Leadership in change management
The importance of change to an organization cannot be overstated, be it total quality management, reengineering, rightsizing, restructuring, cultural change, and turnaround there ought to be proper structuring to facilitate the process. In recent years, we have noted big corporations try to make fundamental changes in how business is conducted to help them cope with new, more challenging market environment. With their continued drive to achieve the same, some change related issues or rather problems have been able to be identified as obstacles towards this much-needed change for the organizations. As these organizations strive to implement change, employees often adopt some sort of resistance towards the changes being implemented as a result of various factors that will be discussed later.
It is important to appreciate the role played by leadership in change management. Leadership is the ability to get individuals in an organization to focus their attention on the problems that the leader considers significant. The functions of leadership, therefore, align to organizational, decisional, and interpersonal processes. Due to increased attention focused on the heightened levels of dynamism found in the global business environment, an emerging interest is being directed towards the need to explore how leadership relates to change management with the view that change is a constant dynamic within the organization. Resistance to change can hinder the efficiency and sustainability of change. (Hayes, 2007)
Change requires effective leadership to be successfully introduced and sustained. Combining an understanding and translation of vision, values, and strategy coupled with inspiration helps to promote a more sustainable change approach within the firm. There are about four leadership theories that I will discuss, that try to explain the relationship within an organization, which subsequently determine the level of employee resistance in events the organization undergoes changes. Authoritarian leadership stems from the great man theory to the effect that leaders are born and not made. In this type of leadership style, there is a separation between the leader and their employees whereby the leader imposes their style, and the employees have little room for input, employee involvement is needed to overcome the deeply rooted structural inertia related to change processes. Change can have an effect on the equilibrium within the firm, and thus, there is a need to lead change in a way which lowers resistance through employee involvement. This system of leadership mostly yields employee resistance in an organization, especially in the event the firm intends to eradicate long term poor practices. In spite of the negative relationship between an autocratic style of leadership and change, there are times when autocratic styles of change may be suitable. For example, autocratic styles of change may be appropriate for those firms having to make a dramatic, time pressurized change. The quick decision-making processes aligned with this form of leadership would speed up the change process.
Democratic or rather participative style of leadership, on the other hand, works towards a greater capacity to allow for employee involvement through promotion of sharing ideas across all levels of the organization. This type of leadership is positively aligned with changing practices within the firm as it lowers employee resistance, the leadership style is effective in initiating gradual, evolutionary forms of change within the firm as it is all inclusive but usually takes time. Transformational leadership is the kind that adopts a more personalized type of style whereby change values are positively related to the passion inspired by the transformational leader. Transformational leaders inspire and motivate people by helping group members understand the importance and higher good of the task. These leaders are focused on the performance of group members, but also want each person to fulfill his or her potential. Therefore, this leadership style is effective at eliciting change, which is inspirational. This is to mean therefore there is low resistance from the employees as the change stems from the adopted culture of the organization and since it requires the development of a culture within the organization, it, therefore, takes time to realize the change. Finally, Transactional style of leadership is to the effect that it directs its employees towards a clearly outlined goal, it contrasts to the transformational style of leadership that seeks to influence rather than direct. Transactional leadership, also known as management theory, focuses on the role of supervision, organization, and group performance. These theories base leadership on a system of rewards and punishments, it depends on self-motivated people who work well in a structured, directed environment and such a leader would not work effectively in an organization that require innovative and creative ideas
It is important to note that employee resistance is not the only change related problem facing organizations today, the styles of leadership have an impact in the relationship experienced across all levels of the organization as this relationship tends to affects the structural inertias within the organization. Kotter, (1996) argues that a central feature of modern organizations is interdependence, where no one has complete autonomy, and most members of the organization are tied to many others by their work, technology, management systems, and hierarchy. Kotter argues that these linkages present a special challenge when organizations attempt to change because unless individuals line up and move together, they will get in each other’s way and fall over one another, as according to Hayes, (2007). Employee resistance mainly stems from interactions in the different levels of an organization expressed in the form of leadership opt by the organization. According to Dannapfel & Nilsen, (2016), there are several mechanisms by which leaders can influence the culture of an organization and groups within an organization. The mechanisms of paying attention to, measuring and controlling regularly as well as deliberate role modeling, teaching, and coaching did have some relevance. However, evidence-based practice issues seemed to depend on committed individuals, often younger physiotherapists, who were interested in research Management of change is greatly affected by the employee’s reaction to these changes, resistance to change is a basic human characteristic, and it strongly depends on every individual’s nature. Employee resistance is a major obstacle to an organization in realizing its change management plans. According to Kaminski, (2011), diffusion of innovation theory is a valuable change model for driving technological innovation. The innovation is improved and presented in ways that address the requirements across all levels of adopters. It also emphasizes the importance of peer networking and communication within the adoption process. The process was mapped out such that, in most cases, an initial few are open to the new idea and adopt its use. As these early innovators spread the information, an increased number of people become open to it, which leads to the development of a critical mass. The idea is that the product becomes diffused amongst the population until a saturation point is actualized. The theory was distinguished among five categories of adopters of an innovation: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. Within this theory, the goal is not to move people within the five adopter categories into another category, but to streamline the innovation to meet the needs of all five categories. The theory majorly focuses on the manner in which the change is conveyed to the different levels of individuals in an organization, to reduce resistance on the change, explaining that the manner in which the change is conveyed helps in articulating the change and its subsequent receptance.
