Unit 8: Discussion
Introduction
Organizations must be both agile and adaptive to deal with the pressure of constant change. It is not easy to implement change inside an organization, however, and successful change requires careful planning, hard work, cooperation, and excellent communication. Change management has been around for over 50 years, yet studies show that 60–70% of organizational change projects fail, despite huge investments in training and education to support them. What are the reasons for these failures? One theory proposes that too many organizations hire outside consultants or experts to design the change projects rather than assigning the responsibility to the managers inside the organization. This means managers do not get the opportunity to fully embrace the changes, and it weakens their ability to implement the changes effectively when the time comes.
One of the main obstacles to implementing organizational changes is resistance to change, people’s unwillingness to accept or support modifications in the workplace. When people resist change it can affect their productivity, performance, and relationships.
Discussion Questions
Read the following article to answer the discussion questions (link below).
Coyle-Shapiro, J. A.-M. (1999). Employee participation and assessment of an organizational change intervention: A three-wave study of total quality management. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 35(4), 439-456.
1. If you were a CEO of a company interested in implementing TQM in your company, what steps would you take to ensure its success?
2. As an employee in an organization interested in implementing TQM how would you prepare for the changes to come from TQM implementation?
