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Student Name: Manisha Verma Course: MBA (HR)

Registration Number: 521112626 LC Code: 3034

Subject Name: Change Management Subject Code: MU0018

Q1. (a) What is change management?Answer: Change is any variation/alteration/transformation, a passing phase from one state or form to another, for example, a change of countenance; a change in habits or principles. Change implies dissatisfaction with the old one and an urge for the new one. Change can be perceived in two ways-changes as intrinsic and continuous, and extrinsic and discontinuous to the organisation.Change Management is a systematic approach of dealing with change, both from organisation and individual perspective. Change Management can be seen from two perspectives, one is from those implementing change and the other is the recipients’ perspective. Change management is the process, tools and techniques to manage the people-side of change to achieve the required business outcome. Change management incorporates the organizational tools that can be utilized to help individuals make successful personal transitions resulting in the adoption and realization of change. Change management uses basic structures and tools to control organizational change efforts, with the goal of maximizing benefits and minimizing negative impact on those affected. Change management entails thoughtful planning and sensitive implementation, and above all, consultation with, and involvement of, the people affected by the changes. If you force change on people normally problems arise. Change must be realistic, achievable and measurable. Change management is also applied in project management. In that, it refers to the project management process where changes are introduced and implemented formally.The goal of change management is to execute these business changes quickly to:

1. Minimise the impact on productivity.2. Avoid unnecessary turnover or loss of valued employees.3. Eliminate any adverse impact on your customers.4. Achieve the desired business outcomes as soon as possible.

(b) Explain the importance of change management.

Answer: Although change is an inevitable part of business, especially in today’s tumultuous corporate environment, it is not always embraced by employees and managers with open arms. No matter how important and unstoppable change is, it can be very stressful. Many individuals are hesitant to take on something new or leave something behind due to already established comfort zones or familiarity associated with jobs and job functions. Most organizations which have gone through change without a change management plan in place can attest to the problems and troubles they have experienced. Effective Change Management plans, which focus on the ‘people side of change’, involve a structured approach aimed at empowering individuals to accept, embrace, and prepare for change. This approach ensures alignment with group expectations and objectives, and personnel readiness for effectively integrating and managing the change or changes about to take place within any given team, department, or company-wide initiative or endeavor. Change management plays an important role in any organization, as the task of managing change is not an easy one. When we say managing change, it means making changes in a planned and systematic fashion. With reference to the IT projects, the change means the versions of a project and managing these versions properly. Changes in the organization can be initiated within the organization or

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externally Earlier, change management was an integral part of business management, but with the emergence of Information Technology (IT), it has gathered importance. Information Technology Infrastructure management is one broad term, which includes all the elements necessary to ensure smooth functioning of business processes. Good change management techniques always help businessmen to adopt new ways of doing business.Change management process undergoes the following steps:1. Identifying the need for change in an organization.2. Designing the changes as per organization’s requirement.3. Making others to understand the need for change for the proper functioning of an organization.4. Altering some organizational processes such as technology, performance meters to incorporate changes.5. Managing both production and changes in such a way that the customers and stakeholders are bonded with each other in a long run.

Question2. List and explain the stages in organizational Life cycle?

