A Business Open Learning Archive resource

Seminar 1

Overview of Change Management Theory

On completion of this seminar you should be able to :

discuss the nature of 'drivers' of change in modern organisations
identify and discuss significant questions relevant to the study and management of organisational change
discuss industrial restructuring as a change phenomenon
account for various criteria that may be used in the evaluation of change management theory.

Matters relating to history, international structuring, politics and individual striving are little understood in the managing change literature that focuses particularly on organisational behaviour. It is important from the outset that we address it. It is always difficult on starting a new module to know which comes first, reading the recommended chapters of the course text first or the seminar notes. For this introduction it is important that you:

read Burnes chapter 1 before or in parallel with the notes. It gives a comparative and historical overview of economic development and industrial structuring across Europe and the USA.
The overview demonstrates how change in individual organisations, affecting people at different levels, occurs within a macro economic and industrial context substantially affected also by geo-political influences, educational and technological trends.
ideas pursued by governments and individuals who, ingeniously, think that something might work for their advantage provide paradigmitic frameworks within which decisions are made.

This first seminar also requires you to read Burnes Chapter 8.

Constant Change

It is a truism that change occurs constantly. We observe it and feel it. When the change occurs we tell stories about the history of the change. Change and organisational change in particular is often steady and imperceptible, happening over decades and centuries. Within our own experience we may experience it as coming in spurts. The 'here and now' affects us directly. It may be explosive or radical e.g. a company takeover.

We - you and I as individuals - change. Our perceptions of the contexts we inhabit change as our bodies grow and our minds adjust to experience. We mature and eventually deteriorate. The notion of "maturing" itself needs examination as we may also fester and regress.

We may want change and support it but also regret it, fear it and want things to be different often not knowing quite what to put in its place.
We may be oblivious or passive to change happening all about us, accepting it or quietly resenting it or we may be active in initiating and adjusting to it or taking to the streets or newspapers resisting it.
We may be the initiators and, excited, drive our coach and horses towards our vision of wealth or utopian destination. The exhileration may make us so single-ended that we neglect others who are on board the coach or who may be soaked as we drive through a muddy puddle. Yet the great achievements of human kind would not have come about without determined, often obsessive, single-mindedness.
As historians, selecting our data, we interpret what we see to be the causes, the factors that have brought about change. We draw conclusions and our current decisions may be substantially shaped by the interpretations of what has worked, what did not work, why and how. Our interpretations have substantial effect in terms of providing boundaries within which we make subsequent decisions.

The word 'may' is speculative. Used here it depicts a style of writing that wants to encourage imagining and a 'heliocopter view' of the rich picture. A historical study of social, technological, economic and political changes highlights the range, depth and diversity of our interests.

Change occurs over time within a backdrop (a context) of many different socio-economic, political influences and cultures. This is so true that we take it for granted and we tend to forget 'time' when we study organisational change.
The interplay between technology and economics is also pervasive and must not be underestimated, brushed aside or even put down distainfully as 'ideologues' we criticise business practice and the corporate world.

Of course we "may". We have volition, make choices and learn and adapt. But this is not so straightforward. Changes may hit us without the opportunity to exercise our will - we are determined by the change. Many writings on management and change assume that practitioners make choices and can intervene to shape the direction of change. This argument applies to all of us. Clearly we react to an externally driven change. We have choices about how we react, how we behave, what we do and how we justify our actions. We are in a position of evaluating whether our interpretations of what we think we need to do and why and how well we do it.

When we consider ourselves as members of groups, the group - as a definable entity or even a social "movement" - may influence our interpretation of and reaction to change.

If we stand back from our experience as individuals and weigh up the extent of our concern for "human well-being" we may critically appraise how inevitable or otherwise we feel the forces of change are. Can 'we', even through our representative governments and institutions or as consumers, hold back and shape the various drivers of change - their forces, speed, direction, nature and processes of enactment. How is this seen at the different levels of organisation, institution and industry/market. "Levels" may be global in scope. Clearly the machinations and outcomes of a G7 Summit or the remarkable bringing together of the European Single Market or the GATT principles - all testify to global cooperation designed in political, regulative ways to influence behaviours in all countries. Compare these levels to simpler (are they so simple?) questions of whether we introduce a new way of organising teams or systems of improving quality and hygiene practices in a hospital.

We can trace turbulent economic and technological changes of the later part of the 20th century. The movements here, for organising and organisations, have parallels with and continue many of the processes of change evidenced in earlier centuries. Some processes may indicate general principles that are at play which we use in our decisions. Technological changes in power, machinery, transport, communication and data processing have impacted on how we organise, make products and deliver services - all providing greater capacity for producing more reliable and higher quality products and services. We can testify to the 'factory system', development of large scale organisations concentrated in one place or dispersed. Such systems in commercial business or across public and voluntary sectors frequently feature substantial routinisation and control over decision-making both predicated upon economic and productive efficiency as necessary principles to be accepted.

