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60 ORGANIZATIONDEVELOPMENT

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s you have no doubt experienced, achieving change is difficult. This story of organizational change at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch has likely been replicated at countless organizations. While it may be tempting to blame the leader and to dismiss failed attempts as yet another example of poorly managed change, it is beneficial to understand what happened in situations like this one and what other explanations are possible. They can teach us about where attempts at change go wrong and how organizational change should be managed differently.

As we have discussed in previous chapters, organization development (OD) was primarily concerned early on with incremental changes that organizations could experience through interventions that targeted individual development. In recent years, with an emphasis on organizational effectiveness, OD has directed attention toward larger-scale and strategic change. Organizational change is the context (and purpose) of OD work, and a key competency of OD professionals is understanding

the nature of organizational change, including what factors help to make changes succeed and what factors cause them to fail. In this chapter we will explore the nature of organizational change, including how researchers and practitioners think

about change. We will explore the levels and characteristics of changes that organizations seek to make, and we will look at the research and writings of scholars and

practitioners that develop theoretical models for how changes occur, as well as the fundamental issues that make changes successful.

To do that, we will also delve briefly into organizational theory. We will discuss two ways of looking at organizations: as systems and as they are socially constructed. The organization-as-system model has evolved from general systems theory over the past 50 to 60 years. Organizations-as~socialJy-constructed is a relatively more recent evolution of organizational theory, becoming prominent in the past 20 to 30 years. While they are contradictory in some respects, containing SOllie

fundamentally different assumptions at their core, both of these ways of looking at organizations offer useful and different insights. They both suggest approaches to organizational change that can help practitioners as they interpret how to best help a client achieve change in a particular organization. As yOll learn about these perspectives and models of organizational change in this chapter, keep in mind the practical challenges faced by those that lead organizational change.

You may be wondering why we need to delve into such theoretical detail just to understand how to manage organizational change at a practical level. The answer is that our approach to change depends on the underlying assumptions and beliefs that we have about how organizations work. In other words, "The way change facilitators think about causes of change determines how they contract, assess, intervene, and evaluate during their interactions with client organizations" (Olson & Eoyang, 2001, p. 7). AJ; we have noted in previous chapters, it is important for OD practitioners to be conscious and intentional about the choices they make and to avoid adopting an intervention or model simply because it is fashionable. By learning more about the assumptions behind the models, you will be a more thoughtful and successful practitioner of organizational change.

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Chapter 4 Foundations of Organizational Change 61

Levels and Characteristics of Organizational Change

When we talk about organizational change, we are referring to many different kinds of changes that occur at many levels. Changes can occur at the individual level when people learn new skills or develop new ways of working through mentoring, coaching, or education and training. Changes can occur at the group or team level

as teams develop new ways of working with one another, define their goals and objectives. and learn ways of addressing conflict. Groups can also learn how to work more effectively with other groups (intergroup change) to solve problems or address interdependencies. Changes occur at the organizational level through the development of new strategies and processes, visions for a new desired future, and

major system practices that affect all organizational members. Changes can also occur at suprasystem levels, where multiple organizations are implicated. These can involve changes, for example, between multiple organizations (such as mergers and acquisitions), between organizations and government agencies, or between cities,

states) or nations.

Practitioners and scholars have noticed that organizational changes differ on a number of dimensions. Changes vary in several ways:

1. Planning. Organizational change can be planned or unplanned. Organizational members can be conscious and intentional about the changes that they want to make, often due to environmental factors, strategic or market needs, or other influ-

ences. Changes can also be unplanned, perhaps in response to an immediate threat or crisis. Weick (2000) contrasts planned changes with emergent changes, which are the "ongoing accommodations, adaptations, and alterations that produce funda-

mental change without a priori intentions to do so" (p. 237). Organization development as a field has primarily been concerned with the successful implementation of planned organizational change (Beckhard, j 969) or intentional change programs developed intentionally to improve the organization or address a deficiency.

