Organisational Change And The Productivity Effects

Description of organization and background of change management

Discuss about the Organisational Change And The Productivity Effects.

Woolworths is leading supermarket in the Australia nation. It operates in about 995 stores in across Australia. Woolworths engaged with approximately 1115,000 workforces in its stores, and distribution store to deliver the quality services, range and convince customers.  It also prides itself to work with Australian producers and farmers to ensure that premium goods are delivered to consumers. It also acquires about 96% of all fresh fruits and vegetables and 100% of fresh meat from Australian growers and farmers. It also produces fresh food for people in Australia. It is one of the top innovative retailers in Australia because it emphasizes on simple and new modes for customers to shop. Consumers can buy the product on the train, on the way, and at the home by using the supermarket app (Woolworths, 2018). The prominent characteristics are that groceries could be delivered directly to the bench of the kitchen.

Change management is the discipline which instructs how the company prepares, equips and aids a person for successfully adopts a change to drive the organizational outcome as well as success. Further, when all changes are unique as well as all workforces are unique, then the company can take action to persuade the people of their individual changes. Change management facilitates a structured approach to support an individual in the organization to shift their own current states to own future states (Eason, 2014).

Change management is the techniques, procedure, and tools to manage the people side of transformation to attain the required business result. Change management entails as the organization techniques, which could be exercised to enable a person to make effective personal alterations. As a result, a person can adopt the change within the organization (Blanco-Portela, Benayas, Pertierra, and Lozano, 2017).

(Sources: Lozano, Ceulemans, and Seatter, 2015).

In the existing business scenario, the business atmosphere is characterized by rapid alteration. There are certain factors that influence to make changes such as internal and external factor. The External atmosphere includes several things such as increased globalization, rapid technology, existing political and regulatory compliances, shorter product lifecycle and innovation. The internal drives for alteration entail decline expenses out of an organization by superior efficiency to improve the result, forces to improve the requirement and growth for the higher degree of organizational pace (Pollack and Pollack, 2015). Moreover, embracing and adapting these factors of change needs ongoing organizational change. It aids to reduce the management issues.   

Internal and external diagnosis for organizational change

It is stated that the economy is an external factor, which may also drive for organizational changes. In Australian economy, Woolworths cannot be able to survive at long-term. Since, customers lose their employment and get the jobs that can barely help them hence they will spend less on fresh fruits and vegetables, recreation, luxury goods, and new cars. High-interest rates on credit cards can also discourage the customers from spending. This factor is uncontrollable hence company should gain understanding about it to address the threats and opportunities (Georgalis, Samaratunge, Kimberley, and Lu, 2015).

It is analyzed that staff is an internal factor that also leads to make an alteration in the workplace. Employees are a major part of making changes in the internal atmosphere of the corporation. Employees should do a good job whether it is selling products to stranger and writing code. Managers should also be good to handle the lower level workforces and over assessing the other element of internal atmosphere. Even if each individual is competent and proficient, internal conflicts and politics can lead to making changes at the workplace (Godemann, Bebbington, Herzig, and Moon, 2014). 

Competition is another external force which leads to making a change in the workplace. Though, Woolworths is unique but, the company deals with rivalry in Australian retail industry due to different competitors in the marketplace. When Woolworths will launch new products in the marketplace then, it will fight against the more experienced companies in the retail industry. After establishing in the market, Woolworths can face the competition from newer companies that try to pull the attention of customers. Competition can break or make the company as Woolworths should focus on making necessary changes within an organization (Waddell, Creed, Cummings, and Worley, 2016).      

Money is another factor that could force the company to make changes in the workplace. Lack of money can assess whether Woolworths can survive or die even in the great Australian economy. When a company has limited cash resources then it could create complexity to hire the number of employees, the amount of advertisement that company can buy and quality of equipment. If the company will have sufficient cash then it will have more flexibility to grow and extend an organization and endure the economic downturn (Ceulemans, Lozano, and Alonso-Almeida, 2015).