Organisational growth with phases of mergers, acquisitions and divestments with iterations of reoganisation, to avoid decline, have restructured markets and industries. In the 'free market system' elegantly defined by Adam Smith (1776), it is the 'invisible hand' of a myriad of individuals all making independent decisions that shapes markets and generates the business and institutional entities operating within these markets. Enterprising people organise and rush to enter a market, win market share, consolidate, concentrate, retrench and then, perhaps, divest or sadly exit the market. As in previous centuries, the decades of the 1980s and '90s saw global trade, new technologies, rising consumer expectations and governmental regulation (even international regulation) pushing organisations into further transformation. These affect individuals everyday in their working lives and occupational opportunities either expanding or limiting these.

Evaluate the scope and implications of the following statement in terms of whether it is a 'universal truth'.
"The challenges and choices raising from the internationalisation of business have meant that no individual or organisation can afford to ignore the context and effects of market competition."

The single European market still presents UK industry with a great challenge as the patchwork of incompatible economies with its single currency and sophisticated market of 350 million consumers is combined in an economic and political union. This change of itself presents a new context and forces a shake up of thinking across every business sector in the community. Economic growth and liberalisations occuring in the Chinese and, perhaps more slowly, the Russian economies will also impact more and more on Western and Japanese economies.

The European Single market aims to harmonise the conditions for trade within a large trading bloc possessing a large population however the entry of Pacific-Rim and Asian countries with advanced technology and high standards of quality and reliability increases the competitive pressure on European business. It impacts also on South American, Australian and New Zealand business. In the 1950s and 1960s Western manufacturers could depend on expanding export markets and an excess of consumer demand over supply. Today more organisations from more countries competing for the same markets with a vastely improved array of sophisticated consumer products and servics. The UK market is less reliant on manufacturing (less than 25% of Gross National Product) and more on services from hotels to banking and airline operations.

Having read Burnes Chapter 1. Debate the following questions with your course colleagues.

Given the summary of historical economic development in Norway and Sweden, what similar (or otherwise) lessons may be seen today in the Finnish economy or that of Singapore?
How significant is it that a nation's difficulties in being slow to develop a prosperous agricultural economy results in labour market problems and such inability of farmers to compete against better quality and cheaper imported goods, that local farming will never be able to rise above the level of bare subsistence?
In what way has the economics of cheap, available power and transportation driven industrial change and the ways in which work is organised? Choose three cases referred to by Burnes and debated these with colleagues.

Simple, messy, evolutionary, revolutionary

Change may involve simple, evolutionary modification elements, activities and relationships. It can be orderly and apparent. Of course it can be turbulent and messy - consuming events and processes over which we feel we have little or no control. The change may hit us personally, cutting across our self-interest and what we value in life - we may react defensively or aggressively. We would also argue that we have a right to do so on the basis of our analysis of the consequences.

Even though changes may be difficult to unravel, a complex web or movement and events, we may nevertheless see a pattern or purpose in the change situation which we may support or be reconciled with or oppose actively or, in terms of our resentment, passively. Indeed Mintzberg (1983) usefully observes that the term 'strategy' (often associated with managerial change) may be seen as a ploy, a pattern, a position, a plan, a programme (five Ps).

External change and the activities of organisational members clearly affect business organisations and this module of study focuses attention on managerial anticipation, reaction and initiative in change situations. We are interested in the prescriptions urged on managers as recipes for handling strategic and operational choices and their implementation.

Having read Burnes Chapter 1 and noting that Taylor, Fayol and Weber did not even correspond with each other, evaluate the propositions (Burnes p.33) of the so-called 'classical and scientific-rational' approaches and identify why these propositions have been so useful. Take a positive, enthusiastic approach to the strength of the propositions and, observing the benefits brought to you as a citizen and consumer, list the significant contributions that the application of these principles have made to the quality of your life and the choices you have available.
What alternative quality of life would have been available to you if these 'classical and scientific-rational' had not been so successfully applied?
What real and lasting damage to 'humanity' has been done by the application of the 'classical and scientific-rational' propositions?

Planned or Emergent Change?

In Chapter 8 Burnes summarises and compares what he sees as "planned" and "emergent" approaches to change and how change theory may be further categorised and tabulated. The following table merely summaries in bullet point form some of the points of Burnes' argument. On pp.296 Burnes summarises Kotter's conclusions (1995) as to why many organisation transformational efforts often fail and the consequences of such disappointments.

At this stage note that Kotter's eight point process for success features the buzz-words: urgency, coalition, vision, communication, empowering, wins, consolidation and anchoring. Kotter's listing illustrates that whilst the emergent change analysts readily analyse, the prescriptions remain as good, "principled" advice.

The Case against Planned Approach

Burnes little explores the case FOR planned approaches.