2. Magnitude. OD literature differentiates between first-order and secondorder change (Watzlawick, Weakland, & Fisch, 1974). First-order change consists of "incremental modifications that make sense within an established framework or method of operating" (Bartunek & Moch, 1987, p. 484), and second-order change is defined as transformational changes that "are modifications in the frameworks themselves" (Bartunek & Moch, 1987, p. 484). Firstorder changes tend to be alterations or changes to existing practices rather than a rethinking or reinvention of the practice. Implementation of a computer system that simply automates existing work practices is an example of first-order

change) where existing work practices are modified within t.he existing understanding of how the work is done, maintaining its current purposes, objectives, and processes. First-order change reflects an evolution of existing definitions rather than a revolution or redefinition. Rethinking how the entire organization

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used the computer system, including redefining roles, processes, values, and implicit meanings, would be considered second-order change. Because secondorder change tends to reflect a more substantial shift, some refer to this type of change as "organizational transformation" (Bartunek & Louis, 1988). Chapman (2002) writes that, historically, most OD models reflect concerns with firstorder change rather than second-order change. Others refer to differences in magnitude of organizational change by the labels transactional or transformational (Burke & Litwin, 1992), evolutionary or revolutionary (Burke, 2002), and incremental or tmnsiormationai (Kindler, 1979).

3. Continuity. Weick and Quinn (1999) distinguish between episodic and continuous change. Episodic change is defined as distinct periods of change, usually infrequent and explicitly defined. When seen in this way, episodic change is usually framed as a response to a stable cond.ition in which adverse conditions are present that force a change. Continuous change, on the other hand, reflects the idea that the organization is never truly out of a state of change, and that even in minute ways, change is always occurring.

Models of Organizational Change:

Systems Theory and Social Construction Approaches

Scholars and practitioners have developed a number of models to explain how change occurs. Some of these models are based on years of empirical research, whereas others are based in practitioners' experiences of witnessing and implementing change in organizations. These models explain change differently based on different underlying theoretical assumptions about organizations, people, and work. In the first section, we will examine systems theory and models of organizations and organizational change that share systems theory's assumptions; in the second, we will discuss the social construction perspective and models of organizational change consistent with that approach.

Organizations as Systems

The first lens that we will use to look at an organization is as a system. Systems theory can be traced to an Austrian biologist, Ludwig von Bertlanffy, who wrote a series of books and articles beginning in the 1940s (see Bertlanffy, 1968) about the systemic interconnections of the natural world. Living organisms and the physical environment, Bertlanffy noted, displayed interconnectedness among their various parts. Fruittrees under stress due to weather conditions such as drought or extreme heat, for example, produce less fruit in order to conserve energy. General systems theory, according to Bertlanffy, was about understanding the characteristics of these natural systems and the underlying laws that defined their interconnections. Rather than investigate only the subparts of these organisms in isolation from one another, general systems theory tried to understand how the subparts related to one another.

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Within these systems, certain functional specialized roles and procedures exist to aid the system in functioning properly. Production workers, for example, work on a specific component of the assembly process. Managers and executives help the system's parts to function effectively and monitor the feedback from the internal and external environment. Procedures help the system to reproduce its processes in standardized ways. The overall organizational system also consists of a variety of interconnected subsystems that depend on one another. For example, the factory depends on human resources to hire and train employees properly. The entire system depends on finance to pay employees, to provide budgets used to purchase raw materials, and to collect money from customers. These departments exist as subsystems within the overall organizational system.

Open systems thinking is the process of considering how people, processes, structures, and policies all exist in an interconnected web of relationships. Systems thinkers see the whole of an organism or organization as larger than the sum of its parts, and as systems that exist within other systems of which they are a part (Burke, 2002). Mayhew (2006) writes that systems thinking is about analyzing the organization on three levels: events, patterns, and structure. Whereas events are single occurrences of an episode, patterns are the multiple and repetitive "archetypes" (Senge, 1990) that allow events to happen in the same way time after time. These patterns exist in structures that support and reinforce them. Systems thinking, as Senge describes it, consists of seeing the interrelationship of structures and components rather than simple and "linear cause-effect chains" (p. 71). Correcting organizational problems requires systems thinking rather than simple linear thinking (A caused B to happen) in order to solve the root of the problem rather than

correcting the immediate, surface-level symptoms of the problem (asking questions such as "What caused A? Are there other causes?"). In other words, it requires analyzing structures and patterns rather than isolated events.

Systems theory has been a popular approach in organizational studies because it resonates with how we understand organizations to work at the most general level. Organizations produce something-whether it is a product, such as cars or breakfast cereal, or a service, such as financial consulting or providing Internet access. Changes in the environment, such as legislative or regulatory changes, cause organizations to adapt to new rules. Poor quality inputs lead to problems in transformation processes and result in poor quality outputs. Erroneous information in the feedback process creates unnecessary or problematic changes in the system. Aspects of the system are interdependent on one another, and problems in one part of the system create problems in other parts of the system. These statements about organizational systems provide a commonsense explanation for how organizations and their subsystems seem to us to work.