On the other hand, William Kahn’s theory on employee engagement, on how to achieve a company’s strategic goals by creating the conditions for human resources to thrive and, for each member, to be switched on in their jobs to deliver their best efforts in the best interest of the business. The theory seems to operate just like the rationale behind transactional leadership that the individual in the organization is self-driven, the ideal is that the staff is fully committed as they are engaged and therefore interested in the organization’s well-being, managerial styles balance the need for operational efficiency with motivation to change from the individuals. It is, therefore, safe to say employee engagement is a two-way street, a reciprocal relationship of trust and respect between employer and employee. It requires an organization’s executives and managers to communicate their expectations, clearly and extensively, with the employees, empower the employees at the appropriate levels of their competence, and create a working environment and corporate culture in which engagement will thrive. From the definition and explanation of the theory, it is clear to see that in the event the theory is applied in the context William Kahn intended, employee resistance to change can be controlled.
As seen, employee resistance mainly stems from the form and style of leadership adopted in governance of an organization, arguing that perhaps what is needed is a move towards more situational forms of leadership, that is, leadership that provides an approach to change that aligns to the adaptability and flexibility required in the external business environment. Reflecting upon recent trends within the leadership studies, and the changing dynamics in the new employment world, situational leadership, refers to a combination of different styles dependent upon the situation. This therefore supports discussions within this essay where the pace of change dictates the suitability of different styles. In light of heightened dynamism, adaptability is key. Therefore, if I were a leader in an organization, adaptability would be my established means of tackling employee resistance emanating from change management plans within my organization, Kotter, (1996) identified and extracted eight success factors as the process. According to Kotter, removing barriers such as inefficient processes and hierarchies provides the freedom necessary to generate real impact. The future of United Way was on the balance. Employee-donor campaigns, their means of earning a livelihood, their funding, was shrinking year over year. The Internet has made it easy for individual donors to donate directly to any philanthropic effort they wanted to support. The corporately sponsored giving campaigns United Way was most known for were becoming obsolete. Change was needed do as survive, They tested and implemented solutions, unpacking decades of acceptable actions that could not yield fruit they adopted a more flexible new culture, with a boldness to think differently which has enabled new initiatives to flourish, like a social innovation arm that invests funding, mentorship and community connections to promising social enterprises poised to do tremendous good. The United Way organization was able to adopt a new culture that was not inherently their way of doing things to combat emerging changes within and outside the organization. I would take prudent actions as a leader to quickly adapt to have the ability to be flexible when handling change management issues. As already noted earlier own, change is a dynamic part of growth and directly reflects the success of the organization. As an employee, I would wholly and heartily embrace this truth. As seen today, most business organization tend to employ a transactional style of governance where employees who show a willingness to thrive with the change are rewarded and those that resist the change are punished.
In conclusion, employee resistance is an obstacle in achieving change within an organization. By carefully illustrating the role played by leadership in change management through various styles of leadership and their ability to handle change and its process and by providing ways and practical, tested means of addressing employee resistance in events of mandatory changes within an organization