Planned approaches are

still prevalent and offer practical recipes which managers of organisations still buy into.
Their suitability and utility are questioned as others emphasise "process", "culture and excellence" as alternative perspectives.
postmodernists decrie centralised power. They see a reality of difference, social interpretation & plurality.
advocates of "culture and excellence" attack bureaucratic form as inflexible and stifling innovation. They want cultures that promote innovation, entrepreneural activity, bottom-up empowerment and a continuous improvement, something that the Japanese call "Kaizen".
Organisation's are not blocks of ice. Thus change prescriptions, such as Lewin's unfreezing, changing and re-freezing model are too crude. Change does not go in a straight line. It overlaps, loops and iterates with participants often unaware of all interconnections. Refreezing suggests a return to rigidity whereas flexibiity and constant adaptation is desired.
Politics and power struggles are neglected and rationality and consensus processes overestimated
We can question the assumptions of "planned change" practitioners from many angles. Neither a free market forces perspective nor a postmodern critique assume change as having a pre-planned, end result quality but take it as an open-ended, fluid phenomenon. External & internal forces, concrete or 'socially constructed' trigger decision/action responses:"adaptation and realignment" or restructuring via struggle (a post-Marxist and postmodern view).
Timetable-objectives-methods approaches rely heavily on managers who may not see consequences so clearly. Similarly managerial action may not be accepted as planned nor implemented fully.

Emergent Approach

The Rationale

"processes", scripts which require improvisation (a dramatic metaphor) and adaptive development (learning) and unpredictability are stressed
change is not linear and concrete and fixed-time delineated but as continuous process in a dynamic and uncertain environment. Notions of unfreezing, change and refreezing belie this. Even employee flexibilites and structural adaptations become issues in change processes that are messy and untidy, involving steps forward and steps back, fuzzy decisions and partial initiatives.
to develop our understanding of the phenomenon of organisational change, we need to "model" critically the elements and relationships to comprehend

connections over time and at different levels
how actions/interventions influence the contexts in which change occurs and how concerns for functioning and performance have vague start-stop points
political and cultural processes underpin and shape core beliefs, practices and arrangements (structures and strategies)

A process view seems to demand higher competence and understanding (knowledge) to cope with the contingent and interpretive processes of decision making so that "tethered" assumptions and bounded rationalities are challenged. There is no 'one right methd'.
Detailed plans and projects may be useful nonetheless as they help to bring "form" to "formlessness".
Navigating a way through webs of power and vested interest is a key skill for change agents to anticipate and overcome blockages or, (for postmodernists who see power system as dominant), give voice to new possibilities.
It is important to realise that organisations operate as interconnected occupational, political and resource-allocation/rational systems. Neglect one and the other hits you in the face.
Transition periods can be disruptive, confusing and unpredictable so change efforts need constant revisiting and tuning to keep them "on-line" but the direction of "the line" may vary also.
The symbolic elements (messages, promotion of values, membership initiation and reassurance events) need to be addressed alongside the concrete (structures, policies, practices).
Managing change is not something just for specialist, expert change agents. Indeed the need for so many external experts is a phenomena worthy of study in itself. Managers generally need greater competence and understanding of external environments and processes. This legitimises the 'managerial' role further as it suggests a "stable managerial class" that brings rational professionalism to external uncertainties and internal movements then enacted which also require support for others in order to cope with associated tensions and problems.
Narrow, one-dimensional change programmes may offer short-term payoffs but the 'Elastoplast' metaphor should be understood i.e. the plaster may stop the bleeding but it may not advance the long term health of the patient.
Emergent change assumes a contingency perpective. Organisations in stable, predictable environments may move steadily and adapt incrementally however turbulent, fast moving, unpredictable environments limit the scope for detailed planning approaches. Events may drive change faster than the organisation can command its own efforts.
Rather than waiting for it to happen this means that environmental scanning, intelligence gathering and boundary management is a key managerial function - analysing trends and disturbances. This is even more difficult as customers may also be competitors and suppliers, partners. Actors in the environment compete for position and resources.
organisational responses from an emergent perspective require deep and full comprehension of strategies, structures, systems, people and cultural/behavioural elements. Bottom-up is as relevant as top-down and - if this is not realised and given life - the "top-down" suffers. Senior managers just cannot do it all. The thrust of the argument can now be seen. It seems to be plausible. Senior managers have to change by trusting more and empowering others something that requires incredible self-confidence - the ability to enact Theory Y without the paranoia of the Theory X style of management (McGregor 1960) However we have to question whether this is merely a more sophisticated argument for what is already recommended by classical organisation texts, the imporance of 'good delegation'. Are we simply trapped in a circular argument within which the managerial role is a given.