The Value of Systems Theory for 00 Practitioners

For OD practitioners, systems theory offers a number of benefits. First, it can offer useful explanations for human behavior in organizations with attention to roles and structures rather than individual idiosyncrasies. Instead of seeing individual differences, 00 practitioners can note where systems may encourage certain

Chapter 4 Foundations of Organizational Change 65

behavior patterns, usually subtly and without conscious decision. If a call center regularly measures the number of calls completed per hour, then call-takers may be motivated to quickly complete calls at the expense of careful diagnosis and resolution of customer problems. Service managers may be motivated to dispatch replacement parts for customers via overnight mail (thereby inappropriately increasing expenses) in order to increase customer satisfaction (for which they will receive a bonus). The measurement and rewards system in both cases directs a certain behavior on the part of call-takers and service managers. Narrow job definitions and roles in one division may result in no employee taking responsibility for a certain problem as employees act in accordance with what the system has asked them to do in defining the role they occupy. Structured role definitions can explain how and why certain people interact with each other in patterned ways (for example) the emergency room nurse may take instructions from the attending physician). The systems theory perspective helps us see role-based interactional patterns rather than isolated actions of single individuals.

Second) understanding the system and its dynamics gives OD practitioners a more appropriate place to begin interventions for change) since the object of change is generally the system, not the individual person (Burke, 2002). For example, inad-

equately maintained or broken equipment can reduce factory output levels. Instead of blaming the production manager's poor management skills for low factory production yields, or placing blame on factory workers for slow work, the systemic issue is a more direct cause. When an organization has unhappy customers due to a quality problem) instead of conducting training for customer service representatives on how to deal with angry customers, the quality problem should be addressed as the source of the problem. Katz and Kahn (1966) wrote that this attention on training

was a common error in organizations-and little change results from it:

It is conunon practice to pull foremen or officials out of their organizational roles and give them training in human relations. Then they return to their customary positions with the same role expectations from their subordinates) the same pressures from their superiors) and the same functions to perform as

before their special training. (p. 390)

An organization that fires an unproductive employee and hires a highly paid) skilled replacement often discovers that the new employee is no more successful because the role exists in a structure (say, low budget, little decision-making authority)

where virtually no employee could succeed. As Senge (1990) puts it, "When placed in the same system) people) however different) tend to produce similar results" (p, 42). OD practitioners can delve more deeply into the causes of problems and interconnections among groups) looking at systemic problems rather than at individuals or individual components of the system as the primary sources of error (Harrison & Shirom, 1999). This can lead to more fruitful targets for change.

Third, because changing one part of the system also results in changes to another part of the system, OD practitioners can be more deliberate about changes that are being proposed, and possible negative results can be predicted. If bonuses are given to sales executives who sell a certain product) the factory likely will need to produce

Chapter 4 Foundations of Organizational Change 69

Transformation processes have been expanded in the congruence model to include four important elements that relate to one another: task, individual, formal organizational arrangements, and informal organization. The task component encompasses the work to be done, but also the skills and knowledge required to do it and

the degree of independence or judgment required. The individual component includes employees' knowledge and skills, engagement and motivation, preferences

and attitudes, and other influences on individual behavior. Formal organizational arrangements include explicitly defined processes and organizational structures. job definition, metrics, the physical layout and environment, and other officially specified aspects of the work. Informal organization is defined as the less explicitly defined or tacit understandings, processes, methods, and norms that comprise how

work is actually done.

Together, these four elements are defined as the primary components of the organization. They interact together in more or less consistent ways as the organi-

zation produces its outputs. Nadler (1981) writes abont a fundamental notion of the congruence model:

At the core of this systems-based perspective is the assumption that the interaction among the organizational components isperhaps more critical than the characteristics of the components themselves, and that as systems, organiza-

tions fundamentally work better when the pieces fit together. (p. 194)

Nadler and Tushman (1983) refer to this as the "congruence hypothesis;' or the idea that the better the congruence between components) the more effective the organi-

zation. "Whenan organization has a market demand to produce a new product (new input and new output), that demand requires a specific task to produce the output. If the task's demands require skills and knowledge that individuals do not possess, then there will be a congruence gap (or low "fit") between task and individuals.

