Topic 3 – Overview

Peoples’ change and resistance

Learning Objectives

 Examine the effects of change on a company’s people

 Identify and discuss the sources of resistance to change
 Evaluate ways to manage resistance to change

Introduction
In their corporate website, Ernst & Young, one of the largest professional service firms in the
world and one of the "Big Four" accounting firms, along with Deloitte, KPMG and
PricewaterhouseCoopers, present an article titled ‘People, NOT technology determine success.

More specifically, the company supports that ‘most common is that leadership focuses on the
technology rather than the people who will be using it. The fact is that organizational change
stems from people. Helping them understand and accept new business processes is the key to
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implementing technology solutions successfully’ (online at: http://www.ey.com/US/en/Services/
Advisory/SAP-Ch4-POC, accessed 12/03/2013). Also, some say that organizations do not
change – people change. As we said in the previous topics, organizations are constantly subject
to change. Technically, the entire process of organizational change is easy to understand. It is the
leader who should visualize the change, acquire resources for its fulfillment, and execute plans
into reality. But what’s harder to comprehend is why people in the organization resist changes.
The hard part is dealing with people and encouraging them to support the organizational change.
Frequently, this resistance to change creates problems for the leader and the entire organization.
Resistance to change causes a number of problems, such as delay in progress, customer
dissatisfaction, dilution of loyalty to the management, decrease in productivity and
dissatisfaction among the ranks. It would take a skillful leader to rise above this resistance and
initiate the change by gradually gaining the support of organizational members. Following this
line of thought, this topic examines how change influences the people in a company, what are the
possible sources of resistance, and how we can overcome resistance to change.

Main Analysis
As we said in the Introduction earlier, there is a body of literature suggesting the ‘organizations
do not change – people change’. In a similar vein, Toby Elwin suggests that organizations are,
made up of social interactions: groups of people. Organizations will not change if people do not
change. There is no such thing as organization change, they don’t change, people change.

All change: transformation, business process reengineering, technology implementation,

mergers & acquisitions, Total Quality Management, Six Sigma, strategic planning or, if you
prefer: downsizing, rightsizing, restructuring, reengineering, redesign, flattening of the
organization, and self-managed work teams are all examples of organization change. What are
the common themes between them? All of them rely on people for success; the best process is
useless if people don’t routinely follow the process; the best technology has no use if people
don’t plug it in and use it to its capability.

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 Reasons Why People Resist Changes Within The Organization:
Despite the potential positive outcomes, change is often resisted at both the individual and the
organizational level. Resistance to change – or the thought of the implications of the change –
appears to be a common phenomenon. According to Mullins (2007), as long ago as 1970, Toffler
wrote about the psychological dimension of ‘future shock’, and that people are naturally wary to
change. Moreover, resistance to change can take many forms. Before we discuss the forms of
resistance, nevertheless, we examine the reasons and motives of resistance to change. The
reasons for which people may resist change within organizations vary. In this part, we examine a
number of reasons, using a number of different sources and studies.

1. Resistance to Technological Change

According to Efthymiou (2011), one of the most common reasons for workplace opposition, mostly in

the management orthodox textbooks, is related to technological and organisational change. It has been

argued that resistance to change has not significantly altered during the last three decades, and this is

sometimes taken as fact by industry professionals and orthodox theory academics (Dent and Goldberg,

1999). Do people resist change per se? Is change alone enough to cause workers’ opposition? Workers

may resist unfair working conditions, low wages, and other injustices at the workplace that may relate

to change directly, indirectly, or not at all.

For example, Symon (2005: 1653) mentions an occasion when technology itself (and, more specifically,

computers) was portrayed as a ‘plaything’. In this case, computer technology was positioned as a toy,

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which computer enthusiasts were using for play instead of work. This type of resistance was

disassociating workers from collective and legitimate forms of resistance. However, Davidson (1994)

discusses a more collective and organised opposition to technology. In her analysis, which is based on a

study in a privatised British utility, workers resisted the introduction of a new BETA1 structure and the

idea that change will enable profit to take priority over service. In another case, after an ethnographic

study that lasted for nineteen months, Prasad and Prasad articulate how the corporate decision to

computerise several administrative operations in an organisation in the eastern part of the United

States, despite not involving any input from employees, generated certain intentional actions and

mundane events, which ‘were discursively constituted [by supervisors and managers] as being

resistance in nature’ (2001: 114). Although they are all concerned with resistance to technological

change, they are indicative of how technology and change may be encountered and opposed by

workers. In these cases, technology is encountered as a threat to labour’s existence, as a means to

achieve profit, as a ‘plaything’, and/or as a tool. These reactions and realisations provide a rich array of

conceptual usages.

In another case, an organisational change took the form of privatisation and commercialisation.

Smith (2008: 7) discusses how, at National Savings, a civil service department, a series of

management initiatives with the aim of changing the organisational culture through privatisation

and commercialisation caused trade union opposition. Also, after the completion of the public–

private partnership, and since trade union effort remained ineffective, a mass wave of

‘volunteering’ redundancies reduced the workforce from 4,100 to 2,000 workers.

