Considering Planned Change

Bartunek, J. M., Balogun, J., & Do, B. (2011). Considering Planned Change Anew:

Stretching Large Group Interventions Strategically, Emotionally, and Meaningfully. The

Academy of Management Annals, 5(1), 1–52.

The research paper tries to conduct a review that combines Scholarly Literature and Skilled Practice and thereby tries to initiate a dialog between them. Authors try to bridge the gap between a popular organization development practice called Large Group Interventions and contemporary academic organizing regarding strategy, emotion & sense-making. Large Group Interventions are the methods for involving “the whole system” i.e. both internal and external systems in a planned change process. Practitioners know about Large Group Interventions but they have very little knowledge about theorizing regarding strategy, emotion, & sense-making. Whereas, researchers have not much knowledge about Large Group Interventions but they are familiar with theorizing regarding strategy, emotion, and content. This research paper tries to establish linkages between OD practice and theory. The paper is divided into five sections. The first section gives a brief historical overview of links between practice, theory, and research. The second section describes Large Group Interventions. The third section summarizes theory in strategy, emotion, & sense-making. The fourth section explains LGIs with two big exemplars. And the fifth section answers various scholarly questions (about strategy, emotion; sense-making) related to large scale changes and then make conclusions. 

Organizational Development is a systemwide application and transfer of behavioral science knowledge to the planned development, improvement, reinforcement of the strategies, structures, and processes that lead to organizational effectiveness. The term OD was founded by Kurt Lewin and he believed that there is nothing as practical as a good theory. Historical studies show that OD interventions encouraged scholarly thinking and scholarly thinking fostered OD interventions. But the recent study does not show any linkages between OD practice and theory and is of the view that LGI has little impact on Organizational scholarship. This paper aims to establish links between the two.

Large Group Interventions are a whole system approach to organizational change. Organizations are open systems, future-oriented, with large networks are meaning-making systems. These four strands led to the evolution of LGIs or OD interventions. Large Group Interventions can be classified into three categories namely:

1) Focused on proactively creating a desired future together, 

2) Redesigning work together as a whole system, 

3) the Whole scale participative work. 

The “Future Search” “Whole Scale Change” are two important interventions used in organizational processes. They are well known by practitioners but academics are not aware of this. But a lot of issues are there in large scale interventions which academics & researchers are now concerned about for example Strategic element of creating future together in LGI, individual and collective sense-making of the intervention & feelings of participants. Therefore, there is a need that these practitioners become familiar with academic research that is relevant to these interventions. Academic research helps us to see those dimensions which we might have skipped earlier.

Human beings are involved in strategies i.e. there is strategizing of activities and practices by people, this led to research in strategizing activities & practices or strategy as practice (SAP). This research focuses not only on what organizations do but what people do. It focuses on day to day work activities and practices of strategists. SAP is the implementation of strategy as a “translation into collective action”. SAP research suggests certain questions like Do LGI address change of the complexity, scale & scope that characterizes strategy process research? Can LGI change the intended and realized strategy of an organization? Does LGI succeed in effecting change in the strategic direction of an organization and whether they can develop a new intended strategy and implement it? What is the role of political, cultural & social processes in the design and enactment of LGIs and their implementation? Are there any patterns in the sequencing that lead to successful change? Whether there is modularity? Are there any linking activities to ensure that all organization components are realigned? Are there any overlapping issues during the implementation of change? What are the different roles of the multiple actors involved in LGI? What are the patterns of behavior, interventions, relationships between different stakeholders as a result of LGI?

Since 1990’s academic interest in the cognitive and emotional processes of individuals in an organization has increased. Studies relating to sense-making and emotions have become more prominent and wider. Academic investigation of emotions and sense-making of change recipients suggests few questions like What various emotions are experienced by planners and participants in LGI? How are these emotions managed? How collective emotions and emotional contagion is manifested during and after the change? How do change agents work with these? What are the different occasions in which participants make sense during LGIs? How do sense-giving & sense-making interact during and after the interactions? How do positive emotions or positive meanings arise during LGI? How do they affect the outcomes of intervention & change? Two Large Group Interventions Future Search and Whole-Scale Change are addressed in this research paper. Future Search is a future-oriented planning conference developed in the 1980s by Marvin Weisbord, Sandra Janoff, and their colleagues. Its purpose is to “explore possible agreements between people with divergent views and interests and to do consensus planning with them”. It is based on the theory of action research regarding problem-solving and planning. Future Search usually takes place in three days conference with an average size of 60-80 people.

