Question

How would you approach to influence such a leader towards embracing change?

Answer 1

When a sense of urgency is established in the Organization, the change effort would first be attempted to convince the Leader that the need of the change in the Organization is inevitable and that it is only in hands of the Leader to implement the change effort efficiently if the Leader wishes that the employees are also in the position to empathy that change is the only solution for the survival and growth of the Organization which in turn, shall have a positive effect upon their professional growth. Hence, to the efforts taken by the Leader to reason with the employees for the implementation of change, the outcome could at least be that the employees are in the knowledge as to why change is inevitable.

Accordingly, following could be done to effectively manage the resistance to change and to enlist cooperation:

Firstly, the change effort needs to be directed towards forming a coalition with enough power such that it makes the Management possible to handle the natural reaction expected from its employees that is ‘resistance to change’. The coalition would be such that it enables the Management to have an upper hand over the employees to ensure that the change is implemented successfully. As against this, the outcome either would be that the employees may show resistance by putting their papers and walking out of the Company or by going to strikes, at its extreme levels.

In this regard, various other forms of Resistance to Change also needs to be considered such as:

• Overt and immediate
  • Voicing complaints, engaging in job actions
• Implicit and deferred
  • Loss of employee loyalty and motivation, increased errors or mistakes, increased absenteeism

Secondly, once the Resistance of change identified, accordingly the Management needs to undertake steps. Hence the following could be suggested in order to ensure the change on the part of the Management for dealing with resistance to change:

• Education and communication
• Participation
• Facilitation and support
• Negotiation
• Manipulation and cooptation
• Coercion