Importance of Behavioral change in an Organization

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 Behavior change often assists people to be self-developed. Changing people’s behavior involves conducting of training programmes, coaching employees in uncertain working areas and getting feedbacks after the coaching, are such aspects.  These activities direct them to do better in their works as well as their lives (Kinley, 2015).

Superiors are accustomed with the employees who are not willing to change according to the organization changes (Laegaard, 2006).  They are reluctant to adopt to the new skills, and they fear to join new teams with younger employees.  Some employees fear to face new challenges and technological changes (Ramalingam, 2006).   If an employee wishes to learn more skills, new technological changes, they become smart and show more commitments towards the new working environment.  Supporting to achieve their goal are the heart of effective management (Keegan, 2001).

E-dialoging and e-conferencing helps share ideas, information and daily updates (Cascio, 2016).  These communication systems are updated according to the organizational growth and changes take place in the forthcoming years.  Virtual chat rooms helps staff to have face to face chats and clarify their doubts (Harbert, 2017). 

Digital work places use e-mail and create common platforms in order enhance team work.  Video streaming helps to hold e-discussion, through video conferencing, this helps employees to communicate from various parts of the country as well as outside the country (Cascio, 2016).  Podcasting method helps to share multimedia files.  Through these methods employees are made aware of the changes and there is a vast impact in organizational behavior change (Ramalingam, 2006).

Figure 1 : Lewin’s three stage process of change management


(Madden, 2019)

Lewin’s three-stage process of change emphasizes the importance of preparation or unfreezing before change, and reinforcement of change afterward or refreezing as illustrated in figure 1.0.

According to Figure 1, Kurt Lewin’s three stage model is one of the most useful change management tools.  Changes should be carried out in an organization with proper preparation, or else it would lead to organization failure.  There are three stages in an organization changes (Madden, 2019).

Unfreezing: In this stage staff who are in an organization should be given proper education and prepare the staff to face the new challenge (Caredda S. 2020).  This stage helps the employees to face the forthcoming challenges and aids to break the longtime habits the have anchored.  In this stage communication plays a vital role it makes the employees aware of the upcoming changes (Verhoye A. M. 2015).  Training and upgrades are needed to achieve their goals.  Stress Management, helps the employees to overcome the fear of change (Calder, 2013).  

There was a time when the institution I work, a leading commercial Bank wanted to install a new system, before 03 months the staff were informed and a trial version of the system was installed to practice and get user friendly with the new system.  Daily our staff members got a one hour to practice in the trial version.

 Change: change process involves a sequence of steps, it is considered as journey which goes through many stages to get to the last stage of transformation (Hussain, 2018).  This stage requires time, support, encouragement and coaching (Mark, 2018).  Counselings helps to buildup the psychological needs.  Transition is the hardest part of this stage (Passenheim, 2010).   

The bank conducts special training programmes are conducted and surveys are requested to be done by the staff members to identify what are the areas that are not understood and special help desk is created and expertized staff members are allocated in order to help the staff members to clarify their uncertainties, and make awareness towards the new system implementation.

Refreezing:  This is the 03rd and last stage of Lewin’s model.  This stage establishes the new changes which were implemented.  In order to sustain the changes, special appreciations, training, rewards and are granted (Joseph, 2015).  These changes are made permanent in order to be included in the normal work (Kaminski, 2011).

Our organization encourages the staff who are performing well to the new changes, and are rewarded with cash prices, appreciation letters and promotions. Effective communication plays an immense part in ensuring in an organizations successful performance.  Communication is very important in order to buildup a cordial relationship among hierarchies of an organization. 

Organizational behavior dominates the performance of an organization, it is connected with employee related circumstances.  This examines in the context of Job satisfaction, employee turnover, productivity and performance.  One of the most challenging conditions in maintaining an employee’s wellbeing in a virtual workplace (Vatsa, 2013). 

Due to the prevailing pandemic situation, many employees get to do their work at home, this makes the employees feel alone (Fossilien, 2020). And also they seem to work long hours, this increase their stress level of the employees.  At this juncture Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS), is being created by the organizations in order to develop the human psychological strength and unlock potentials (Robbins, 2018).  

