Due: After you complete Lesson 5 Credit Weight: 25% of your final grade Purpose: Identify two job design components that might help the major problem identified in the organizational diagnosis (Assign

ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE ANALYSIS

ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE ANALYSIS (1)

Introduction

In Our Iceberg Is Melting (Kotter & Rathgeber, 2017), the writers use penguins to explain important principles in organizational change management. After Fred discovers that the iceberg is melting, he works with the colony to open themselves to new ideas. That is why organizations experienced this problem when traditional routines kept them from dealing with new challenges.

My job as an OD practitioner is to review this case using Kotter’s 8-Step Change Model, ethics in OD and the open-systems model. How the colony reacted from denial to taking action is useful for understanding change management. If we carefully analyze this case, we can see principles that apply to change in other organizations. It will explore how using structure, ethics and systems approach can assist companies during unpredictable changes.

Application of Kotter's 8-Step Change Model

This model developed by John Kotter allows for a good guide to help the penguins change. It begins when Fred discovers the melting iceberg and creates a sense of urgency for the others. Yet, other experts do not pay attention until he puts forward a strong proof of the danger. Here, it is important to make complex risks feel important and touch people emotionally in order to motivate the organization. Kotter (2012) found that major change can only start if 75% of a company’s leaders agree that staying the same is more dangerous than bringing about change.

Forming a strong group of leaders to lead the change comes next. He invites Alice, budget to join and Professor, as they have various experience and connections. Hiatt (2006) suggests that it is vital for change management today to involve teams that make use of official authority and trusted informal influence. When members of the coalition can collaborate despite their unique personalities, it shows the emotional intelligence that effective change leaders should develop

Coming up with a vision for change and sharing it with others are separate steps that also depend on each other. In their article, Kotter and Cohen (2002) write that change visions must be imaginable, desirable, feasible, focused, flexible and able to be shared; this vision satisfies all these qualities. Buddy is skilled at creating messages that stick in our minds and using several channels to communicate change.

During the empowering broad-based action phase, the group tackles both the obstacles in systems and the obstacles people face. While assigning scouting missions, the leaders try to handle resistance by acting with them, not fighting against them. By using this method, it is recognized that both workplace structures and the behavior of individuals must change for change to be successful (Cameron & Green, 2019).

It happens when the scouts present satisfying options for relocation. These achievements quickly increase support for what is being done. Modern studies demonstrate that the first achievements should be evident, significant and easy to see (Hornstein, 2015).

It is tough for the colony to do this since there is a need to maintain speed while achieving results. The leadership meets the challenge of laziness by making changes in sections and always setting goals higher. Kotter (2012) concluded that some change initiatives fail since the organizations declare victory before the efforts are complete.

Ethics in Organization Development

The ethical side of OD helps ensure that change initiatives are fair, responsible and may last. OD ethics in the present day is created by combining ideas from psychology, business ethics and social justice which help protect people and businesses during times of major change. The penguins’ change in behavior reflects some of the ethical issues that OD professionals encounter in real companies.

Ensure the highest confidentiality or else the system would not operate. Disclosing unverified threats to the colony could result in panic. It mirrors the Organization Development Network’s (2020) ethical requirements for managing information. Within the colony, the group made an effort to manage what was known about how unsafe the iceberg was.

Even though revealing the threat became important, early press release of information that had not been checked could have led to unnecessary panic. According to Armenakis and Harris (2009), employees feel better able to raise concerns if their work environment is 'psychologically safe,' a situation the penguins reached using set times for everyone to bring up issues.

Gaining informed consent can become challenging in supervisory groups. Those in charge see to it that the penguins are aware of the changes and can add their input to any decision-making process. It is an outcome of today’s approach which puts a strong focus on people participating and making their own choices (Shapiro & Stefkovich, 2016). The forums in the colony work well to showcase this idea.

Responsibility for the society includes considerations for the environment. Before introducing a new organism, its potential habitats are studied together with predator-prey relationships as well as environmental issues. Triple bottom line is a main principle that this approach reflects and it is crucial today when talking about conscious business development (Elkington, 1997).

The process allows new groups of people to be heard despite the respect still shown to the longtime members. It shows the type of participatory parity in organizational justice that Fraser describes in 2008. When supporting the change process, the OD practitioner entrusts specialists with decisions relating to ice stability. It proves that a manager is respectful of different knowledge areas (Cummings & Worley, 2019). Beneficence is guaranteed by routinely evaluating whether the needs of the colony are put first instead of those of the institution. What is significant is that the innovations adopted by penguins prove the ethics behind people choosing their own actions.