Six major tasks take place during the three-day Future Search conferences. 

1. The first task is for participants to focus on the past concerning the Future Search topic and other events. (Individually create timelines of key events in the world, in their own lives, and the history of the Future Search topic).

2. The second task is to focus on the present. The whole assembly makes a “mind map” of trends currently affecting the Future Search topic and identifies the trends most important for it.

3. The participants form stakeholder groups in which they discuss what they are doing now about these key trends and what they want to do in the future. (They report what they are proud and sorry about dealing with future research topic).

4. Forth task focus on future, diverse group’s imagines and describe their preferred future as if it has already been accomplished. 

5. The fifth task is based on hearing the preferred future, the groups post themes and discuss and agree on the common ground for everyone. 

6. The sixth and final step is action planning. After action plans are developed, volunteers sign up to implement them over the coming months.

Future Search conferences may bring a wide range of emotions both positive and negative. It is being used successfully by large organizations around the globe. For example- Boeing used a version of it in the design of its 777 aircraft; IKEA used Future Searches that started with a single product (a sofa) and that led to a review of the entire system and Future Search intervention helped 3M carry out union-management joint planning. An extended illustration of how Future Search was used with the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to address a crisis had been discussed in the research paper. 

Whole Scale Change was developed by Kathy Dannemiller, Robert Jacobs, and others. One of the distinguishing features of the approach is its flexibility in dealing with large and small groups and in addressing a wide variety of systems issues. Whole-Scale thinking can be used to unite and mobilize people in organizations and communities around nearly any kind of convening issue. It is based on the adaptation of Gleicher’s formula for change D X V X F R(DVF). This rubric posits that if an organization wants to accomplish system-wide change, it must work with a critical mass of the organization to uncover and combine member dissatisfaction (D) with the present state, uncover and combine yearnings for their Vision (V) of the future and the first steps (F) towards reaching the mission. The value of D, V, and F needs to be greater than zero to be greater than people’s resistance (R) to change. Whole-Scale Change steps include building a common database of information, determining what the data mean for the organization, agreeing on change goals, committing to specific actions, and taking time to check and measure what was agreed upon. Whole-Scale Change assumes that while emotions may be difficult at first, they will, as a result of the process, end up being very positive. Whole-Scale Change has been used in other settings, including the U. S. Central Intelligence Agency, HomeCare, a comprehensive home care services organization, and Ferranti-Packard Transformers, Ontario. The use of Whole scale change by Best Animal Society to create structure and professional management is discussed in detail in the research paper.

Although after understanding both Future Search and Whole Scale Change, they appear to have much in common like short term, careful intense and planned two- or three-days meetings and including stakeholders as participants. But they are not identical, and the differences between them are central to their designers’ conceptions. Whole-Scale Change focuses on the past year, while Future Search focuses on a longer time horizon. Future Search explicitly alternates diverse group experience with individuals working in similar stakeholder groups. This may or may not happen in Whole-Scale Change, depending on the type of issue being addressed. Future Search events are very democratic. Thus, leaders need to decide in advance what is on the table for discussion or not. In Whole-Scale Change, there is more opportunity for lower-level organizational members to interact with leaders. Planning takes place in both types of interventions. However, in Future Search the whole group develops something new, while in Whole-Scale Change a leadership group develops draft plans to which the whole assembly responds and the leadership group has the final say. 