 References

Ben-Hur S. and Avagyan K. (2018), Changing Employee Behavior (online), available on: https://www.imd.org/research-knowledge/articles/how-can-you-motivate-employees-to-change-their-behavior/ , cited on 27th March 2021.

Calder A. M. (2013), Organizational Change: Models for Successful Implementing Change, Utah State University, available on: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1142&context=honors  cited on 25th March 2021.

Chew M. M. M., Cheng J. S. L. and Lazarevic S. P. (2006), Manager’s Role in Implementing Organizational Change: Case of the Restaurant Industry in Melbourne, (online), available on : https://gbata.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/JGBAT_Vol2-1-p6.pdf, cited on 24th March 2021.

Caredda S. (2020), Models: Lewin’s Three Steps Change Model (online), available on: https://sergiocaredda.eu/organisation/tools/models-lewins-three-steps-change-model/ cited on 27th March 2021.

Cascio W. F. and Montealegre R. (2016), How Technology is changing work and organizations, available on: https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-041015-062352 , cited on 27th March 2021.

Fossilien L. and D. M. W. (2020), Managing Stress and Emotions when Working Remotely (online), available on : https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/managing-stress-and-emotions-when-working-remotely/, cited on 27th March 2021.

Harbert T. (2017), Is Group Chat the New E-Mail (online), available on : https://www.shrm.org/hr-today/news/hr-magazine/1117/pages/is-group-chat-the-new-email-.aspx cited on 27th March 2021.

Joseph O.B. (2015), An Assessment of the Training and Developmental Needs of Employees in Nigerian Local Government (online), available on:  https://www.swinburne.edu.au/collaboration-partnerships/workforce-training/training-needs-analysis/ cited on 27th March 2021.

Kinley N. and Ben-Hur S. (2015), Changing Employee Behavior, A Practical Guide for Managers,  Mackmillan Publishers Limited, Houndmills, Basingtoke, Hamshire, RG21 6XS, (online), available on: https://www.amazon.com/Changing-Employee-Behavior-Practical-Managers-ebook/dp/B00TXT91RM/ , cited on 24th March 2021

Kegan R. and Lahey L., (2001) The Real Reason People won’t change from the Magazine

(online), available on: https://hbr.org/2001/11/the-real-reason-people-wont-change , cited on 21st March 2021.

 Kaminski J. (2011), Theory applied to informatics – Lewin’s Change Theory/ CJNI Journal (online), available on: http://cjni.net/Journal_original/Winter2011/cjni.net-_Theory_applied_to_informatics_%96_Lewin%92s_Change_Theory___CJNI_Journal_.pdf , cited on 25.03.2021,

Laegaard J. and Mille B. (2006), Organizational Theory, 1st Edition

Organizational Change, (online), available on: https://open.lib.umn.edu/organizationalbehavior/chapter/14-3-organizational-change/

Cited on 23rd March 2021.

Madden D. (2019), Increasing Medication Error Reporting to Improve Patient Safety. Eastern Kentucky University (online), available on: https://encompass.eku.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1041&context=dnpcapstones , cited on 27th March 2021.

Mark T. (2018), Coach to Your Team’s Strengths to Improve Employee Engagement (online), available on: https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/employee-relations/pages/coach-to-your-teams-strengths-to-improve-employee-engagement.aspx cited on 27th March 2021.

Passenheim O. (2010), Change Management, (online), available on: http://www.mahavirlibrary.org/files/change-management.pdf, cited on 24th March 2021.

Ramalingam B. (2006), Tools for Knowledge and Learning: A Guide for Development and Humanitarian Organizations. Available on: https://www.ircwash.org/sites/default/files/Ramalingam-2006-Tools.pdf, cited on 25/03/2021.

Robbins S. P. and T. A. Judge (2018), Essentials of Organizational Behavior, (online), available on : http://homepages.se.edu/cvonbergen/files/2018/03/Essentials-of-Organizational-Behavior_14th-ed_Chapters-1-and-2.pdf , cited on 26th March 2021.

Stobierski T. (2020), Organizational Change Management: What it is & Why It’s Important (online), available on: https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/organizational-change-management , cited on 27th March 2021.