Organizational effectiveness can only be achieved if the fit is increased.

The model points to areas that affect one another so that changes in other parts of the system can be noted and controlled. Nadler (1981) explains that when parts of a system are changed, they may increase or decrease the "fit"or

congruence with other parts of the system. When change happens, other components of the organization may resist the change and encourage regression to the prior state. Thus, Nadler points to the need to motivate change (tile individuaJcomponent), manage transitions, and pay attention to political dynamics of

change as well.

The Burke-Litwin Model of

Organizational Performance and Change

Burke and Litwin (1992) praised many of the models of organizational change that had been developed up to the early 1990s, bnt they also saw them as overly

simplistic. Many of these models had real-world proven ntility and had been

developed from practitioners' own experiences. Some prior models could not, however, predict the impact of an organizational change with certainty on other

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diagnostic recommendations in the practitioner literature (e.g., Harrison & Shirom, 1999). This approach can be enhanced, however, by another perspective, to which we now turn.

Organizations as Socially Constructed

The story goes that three umpires disagreed about the task of calling balls and strikes. The first one said, "l calls them as they is." The second one

said, "I calls them as I sees them." The third and cleverest umpire said,

"They ain't nothin' till I calls them."

-Simons, 1976 (cited in Weick, 1979, p. 1)

A second view of organizations is a more recent evolution in organizational theory, and it offers a different perspective on change than the models we have just seen. The intellectual history of the idea of social construction in organizational studies is usually traced to Berger and Luckmann's (1967) seminal work The Social Construction of Reality, and it has been particularly influential in organizational theory over the past three decades. Consider that in our everyday language, or even in texts such as this OIle, organizations are frequently personified as actors in their

own right. We speak of working "in" an organization, thinking of an organization as a container or physical environment. We speak of organizations "adapting" to their environment) or the production department "deciding" to increase output. Classical organizational theory actually considered organizations to be "living things" with "a concrete social environment, a formal structure, recognized goals)

and a variety of needs" (Wolf, 1958, p. 14). Yet organizations are not people, and a nwnber of important ideas are obscured when we personify them.

The social construction view argues that organizations are not exactly things at all) but that the organization is really a concept developed out of our own

actions and language. Some scholars suggest that the study of organizations is really the study of the process of organizing, with the verb form emphasizing the

active role we take in creating our organizations. If you consider an organization that you know well and try to point to what "it" is, you may point to a building to show where it is located or show an organizational chart as an abstract repre-

sentation of how that organization is structured, but you will not have pointed to the organization. (The building could still exist without the organization, for

example.) Drawing boundaries between the organization and its environment

can be an equally challenging exercise. Consider the city in which you live as an organization and try to delineate what is "inside» and what is "outside" it. There is city hall and its employees, but what about the citizens, or those who do busi-

ness in the city but live in another, or the developers who built the local shopping

maJl? Are they to be considered part of the organization as well, or do they belong in the environment category? From this perspective) the boundary between the organization and its environment is not a sharp or easily defined one, and can even sometimes be fluid from interaction to interaction. Weick (l995) writes that

Chapter 4 Foundations of Organizational Change 75

,t environment and organization conceal the fact that organizing is about flows, change, and process" (p, 187). The terms organization, boundary, and environment in systems theory become more complex and perhaps Lessmeaningful when we

start to delve more deeply into how to define them.

The view of organizations as socially constructed differs sharply from the systems theory perspective in many respects. It challenges the prevailing assumptions

of systems theory that organizational environments, inputs, processes, outputs, feedback, and so on, are self-evident concepts and categories with predefined singular meanings on which we all agree. Instead, it sees those concepts and categories as created, developed, and infused with meaning by organizational members. The quote above about baseball umpires illustrates the primary difference between systems theory and social construction. In systems theory, the process of pitching to a

batter, calling balls and strikes, and tallying outs and so forth would describe a subprocess in a baseball game. While accurate on its surface, it omits the process of constructing meaning (defining what count as balls, strikes, and outs) from an umpire's perspective that actually creates the possibility of the game existing (imag-

ine if all umpires agreed to refuse to interpret a pitch!).

