4 readings and 4 response to them.. due in 24hrs

READING 1

When attempting to reinforce a new culture of collaboration it is important to consider that there will always be individuals who are reluctant. This reluctance often stems from those employees that feel the need to be recognized and standout from their peers. These employees often discourage collaboration because they are unwilling to share their knowledge and often put their own needs before the company’s. As was discussed in earlier weeks these employees lack congruence and do not allow the organization to take full advantage of it’s intellectual capital.

To counter such a problem it may be beneficial for management to form teams. By establishing teams and assigning team-based tasks individuals who refrain from collaboration would be put in a setting in which they would be required to share their knowledge and experience. It would seem as though these individuals would be unlikely to withhold their knowledge and experience while participating in team tasks because their nature is still one of competiveness and they would likely still strive to be successful.

            According to Katzenbach (2008) establishing a culture of teamwork and collaboration should begin before new recruits are hired. Human resource personnel should not only go through the standard matching process of seeking out recruits based on competency and experience but should pay special attention to examples of how the recruit performed in team settings or how they have demonstrated an ability to share knowledge and assist others. Katzenbach (2008) also states that it is important for organizations to have recruiters who value collaborative individuals and are collaborative people themselves.

            Establishing a culture of teamwork and collaboration also requires a strong mentoring process (DuFour, 2004). A junior employee who is mentored learns early the importance of teamwork and collaboration as their success early on is often determined by the guidance they receive by their mentors. Increasing the number of mentors reinforces the idea of the importance of sharing knowledge through collaboration. Just as in the previous examples organizations should seek to recruit and retain experienced managers that recognize the importance of mentorship and collaboration. Establishing a mentor program with a senior member of the organization who does not fully accept the role will likely have the opposite affect and may demonstrate a culture of individualism rather than collaboration. For this reason DuFour (2004) suggests mentors should be accepted only on a volunteer basis.

            Structuring the organizations reward system to benefit members of teams rather than individuals can also help to establish a collaborative culture. Many believe that individuals should not be rewarded in team-based settings because it decreases the collaborative effort and puts the emphasis back on the individual. By rewarding the team the employees receive reinforcement that collaboration and teamwork are required for success. Not all situations and job types are suitable for team-based work and in these situations establishing some type of profit sharing incentive can still function to increase collaboration. In the case of city employees where profits are not the goal of the organization other types of team incentives such as days off or special recognition could be considered. 

References

Katzenbach, S. (2008). Enhancing teamwork and collaboration in your unit. Innovation

      Insights, 2. Retrieved from

      http://www.psu.edu/president/pia/innovation/insights002.pdf

DuFour, R. (2004). What is a professional learning community. Educational Leadership.

     Retrieved from http://staffdev.mpls.k12.mn.us/sites/6db2e0f-8a2d-4f0b-9e70-

      e35b529cde55/uploads/What_is_a_PLC._DuFour_Article_2.pdf

READING 2

When implementing any changes there will be challenges along the way and concerning an organization’s culture this can be one of the toughest to change. But first, what is organizational culture? It is defined in our text as “the values and assumptions shared within an organization”.  An organization’s culture is the unseen norm within the company, something that is just known and employees continue to work and make use of. It is what makes the company what it is and those that mainly determine what the culture maybe, are those in the top positions within the company. Often times the values of managers and bosses are those that become part of the organizations culture and the employees’ look to those in these top positions for signs of whether particular behavior and actions are acceptable. This is how the culture is created (Time, n.d.).

            However, there is a great challenge with changing an organization’s culture one of the first being, that employees must understand the need for the cultural change. Without some sort of explanation as to why the company is steering towards another culture, many employees may be reluctant to change. This is because they may not trust something they don’t understand. Another challenge would be that the organization may have limited resources and making cultural changes would require time and effort the company may not want to shift towards from areas; areas that maybe more critical to the company at that present time. Also, there maybe challenges with a lack of motivation demonstrated by employees, especially those that have been with the company longer, because for them the need to change would seem futile.

Concerning ways in which to reinforce a new culture of teamwork and collaboration within a city government organization, the organization can begin by firstly placing employees into small teams within different departments. These teams can then begin weekly/daily meetings with “icebreaker” exercises, where fun facts can be shared amongst employees. Or the organization can allocate social events on its agenda throughout the year for employees within different departments such as pot-lock-lunches, sport events, group hikes or even special retreats (Heathfield, n.d.). These events not only are fun, but also help employees to work together and learn more about each other outside of just the workplace, which can help with each teams relationship and overall team cohesion.

Another suggestion would be for the organization to go a more non-traditional route when establishing employee teams, where a mix of employees of different talents and identified strengths are placed into teams. This can include employees of different experience levels as well, where younger team members can help to provide fresh new innovations to the group, but with older more experienced members providing added knowledge from past experiences. This then not only encourages teamwork, it can spark added creativity within the work. environment. Lastly, work stations can also be adjusted within the company to be more group oriented and open, rather than individualized with cubicles and being more private (Murray, n.d.). This then encourages groups to continue making use of each other’s idea/ input and communication can remain constant.

 

 

References

Heathfield, S. (n.d.). How to build a teamwork culture. Retrieved on Thursday, June 19th 2014 from http://humanresources.about.com/od/involvementteams/a/team_culture.htm

McShane, S. and Von Glinow, M. (2013). Organizational Behavior. New York, New York: McGraw-Hill Irwin

Murray, A. (n.d.) How to change your organization’s culture. Retrieved on Thursday, June 19th 2014 from http://guides.wsj.com/management/innovation/how-to-change-your-organizations-culture/

Time, F. (n.d.).What is organizational culture. Retrieved on Thursday, June 19th 2014 from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/organizational-culture-74302.html

READING 3

Resistance to Change

            There are many reasons for resistance to change such as fear of the change, not having been consulted, poor communication, changes in routine, low trust, misunderstanding about the need for change, exhaustion or a change in the status quo (Connelly, 2014).