Changes in government policies can have a large impact on the business. The retail industry is a classic example. Woolworths has required for placing the quality labels on their products and show the quality of the products in the advertisement. Consumers have fewer places to choose quality products. The percentage of Australian uses quality products as it could affect the revenue of company (Grant, 2014).

Overview of Change theories and models Literature review

Company culture can also drive to change within an organization. Internal culture consists of priorities, values, and attitudes of employees. A cutthroat culture in which each employee competes with one another generates a distinct atmosphere in Woolworths to focus on teamwork and collaboration. The culture of Woolworths flows from the top down. The staff of Woolworths will infer the value based on the type of people that company hire, promote and fire. Hence, the company should develop the value into workplace culture to make changes (Hottenrott, Rexhäuser, and Veugelers, 2016).

Customers and suppliers are other external forces that lead to making changes. Suppliers have a larger impact on the costs. The power of suppliers relied on the scarcity. Furthermore, Woolworths has a limited option of negotiating with suppliers. Hence, it would face issue to make changes in suppliers. The power of customers relied on how competition level, product quality, advertising of Woolworths is different from other company (Kempster, Higgs, and Wuerz, 2014).

According to McCall and Gray (2014), the company should eliminate the execution of inappropriate and random tools to manage the alteration and implement the change strategy. It should also emphasize on a feasible action plan. Change management is an enduring process that takes time, efforts, expertise as well as dedication to implement and run within an organization. There is also a requirement to focuses on the people and team member of the company who will be influenced by transformation. Before implementing the well-known and effective change management models and strategy, a company should initially make framework regarding the reason for transformation and how this alteration will give benefit to employees.

In support of this, Elsmore (2017) evaluated that different theories of change management are used by the organization to manage the transformation. Lewin’s Change Management Model is a prominent model because it builds the knowledge regarding structural and organizational alteration. This model includes different stages like unfreeze, change and refreeze.

According to Cho Park and Dahlgaard-Park (2017), unfreeze is the initial phase of Lewin’s model which shows the preparation for the transformation. It demonstrates that a company should be prepared for transformation and reality that change is necessary. This phase is vital because there are a high amount of people in around the company who attempt to resist the change. It is vital to categories the status quo at the workplace. The key issue is to define the individual regarding the reason for making an alteration in current procedure and defines the advantageous of those changes. This phase highlights the core business activity of an organization. 

In favor to this, Horrell Lloyd, Sugavanam Close and Byng (2018) discussed that change is the second phase of Lewin’s model where real transformation is applied at the workplace. This process may take more efforts as an individual generally spend their efforts to build the new change and development at the workplace. In this stage, good support with leadership is vital because these aspects not only drive to move towards the appropriate directions but also formulate the easier process for their staffs, which are combined with the transformation procedure. The two elements are necessary for transformation such as efforts and communication to make the transition in an efficient way.

Campbell Balabanova and Howard (2018) stated that refreezes is the third stage where transformation has been holding, accepted and implemented by group, individual and organization for finding a constant position. Therefore, this stage is an alias as refreezing. Under this stage, staffs and process initiate to refreeze and functions work in a standard way. But, under this stage, there is a requirement to support the people in order to make sure the changes are applied in feasible time and after the attainment of objectives. In addition, workforces get to relax and confident for implemented changes due to obtaining a sense of constancy. In contrast to this, Pimentel and Major (2014) discussed that another model is Kotter’s change management that is renowned and executed by a company. This theory describes eight phases in which each of them focuses on the identical approaches associated with responses of people to alteration.

According to Urquhart and Wearing (2017), increase urgency is primary stage of change management model which emphasizes on building a sense of urgency amongst people in order to motivate them to move towards the goals of a company. Team building is next phase of change model. This phase is associated with building the team by integrating the different elements like skills, information sharing and commitment at the workplace.