Thus organisations who have a receptive, adaptive culture need

champions,
keen attention to intelligence- information sharing and usage
realistic understanding of environmental pressures
awareness of the internal structural and cultural conditions operating

These four points alone indicate current emphasis on

fostering an organisation that is aware of, supports and values learning at every level - through top-down communication
methods of information processing and intelligence to enable anticipation of events and incremental adaptation.
the importance of self-development, greater competence and confidence for organisational members. This recharges our interest in staff development. For managers, this even extends to e.g. the curriculums of an MBA and Executive Development variety. Generally the propositionis that organisation members as a whole need to ne able to learn from their experiencing of changes they are caught up in.
the managerial roles of analyst, leader,team builder, facilitator, coach and boundary negotiator are reinforced. Strategic analysis and agenda building competences that together with self-awareness of emotional and intellectual processes enable coping with risk and ambiguity.
This might herald renewed interest for the type of peripheral training that was represented by transactional analysis, team training, group problem-solving, negotiating skills etc. But such a proposition could also be small beer, a search for a Holy Grail, with such techniques being the best available from a weak tool-kit.
a neo-management perspective stresses commitment to methods of open, organisation wide communication through formal and informal means and a learning organisation concept gives "visionary" credit to lots of small scale incremental changes over "big bang" BPR and TQM-type programmes.

We have to be careful about such either-or statements however as we may commit the same error if we are not quizzical and sceptical about learning organisation promotions. Not everyone wants to be an active learner of a recharged, confident variety. The ideas of "emergent" need to note the "claim rights" of rival cultures in the occupational systems of the external and internal labour markets.
If politics and power are dominat forces in emergent change then we may see this in changes in language. Burnes (pp. 293) reports Pettigrew's pairing of contrasting labels: closures become redevelopment, problems become opportunities. Nadler's four step recipe (1993) for "managing the politics" can be used by change agents - to paraphrase "rope in the powerful first, get leadership backing, use signs and signifiers and don't neglect the stablisers when moving towards instability".
Burnes nicely summarises Pettigrew and Whipp's 1993 five factor advice for managing "emergent" change. Factors to be managed are:

environmental assessment
leading change
linking the strategic with the operational
mobilising human resource assets and manage these well
make sure that the whole process is coherent and self-reinforcing

He also notes Wilson's injunction (1992) not to neglect the long-term nature of change and Kanter's tabloid headline (1992) that distinguishes between "the Bold Stroke" and "the Long March" - although Kanter et al argued that these may be complementory rather than alternatives.