As a second example, let's return to the illustration cited previously about the automobile factory and feedback processes, where information such as sales revenue figures fed back into the factory tells them to build more cars. The revenue figures

themselves, as numbers, mean nothing on their own. Instead, they must gain meaning through the process of interpretation. An organizational member (a manager or

executive, presumably) must interpret the sales figures and decide (based upon

a preexisting agreement, past experience, or even just a hunch) that the numbers mean that enough cars have been sold that additional inventory will be needed. Here, it is the manager's interpretation and judgment that give the data meaning for the organization. Indeed, an incredible amount of information exists in organiza-

tional environments that must be given meaning (think, for example, of the competitive landscape, Wall Street expectations, financial performance, past history of the firm, union agreements and employment conditions, customer expectations,

and much, much more). To say, as systems theory does, that the environment specifies how the organization must act to achieve equilibrium omits the process of making and creating meaning, and developing and sharing interpretations, that explains

how and why organizational members decide to take action. (Not.ice how few organizational members are mentioned in the descriptions of systems theory.) One

could never gather all relevant information before a decision. Instead, information is selectively gathered, made sense of, and shared to create a socially constructed

truth that organizational members will use for decisions and action (March, 1994). The category ofvenvironrnent" is thus invented and invested with meaning by organizational members, and it does not exist outside of their interpretation. Weick (1995) calls this concept sensemaking, which he defines as "placement of items into frameworks, comprehending, redressing surprise, constructing meaning, interacting

in pursuit of mutual understanding, and patterning" (p. 6).

Interactions and language are important areas of attention in the social construction perspective because it is through regular interaction and dialogue that organizations are developed and through which change can occur. As Benson

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(1977) wrote, "People are continually constructing the social world. Through their interactions with each other social patterns are gradually built and eventually a set

of institutional arrangements is established. Through continued interactions the arrangements previously constructed are gradually modified or replaced" (p. 3). Thus, sensemaking is an ongoing process, not something with a defined beginning or ending (Weick, 1995). (This idea reinforces the value of OD discussed in the pre-

vious chapter that organizations and individuals are always in process.)

The social construction perspective has become an attractive one for both researchers and pract.itioners because it resonates with what we experience in organizations as we make sense of our activities and the actions of others. It also respects the ambiguity a~d multiple meanings that many organizational members experience and the necessary interpretive processes that characterize much of organizationall.ife. Decisions are considered and rationalized based on complex and contradictory facts. Roles are negotiated and enacted, not predetermined by

job descriptions. Press releases and executive communications are scrutinized, debated, and examined for hidden meanings. We leave conversations with colleagues to begin other conversations, sharing information and interpretations in each conversation. Multiple contexts and facts can be brought to bear on any situation to result in ambiguous and inconsistent interpretations. For many students

of organizational studies, the social construction perspective fills in the missing

elements of systems theory to provide a richer and more dynamic view of how organizations work. It describes how members experience organizations as social environments where interaction is fundamentally how work is accomplished and sensemaking is how it is understood and experienced. Particularly in less mechanistic, manufacturing-oriented environments, in today's knowledge-intensive

organizations, the machine view of organizations assumed by systems theory seems less accurate when applied to the globalized and fragmented "postmodern" organization of the 21st century. Many believe that the social construction approach more effectively captures this new reality (Bergquist, 1993).

The Value of the Social Construction

Approach for OD Practitioners

The social construction perspective has gained a following among organization development practitioners because it offers several unique benefits. First, like systems theory it offers a useful (but different) explanation for human behavior. it explains why, for example, organizational members would be less wiUing to take risks after witnessing a layoff in another division in which risk taking was common. Perhaps a logic has been developed in which members believe that taking risks means that losing one's job is likely.As a second example, consider that perhaps an executive decides to terminate a product line that is losing money. Instead of seeing this as a one-dimensional decision based on input from the environment, the social construction perspective helps to articulate the complexities in collecting, interpreting, and sharing the information used to make and communicate the decision. The social construction perspective directs the OD practitioner's attention to the cultural processes of sensemaking that result in action.