Most of the time though the resistance is brought on by fear; fear that the employee will lose their job, fear that they will lose pay, or even fear that they will lose seniority. Most of the time these fears can be avoided by proper communication of why the change is being made, who will be affected, what will be changed and why, and what the new responsibilities of each individual are.

There are many ways to spot a resistance in change as well. Some of these indicators are:

•Aggression and anger

•Unusual flare-ups of emotion

•Employees encouraging and mobilizing resistance

•Staff portraying themselves as innocent victims of unreasonable expectations

•Insensitive and disagreeable behavior

•Not meeting key performance areas (missing meetings and not responding to emails, for example)

•Increased absenteeism, late arrival

•Not responding, not listening, seems disinterested

•Active attempts to disrupt or undermine work / projects (Kimball, 2014)

            Two of the main types of resistance that may be portrayed in the case that is presented to us where change in management duties or structure of responsibilities would be failure to meet key performance areas such as missing meetings, not responding to emails promptly, or even not meeting sales quotas.  They may even portray themselves as innocent victims of unreasonable expectations. They may complain that they are being sidestepped or have lost value because of the changes, or that they have been demoted when in reality their duties have changed.

            To avoid these types of resistance the response of top management should be to make sure that the reason for shifting of duties and change is in the best interest of the company and why those changes need to be made. The proper communication as well as involving the managers in the process of change by using their ideas to help make the change possible may make them feel more important and not pushed aside. If attention to this matter is addressed correctly and in a timely manner you can avoid other types of resistance that could be much more hurtful of the company change such as deliberate attempts to disregard work or purposeful disruptions of the change (Warrilow, 2009).

Anger and flare-ups of temper, or the neglect of duties can also happen as a type of resistant that would set a poor tone for the employees who are under the management. This would create more resistance that the company needs to deal with. As a final result to resistance the managers who are not complying may need to be terminated and new managers who are more willing to comply hired in their place (Warrilow, 2009).

            Change can be difficult to many people who have gotten used to the way things operate. If the company addresses the issues that may arise before the change is put into place and uses good communication of what the changes are, who and how employees will be effected and what the end results will be, the process of the organizational change will be much easier for all involved and there should be good results in the end.

References

Connelly, M. (2014). Manage Resistance To Change Proactively. Retrieved 06 19, 2014, from Change-Management-Coach.com: http://www.change-management-coach.com/resistance_to_change.html

Kimball, R. (2014). Frustrated By. Retrieved 06 19, 2014, from Change-Management-Coach.com: http://www.change-management-coach.com/resistance-to-change.html

Warrilow, S. (2009). Resistance to change. Retrieved 06 19, 2014, from Strategies for Managing Change: http://www.strategies-for-managing-change.com/resistance-to-change.html

READING 4

There is always a change constantly, these change might be good or bad depends on the situation and conditions.  In a similar way, the changes in the organization are called as organization change.  According to the Batemen & Snell “change happens constantly and it is unpredictable. Some reasons given for this change include emergence of new markets, new competitors and a shift in the demographics”(2011).  This shows the changes can happen without predictable; it could be happen due to internal conflicts or external conflicts. Having changes in a organization keep interesting and something that employees have to learn constantly.  In the above quotes the author points it out that competitive advantage is dependent on the particular circumstances at a particular time. There is always some things in organization that keeps changing over time, which make employees to seek the new knowledge and keep update with the technology world.

Many authors have quoted the employees resistances to change in the organization and the process of changing.  According to the Peccei, “capacity for change is significantly affected by employee resistance to change”(2011).  The case is presenting shows the two major factors that can affect the resistances in employees. He also points out that resistances can be changed depending on the extend to which the employees see the change to have the beneficial or negative affect on the them or even the organization. This will the is the involved of the employees come into the picture in changing process.

Changes can happen at any given point which includes the good time or bad time for instances, The last quarter sales of the company would be great and the managers are all hyped up and motivated the employees to the limits to get maximum work.  All of the sudden, the employees might receive a notice saying that they are not in charge of the manufacture department anymore, even though employees’ have given their best.  These changes are hard to digest by the employees’ but it even harder to make those decision by the management.  However if the organization demands the change, even management has no say against it except to imply it.

Considering these change can benefit the organization or hurt the organization.  The only way to test is to experiment it, According to the Bateman & Snell, “sudden increase in tuition at the middle of the semester and it is effective starting the beginning of the next semester” (2011). The response to this quiet obvious. Students will wants to know why the increase and why so abrupt. Did senior management of the school just realize the need to increase the tuition? They added that managers or others initiating a change often forget that others have not given it a thought. In this case, senior management has inform the personnel involved and allow time for them to think about the change and prepare for it. There are some basic considerations that senior management can reflect over and much of the resistance from lower level employees will be minimized.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reference:

Bateman, T. & Snell, S. (2011). Management. 2nd edition. New Your, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Peccei, R., Giangreco, A., & Sebastiano, A. (2011). The role of organisational commitment in the analysis of resistance to change. Personnel Review, 40(2), 185-204. Retrieved June 20, 2014 from :

http://search.proquest.com.proxy.davenport.edu/docview/848003993?accountid=40195