Answer: Organisational life cycle is the cycle of any organisation from its birth to termination. the Organisational life cycle of businesses are seen as generally having four or five stages of developments like, start-up, growth, maturity, and decline, with diversification sometimes considered as an additional stage that comes between maturity and decline. As companies progress through the organisational life cycle, their effectiveness will change. Change will be made in the management, reward systems, organisations’ structures, communication and decision-making processes, and corporate plans. Companies become more innovative when they mature.Organisational life cycle is divided into the following phases:1. Start-up (or Birth).2. Growth: This phase is sometimes divided into an early growth phase (fast growth) and maturity phase (slow growth or no growth).Maturity phase further leads to decline.3. Decline: While declining, an organisation will undergo either renewal or death.4. Renewal.5. Death.These stages show that the beginning of one phase is the end of the previous phase. Each of these phases showcases different management and leadership challenges that have to be dealt with. The Start-Up phase: In this phase, the entrepreneur thinks about the business, forms a management group, write a business plan. The company goes into the growth phase when the investor writes the check. The start-up ends for those that don't need outside funds.The growth phase: In the growth phase, revenues are expected to be increasing, new services and products developing, more employees’ recruiting and so on. For example: The management textbooks believe that sales grow each year but in reality it is different as a company can have both good and bad years depending on the market conditions.In organisations that have been running for a few years, dry rot sets in. Dry rot refers to decaying of timber in buildings and wooden furniture caused by fungi. So, many companies have their own types of programs relating to organisational development in place.The decline phase: Corporate insanity is seen in this phase. Corporate insanity can be defined as doing the same thing in same way but expecting different results. Management expects to be better next year, but doesn't know or is unwilling to change to get better results. An easy truth was shown in 2003 study of 1,900 professionals who helped businesses that were in trouble. Many organisations will not enter decline phase unless there are precise

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program of transformational leadership development. If senior leaders detect the symptoms of decline at early stage, they can easily deal with it.Some of the noticeable signs include:

1. Declining sales relative to competitors.2. Disappearing profit margins3. Growing of debt continuously year after year.

However, by the time the accountants discover that the organisation is in trouble, it takes remarkable leadership to get the organisation to change course.The renewal phase: Once the organisation starts declining, it doesn’t mean that it should continue. Some of the external experts have focused on the importance of organisational development as a way for preventing decline or reducing its effects.Dry rot can be reversed through the use of training as a way of injecting new knowledge and skills. You can also have rigorous programs to change and transform the organisation's culture.This assumes that though you have enough transformational leaders to change the status quo, without the right type of leadership, the organisation will go down to bankruptcy.The death phase: About 80% of business failures occur due to the factors related to leadership control. Even firms that are close to bankruptcy can overcome this adversity and nurse themselves to be financial healthy. A very good example is Lee Iacocca’s turnaround of the Chrysler Corporation.These are the different stages of organisational life cycle.According to Richard L. Daft, there are four stages in an Organisational Life Cycle. The four stages are:1. Entrepreneurial stage – This stage has a strong leadership.2. Collectively stage – This stage has delegation.3. Formalisation stage – This stage has too much of red tape.4. Elaboration stage – This stage needs revitalisation.

Q3. Explain briefly the recent approaches to organisational development and change. Answer: Organizational Development (OD) is about improving performance at the individual, group and organisational levels. It is about improving the organisation’s ability to effectively respond to changes in its external environment and it’s about increasing internal capabilities through ensuring the organisational structures, human resources systems, job designs, communication systems and leadership/managerial processes fully harness human motivation and help people function to their full potential. Organization development is an ongoing, systematic process of implementing effective organizational change. He basic approaches of organisational development are techno-structural approach and human process oriented approaches. The former is related to theories of intervention into the structure and technology of the organisation. The latter focuses on the organisational process and human participants.Researchers have developed various models on organisational change. The recent approaches to organisational development and change are broadly divided into two categories:

1. The Top Down Approach: the classical paradigm.2. The Bottom Up Approach: the systems paradigm.

The top down approach: The classical paradigmOrganisations consist of functional areas such as production, sales and accounting, etc. The top management will drive these areas through command and control. The assumption here is that management should try hard to maintain change.This approach adopts the steps (Binned and Williams, 1997) to:

1. Develop a vision.

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2. Communicate the vision.3. Maintain top management’s determination.4. Plan and program. 5. Adopt the best practice.