The next segment of the research paper talks about Questions that are applied to Large Scale Changes. It has been evident that despite the many reported successes of Large Group Interventions, it is evident that organizational change often runs into problems, especially when it is major. It raises issues regarding their scope of change, the relationship between their formulation and implementation, and the experiences associated with various types of roles and timing issues. They begin with questions about the extent to which Large Group Interventions address strategically complex change such as that studied by strategy scholars. There are also questions about the implications of Large Group Interventions for what scholars know about the possibility of planned interventions affecting shifts in both the intended and realized strategies in organizations. The use of social, cultural, and political methods in the change process is also questioned. Doubt is also raised on the assumption of linearity in these change processes.

Questions about emotion and sense-making are also raised in a research paper that addresses a variety of experiences of change recipients. The questions also address the participants’ sense-making, including how it evolves and how it comes to be shared. First, there are questions about the relationship between Large Group Interventions and change recipients’ emotions, particularly the way the interventions generate, influence, and benefit from their participants’ emotional experiences. Another question is that, how do change agents work with collective emotions, especially if the shared emotions are not what would seem most desirable? How do Large Group Interventions contribute to decreased cognitive dissonance between old and new schemata? Do shared meanings of change emerge among participants through an iterative process between sense making and sense giving? 

Theoretical material presented in the research paper opens up several questions about the strategic processes accompanying the change efforts and the affective and sense-making experiences of participants in them. For future research, it would be obvious in the relationship between Large Group Interventions and academics for academics to study the effectiveness of Large Group Interventions. A second step might be joint academic-practitioner forums. Third, it is important to connect individual practitioners and academics. Fourth, it is important to create joint academic-practitioner communities for action and to have a sense of urgency about them concerning joint goals. Fifth, it is important to make sure that academic-practitioner interactions are fair, that one “side” does not have unjust advantages.

Submitted by: Shivangi Dhawan & Charu Sehgal, M.Phil. Research Scholars [OBD area]

The Role of Power and Politics in the Repricing of Executive Options

[Timothy G. Pollock, Harald M. Fischer and  James B. Wade, (2002) The Role of Power and Politics in the Repricing of Executive Options, The Academy of Management Journal, 45 (6), 1172-1182]

This paper aims at developing a framework explaining why certain firms reprice options while others do not. The focus of the paper is to explore the moderating role of CEO’s power, the power of external stakeholders and the visibility of the firm and it’s CEO on the primary relationship between negative spread (difference between strike price of stock options and the market price) and the likelihood to reprice options.

Ownership sources of power resulting from concentration of stocks in the hands of both the institutional investors as well as the CEO results in reduced likelihood to reprice options. Institutional investors can mitigate the power of executives either directly or indirectly by virtue of their large shareholding and hence can keep a check on the self-serving behaviour of management. CEO who also owns shares of his company might not undertake activities that have the potential to raise organisational risk of a negative backlash from the shareholders subsequent to options repricing even when such acts may reduce individual risks.

However, the structural source of power enhances the ability of the CEO to engage in option repricing and hence mitigate their losses. CEO who is also the chairman of the company enjoys much greater power to reprice options. When there are barriers to hostile takeovers such that the market loses its effective corporate control and the management has no fear of being ousted, then its ability to engage in unpopular activities rises. His ability to nominate people on the board who are either his loyalist or are dependent on him for board seats can significantly enhance his ability to make these directors function in the interest of the CEO.

But, when the board of directors perceive that their actions to reprice options will be visible and discussed publically then their incentive to reprice options goes down. They are more concerned about impression management rather than serving the interests of the CEO so that they do not lose out on their credibility and legitimacy regarding other claims.

The paper has articulated how the struggle of power, whether its ownership power or structural power between the shareholders and management gets reflected in the decision of the company to reprice options. The party having more power tends to make a decision that is in its own self-interest. The study gives suggestions to use restricted stock awards in place of stock options that gives ownership to the CEO but at the same time preventing him from selling the stock for a stipulated period of time.