In support of this, Pimentel and Major (2014) stated that developing a feasible vision is the third stage of Kotter’s change model which highlights to make the feasible vision for transformation. It is not the only approach to change but also connects the emotional feeling, and innovation with the business goals. Communication is the next phase of change model where a person relates to the transition and their requirement is essentials components of Kotter’s change management theory. Moving and empowering the act is next process of change model where a person has a requirement to assist and eliminates the roadblocks with formulating the feedbacks in a constructive way. 

Horrell Lloyd Sugavanam Close and Byng (2018) stated that focuses on short-term goal are the sixth phase of Kotter’s change management model where the company should focus on short-term goals as well as classifies the objectives into the attainable and small components. As a result, it is a better option for attaining the goal and objective without different external and internal forces. Persistence is next process of change model that is a key factor to success. In this process, the company should not quite during the change process even there are different forces affecting to the organization. Incorporate change is the last stage of Kotter’s change process. It is vital to reinforce the transformation by making the favorable working environment and organizing change successfully.

According to Baldini Fini Grimaldi and Sobrero (2014), Kotter’s change management model is step by step model that is easy to incorporate and track. The key reason behind this process is to adopt the transition and prepares for it as compared to altering itself. But, at the same time, it is stated that Kotter’s change process is a step-by-step process as no phase could be skipped to reach at the next stage. The whole process given in this theory could be very time-consuming.

From the above interpretation, it could be suggested that manager should give the contribution about how the proposed transition will influence the employees. They can also suggest the technique to implement the transformation procedure that would be easier and more appropriate for the corporation. A corporation should emphasize on the requirement for transition as workforces will understand the significance of transition within an organization. It should also generate a sense of urgency such as what company deals in the present scenario, and to what extent company can provide better benefits after the transition at the workplace (Pimentel and Major, 2014).

It can be also recommended that Woolworths should get prepared for a stable assessment of company to manage the transformation within an organization. The management team should evaluate the revenue information, alteration in the marketplace and practices of market players to make the future transformation. It can be also suggested that company should develop confidence amongst the team and increase their morale by the transformation process. It should be also attentive towards the change in the workplace (Horrell, Lloyd, Sugavanam, Close, and Byng, 2018).

It can be also recommended that managers should communicate the cause of changes and process, which would be required for transformation within an organization. For example, if Woolworths has needed to apply a procedure that will help to increase the efficiency of workforces then they have need of a large number of employees to develop the new procedure and sustain the business operation. In such manner, managers can interact regarding why the transition is required as it would aid to develop the awareness amongst team members about the reason behind the organizational transformation. It would also help to identify the interest of employees for changes within an organization (Cho, Park and Dahlgaard-Park, 2017).

Change intervention is effective for Woolworths to manage the transformation within an organization. By using the change intervention table, the company can monitor how these transitions will impact the business. It is also effective for a company to convey to employees in a comprehensible way about the change process. Therefore, the company should assess how the transition will impact their whole production process. After the initial process of change process, company should identify that whether change process is effective or not and then take corrective action for improving it (Bernstrøm, and Kjekshus, 2015).

Conclusion

From the above interpretation, it can be concluded that change management is the discipline that instructs how a corporations equips, prepares and supports an individual for adopting the changes to improve the organizational productivity. It is also evaluated that there are different external and internal diagnosis for organizational change. In this way, external atmosphere involves several things such as increased globalization, rapid technology, existing political and regulatory compliances, shorter product lifecycle and innovation. It can also be demonstrated that the internal drives for change involve the reducing cost from the business by superior efficiency to improve the productivity, forces to improve the requirement and growth for the higher degree of organizational pace. There are certain change theories and models used by an organization such as Lewin’s Change Management Model and Kotter’s change management. It can be also summarized that Change intervention table is used to focus on underlying ideas, Description of factors affecting change, role and contribution of the student/interventionist and change level. It can be concluded that manager should give the contribution regarding how the proposed change will affect the employees. It can be also summarized that by using the change intervention table, a corporation can monitor how these changes will impact the business.

References

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