The Case against Planned Approach
Burnes little explores the case FOR planned approaches.	Planned approaches are still prevalent and offer practical recipes which managers of organisations still buy into. Their suitability and utility are questioned as others emphasise "process", "culture and excellence" as alternative perspectives. postmodernists decrie centralised power. They see a reality of difference, social interpretation & plurality. advocates of "culture and excellence" attack bureaucratic form as inflexible and stifling innovation. They want cultures that promote innovation, entrepreneural activity, bottom-up empowerment and a continuous improvement, something that the Japanese call "Kaizen". Organisation's are not blocks of ice. Thus change prescriptions, such as Lewin's unfreezing, changing and re-freezing model are too crude. Change does not go in a straight line. It overlaps, loops and iterates with participants often unaware of all interconnections. Refreezing suggests a return to rigidity whereas flexibiity and constant adaptation is desired. Politics and power struggles are neglected and rationality and consensus processes overestimated We can question the assumptions of "planned change" practitioners from many angles. Neither a free market forces perspective nor a postmodern critique assume change as having a pre-planned, end result quality but take it as an open-ended, fluid phenomenon. External & internal forces, concrete or 'socially constructed' trigger decision/action responses:"adaptation and realignment" or restructuring via struggle (a post-Marxist and postmodern view). Timetable-objectives-methods approaches rely heavily on managers who may not see consequences so clearly. Similarly managerial action may not be accepted as planned nor implemented fully.
Emergent Approach
The Rationale	"processes", scripts which require improvisation (a dramatic metaphor) and adaptive development (learning) and unpredictability are stressed change is not linear and concrete and fixed-time delineated but as continuous process in a dynamic and uncertain environment. Notions of unfreezing, change and refreezing belie this. Even employee flexibilites and structural adaptations become issues in change processes that are messy and untidy, involving steps forward and steps back, fuzzy decisions and partial initiatives. to develop our understanding of the phenomenon of organisational change, we need to "model" critically the elements and relationships to comprehend connections over time and at different levels how actions/interventions influence the contexts in which change occurs and how concerns for functioning and performance have vague start-stop points political and cultural processes underpin and shape core beliefs, practices and arrangements (structures and strategies) A process view seems to demand higher competence and understanding (knowledge) to cope with the contingent and interpretive processes of decision making so that "tethered" assumptions and bounded rationalities are challenged. There is no 'one right methd'. Detailed plans and projects may be useful nonetheless as they help to bring "form" to "formlessness". Navigating a way through webs of power and vested interest is a key skill for change agents to anticipate and overcome blockages or, (for postmodernists who see power system as dominant), give voice to new possibilities. It is important to realise that organisations operate as interconnected occupational, political and resource-allocation/rational systems. Neglect one and the other hits you in the face. Transition periods can be disruptive, confusing and unpredictable so change efforts need constant revisiting and tuning to keep them "on-line" but the direction of "the line" may vary also. The symbolic elements (messages, promotion of values, membership initiation and reassurance events) need to be addressed alongside the concrete (structures, policies, practices). Managing change is not something just for specialist, expert change agents. Indeed the need for so many external experts is a phenomena worthy of study in itself. Managers generally need greater competence and understanding of external environments and processes. This legitimises the 'managerial' role further as it suggests a "stable managerial class" that brings rational professionalism to external uncertainties and internal movements then enacted which also require support for others in order to cope with associated tensions and problems. Narrow, one-dimensional change programmes may offer short-term payoffs but the 'Elastoplast' metaphor should be understood i.e. the plaster may stop the bleeding but it may not advance the long term health of the patient. Emergent change assumes a contingency perpective. Organisations in stable, predictable environments may move steadily and adapt incrementally however turbulent, fast moving, unpredictable environments limit the scope for detailed planning approaches. Events may drive change faster than the organisation can command its own efforts. Rather than waiting for it to happen this means that environmental scanning, intelligence gathering and boundary management is a key managerial function - analysing trends and disturbances. This is even more difficult as customers may also be competitors and suppliers, partners. Actors in the environment compete for position and resources. organisational responses from an emergent perspective require deep and full comprehension of strategies, structures, systems, people and cultural/behavioural elements. Bottom-up is as relevant as top-down and - if this is not realised and given life - the "top-down" suffers. Senior managers just cannot do it all. The thrust of the argument can now be seen. It seems to be plausible. Senior managers have to change by trusting more and empowering others something that requires incredible self-confidence - the ability to enact Theory Y without the paranoia of the Theory X style of management (McGregor 1960) However we have to question whether this is merely a more sophisticated argument for what is already recommended by classical organisation texts, the imporance of 'good delegation'. Are we simply trapped in a circular argument within which the managerial role is a given. Thus organisations who have a receptive, adaptive culture need champions, keen attention to intelligence- information sharing and usage realistic understanding of environmental pressures awareness of the internal structural and cultural conditions operating These four points alone indicate current emphasis on fostering an organisation that is aware of, supports and values learning at every level - through top-down communication methods of information processing and intelligence to enable anticipation of events and incremental adaptation. the importance of self-development, greater competence and confidence for organisational members. This recharges our interest in staff development. For managers, this even extends to e.g. the curriculums of an MBA and Executive Development variety. Generally the propositionis that organisation members as a whole need to ne able to learn from their experiencing of changes they are caught up in. the managerial roles of analyst, leader,team builder, facilitator, coach and boundary negotiator are reinforced. Strategic analysis and agenda building competences that together with self-awareness of emotional and intellectual processes enable coping with risk and ambiguity. This might herald renewed interest for the type of peripheral training that was represented by transactional analysis, team training, group problem-solving, negotiating skills etc. But such a proposition could also be small beer, a search for a Holy Grail, with such techniques being the best available from a weak tool-kit. a neo-management perspective stresses commitment to methods of open, organisation wide communication through formal and informal means and a learning organisation concept gives "visionary" credit to lots of small scale incremental changes over "big bang" BPR and TQM-type programmes. We have to be careful about such either-or statements however as we may commit the same error if we are not quizzical and sceptical about learning organisation promotions. Not everyone wants to be an active learner of a recharged, confident variety. The ideas of "emergent" need to note the "claim rights" of rival cultures in the occupational systems of the external and internal labour markets. If politics and power are dominat forces in emergent change then we may see this in changes in language. Burnes (pp. 293) reports Pettigrew's pairing of contrasting labels: closures become redevelopment, problems become opportunities. Nadler's four step recipe (1993) for "managing the politics" can be used by change agents - to paraphrase "rope in the powerful first, get leadership backing, use signs and signifiers and don't neglect the stablisers when moving towards instability". Burnes nicely summarises Pettigrew and Whipp's 1993 five factor advice for managing "emergent" change. Factors to be managed are: environmental assessment leading change linking the strategic with the operational mobilising human resource assets and manage these well make sure that the whole process is coherent and self-reinforcing He also notes Wilson's injunction (1992) not to neglect the long-term nature of change and Kanter's tabloid headline (1992) that distinguishes between "the Bold Stroke" and "the Long March" - although Kanter et al argued that these may be complementory rather than alternatives.

Industrial Structuring

Industries are structured and are subject to growth, consolidation, maturity, decline, modification and regulation but

how are industries structured?
who does the structuring?
what do we see when structuring is taking place?
what mechanisms operate?
are the processes so independent and powerful (market forces) that even governments cannot staand in their way?