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‘BETA Structure’ was the introduction of a multi-functional team-working. ‘Under the BETA Structure, clerks
were to be attached to a particular ‘Geographical Team’, which would deal with all the clerical work arising in a
particular geographical area, instead of being attached to a particular function. Thus, clerks would no longer simply
undertake a narrow range of function-specific tasks’ (Davidson, 1994:73).
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 2. Fear of the unknown
This is the dominant emotion that pervades human beings when faced with the possibility of
doing something new or which has never been tried before. Fear of the unknown paralyzes an
individual to think, move and act productively. Very often, this fear is expressed in language like
this:
“It can’t be done”
“We have never tried that before”
“It’s too risky”
The solution for this fear is to let organizational members become familiar with the proposed
change plan. The leader should create programs that are aimed at familiarizing the members with
the visions and goal of the change.

3. Lack of information
Very often, people resist change simply because they don’t have enough background knowledge
and information about it. When implementing organizational change, it is the role of the leader to
communicate relevant information and details to the people in the organization. The members
must be given adequate facts and understanding about the advantages and disadvantages of the
proposed change. They must also be briefed regarding the benefits of the desired change if
achieved.

4. Personal Interests and Ulterior Motives

A lot of people resist change, not because they think it is a bad idea, but because they are
protecting their own interests and motives. When a leader decides to change some things for the
better, the tendency is to clash with the interests of the members of the group. For example,

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changing the organizational structure may end the “political” plans of many people within the
management team. For a leader to succeed in this area, he must be able to unite all team effort,
discourage ulterior motives, and influence all key members to work towards the common good.
Instead of escaping change, the leader must embrace it! Change is like a pregnant woman
waiting to give birth. Before giving birth, the mother first needs to go through pains and pangs.
In the same manner, an organizational leader should also go through challenges, resistance and
hardships to be able to implement major changes within the firm. (Online at:
http://ultimateallianceconsultancy.com/what-is-organizational-change-and-why-people-resist/,
accessed 11/03/2013).

5. Fear of Change Due to Social Consequence

One other major type of employee fear is caused when the potential social consequences of the
change are not anticipated and allowed for. Perhaps this is best illustrated when looking at the
effects of hiring a new director in a fairly small public library. Let's say that the old director had
been at the library for twenty years and is retiring. The ten employees have been trained by, and
have worked well with, the old director. In this situation each of the employees is not only
nervous about whether the new director will be satisfied with their individual performance, but
also they are nervous about how the new director will relate to them both as a person and as an
employee. In other words, they are nervous that the change might have unanticipated (and
negative) social consequences. In fact, the levels of employee stress just after the hiring of a new
director tend to be very high. One main way the new director can reduce stress levels is to be
very careful during his first few months on the job to treat employees as if he likes each and
every one of them and as if he recognizes the unique contributions that each is offering the
library.

6. Resistance because of Failure to Prove Change is Needed

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Resistance to change also occurs when managers fail to convince employees that the change is
needed. In one public library in Ohio, library staff resisted efforts to reintegrate the genre fiction
collection into the general fiction collection. Management wanted to do this because they felt one
interfiled system would make it easier for the technical services staff to inventory the collection
since they wouldn’t have to look in three or four possible places for a particular book. However,
the staff noted that patrons liked having mysteries and other genre areas separated out from the
regular collection and that inventories were conducted only once every ten years. In this case, the
employees perceived that the proposed change was not a valid one. Ultimately management
agreed to let the collection remain separate by genre.

Change should only be implemented when a performance gap exists-that is, when people become
highly dissatisfied with some aspect of a task or process. Remember the study of high school
students performing the simple manual tasks. The experienced group was finally persuaded to
change by an astute manager who made them consider the performance gap, showing them that
automation would enable them to complete the work in a fraction of the time (Sagie et al., 1985,
p. 160, cited in Baker, 1989).

The implication here is that management must do a good job identifying and publicizing areas
where true performance gaps exist if they expect employees to feel that they have valid reasons

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for changing. It also implies that if a performance gap does not really exist, manage- ment should
reconsider the change.

7. Uncertainty about Job Performance

According to Baker (1989), another reason for employee fear of change is uncertainty about
new work-related expectations associated with job performance. Specifically, the employee fears
that he may not have enough skill to perform the changed task.

A recent study supports this by showing that individuals with experience performing a
specific task one way will resist change more than individuals with less experience (Sagie et al.,
1985). This was discovered in an experiment where two groups of high school students were
asked to complete a series of simple manual tasks where they were rewarded for correct
performance. One group was given more experience than the other, and developed more skill at
the tasks. They were then asked to adopt automated procedures for these tasks. The students with
more experience resisted automation significantly more than those with less experience. This
was because the experienced group of workers had a higher degree of confidence in their ability
to do the job in the old (i,e., manual) way; when they were asked to automate, their initial anxiety
was higher. The levels of uncertainty about performance for students with little experience in
their jobs did not change when they were asked to automate. This was because they were still a
bit unsure about their performance in the manual task and were thus more receptive to trying new
work methods.