The bottom up approach: The systems paradigmThis approach deals with organization as a system which easily gets affected by environmental changes. It is also known as the living-systems approach because the organisation is considered to be a learning organisation which has many feedback systems between its sub-systems. Here, change occurs continuously and is considered natural when an opportunity is present and is not driven externally. The main features of this approach are as follows: Studying of organization in relation to the contextual environmental factors such as size, structure, technology, and leadership patterns (Smircich, 1983).· Composing of many interdependent subsystems within the organization where change in one or more parts affects the entire system (Sisaye, 2005).· Persisting organizations comprises of individuals, groups/teams, structures, systems, and policies (Beer, 1980).Such systems allow both individual learning and social interactions. Here, the leader provides a clear vision and helps in the change process by facilitating, identifying, and directing the emerging patterns of behaviour and thinking (Binney and Williams, 1997).Some other benefits of this approach are:

1. Assumptions made in any organization are always dynamic, flexible, self organised, and interdependent.

2. Facts about the leaders showing that they are democratic i.e., release the potential for change and not autocratic who drive changes.

3. Need for both change and stability. 4. Importance of both current reality and future orientations.5. Uniqueness of each organisation and respect the individuality and its need for change.6. Subsystems interdependency within the organisation and their influence on each

other subsystem.According to systems approach, organisations should simultaneously pursue both process and structural intervention strategies in order to bring about change. Process intervention strategies focus on changing people’s behaviour, culture, attitudes, interpersonal and inter-group interactions, and also organisational communication styles and flow of information (Beer, 1980). These strategies help to bring in team work, cultural change, and systems maintenance in the organisation. Structural intervention strategies focus on and change the components of organisational systems such as the organisation and job design, reward systems, performance management systems, and accounting control systems. Both process and structural intervention strategies should be simultaneously handled to guarantee effective team characteristics, functions, cultural interactions, and structural aspects of management systems.Another way of analysing change models is to consider the external or internal forces as influencing change. The adaptation model focuses on the role of external factors in bringing about changes in the organisation. Some of the examples include a new government policy, competitive environment. The proaction model says that explanation comes from within the organisation as actions and change by itself.Some of the change models have had relevance and existed over a span of time. These models are categorised based on their nature of change, analysis, and treatment into three groups. They are Process-based models, Content-based models and Integrated models.

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Another explanation of organisational change lies in an emphasis of the structure or the process. According to structure model, successful change needs to prepare the necessary structural details and introduce them systematically. Some of the examples are technology, design of the organisation and systems. People will also change by this.According to process model, successful change needs to be planned by helping people to develop process competencies. Some of the examples are ways of planning, decision-making, problem solving, communicating, etc. People will find new ways of organising things by this.

Q4. Discuss in brief about the role of leaders in the change process. Answer: The leaders play an important role in the change management. The leaders at different levels in the organisation will have different roles to play. The leaders work towards achieving the goals in the organization.Whenever the leaders are planning to manage change, it is necessary to follow few principles. They are:

Different people react in different way for the changes. Everyone has fundamental needs that have to be met. Change often involves a loss, and people go through the "loss curve". Expectations need to be managed realistically. Fears have to be dealt with.

Different people react in different way for the changes. The opinion of different people varies in a different way. Some people like to follow the old system and they want things to be as it is, so they like to be at the stability end of the spectrum. Some other people encourage for the new upcoming change, so they like to be at the change end. Many problems come when the people find that their opinions do not match with the situations. In such a condition the individuals will be dissatisfied, experience stress, and dislike individuals at the other end.According to Senge, Leadership occur at different locations in an organisation. Some leaders have the traditional hierarchical leadership they are more formal. Some local leaders have to transfer the vision into an action. Network leaders have the job of connecting different parts of an organisation that are involved in the change.Bate has given the list of roles of leaders according to his idea of five dimensions of cultural leadership. The five dimensions are:

1. The aesthetic culture deals with the ideas about the change. This is the sensate, ideational and idealistic culture. This is the species culture.

2. The political culture deals with the meaning of change and involves putting ideas into the words. This gives the ownership to that political idea of the community.

3. The ethical culture deals with the standards in the change and involves the guiding of learning process. This involves some ethics that have to be followed in the organisation.