[submitted by Anisha, M Phil Scholar, 2017]

The roles of departmental and position power in job evaluation

[Welbourne, T. M., & Trevor, C. O. (2000). The Roles of Departmental and Position Power in Job    Evaluation. The Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 43, No. 4 , pp. 761-771]

Power may be defined as an ability to influence the decisions or outrightly control the behaviour of people. In organisations, it is nowadays used as a tool which can lead to positive or negative outcomes depending on how it is used. Such use of power to attain desirable outcomes gives rise to another term i.e. ‘politics’. Studies have shown that almost all the departments and processes are under the huge influence of organisational power and politics, and job evaluation process is no exception to that. Job evaluation may be defined as a process of systematic comparison between jobs to access their relative worth for the purpose of establishing a rational pay structure. The researcher, in this paper has attempted to test whether the job evaluation outcomes are affected by the departmental power in a university setting.

The researcher has successfully proposed a political perspective on job evaluation wherein it is believed that the job evaluation is based on the worth of a position and not on the worth of its incumbent, due to which the position holders use influence tactics in the job evaluation committees. This has made the researchers suggest that job evaluation procedures are not accurate and reliable because power and politics come in between and influence the job evaluation outcomes.

Further, the coalitional view or the political view of the organisation suggest that firms can be characterised as groups of subunits, each with its own agenda, which might or might not be consistent with organisational goals and thus this gives rise to the ‘departmental power’ which becomes an important determinant for resource allocation decisions. The literature suggests that more powerful departments are better at acquiring what they want and thus they have positive effect on favourable job evaluation outcomes. However, the researcher proposes that such positive effect will be greater when the position power of the jobs being evaluated or upgraded is high. Thus, the researcher posits that it is not only the departmental power but also the position power within the department that influence the job evaluation outcomes. Also, a clear distinction has been made between the position power and personal power wherein the position power signifies the incumbent’s ability to influence others through position held in an organisation’s hierarchy rather than through personal characteristics.

The results suggest that departmental power definitely affects resource allocation, however such effects become more substantial when the power associated with resource recipients is high. Also, the effects of departmental power on the number of new positions and position upgrades are greater when the position power associated with the jobs being evaluated is high. Thus, both departmental power and position power strongly influence the job evaluation outcomes. However with regard to politics in job evaluation, the researchers hold mixed views. While some researchers view this politics positively since it ultimately improves the department’s and firm’s performance, others contend that such job evaluation (under the influence of power and politics), does not accurately access the worth of the job.

[submitted by Mansi Babbar, Ph D Scholar, 2017]

Individual Power and Political Behaviors in Organizations

[Schein, Virginia E. (1977), Individual Power and Political Behaviors in Organizations: An Inadequately Explored Reality. Academy of Management Review, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Jan), pp. 64-72]

In organizations, we have different perpetually ongoing and pervasive functions like planning, organizing, directing and controlling. All these functions deal with the usage of available resources in the organization like men and machinery. Employees (men) are an important asset of any organization. But as each individual is unique and they carry their unique personal goals along, the difference between their personal goal and organizational goal creates a conflict between the individual and organization. To avoid that open conflict, individuals try to acquire certain power or favor. That’s why individuals get involved in struggle for power. That’s how struggle for power and its practice become much a part and parcel of the above mentioned functions performed in organizations. By this one could conclude that power and political behavior will also be all pervasive function of the organizational environment.

The paper which is reviewed here narrates this reality and develops arguments.  Power is always acquired on the basis of certain tangible or intangible set of resources which forms the bases of power. Now when one is in possession of some power then one can use it (via means) in order to get our personal goals achieved (intent) using some tactics. In this paper, Schein describes intent of the power holder as the mediating variable between the powers available to them and means to be used. Intent of the power holder is a function of personal needs or goals of individual and the contingency of situational factors. Intent of the power holder will be the deciding variable for the means to be used for getting the needs fulfilled or goals accomplished. There is a strong link between intent and means of using power by individuals in the organization. He put forwarded that whether one’s personal goals are congruent to the organizational goal or not has a strong relation with what type of means one would be using to accomplish that goal. The literature had founded that when individual’s goal was congruent to organizational goal, then that individual had used overt means and when his goal was incongruent to organizational goal then that individual had used covert means. 

Now this is not true that at one time individuals use only one type of means as they are found to be using both overt and covert types of means simultaneously. For example, when an individual’s personal goal is incongruent to the organizational goal, then although he is using covert means to reach to his goal but he will be expressly showing certain overt means which are congruent to the organizational goal. Now in this way the individuals use their powers in order to get their incongruent personal goals achieved without openly going in contradiction with the organization. So in nutshell on the basis of paper one could conclude that the individual intent plays a very important role in evaluation of his political behavior in organization.

