Introduction
The twenty first century has come with various challenges to organization. Business environment today is characterized by frequent changes than poses challenged to managers. In the tradition organizations, change was moderate and predictable. For these organization, long-term strategic plan were effective. The strategic plans could anticipate long-term changes and plan on how to handle the changes. Globalization, technological advancement and other changes make business environment in 21st century highly unpredictable and challenging.
Many managers in 21st century find coping with frequent business environment. The managers understand that the survival of their organizations depends of the decisions and actions that they make. To cope with the frequent changes, the managers have to implement changes in their organizations (Allio, 2007, p. 103). This action plan outlines how the managers can manage change in the dynamic business environments.
The 21st century is characterized by highly unpredictable business conditions. Frequent technological, market place, competition, economic social and political changes make doing business today and in the future challenging (Rodacker, 2001, par 7). The frequent changes obscure the ability of management to predict and plan for the future. To be successful in the new business environment, organizations must be able to take the necessary first steps and then build on the steps for future actions. Business environments are changing chaotically to support fixed plans, firm objectives or fixed programs of change. The ability of an organization to learn as it progress the solution to the unpredictable business environment (Argyris & Schon, 1998, p. 156). Unable to predict the future clearly, the organizations must learn from past experience and be able to implement changes more quickly.
Objectives, Goals and Targets
Despite of the challenges in the new business environment, organizations have to take actions that allow them grow and be more competitive. The objectives of the action plan is to illustrate the roles of managers in implementing change, to address the challenges to change management in 21st century, to prescribe ways to achieve progressive organization change and to achieve harmonious change in organizations. The specific target is to create a dynamic organization that dynamically adapts to changes in business environment. The overall result is an organization that gains competitive advantage through change.
Action Lines
Role of managers in Change management
Managers have important roles in identifying the need for change and implement the changes. Managers act as leaders in change management. In conventional organizations, most changes resulted from the stakeholders or top managers. However, this has changed as middle managers are closely involved in change managers. Most of the changes in 21st business environment result from external factors. External changes in business environment necessitate the organizations to change in order to adapt to the change (Bolton, 2005, par 6). Managers have special roles in change management. The managers act as change agent, communicators, coaches and resistant managers. To play these roles, managers must have desired skills. Ten of the desired skills include:
- Be self motivated
- Be well informed
- Be observant
- Be motivating,
- Have good decision making skills
- Be open minded
- Optimistic
- Be team player
- Good communicator
- Have detailed knowledge of the organization and business of the organization.
Business environment in the 21st century calls for organizations to be able to adjust to frequent changes rather quickly. To adapt to frequent changes, the managers must be receptive to needs for change, communicate the needs to other decision makers, participate in formulating the changes and implement the changes. To perform these roles the managers have to be observant, informed and self motivated. Managers in 21st century must informed on changes in their areas, observe and anticipate changes, and make fast decisions on desired actions. In addition to observing needs for changes, the managers need to communicate the needs to other stakeholders more effectively (Garrat, 2000, p. 124). In order to identify needs for change, the managers must have broad knowledge of their organizations and the business of their organizations. Implementing change is the most challenging role in change management. The managers must play an important role in ensuring that the changes are implemented smoothly without negative effects.
Theoretical Framework
There are many change theories. The many theories show change is a real phenomenon that organizations have to deal with. Change in an organization is defined as the efforts that lead to physical, operational to emotional changes. Change in organization is sometime desired in order to achieve some organizational goals and objectives. In most cases change in organization involves moving from certain to uncertain situation (Beilharz & Chapman, 1994, p. 57). This process of change in organization mostly involves various challenges. Change theories try to explain change in organization can be implemented with less difficulty. Two theories are chosen for the action plan: Lewin’s Three-Step Change Theory and Theory of Reasoned Action and Planned Behaviour.
Lewin identified three steps that are involved in implementing change in an organization: unfreezing, movement and unfreezing. The first step involves unfreezing form the existing situation. The second step is the step that includes the management of the process of change. The third step involves refreezing to other stable situations. In organizational framework the steps of change involves moving from a state of stability to a state of instability and then back to a state of stability. The unfreezing is the step that initiates the change by observing the need for change and taking the desired steps to bring change. Intervention, on the other hand, involves the actions that are taken in order to achieve changes while refreezing involves the steps taken to bring back stability.
Theory of Reasoned Action and Planned Behaviour posits that an individual’s performance of change depend on the individual’s intention. The theory identifies two factors that affects and individual’s attention: attitude towards change and influence of environment. The theory observes the need to create favourable environment for change and influence the attitude towards change. On the other hand, the theory of planned change emphasizes the need for control over opportunities, skills and resources required in change implementation.
