This is a complete summary of the course Organisational Development and Change taught at KU Leuven, campus Brussels including complete notes from all classes. The course is part of the track module of the Master of Business Administration - Leadership and Change Management.
- Communication, trust, problem-solving, decision-making
- Leadership, group effectiveness
Organisation and system level:
- Structure & culture
- Inter-organisation cooperation/competition/CSR: how can organisations work together
- Organisational learning, organisational development, change mgt
VUCA:
- Volatility: increasing rate of change; the world is constantly changing eg AI
- Uncertainty: less clarity about the future
- Complexity: multiplicity of decision factors; multiple things to take into account
- Ambiguity: there may be no “right answer”
Organisational learning: used to point to sth you do to become better; holds on an individual level but also on
group level
Development is always a positive situation while change can also be difficult things that you didn’t always want
Examples of organisational change: mergers (different company cultures); restructuring and reorganisation;
new ways of working
Examples of learning & change: new ways of working (flex-office, activity-based office), culture change (from
specialised to collective, from traditional to innovative), restructuring & reorganisation, m&a, co-creative
leadership and implementing self steering teams, implementing new software
70% of the change processes fail; don’t achieve the intended results (goals aren’t met, initiatives fade away,
clients unhappy, employees show change resistance) ; most managers blame ‘circumstances’ or ‘individual
features’ and not the process of change itself
Reasons mostly attributed to low success ratio: unclear policy, hierarchical structure, ppl want to keep power,
ppl are change resistant and want to keep their identity, existing culture impedes change
Boonstra: many change processes fail bcs the approaches don’t fit today’s context; the wrong approach is used
to do the change
,Three types of change/learning:
First order change:
- Stable, predictable situations
- Technical/instrumental problems are solved in an existing context
- Logical adjustments without changing values/culture
- No reflection
-> Approach 1: planned change approach:
- “IMPROVING” metaphor of remodelling a house
o Organisation as adaptive to market demands, ‘economic’ model
o Top-down steering, managers using power or persuasion
o Consultants are knowledge experts
o Single linear process within a culture/structure that stays the same
o Structured, uniform, ‘techniques’; plan in advance
- Is overused; after a while of failed change efforts, ppl lose their motivation
Second order change:
- Problems are complex, several perspectives on problems/solutions
- Replacing current values and assumptions by new ones
- Transition from A to B is needed, there are ideas how B should look
- Reflection
-> Approach 2: organisation development approach:
- “CHANGING”, metaphor of moving to another house
o Using knowledge and insight of coworkers
o Consultants are process-consultants that help building a transition to point B; movement
from A to B; ppl and organisation is separate; change agents (eg consultants) and employees
also separate
o Based on existing situations and problems
o Collaborative process, commitment
- Danger for paternalism and manipulation: change agents and consultants become the social engineers
who guide the change and seduce ppl to participate; manager or consultant that seduces you to go in
the direction that the top wants to go
Third order change:
- Turbulent, complex, ambiguous situations
- New forms of organising towards unknown new situation
- Multiple actors and organisations work together; not limited to one organisation; different
stakeholders etc that come together
- Reflection-on-reflection
-> Approach 3: continuous learning and cocreating approach
- “CONTINUOUS RENEWAL”, metaphor of going on adventure
o Organising as ongoing relational process and sensemaking
o Employees, leaders and consultants cocreate new reality
o Changing is continuous process of endless modifications
o Collaborative process, stakeholder involvement, ‘everybody is expert’
o “relational perspective”, ownership and dialogue are central
- Future is unknown; continuously renewing; collaborative process; everybody is invited to think about
the direction that will be taken; get everybody together and try to create the new situation together
, Five change theories
Unfreeze-change-freeze model (Lewin)
Unfreeze: create an awareness of why the current way is hindering; questioning old values; creates a
(controlled) crisis
- Result: strong reactions but they are necessary to create a strong motivation to find a new equilibrium
Change: make ppl truly understand how change helps them; offering training and support; time & a lot of
communication are crucial; ppl begin to learn new behaviour, processes etc
Freeze/refreeze: after a critical mass accepts the change; consolidating change (a new form of stability);
rewards and acknowledging efforts; reinforcing, stabilising new ways
The changes in this model are more like first-order changes
Eight steps toward transformation (Kotter)
Each of the steps are necessary to succeed: forgetting a step or an error in a step creates problems
1. Create a sense of urgency -> in order to change, ppl have to feel that the old way isn’t working
anymore, that there is a need for change
- Assumption that creating a sense of urgency is a catalysator for change has become central in the way
many managers think about organisational change
2. Form powerful guiding coalition (top-down vision)
3. Create compelling vision
4. Communicate vision
5. Empower others & remove obstacles
6. Create ST wins
7. Consolidate & build on change
8. Institutionalise change
Kotter model is based on making ppl feel bad to make them realise that change is needed
Change triangle (Bouwen & Fry)
What should managers focus on when transforming their organisation (~how)
- Continuity: change means disruption (should have
attention for it), managing strengths, appreciating what is
already there, knowing what the culture is, knowing what
the strong points are
- Novelty: creating a shared vision; new ideas, visions,
intentions etc
- Transition: making sure learning occurs; ppl have to have
space to go from one stage to the other; letting ppl think
about things etc
- You need to balance all three of them to make a good
change, if you only have two, it won’t be a good change
Four pathways for innovation (Bouwen & Fry)
POWER model
- Authority w access to power resources
- Imposing change, declaring change
- Interest and power
- Are we really in control?
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