resources

Things within an individual's control that can be used to resolve demands.

Sensitivity training

Training groups that seek to change behavior through unstructured group interaction.

Allostasis

Working to change behavior and attitudes to find stability.

Environmental tasks

- Economic uncertainties - Political uncertainties - Technological change

Ways to overcome resistance to change

- Communication - Participation - Building support and commitment - Developing positive relationships - Implementing changes fairly - Manipulation and cooptation - Selecting people who can accept change - Coercion

Five steps in action research

Diagnosis, analysis, feedback, action, evaluation

Coercion

The application of direct threats or force on dissenters.

Kotter's Eight-Step Plan

- Establish a sense of urgency by creating a compelling reason for why change is needed. - Form a coalition with enough power to lead the change. - Create a new vision to direct the change and strategies for achieving the vision. - Communicate the vision throughout the organization. - Empower others to act on the vision by removing barriers to change and encouraging risk taking and creative problem solving. - Plan for, and reward short-term "wins" that move the organization toward the new vision. - Consolidate improvements, reassess changes, and make necessary adjustments in the new programs. - Reinforce the changes by demonstrating the relationship between new behaviors and organizational success.

Personal factors

- Family issues - Personal economic problems

Individual sources

- Habit - Security - Economic factors - Fear of the unknown - Selective information processing

Sources of Resistance to Change

- Individual sources - Organizational sources

OD Techniques

- Sensitivity training - Survey feedback - Process consultation (PC) - Team building - Intergroup development - Appreciative inquiry (AI)

Organizational sources

- Structural inertia - Limited focus of change - Group inertia - Threat to expertise - Threat to established power relationships

Action Research

A change process based on the systematic collection of data and the selection of a change action based on what the analyzed data indicate.

Organizational Development (OD)

A collection of planned change interventions, built on humanistic-democratic values, that seeks to improve organizational effectiveness and employee well-being.

Process consultation (PC)

A meeting in which a consultant assists a client in understanding process events with which he or she must deal and identifying processes that need improvement.

Innovation

A new idea applied to initiating or improving a product, process, or service.

Appreciative inquiry (AI)

An approach that seeks to identify the unique qualities and special strengths of an organization, which can then be built on to improve performance.

Learning organization

An organization that has developed the continuous capacity to adapt and change.

Stress

An unpleasant psychological process that occurs in response to environmental pressures.

Demands

Responsibilities, pressures, obligations, and even uncertainties that individuals face in the workplace.

Cooptation

Seeks to buy off the leaders of a resistance group by giving them a key role, seeking their advice not to find a better solution but to get their endorsement.

Discovery

Sets out to identify what people think are the organization's strengths.

Planned change

Change activities that are intentional and goal oriented.

Four steps in AI

Discovery, dreaming, design, destiny

Role demands

Relates to pressures placed on a person as a function of the particular role he or she plays in the organization.

Dreaming

Employees use information from the discovery phase to speculate on possible futures.

Driving forces

Forces that direct behavior away from the status quo.

Restraining forces

Forces that hinder movement from the existing equilibrium.

Team building

High interaction among team members to increase trust and openness.

Idea champions

Individuals who take an innovation and actively and enthusiastically promote the idea, build support, overcome resistance, and ensure that the idea is implemented.

Change

Making things different

Intergroup development

Organizational development efforts to change the attitudes, stereotypes, and perceptions that groups have of each other.

Wellness program

Organizationally supported programs that focus on the employee's total physical and mental condition.

Design

Participants find a common vision of how the organization will look in the future and agree on its unique qualities.

Destiny

Participants seek to define the organization's destiny or how to fulfill their dreams, and they typically write action plans and develop implementation strategies..

Change agents

People who act as catalysts and assume the responsibility for managing change activities.

Interpersonal demands

Pressures created by other employees.

Manipulation

Refers to covert influence attempts

Task demands

Relates to a person's job.