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Opinion, Silinganiso Moyo
DUE to the rise in internationalisation and competition, change management is inevitable for organisations.

Every organisation will go through this process at some stage in their endeavours to adopt and embrace new systems.

Change management is the process that organisations go through when they prepare the entire organisation from individuals or teams to discard the status quo in order to achieve new anticipated and desired goals. This reality is corroborated by a management expert Peter Drucker who once said “A perfect balance in a business exists only on the organisation chart. A living business is always in a state of imbalance growing here and shrinking there …”

Managing change will never be easy even when it is properly timed. It is always an excruciating experience which, however, every leader must endure for an organisation to continue to grow and remain viable. Organisations must assist employees to adjust their mind-sets in order to achieve the desired change. The propensity for employees to defend the status quo will always be a hindrance to any desired change. Management must consider the countless problems that may result if such highlights are ignored at the workplace.

Although change may be effected to achieve set organisational objectives and to improve livelihoods, employees may reject the change at the onset without considering the possible positive outcomes of a change programme. People would rather remain in an unpleasant situation than venture into the unknown, which might be pleasant.

Organisations therefore need to concentrate on developing three employee mind-sets to overcome this stumbling block:

Systems thinking: A recognition and understanding that all organisations are open systems, requiring an integration of all organisational systems.

Process consulting: An appreciation that it is a human resource role to help internal clients deal with reality during any change management so that employees find solutions that will work and leave ownership of change with all employees.

A project mind-set: An adoption of the principles and approaches of project management so that the change adds most value to the business.

During change, leadership must be convinced that there is congruence and commitment within their teams.

Leaders must do away with the notion of having followers as this portrays a picture that the leaders are the ones who know everything and solutions reside in them, whilst others are just followers.

Leadership is working together with those who will implement the change. Organisations should not embark on change programmes because other organisations are, as this could be detrimental to the entity.

Some new bosses have a tendency of unnecessarily overhauling their teams and systems because of the old adage “a new broom sweeps clean”.

Any effective change management should encompass the following steps.

There must be a clear need for change communicated to all stakeholders.

The change must be planned for and implementers involved at this stage. There must be the implementation of the anticipated change. Reviewing processes and stages to ensure the change is sustainable

Targeted benefits should be the ultimate intention. Change must be incremental even if the situation is desperate for solutions. Many organisations have shot themselves in the foot by importing change formulas that are not compatible with the current business environment in Zimbabwe and their organisational internal systems.

Organisations must apply contingent thinking that will allow them to think about the cause and effect outcomes.

While it’s good to benchmark, every organisation is unique in its own right and therefore must implement changes that will sustain their competitiveness. Leadership must appraise the capabilities and responsiveness of their teams first and then move to implement change that will complement the organisational strategy.

Charles Darwin once said “It is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change”.

It is common for employees to resist change for various reasons and this is normal for any human being. The onus is therefore on leaders to be enthusiastic and able to convince everyone how and why change will be implemented.

Leadership must be honest and fair in their dealings with team members. Some organisations will only deal with individuals and selected departments forgetting that an organisation is a system only discovering later that they blundered.

Every employee needs to be apprised of any organisational changes whether they are affected directly or indirectly as synergies would be vital at some point. Organisational silos will retard any smooth transition of a change programme.

Leadership must understand that change unsettles people and to a certain extent may distort organisational systems and worse if the change is radical.

This calls for management to be tactful in their approach and make sure all the loopholes are dealt with in order to achieve the intended results.

Proper planning will make the entire change management process easy to articulate and manage.

Genuine consultation and communication are the key factors for effective change management programme to succeed.

Rushing through the programme without checks and balances will be harmful to an organisation intending to implement any change.

Silinganiso Moyo is a consultant with Dispute Resolution Consultancy (D.R.C) (Pvt) Ltd; a Labour Law and Talent Management Consulting Firm.

She can be contacted on 0772238496; email [email protected]