4. The action culture involves the translations from cultural meanings into the cultural practices. This involves the practices that are followed around in the environment.

5. The formative culture deals with the structures those are in change. This involves the architecture of culture. This involves the structures around the change.

The role model leader provides the confidence to manage the change process and demonstrates some of the characters which play an important role in the change process. They are:

1. Wider context: The leader has the ability to deal the changes in wider way since it is not only limited to the organisation strategy but it is spread to the team, division and the organisation.

2. Empathy: The leader has the ability to see others and understand and acknowledge others for managing the change process.

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3. Communication or being straight: The leader communicates directly to the people about the present and future changes and keeps the people well informed. Leader communicates both the good and the bad news with the people. Leader will be honest in terms of the change and the consequences of the change on the individual as well as the team.

4. Counselling: The leader counsels the individuals who are undergoing change and respects the individuals change by understanding their emotions.

5. Challenging: The leader identifies the unacceptable attitudes and behaviours and suggests for the acceptable attitudes and behaviours and maintains the comfort among the individuals and groups.

6. Involving: The leader encourages the individual and team to involve fully in the change process and make sure that the change is successful.

7. Reframing: The leader has the ability to see the situation from different perspectives and encourages others to do in the same way. This helps to create solutions in order to put the situations in a coherent framework.

8. Enable learning: The leader enables the people to learn new skills, gain knowledge and the behaviours.

9. Reviewing: The leader ensure that the certain reviews are done on regular basis for the proper management process. Recognitions set a positive environment so it is necessary to give positive feedback for the individuals as well as the group when they achieve their objectives.

The leaders can motivate the people in different ways. The different ways how the leaders can motivate are: Using the motivation theories to identify what motivates the people in the organisation. Providing clear job descriptions that considers the people' goals and aspirations. Rewarding the people those are doing well and it’s not only telling that you are doing good job but the good work has to be rewarded in a good manner.Change process usually needs leaders. However, leaders must have self-awareness to bring in new ideas for change management. The self awareness can be gained by being your own teacher and accepting responsibility and blame no one. With these leadership qualities, leader can lead the change.

Q5. Explain the strategies for competitive advantage. Answer: A competitive advantage is an advantage over competitors gained by offering consumers greater value, either by means of lower prices or by providing greater benefits and service that justifies higher prices.Michael Porter has given four generic business strategies that are analysed by him on his work in the competitive industry Differentiation: These are the strategies which include the selection of one or more criteria that can be used by the customers for taking the product in the market. According to the criteria’s, the organisation can develop the special strategy to meet the needs of the customers. This often involves the product with the premium price to demonstrate the production costs and the value added features that are present for the customer needs. This strategy gives the clear idea about the product and what is the advantage of using this product compared to the other product in the market for the benefit of the consumer.Cost leadership: The main aim of this strategy is to provide the product with the less cost in the market. The lowest cost producer is its main aim. Even the market segments suggest the same thing. The lowest cost producer will be benefited when the product rate is at minimum equal to the average price in the market. Usually this type of strategy is associated with the large scale industries which aim at offering the standard products with a minimum differentiation and perfect product. Majority of the customers prefers the perfect product with

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the minimum differentiation. The low cost leader always tries to put the discount on the products with the goal of maximising the sales. This will work out particularly when there is much of competition on the market.Differentiation focus: This strategy aims at differentiating the product with a minimum number of target market segments. This strategy is applicable to the special needs of the customer. The customer well in advance informs the industry for the production of the special with the needs that will be differentiated with the already existing product in the market. There is a valid factor for the differentiation and the existing competitor products are not meeting those needs.Cost focus: This strategy focuses on the cost of the product which is the base for the business of the organisation. There are some products, which have features that are not needed for the customers. That time the sale will also be less since the cost is more, which is not worth according to their needs. During that time, it will be very helpful if the organisation provides the product with the, less cost and the specific needs that are required for the customers.