These are questions explored by Ruigrok and van Tulder whose work, 'The Logic of International Restructuring', is so useful to policy makers at governmental and supra-government levels. At this level it is important for us to understand that the entry and exiting of organisations from markets and the regulation of activities within markets "structures" the industry. Even the exclusion of areas of national economic activity from open commercial trading activity, through forms of protectionism, 'structures' the industry. The latter may have short term benefits. Experience demonstrates that the internal, protected structure, over time fails to adapt and improved and that when subsequently exposed to the economic and technological rigours of the 'open' market, it is not in sufficient 'health' to be able to compete.

Governments intervene (socio-political choices) to limit the extent of monopoly and cartel practices in the knowledge that such practices tend to operate against beneficial, open market practices - what Adam Smith (1776) referred to as the 'invisible hand' of the market. Similarly governments may take parts or all of industries into public ownership for strategic reasons or to protect and nurture their development (building their health and strength in the short-term). They may then hope to reverse these decisions and privatise.

Merger and acquisitions policies and activities combine and consolidate organisations for a whole set of reasons: economies of scale, savings, market position and share, potentials arising from an improved product and service base and advantages in utilising managerial and technological expertise. When a company takes over or mergers with another company it gains more customers, a new or complementary range of products, the know-how and expertise that exists in the acquired organisation which, it is hopped, may be exploited and so on. Acquisition enables a mature company to get into a new 'rising star market' quickly. Acquisition may enable market share to be captured before a rival corganisation does so. In 'portfolio management' terms an acquisition may give an existing organisation a foothold or bridgehead into a new market. These are strategic concerns and ones, as the dot.com and telecomms industry experiences of the late 90s demonstrated, that involve major investments and risks.

Mergers and acquisitions and divestments restucture the industry as does preferential government funding e.g. through regional development gants and subsidies. A reduction in the level of grant by the UK's Arts Funding Council or Heritage Trust will force performing arts companies faced with a cut in their grant to change in order to survive and continue. Economics is at the heart of much organisational change - but this tends to be under stated in the organisational behaviour and change literature which emphasises the human values side of this domain of human activity.

Consolidations and divestments both restructure 'the firm' and the industry/marketplace. Institutions and organisations that make up industries, adapt to global or local factors, emergent technologies, dominant values, rules and opportunities and both manager and worker are influenced in terms of choices and behaviour. Child (1972) elaborated some of the dynamics of strategic choice by exploring the extent to which managers or management teams may endeavour to anticipate, manipulate and shape for themselves the environmental forces at play.

Clearly organisational leaders and of course governments try to intervene and better regulate the structures and activities of 'the firm' or the 'industry'. Organisational leaders join their own representative organisations through which (by research, media coverage and lobying) they seek to be present when regulatory matters are being discussed. An organisation such as Shell for example will take the initiative to undertake research across a range of subject relevant to its own business. By participating on government and industry committees and working parties it will take every effort to present the findings of this research to world, European Union and national government decision-makers so that, as directives are proposed some of which may adversely affect the company, decisions are based on the fullest possible, well research information not just the points of view advanced by 'nimby' (not-in-my-backyard) pressure groups of differenty persuasions each with their own agendas. Of course, in doing so, the mutlinational has its agenda, but, in the media eye as matters of ethical conduct and openness in sharing information are clearly identifable it has ensure that its research findings are accurate and comprehensive and not hidden away or selective, wholly serving its own purposes.

These self-seeking behaviours, associated with 'strategic choice' will also be exhibited by owners and managers of small businesses, government and non-government departments and managers pf other public and voluntary bodies. Membership of the local 'round-table', industry federation or 'Business Club' may offer benefits of intelligence gathering and ability to properly and fairly influence other stakeholders and decision-makers.

Industrial structuring and restructuring for example the railway industry in the UK or the European steel industry or fisheries has an impact on market entry and exits, standards and expectations, customers, working arrangements, jobs, families and individuals. In early 2003, the Mayor of London's decision to implement congestion charges in order to reduce traffic at peak times in the City of London is a change effort by a democratically elected leader. Will it work? This will be a matter for detailed evaluation.

It was reported in the Daily Telegraph (8 January, 2003, p.8) that traders at Smithfield meat market in London might take legal action aimed at stopping the £5 per day London traffic congestion charge due to start in six weeks later. The traders argued that their human rights were threatened as they and their staff, (2000 work at Smithfield), needed their cars to drive to work at unsocial hours, times at which public transport options are inadequate.

discuss how 'human rights' are undermined by such a congestion charge being imposed
what strategic choices (actions) were available to the owners of Smithfield businesses?
how far was the political decision to require congestion charges, a strategic choice based on the utilitarian principle of 'the greatest happiness of the greatest number'?

The congestion charging policy could be said to be testing the hyphothesis that by pricing cars off the roads, people can be brought back to using public transport by various other methods. What is your estimate of the possibility of success or failure of the policy? What assumptions, values and personal preferences do you use in coming to the viewpoint that you do?