[submitted by Kirti Saroha, M.Phil Batch XLI (2017)]

Gender Differences in the Perceptions of Organizational Influence Tactics

[Drory, Amos and David Beaty (1991) Gender Differences in the Perceptions of Organizational Influence Tactics, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 12, No. 3 (May, 1991), pp. 249-258]

Organization politics is referred to as attempts to informally influence others to enhance or protect one’s share of organizational resources or benefits - often through use of power – and is generally associated with conflict. This paper explores extant literature on organization politics, and then tests some of the stereotypical beliefs about gender vis-à-vis organization politics.

Past studies indicate that attitude towards organization politics is affected by cultural and organizational variables, as well as supervisory position, in addition to characteristics of the behavior. This study explores attitudes and perceptions towards organization politics based on another variable – gender. It is commonly perceived that men and women behave differently when it comes to using power. The general perception is that women exploit less, have less need for dominance, do not understand organizational power as well as men do, are less skilled compared to men in handling informal networks, and are not as direct as men in using influence tactics. The study concerns itself with a two-fold purpose – first, to assess if men and women have different attitudes towards political behavior, and second, if gender affects judgment of organization politics.

An experiential instrument – a short critical situation in which one person (manipulator) tries to influence another (target of influence) - is used to test the hypotheses derived from questions above. The sample of male and female respondents to the given situation are differently grouped to assess responses based on four influencing combinations - (1) Male influencing male, (2) male influencing female, (3) female influencing male, and (4) female influencing female. Respondents are asked to describe their attitude towards the manipulator (friendly-unfriendly, pleasant-unpleasant,considerate-inconsiderate, and cunning-straight), and towards the behavior (aspect of morality, negative effect to the organization, and willingness to behave in a similar way).

Contrary to popular belief, the experiment shows that men and women are guided similarly in matters of power and politics based on the perceived effect of situations on their gender group. Thus both males and females perceive manipulators of their own gender more favorably, consider manipulating a person of the opposite gender less immoral compared to manipulating a person of the same gender, feel manipulating a person of the other gender less detrimental to the organization, and prefer to exert political influence over the opposite gender. These findings also indicate that both males and females consider gender to be a meaningful affiliation group.

The paper proposes that similar studies be undertaken to test attitudes towards organization politics among other affiliation groups such as work units, or professional groups.

We feel that certain aspects of the paper can be improved. The paper cites some issues about organization politics in relation to women during formulation of hypotheses, raising expectations that these issues will be addressed subsequently; these are not followed through. For example, the authors’ suggestion that this study challenges the stereotypical view that women accept male superiority at work, or that they are discriminated against, is unsupported by the experiment design. Similarly, the citation that males indulge more in organization politics as compared to women is not assessed by the instrument design. It is suggested that future research explore these assertions as well.

[submitted by Nidhi Sharma, Ph D Scholar, 2017]

The Ethics of Organizational Politics

[Gerald F. Cavanagh, Dennis J. Moberg and Manuel Velasquez (1981), The Ethics of Organizational Politics, AMR, 6(3) (Jul) 363-374]

The objective of the paper is to develop a normative model of ethical analysis that can be helpful in determining the ethical quality of political use of power within organizations. Power in organization is described in the paper as the ability to mobilize resources, energy, and information on behalf of a preferred goal or strategy [Tushman, 1977] and power is assumed to exist only when there is conflict over means or ends [Drake, 1979; Pfeffer, 1977].

The paper has also drawn distinction between political and non-political use of power. Non-political uses of power are those that involve approved means are used to achieve approved end. Political uses involve when unapproved means, or approved means are used to achieve unapproved or unjustified ends. Paper also highlights the difference between management theory and normative ethics. Management theory tends to focus on 'end justifies the mean'. What a manager should do is determined by the desirability of the consequences of the activity and not on the activities, processes and quality of the behaviors used to achieve that outcome. Normative ethics help to reduce the ethical uncertainty surrounding the political use of power. 