Literature Review
Change in organizations is widely addressed by various authors. It is commonly accepted that an organization needs to change in order to grow. The organization must be able o observe the changes in its environment and implement the desired changes in order to remain competitive. Change is mostly viewed as structured in a top-down structure. This means that the changes originate from the management. The main challenge to change management is resistance to change. This makes the major role of managers in change to be to manage resistance. According to Cheng and Petrovic-Lazarevic, resistance to change in the managerial standpoint is understood as behaviours of some members who find it difficulty to accept the changes (Cheng, & Petrovic-Lazarevic, 2005, p.44). Ansoff defines resistance to change as multifaceted phenomenon that lead to delays in implementation of change and instability to strategic change (Ansoff, 1988, p. 78). On the other hand Bemis and Reshef defined resistance to change as the actions that try to delay or stop change (Bemmers, & Reshef, 2005, p. 247). Despite of the negative connotation of resistance to change, some authors view change from different perspective. Conner view resistance to change as a natural effect of self defence (Conner, 1998, p.109.) Employees and other individuals can resist change out of fear that the anticipated changes could threaten their job security. Mabin and Forgeson and Green categorize resistance to change as individual, group or organizational. They say that organizational resistance to change are the resistance that result from unwelcome organizational structure. Group resistance originate from cohesion within employees while individual resistance is resistance resulting from personal perception of change.
Discussion
Timely change is a major factor in the success of organizations in the 21st century. Organizations must be able to change fast enough in order to take advantage of opportunities resulting from the new business environment. In the changes, managers act as change agent by identifying the needs for and initiate the changes (Glass, 1998, p. 89). The managers observe what is required in order for organization to achieve its goals. After identifying the actions required for change, the managers should ensure that the changes are implemented. However, in the process the managers are faced by resistance.
The main challenge to managers of change is managing resistance. In the 21st century, organizations need to implement the changes quicker than in previous periods. Thus, resistance to change have more effect in current business environment than in traditional organizations. Managers in organizations in 21st century must make sore that their organizations gain competitive advantage by managing change more effectively. Lewin model of change can be used to manage resistance and ensure fast and smooth implementation of change. Planned change theory helps to manage the resources involved in implementing change and ensure desired results are obtained in appropriate time. As it is common within organizations, management skills trickle down from the managers to the subordinate staffs. Managers are the ones who direct on how processes are to be conducted within an organization. This emphasizes the importance of managers in change management
Strategies for Effective Change
Three Emphasis Areas
Managers in learning organizations in 21st century have three major roles as communicators, coaches and resistance managers in change management. The managers should act as communicators in the process of change (Hamnigan, 2002, p. 131). The managers communicate in various ways and different directions. The managers communicate message from top management to the employees and also from employees to the top management. The manager should ensure harmonious relation between the top management and the employees. The mangers should engage the employees to identify the need for change. Responsibility of managing resistance mainly falls with the managers. The managers must be able anticipate and identify the sources of resistance. Through communication and other engagement, managers can help to ease resistance to change and ensure that the intended changes are attained in desired time (Deming, 1998, p. 107). In implementation, the managers have the responsibility of assisting the employees to cope with change.
Involve all stakeholders
To be successful in change management, all the stakeholders must be involved. The managers must communicate every step in change process to all stakeholders. Involving all the stakeholders would help to reduce resistance and ensure progressive change.
Communication
Many authors on management emphasize the need for communication in change management. Communication is a major factor in change management in 21st Century. Because of frequent changes in business environment, communication should be enhanced.
Conclusion
Doing business in the 21st century is challenging. Frequent changes in business environment call for the organizations to learn in order to cope with the changes. In change management in this century, managers have important role to ensure smooth implementation of the changes. Managers should play a major role in identification of change need, developing solutions and implementing the changes. Some of the important skills for managers in change management include effective communication, resistance management and coaching employees.
Recommendations
Managing organizations in the twenty first century require quick identification of change needs and implementation of the desired changes. The following recommendations can help an organization to gain competitive advantage through effective change. The recommendations are:
- Become observant and informed on changes in organization’s business environment. This will enable timely identification of change needs and timely solutions.
- Become aware of the interests of the stakeholders in the organization.
- Use Lewin’s Three Step Model and Theory of Reasoned Action and Planned Behaviour to understand the implication of change and to manage resistance.
- Communicate the change process to employee and stakeholders.
- Highlight the benefits of change to employees and stakeholders.
Reference
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