'Administrative science' and change

The late '40s heralded discussion of an 'administrative science' offering general rules and predictions about organisational change. The years since the 1940s have seen much concern about developing organisational forms in public and private enterprises that in various ways are charged with beig 'more responsive' both to customers and employees - but also to shareholders and other stakeholders. These phenomena all gather under the umbrella concern of 'organisational change'. Thus the question of how should we research and understand the process of change is a significant one? It is hardly surprising that academics of different persuasions are divided and models of organisational change fall into several camps two of which are prescriptive or descriptive in orientation.

Prescriptive (planned) approaches seek to identify "best ways" to achieve different future organisational states or outcomes. These are recommended often by those who have managed changes and who summarise their experience offering recipes of "how to do it, what the pitfallsw are, and what orientations and methods might best be used'.
Descriptive narratives try to analyse how and why organisational change takes place (analytical description). The description may then extend to analytical explanation as the dynamics and process(es) involved are modelled. Explanatory frameworks may assist us in predicting the outcome of change activities. We may refer to this approach as processual and Wilson 1992 makes a similar distinction between Planned and Emergent approaches broadly equating the term 'emergent' with 'processual'.

	The process of change	Implementation of change
Planned change	Logical incrementalism, evolution, need, commitment & shared models	Programme of methods, reducing resistance thru. participation
Emergent (processual) Change	Multi layered, complex strategic decisions; messy management; strategic choice, political models	Context & environment: implementation over time, loops, general directions, culture & response to events.

Theories of change management are underpinned by organisational theory. Several "schools of thought" are noteable:

Scientific Management
Classical and Administrative Management
Human Relations
Systems perspectives including Contingency Theory and Strategic Choice

You should already be familiar with some of this organisational theory and the behaviour issues involved. The last, Strategic Choice, features in contemporary debate in relation to a processual approach to change management. This tends to views such as:

commitment to change is helped by structuring incentives appropriately
involving staff in the development. If teamwork is the aim, then teams must be rewarded with similar concerns applying for individual performance and reward.
it is managers' role to achieve a balance between performance requirements set at the organisational apex and local 'ownership' of the service delivery process, so those at front of shop and in the back, support office have scope to make their own creative contribution. Managers however retain autonomy over 'ends' (what we are trying to acheive) while those delivering the services are, within a framework of defined and consensually understood standards, empowered over the implementation of 'means'.
effort to minimise aspects of bureaucratic form and behaviour that are regarded as dysfunctional and limiting to people's capacity to be creative. This typically may involve searching for ways to escape a close supervision culture. There is a prevailing, experienced-based belief that adding further layers of management or administration adds burdensome costs rather than adding value to the organisational process chain.

Consider the proposition that the bureaucratic form, when efficiently and smoothly run, offers benefits of such significance (in terms of how organisations may usefully be organised) that these far outweigh the problems we experience with such bureaucracies.

Internal and External Drivers of Change

Many external and internal factors stimulate change within an organisation. External drivers include factors from the general environment such as:

government laws and regulations
technology
social and economic change
changes in the conditions of trade

Factors originating in the organisation's specific environment include:

technological obsolescence
major political events
an increase in the size and complexity of the organisation
the internationalisation of business
government legislation
economic climate
demographic change

Internal drivers of change normally originate with the decisions of senior management. Internal factors would include:

the need for company restructuring
the need for enhanced organisational effectiveness
changes resulting from perceived performance gaps
the need to cut costs
the need to respond to opportunities offered by new technology
the avoidance of turf wars.

The Technological Change Driver

The well-known aphorism 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it' is worth further evaluation so that we focus lso on

conditions of stability and performance as well as
instability/turbulence, adapt or die or even
change for change sake or 'change because I (the owner) will it to be so'.

It is an amusing anecdote that in the early 1950s, an IBM manager when asked 'how many of these new fangled computers will be needed in the world' is reported to have replied, 'oh, upwards of 10'. Whilst this is the stuff of folklore (as long as Rapunzel's hair), nevertheless IBM were very late in recognising the adverse impact that personal computers and local area networks would have on their mainframe business. Further more the Microsoft organisation, when it realised that it was threatened with being overtaken by the Web browser revolution had to do a quick rethink and throw money into developing its own browser otherwise its competitiveness would have gone into sharp decline.

Our language of change in such cases becomes imperative. It also becomes justificatory, legitimising the grounds on which the changes occur. Current organisation arrangements may still work well but those who evaluate the status quo may foresee environmental trends gathering that may threaten the organisation and so argue that it is time for change. The imperative becomes one of acting in a timely way to reposition and modify "how things are currently done" before the organisation, its back-to-the-wall, is forced by externalities beyond its control to act. Of course, trends may be selected and the imperatives defined in ways that further the interpreter's own position and interests.

New and adapted technology impacts on work organisation and industry structures. The invention of the steam engine and the seed drill clearly revolutionised travel and farming as did the telephone, the computer and the JCB. If we want to dig a canal today we would not use an army of navies equipped with spades and wheel barrows. We would hire a JCB.