Open-Systems Model Analysis

Research conducted using the open-systems model found that the colony behaves like a system that interacts with its surroundings. Since it is an open system, the colony is always interacting with climate, where and what it eats and who might eat them, all of which affect its activities and methods for staying alive. The melting iceberg crisis is caused by the traditional methods business use becoming unusable when the environment changes. Initially, the society held off new influences and trusted in its knowledge and regular activities.

As the world went through minor changes in environment, this approach worked well, but it suddenly became inadequate when the ice began to change rapidly. Looked at from a systems perspective, the reason minor adjustments did not fix the problem is that the organization required bigger changes at several points instead of tinkering with old systems. The successful change happened when the colony began to take in data from its environment and use it to support decisions. Systems analysis underlines the value of adapting and monitoring the environment in case of extreme market changes.

To ensure ethical treatment in developing the colony, the dimensions involved in organizational development must be looked at deeply and all at once. There are concerns about privacy because the colony must feel secure and not panic by receiving information too early or without caution. This issue is comparable to real-world leadership challenges when managers recognize what details must be revealed, by whom and by what means.

An ethical practitioner assures that meaningful participation is offered, even as they follow the existing leadership guidelines. Power must be handled properly, so no one group gains too much advantage as hierarchies are being questioned. It is important to ask if a given approach serves the colony more than replicating a model from somewhere else or simply being a preference of the person implementing it. When these ethics are followed, the process of change management treats every stakeholder fairly as it completes the needed upgrades.

Utilizing Kotter’s 8-Step Change Method on the transformation of the penguin colony has revealed its pros and cons as a practical change strategy. Simply listing facts was not enough — to create urgency, the movie focused on demonstrations that drew out emotion and made each person feel involved. To build the guiding coalition, various leaders from all areas of authority and recognized goodwill in the organization were chosen so that the group would have a strong influence on many groups within the company.

The process worked well since it detailed clear objectives and left room for change in the strategies. Sharing the vision included telling stories and symbolic acts, plus continuous exposure though many sources, because complicated points need to be made more than once before people accept them. For action, apart from making funds available for search missions, the leaders listened to and included doubtful employees, instead of letting them feel ignored. Selected victories aimed to display the positive results and meaning of the changes without leaving room for confusion.

Maintaining the pace required a lot of effort since the colony also had to handle the challenging and slow work of relocation, the point in a change process where many initiatives lose their drive. To stick with these new ways, like tracking the environment, organizations had to change their daily practices and routines through cultural efforts, as they could otherwise return to what they used to do. The penguin case demonstrates that Kotter’s model is useful, but it still needs to be adapted for unusual organizations in emergency situations.

Conclusion

The story in Our Iceberg Is Melting explains in detail the reasons behind organizational change which is very important for businesses and institutions today. Applying the Kotter 8-Step Model helps the colony overcome serious resistance to change once the model is adapted to its environment. Practitioners encounter a difficult balance as they must manage with tension between being quick, open, as well as on top of everything and also remaining considerate of everyone.

More importantly, open-systems analysis shows that for change to last, all parts of the system should transform at once, instead of just reforming single elements. From what happened in the colony, we learn that organizations should combine solid techniques with sensitivity to people in leading change, let ethics direct every step of transformation and rely on systems thinking to see the forest and the trees. Probably the most valuable thing to learn is that in changing circumstances, a company stays alive by questioning its usual approach but never sacrificing its key values.

References:

Argyris, C. (1977). Double loop learning in organizations. Harvard Business Review, 55(5), 115-125.

Bushe, G. R., & Marshak, R. J. (2015). Dialogic organization development: The theory and practice of transformational change. Berrett-Koehler.

Cameron, E., & Green, M. (2019). Making sense of change management. Kogan Page.

Cummings, T. G., & Worley, C. G. (2019). Organization development and change (11th ed.). Cengage Learning.

Elkington, J. (1997). Cannibals with forks: The triple bottom line of 21st century business. Capstone.

Fraser, N. (2008). Scales of justice: Reimagining political space in a globalizing world. Columbia University Press.

Hiatt, J. (2006). ADKAR: A model for change in business, government, and our community. Prosci.

Kotter, J. (2012). Leading change. Harvard Business Review Press.

Kotter, J., & Rathgeber, H. (2017). Our iceberg is melting (10th ed.). Penguin.

Organization Development Network. (2020). Ethical guidelines for organization development practitioners.

Schein, E. H. (2016). Organizational culture and leadership (5th ed.). Wiley.

Shapiro, J. P., & Stefkovich, J. A. (2016). Ethical leadership and decision making in education. Routledge.