This research implies that managers need to follow two strategies when introducing new tasks.
First, they need toprovide employees with exact information about what the changed tasks will
be because knowl- edge reduces fear. Second, managers need to reassure their employees that
they will develop the skills to do these tasks. The latter can be accomplished if workers receive
adequate and complete training and receive reassurance that they will not be punished if their
performance levels drop initially while relearning the changed tasks.

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 8. Resistance Due to Failure to Create a Climate Conducive to
Change
General resistance to change may also result when managers fail to create a positive climate
where change can flourish. The best illustration of this might be a library where management
allows employees little participation and in fact does not encourage new ideas in any way.
Research has shown that employees resist change less when they are given opportunities to
participate in continuing education activities, in professional organization activities, and in
professional training (Maag, 1975, cited in baker 1989).

Think Theory....
The reasons for resistance we discussed in the
foregoing analysis are just some among many. After
completing the suggested reading, write down
additional reasons for resistance to corporate change.
You may also recall reasons for resistance from your
personal experience at the workplace.

Managing Resistance to Change

As we discussed earlier, resistance to change is a natural reaction when employees are asked,
well, to change. Change is uncomfortable and requires new ways of thinking and doing. People

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have trouble developing a vision of what life will look like on the other side of a change. So,
they tend to cling to the known rather than embrace the unknown. Below, there is a selection of
techniques for managing resistance to change from a number of sources:

1. ‘Education and commitments: Leaders should share their perceptions, knowledge and
objectives with those affected by change. This can involve a major and expensive
programme of training, face-to-face counselling, group meetings and the publication of
memos and reports. People may need to be informed about the nature of the problems
necessitating change. Resistance may be based on misunderstanding and inaccurate
information
2. Take concrete steps to deal constructively with staff attitudes: The steps include
emphasizing new standards of performance for staff specialists and encouraging them to
think in different ways, as well as making use of the fact that signs of resistance can serve
as a practical warning signal in directing and timing technological changes.
3. Participation and Involvement: Arguably, collaboration can have the effect of reducing
opposition and encouraging commitment. This helps to reduce fears that individuals may
have about the impact of changes on them, and also makes use of individuals’ skills and
knowledge. Some participants have the knowledge and ability to contribute effectively
and are willing to do so. First, participation increases employee knowledge about the
innovation thus lessening fear. Second, participation can be ego enhancing, intrinsically
satisfying, and challenging, thus making workers feel needed and appreciated. Finally,
participation encourages employees to believe that they have some control over a system
that will affect them (Lucas, 1974, pp. 49). This last point is particularly important since
psychologists have shown that even small amounts of individual control over adverse
stimuli will reduce a person's opposition to these stimuli (Gratchel & Proctor, 1976).
4. Facilitation and support: employees may need to be given counselling therapy to
overcome fears and anxieties about change.
5. Help the employees identify what's in it for them to make the change. A good portion of
the normal resistance to change disappears when employees are clear about the benefits
the change brings to them as individuals. Benefits to the group, the department, and the

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 organization should be stressed, too. But, nothing is more important to an individual
employee than to know the positive impact on their own career or job.
6. Negotiation and agreement: it may be necessary to develop individual awareness of the
need for change, as well as the self-awareness of feeling towards change and how these
can be altered.
7. Empower employees to contribute: Control of their own jobs is one of the five key
factors in what employees want from work. So, too, this control aspect follows when you
seek to minimize resistance to change. Give the employees control over any aspect of the
change that they can manage. If you have communicated transparently, you have
provided the direction, the rationale, the goals, and the parameters that have been set by
your organization. Within that framework, your job is to empower the employees to make
the change work. Practice effective delegation and set the critical path points at which
you need feedback for the change effort - and get out of the way.
8. Manipulation and co-operation: this involves covert attempts to sidestep potential
resistance. Management put forward proposals that deliberately appeal to the specific
interests, sensitivities and emotions of the key groups involved.
9. Implicit and explicit coercion: Where there is profound disagreements between those
concerned with the change, and where there is little change of anyone shifting their
ground, it may be appropriate for management to abandon attempt to achieve consensus
and resort to force and threat (not violence). It may be sufficient to offer to fire, transfer
or demote individuals, or to block their career prospects.
10. Understand the true nature of resistance: Actually, what employees resist is usually not
technical change but social change — the change in their human relationships that
generally accompanies technical change.

AT THIS POINT YOU ARE REQUIRED TO ACCESS OUR EBOOK AND READ
CHAPTER 5. THEN, GO THROUGH THE ARTICLES THAT ARE POSTED IN THE
VLE FOR TOPIC 3. PLEASE BE ADVISED THAT YOU MAY TAKE NOTES WHILE
READING TOWARDS DEVELOPING YOUR ASSIGNMENT TASK

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