Q 6-(a) Define learning organization. Answer: The field of organisational learning explores ways to design organisations so that they fulfil their function effectively, encourage people to reach their full potential, and, at the same time, help the world to be a better place. Learning in an organisation is required whenever there is gap or error between the actual and the desired conditions. This learning process helps to analyse the gaps and find appropriate solution. Senge defines Learning Organisation as the “organisation in which you cannot ‘not’ learn because learning is so insinuated into the fabric of life." Also, he defines Learning Organisation as "a group of people continually enhancing their capacity to create what they want to create."Learning organisation is defined as the organisation which has embedded the philosophies like anticipating, reacting and responding to change, complexity and uncertainty. The competitive advantage mainly depends on the rate at which the organisation can learn. There are four characteristics of learning organisation. They are:

1. Learning culture: Learning process takes the help of learning organisation. Learning culture is the atmosphere of the organisation.

2. Processes: These are the interactions across the margins. These can be the processes related to the infrastructure, development and management.

3. Tools and techniques: These are the methods which help in individual as well as group learning. These techniques can be creativity and problem solving techniques.

4. Skills and motivation: These are the skills that have to be learnt and adapted to gain the competitive advantage.

A learning organization has five main features; Systems thinking: states that all the characteristics must be apparent at once in an organization for it to be a learning organization. If some of these characteristics are missing then the organization will fall short of its goals. Personal mastery: The commitment by an individual to the process of learning is known as personal mastery.There is a competitive advantage for an organization whose workforce can learn more quickly than the workforce of other organizations.Mental models: The assumptions held by individuals and organizations are called mental models.To become a learning organization, these models must be challenged. Individuals tend to espouse theories, which are what they intend to follow, and theories-in-use, which are what they actually do. In creating a learning environment it is important to replace confrontational attitudes with an open culture that promotes inquiry and trust. Unwanted values need to be discarded in a process called ‘unlearning’.

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Shared vision: The development of a shared vision is important in motivating the staff to learn, as it creates a common identity that provides focus and energy for learning.The most successful visions build on the individual visions of the employees at all levels of the organization Team learning: Learning organizations have structures that facilitate team learning with features such as boundary crossing and openness. Team learning: requires individuals to engage in dialogue and discussion, therefore team members must develop open communication, shared meaning, and shared understanding Learning organizations typically have excellent knowledge management structures, allowing creation, acquisition, dissemination, and implementation of this knowledge in the organization.

(b) Explain the need for learning organization.

Answer: Many of the companies in the world focus on improving the existing products and services, and innovating things to excel in the business strategy. This resulted in the starting of many activities like TQM (Total Quality Management) and BPR (Business Process Reengineering). These programmes can be successful or a failure, depending on some factors likes individual skills, attitudes and organisation culture. There are few factors that are needed for learning organisation to deal with. They are to:

Face sudden and unexpected changes where there are no responses for the existing programmes.

Expect the changing situations. Allow the staff to respond to the customer needs in a proper way.

The need to create organizational cultures where learning together is the norm has never been as important as it is during this time of increasing complexity and change. Learning is not just an individual activity that is focused on acquiring knowledge and skills. Learning is a collective process that helps us make meaning within the context of our lives. When organizations create cultures that support people learning together, through engaging reflection and dialogue, they are less likely to encounter the major unexpected losses such as those reported by JP Morgan Chase or the many others that caught the financial industry by surprise in 2008 and took down the world economy. We no longer live in a world where these types of actions can be tolerated. Organizations have to be held accountable for the risks they take and especially for their errors in judgment. Government regulation is not a systemic solution to the problem, but likely needed until organizations create learning cultures that ensure they can take healthy risks and learn from small mistakes. As Senge noted more than 20 years ago, it is time to give up the illusion that the world is created of separate, unrelated forces. We have seen this proven in many instances now. What Senge wrote two decades ago still holds true today: What we need are learning organizations "where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together."