Communicating change in an organization

Management researchers have recognized that organization gain due to their ability to implement change in their environment. A few will comfortably accommodate any degree of change but most people resist. The common response to impending change is a negative response, where people see change as bad or a threatening thing. Resistance to change is normal. The Manager should expect to encounter it and deal with it. Now, for managers to deal with the resistance to change must possess certain competencies. Let us take a look into this prerequisite. Planned organizational change would require communicating the need for change. Messages supporting the change objectives should be carefully constructed. The best media should be identified to convey the right messages to the right people at the right time. These messages and methods will have to be refined based upon achievements, feedback and the changing circumstances. It would also require mobilizing others to support the change and make it happen. The final stage would be to constantly monitor and evaluate the effect.

“You cannot over-communicate when you are asking your organization to change. Every successful executive, who has led a change management effort, in my experience, makes this statement”- Susan M. Heathfield, About.com Guide. Managers and leaders must communicate the need for change. Change needs to be understood and managed in a way that people can cope effectively with it. Change can be unsettling, so the manager logically needs to be a settling influence. Resistance to change initiatives is partly attributable to organization members’ emotional reactions, stemming for eg. Threats to self esteem (Nadler, 1982), confusion and anxiety, uncertainity. Managers skilled at interpersonal relations are able to monitor this. John P Kotter a Harvard Business School professor and leading thinker and author on organizational change management says “Involve as many people as possible, communicate the essentials, simply, and to appeal and respond to people's needs. De-clutter communications - make technology work for you rather than against”. Person- oriented managers are likely to emphasize the communicating activities of planned organizational change implementation as a way to explain why the change is needed, and to discuss the nature of the change and thereby reduce organization members' confusion and uncertainty. Being at ease with the interpersonal dimension that communication involves (Bass, 1990), person-oriented leaders are also more inclined to put emphasis on communicating activities. Leaders who are effective at task oriented behaviours, rather than communicating the need for change are likely to concentrate their energies on developing the procedures, processes and systems required to implement change. Most organizations claim to put people first because people are their greatest asset. Yet many organizations fail to live up to this claim when employee concern is greatest. Change implementers should invest time and effort to understand human concerns, put themselves in the place of those affected, and then practice the Golden Rule of treating others the way they would like to be treated. Change threatens people, fosters uncertainty about the future, and engenders fears about a job loss or the ability to do things a new way. That's why effective communication is so important. People fear the unknown. Management's assurance that although things will change, workers will receive every consideration, including time to learn to do things the new way.

Author: Not Disclosed.