Verhoye A. M. (2015), Unfreezing the Organizational Culture of the Catholic Church: A Case Study of Pope Francis Organizational Culture Change Initiative Using the Transformational Leadership Theoretical Framwork (online), available on: https://conservancy.umn.edu/bitstream/handle/11299/175357/Verhoye_umn_0130E_15994.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y cited on 27th March 2021.

Vatsa N. (2013), Relationship of Job Satisfaction with Organization Behavior, Dept. of Education Sai Nath University, Ranchi, Jharkhand, India (online), http://ijear.org/vol32/1/neelima.pdf cited on 27th March 2021.

 

 

 




 

Comments

  1. Harsha WijesingheMay 8, 2021 at 11:19 PM

    As you suggested, behavioral changes are needed in any organization to accomplish sustainable success in the market. Behavioral change is a collective decision of cultural aspects and belief systems to mitigate the risk of any given situation. As recommended by Mahmood (2021), the entire procedure of behavioral changes depends on the leaders and how they manage the followings,
    -motivating the employees and setting their rewards
    -understanding the political environment
    -clear power distribution
    -managing conflicts among employees
    -planning and decision making
    -achievement and encouragement
    -performance appraisal
    -training and development
    -acceptance and adoption towards change
    -learning about other cultures

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Treva PattersonMay 10, 2021 at 6:35 AM

      Exactly Harsha, Motivation gets people inspired, proactive and involved. When people are motivated to achieve and sustain a specific change, they are far more likely to succeed, as higher motivation means higher effort. There are two types of motivation. Most managers are aware of the importance of intrinsic motivation, but mostly they focus on extrinsic motivation, such as awarding bonuses and merit increases. The latter are effective in boosting performance on those tasks that use mechanical skills. For cognitive skills, intrinsic motivation is far more effective (Ben-Hur 2018).

      Delete
  2. Indeevari RatnayakeMay 12, 2021 at 3:21 AM

    Agreed Treva, Organizations change in response to changes in the environment and in response to the way decision makers interpret these changes. When it comes to organizational change, one of the biggest obstacles is resistance to change. People resist change because change disrupts habits, conflicts with certain personality types, causes a fear of failure, can have potentially negative impacts, can result in a potential for loss of power, and, when done too frequently, can exhaust employees. Change effort can be conceptualized as a three-step process in which employees are first prepared for change, then change is implemented, and finally, the new behavioral patterns become permanent(Deutschman, 2005).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Treva PattersonMay 13, 2021 at 6:08 AM

      Agreed to your comment, as per Turner (2017), change is inevitable and is present in all facets of life, and the management of any change is widely varied and diverse in different forms of business. Negative employee behavior is most often the root of resistance of change. The dynamics of management leading the change can either contribute to the negativity or turn a negative situation into positive with winning results for the organization as a whole.

      Delete
  3. Oshadee WanasingheMay 14, 2021 at 11:03 AM

    Yes Treva, organizations cannot avoid change when it occurs. Therefore, most organization consider change as a part of the organization’s existence (Jalagat, 2015). Grundy (1993) classified change into three types namely, smooth incremental change, bumpy incremental change and discontinuous change. Professor Nut have also introduced three types of change namely, adaptive change, innovative change, and radically innovative change (Jalagat, 2015).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Treva PattersonMay 14, 2021 at 11:47 PM

      Adding to you comment, today’s organizations are operating in highly competitive and changing environment that pushes them to continuously adapt their organizational structures and to such environment. However, the success of change initiative may face barrier in the response of employees, especially when they lack reediness to change (Metwally et al., 2019)

      Delete
  4. Wasantha BasnayakeMay 16, 2021 at 12:08 AM

    Agree with you. Adding to that, Behavior Change Encourages Positive Attitudes Toward L&D
    Learning and Development can literally change people’s lives. It equips employees with the tools for career progression. Everyone in the organization should love Learning and Development departments. After all, it exists to make everyone better at what they do(Cloke,H.,2019).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Treva PattersonMay 16, 2021 at 6:12 AM

      Correctly said, and also, organizational change initiative are managed and led is hugely important for their success. Organizational changes is largely dependent on their trust in management. Employees have to perceive the processes underlying the changes as fair and feel that they have been treated appropriately and given the adequate information about the changes and reasons for them (Claudia, 2009).

      Delete

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