Guiding an organization through a major change

Guiding an organization through a major change
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Leaders experience different hurdles while initiating change in organizational development. In effecting change, individuals require to adapt to new processes and leadership. Lewin indicated that attempting to change something leads one to attain total understanding. Lewin stated that to refer to the necessary knowledge that leaders require before embarking on a change process. They must be knowledgeable on the prevailing state, the expected outcomes and the extent of the impact of the expected changes on the organization’s operations. Understanding these issues is important because a change decision has the potential to impact careers, the size of personnel required to undertake certain tasks as well as the perception of the business to the consumers (Bennis, 2003).
Lewin proposed three primary steps of change in organizational development namely unfreezing, changing and freezing. It is important for organizations to give equal and adequate attention to all the three steps in the change process. It is common place for organization to mistakenly focus only on the changing step and ignore working on people’s receptivity to change as well as implementing strategies to ensure permanency of the change in the organization’s operation (Kaminski, 2011).
The first stage involves communicating about the need and desire for change of the status quo in particular areas of the organization’s operations. The leadership carefully examines organization’s beliefs, attitudes and behaviors and communicates the reasons against continuing with the existing operations even though it may evoke strong resistance. Leaders engage the people in the organization in a force field analysis where they weigh the need for a change. They brainstorm to assess the benefits and the disadvantages of the prevailing system. When the cons outweigh the benefits people perceive the need for change. When the cons of the status quo outweigh the pros, people identify this as a problem. This stimulates the desire for change motivates the people within the organization towards change (Kent, 2011).
The second stage involves proposing a solution to the identified problem and implementing it. In this stage people are set off balance by the new approach and people are uncertain and afraid of its efficacy. The people involved are trained on how to do things in new ways. It is important to prepare those affected by the change adequately for their easier adjustment. Other necessary factors such as enough time for the employees to fully connect with the change, communication and support such as coaching which takes into consideration that mistakes are common in a transitioning process also expedite employee’s familiarity with new processes. It is also important to consistently remind them about the importance of the change and its foreseeable benefits to their work and the organization as a whole. This is a time consuming and expensive process that results in greater productivity when effectively implemented (Kent, 2011).
The third stage is called refreezing whose primary role is reinforcing the change to create a stable and permanent adoption of the new aspects in the organization’s operations. The stage solidifies the new ways as the accepted norms and works to ensure that peop...