The proposed model in this paper integrated three kinds of ethical theories: Utilitarianism, Theories of moral rights and Theories of justice. Utilitarianism requires a decision maker to select decision which results in the greatest good for the greatest numbers. There are two types of PBAs (Political behavior alternatives) that are typically judged unethical:

(1) when personal goals are preferred at the expense of the societal goals, and

(2) when comparatively inefficient means are used to achieve the desired ends. 

Theories of moral rights assert that fundamental rights of the human beings should be respected in all decisions. Moral rights are like the right of free consent, right to privacy, right to freedom of conscience, right of free speech, and right to due process. One only needs to avoid interfering with the rights of others who might be affected by the decision. Theories of justice require decision of the decision makers to be guided by equity, fairness, and impartiality. Three types of moral prescriptions:

(1) Distributive rules: Individuals who are at equal or similar position should be treated similarly, and individuals who differ in some respect should be treated differently.

(2) Principles of administering rules: Rules should be clearly stated and declared publicly.

(3) Compensation norms: First, individuals should not be held responsible for matters over which they have no control. Second, individuals should be compensated for the cost of their injuries by the party responsible for those injuries. 

All the decisions of the organization taken under the political use of power should be examined under these three ethical criteria. Any ethical criterion is overridden if any significant factor exists to justify that. These factors are called overwhelming factors or situational factors. These overwhelming factors are (1) Conflicts between criteria and Principle of double effect: The good effect is important enough to permit the bad effect. (2) Conflicts within criteria and (3) Lack of capacity to employ the criteria: First, when Decision maker is in partial control of a certain decision and thus unable to employ a specific ethical criterion. Second, when decision maker fail to employ a certain ethical criterion due to a lack of adequate information. Third, when decision maker has strong and reasonable doubts about the legitimacy of an ethical criterion. 

In these cases, decision can legitimately be excused from adhering to that criterion.

[submitted by Anjali Sain, M.Phil Batch XLI (2017)]

IN SEARCH OF EXCELLENCE by Tom Peters & Waterman

Various organizations continuously strive for getting best results in the market but even after following hardcore strategies only few company emerges as real winners. What factors make these few companies to get an edge over others, is very aptly described in this book. One of the classic work of Tom peters and Robert H. Waterman “IN SEARCH OF EXCELLENCE” is a widely quoted book on organizational effectiveness. 62 American companies were analyzed and their findings were reported with great insights. From the research of these companies an intelligent approach to organizing was developed known as Mckinsey 7-S framework. Companies which got qualified as excellent companies shared some very basic traits like best efforts for customer satisfaction, employees were treated as assets, organizational culture was flexible enough to account for required changes and at the same time was very strictly controlled. Eight such traits or principles were followed by these excellent companies and the same are very nicely described in this book. The findings of this book suggests that companies which were stamped as excellent prioritized simplicity over complexity in various organizational processes. This book is a must read to understand how these excellent companies performed simpler task in most effective way to turn them into their competitive strengths.

[Reviewed by Gautam Kumar who is a student of M Com at the Department of Commerce, Delhi School of Economics]

The Secret of joy in work is contained in one word – EXCELLENCE. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it. A Company can survive in the long run only when it is unique in whatever activities it performs. What sets great businesses apart? To answer this question Tom Peters & Robert H. Waterman, undertook a research project into the best run companies in the US. This was their search of excellence.

Their results provide a model of eight core principles for excellence that are narrated in a very simple and convincing way with tons of examples. Principles discussed in the book like ‘close to the customer’, productivity through people, benefitting from the management that is hands on and driven by values, considering employees as a source of quality make the book a good study of successful businesses as they continue to be very important even today. The authors are successful in proving  how crucial people are to business success. The model of excellence provides only the general framework but not the benchmark that will apply forever. Still it is one of the all-time classics of business management and a must read to get useful insights into the management theories and evolution.

 

 

[Reviewed by Kamaldeep Kaur Sarna who is a student of M Com at the Department of Commerce, Delhi School of Economics]