literature Review

The following is an excerpt from:

Barnard, M. and Stoll, N. 2010, ‘Organisational Change Management: A rapid literature review’, Centre for Understanding Behaviour Change, University of Bristol, UK.

Resistance to change

Fundamental to the success of organisational change is the acceptance of the change by employees. Within this context, the work of Kubler-Ross (1973), who argued that all humans go through 5 stages of ‘grief’ (denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance) when faced with a loss or change, has been seen as relevant and has been applied to the management of organisational change. Wiggins (2009) uses the model to help guide communication and support during the period of change, which she suggests should be tailored to the stage of change that the employees have reached. For example, after the news of change is delivered, employees need to be given information to tackle their denial. Once the information has sunk in and they experience anger, bargaining and depression hey require various kinds of support. Once employees have begun accepting the situation they need a vision to put their commitment into.

Others take a more individualist approach to studying resistance to change, arguing individuals reactions are highly complex and vary greatly. One advocate of such thinking is Shaul Oreg who proposed that resistance to change is based both on personality and also the context in which the change occurs. In his initial study (2003) he developed and tested a scale called the “Resistance to Change Scale” (RTC) which he conceptualised as a stable personality trait. In his following study he found a positive and significant relationship between the individuals’ RTC score and their affective and behavioural resistance to a particular organisational change they were subject to.

As well as personality determinants affecting the level of resistance engendered by organisational change, Oreg also found that context variables played a significant role. Trust in management was found to have a particularly strong effect on affective, cognitive and behavioural resistance, a finding that emphasises the importance of good management skills throughout a period of change. However, the study also found that an increased amount of information given to individuals about the change resulted in a worse evaluation of the change and an increased willingness to act against it. This last finding led Oreg to propose that there might be an optimal amount of information that can be given, after which employees feel overwhelmed. He also hypothesises that if the change has negative implications for the individual it would not be surprising if hearing more about the change

increased resistance to it. This finding again highlights the important role of management, in this case regarding their communication strategy. It could also be argued, in line with emergent theory and OD advocates, that to make successful decisions about such issues an in-depth knowledge of the strategy, structures, personnel and culture of the organisation is required.

One strategy for reducing resistance in employees mentioned frequently in organisational change literature is to involve the employees in the change or to empower them to make changes themselves. Empirical studies have supported the efficacy of this strategy for successful implementation of change, especially within the public sector (Warwick, 1975, Denhardt and Denhardt, 1999; Poister and Streib, 1999). However, employee involvement alone is not sufficient with managers still playing a critical role encouraging and rewarding innovation and expressing support the change (Thompson and Sanders, 1997). Bruhn, Zajaz and Al-Kazemi (2001) concur with this view, advising organisations that the involvement of employees should be widespread and span all phases of the change process, but also emphasising the importance of a supportive and engaged management team.

Kotter and Schlesinger (1979) proposed a more emergent view to tackling employee resistance, stating that the circumstances of the change and the content of the change itself will vary largely between organisations and that this should determine the appropriate response. They outline a number of approaches from education to coercion, describing who and when to use them to reduce resistance, and details the advantages and drawbacks of each.

It is worth mentioning at this point that in terms of strategies for addressing change it may be useful to consider the different personality ‘types’ that employees may correspond to. There is a vast literature on personality types, and a number of widely used tests for determining which type an individual is (see for example Myers 1998 and Bensinger 2000), though these are not without their critics. From an organisational change point of view, it is worth considering whether a particular set of employees might be more likely to be a particular personality type and adjust the change management strategies to reflect that. It is likely, however, that any set of employees will encompass a range of personality types, which implies that a range of different strategies may be needed, and that at an individual line management level, managers need to consider carefully how an employee might react to change.

Note: the Reference List has been omitted from this example.