Technology reflects human ingenuity and humans exploit new technologies. Major advances in medicine offer longer lives and, in the developed world, to have expectations about medical treatments. Pressure is put on governments to increase expenditure on health provision. Governments face opportunity cost dilemmas as the resource demands of a universally accessible health service escalate. Structuring decisions are forced in terms of political attempts to satisfy public outcries and how health care can be better administered through e.g. new hospitals, an Internet/WWW health advisory service help line, investment in new medical staff and medical technology, expanding administrative and information and control systems or changing the balance between crisis and preventative (community health) care.

Whether new technologies and the way they are exploited (and by whom) enslave those who are engaged to utilise them is a matter of socio-political interpretation. Witness the seductive capacity and ability to shock of words such as 'exploit' and 'enslave' or phrases such as 'we cannot put a cost on peoples' lives'. Used in perjorative and rhetorical/persuasive speech they give power to the speaker and further a particular case - often to the exclusion of alteratives. This characterises agenda setting, influence and political action yet politics features but little in the change literature - many elements of which fail to properly address power and politics in organisational change.

By the mid 1980s and accelerating into the 90's, manufacturing in the UK was declining substantially as a proportion of GDP. Services and service sector employment grew. The rise of computing power: hardware, software and telecoms industries was evident. All sectors spent more on computing and communications infrastructures than on combined expenditure on all industrial, mining, agricultural and building equipment. This exploitation of technology reflected concern for competitive advantage (Porter), quality, time compression and improved responsiveness and coordinative control over production and delivery systems. Quicker, more accessible managerially relevant information was desired and available. Yet technology-spread increases complexity and our dependency increases on a new army of technocrats who maintain and develop information systems to their full potential. It is argued that the information technologies liberate yet they also 'determined'. The interface between the human operator and the computer becomes critical. The technology is being exploited in ways that lead to

job change (call centres, remote working, computer screening of worker performance)
Concerns are raised about privacy and personal data
new demanding job opportunities emerge
computing technologies even impact n our educational and prison organisations
- Are people really enslaved at work by technology or is this just the rhetoric of those seeking to progress their own socio-political agenda?
- Do new job opportunities emerge as others disappear such that, so long as we take responsibility for ourselves with new career training for new professions, unemployment problems are alleviated naturally? What are the implications for individuals, organisations and goovernments?
- Do the new jobs offer more scope for personal challenge and occupational achievement?
- Exploitation of technology often increases complexity and dependency. To what extent will a manager or university lecturer today not be able to work with the flexibility and intensity required if they do not have their desktop PC or laptop to hand?
- Are the days of the traditional lecturer numbered now that computer-supported, multimedia based learning systems are available? Will we see a consolidation of higher education around a few top universities which are the hub of a series of viewing and learning centres which give tutorial support?
- How do the "human-interface" demands of computer technologies bring new problems to the design and management of workplace arrangements?

Information Technology and the Management of Change

Technology is often cited as an ingredient in change. New science finds new applications which are exploited for profit -bringing new products and services to market. Over the millennia, technologies of energy, transportation, work organisation, communication, building and materials science and information processing have been exploited to elaborate products and services of greater and greater complexity and utility. These enrich our quality of life and aid human coordination of effort whilst constantly reducing costs. It is the latter and the economic efficiencies associated with it that is typically the concern of organisational change.

However as Lewis Mumford (1962) noted technology is not an independent force for change. Someone decides whether and how to use it. Such choices about the adoption of new technology into productive operations are made by entrepreneur capitalists and managerial functions at various levels. We all have immediate experience of the potentialities of information and communication technologies. These have been superbly exploited with a substantial effect on organisational form and activity.

"Globalise and compete or die" as a change driver

The pressure to 'globalise and compete'' is real. This is a concomitant of open market economic systems. Closed markets - as was the Soviet system from 1917-1989 - have great difficulty in remaining closed. Such is the level of this difficulty that their weakness of wealth creation and efficiency of distribution and results in incapacity to adapt readily. With their economic and social inefficiencies exposed - the efficiencies demonstrated and demanded by open market practice - the centrally planned, closed systems fail.

To take advantage of wider markets, the imperative of competition becomes a driver in a constant search for improvement in performance. Under conditions of competition, the stakes are for organisations to be leanest and fittest and not "protected". The metaphor here is that of economic Darwinism. The question of whether a 'harsh law of the jungle' only applies is one for social and political debate about how we as a 'community' wish to balance individualism and self-interest (libertarianism) with altruism: concern for others and egalitarian/communitarianism.

Those who are less able to compete on terms of equal opportunity in the hurly burly of the bazaar suffer and as Adam Smith (1785) advocated in his "Theory of Sentiments", law, social intervention, support and regulation must mediate the raw cut and thrust of the bustling marketplace where the less fit are not able to even access the opportunities that "should be" available to all.