Chapter 4 Foundationsof OrganizationalChange 77

Second, the social construction perspective emphasizes the active role that members take in creating the organization. Members may decide to create a new department, change a structure, adopt new titles, or change a process. While an individual member may not have the choice to change a certain policy, the policy

is one developed by organizational members and created for the organization's benefit. Relationships among supervisors and employees are not confined to rigid role-based interactions, but are multidimensional and can be friendly, cold, formal, sociable, and so on. Relationships between coworkers or departments are

more complex than simply sharing orders or instructions between them, and can be cooperative or contentious, relaxed or rigid. The social construction perspective illustrates the active choice that we make in creating these systems and relationships. This implies that OD practitioners should create situations in which people can choose a different organization to create, such as new policies, processes, roles, or relationships. Accepting this adaptability gives practitioners and organizational members the freedom to create changes that they desire to see (within boundaries, frequently, that we also agree to respect). While this does not deny the importance of leadership in change or the financial or environmental realities, it places an equal emphasis on everyday conversations that occur in the

organizational network between all participants.

Third, the social construction perspective helps OD practitioners to see the importance of communication in creating change (Ford & Ford, 1995):

Stories, myths, rituals, and language use are not simply reflections of organizational meanings; they are the ongoing dynamics that constitute organizational life, Meanings, then, do not reside in messages, channels, or perceptual filters. Rather, they evolve from interaction processes and the ways that individuals make sense of their talk. (Putnam, 1983, p. 40)

Words and their context are important, and the interpretive processes that we use to make sense of words often go unexplored. Consider a situation in which an organization, under financial pressure and rumors of layoffs, is required by law to send out an annual benefits notice to all employees. The notice states that following an involuntary termination, employees are eligible for continued medical benefits for a length of time following termination. From the perspective of the human resources benefits department, this is an ordinary compliance activity, but from an employee's perspective, it could be alarming to receive such a notice unexpectedly mailed to one's home considering the context. OD practitioners can become attuned to context, language, and interpretation mechanisms a,nd help organizational members become more explicit about their interpretations. They can under-

stand the context for interpretation of any particular message and make better recommendations about how communication will be received. Ford and Ford (1995) write that communication is not just another part of change, but it is the primary means by which change occurs.

Finally, the social construction perspective stresses that organizational change has as its foundation a change in meaning. Sensemaking logics lie beneath values, beliefs, and attitudes, as well as organizational practices, identities, and processes.

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Simply changing a practice, a role, a title, or a department name does not always change the underlying interpretive processes that members have adopted. Consequently, the approach assumes that change can best be accomplished when organizational members have the opportunity to work together to define new prac-

tices (Weick, 1995).

Models of Organizational Change

Consistent With a Social Construction Perspective

Models of organizational change consistent with a social construction perspective look quite different from those explained earlier that are consistent with a systems theory perspective, as they recognize that change is a "messy" and unpredictable phenomenon (Shaw, 1997). Calling them "models;' in the sense that we have just seen, is also misleading, because they question the very structures that systems theory assumes. Instead of locating organizational change in categories such as leadership, strategy) or rewards, the social construction perspective explains change as a change in interpretive mechanisms, conversations, communication, meaning, and cognitive schema. In fact, the very idea of organizational change is rethought in this perspective. Weick (2000) argues that "the breathless rhetoric of

planned transformational change, complete with talk of revolution, discontinuity, and upheaval, presents a distorted view of how successful change works" (p. 223). He argues that most models contrast change with inertia, whereas if we recognize that organizations are never really in inert states at all, we become more interested in the ongoing "ebb and flow" (p. 230) of organizational life.

As Ford (1999) points out, what constitutes a change is ambiguous and can mean different things to different people. Most change models tend to presume that

a change is a single, easily identifiable phenomenon that members could point to and identify as «the change." Most practitioners and organizational members, how-

ever, recognize that change has multiple parts, some of which mayor may not be successful, and that these have multiple meanings for various audiences. A widespread organizational change affects different employee groups in different ways, so a single definition of the change may not be possible. Instead, as we have learned, the social construction approach is interested in what the change means to people, recognizing that this meaning may shift and adapt at various points in time. Consequently, social construction approaches to change tend to emphasize continuous change rather than episodic change, privileging the role of language and dis-

course in change (Weick & Quinn, 1999).

Ford (1999), for example, argued for a defmition of organizational change as "shifting conversations," in which people use different language to understand their reality.When change occurs) it does so "when one way of talking replaces another

way of talking" (Barrett, Thomas, & Hocevar, 1995, p. 370). Ford and Ford (1995) describe four different kinds of conversations that occur during organizational change: conversations that initiate change, conversations that seek to understand change, conversations for performance, and conversations for closure. This model can explain how, when change does not proceed as expected, certain conversations may not have taken place at all, or may have taken place unsuccessfully.