The Heart of Management Change - Essay Example

?Management INTRODUCTION Change leadership has evolved as an inevitable managerial dimension in the 21st century context with the increasing influence of globalization and modernization. To gain a comprehensive understanding regarding the practical mechanisms and the challenges faced by modern leaders in implementing change leadership, the two steps taken into consideration from the book titled “Heart of Change”, written by Kotter and Cohen, are step 7 advocating the notion ‘Don’t let up’ and step 8 discussing on the philosophy of ‘Make Change Stick’ (Kotter and Cohen 30). The inferences drawn by Kotter and Cohen (30) in the referred two steps will further be related with the leadership traits observed in Jack Welch’s strategies to manage transformation within General Electric (GE) during the recent two decades. Assessing the leadership strategies in accordance with the two steps described by Kotter and Cohen (30), it is expected that this assignment will be helpful in rewarding an in-depth and more specific understanding to the challenges as well as mechanisms associated with change leadership practices. THESIS STATEMENT The assignment intends to give a detailed account of the learning obtained from step 7 and step 8 explained by Kotter and Cohen (30). Subsequently, taking the example of GE’s change leadership strategies practiced by John Welch, the discussion henceforth will aim at identifying the key issues related to the practical implementation of the steps mentioned. DISCUSSION a) Learning and ideas obtained from steps 7 and 8: The most interesting point in the step 7 was observed in relation to the fact that the leaders of large scale do not try to achieve all their determined goals at once. Instead, they make frequent changes until the ultimate vision is obtained successfully through a step-by-step procedure. Additionally, the information revealed by Kotter and Cohen (30) in step 7 that people who attempt to accomplish the goal at once, tend to quit too early, which increases the chances of strategic failure (Kotter and Cohen 30). Correspondingly, step 8 connotes an interesting view that the tradition is a strong force. This step focuses that the successful changes made within the organization are often very delicate than imagined. The most important learning obtained with reference to this step explained that if the changes are not properly made in the organization, it will result to a great loss for the business, which essentialises nurturing organizational culture (Kotter and Cohen 30). b) Difficulties in the implementation of the steps 7 and 8: During the implementation of the step 7, the major problem that would arise is the proper scheduling of tasks on the basis of priority owing to the influences of multiple factors including resource requirements, barriers as well as complexity. Preparing a well planned schedule may therefore be quite difficult in the implementation of step 7. Again, according to step 8, changes within an organization should be implemented in alliance with the prevailing organization culture, by continuously nurturing new values and principles, which in turn shapes the new culture (Kotter and Cohen 30). However, from a generalized point of view, it can be argued that initially aligning the new vision with the existing culture and steadily cultivating a fresh culture might prove quite time consuming as well as a costlier approach to change implementation. Hence, implementing skillful employee orientation through an emotive motivational approach and simultaneously, avoiding disregard to the existing culture might prove quite challenging and thus, require high quality leadership competencies. c) Discussing how Jack Welch effectively addressed the steps in his management of change at GE with examples: John Welch, after being absorbed as the Corporate Executive Officer (CEO) of GE, strategized a chain of innovations in the business in the technical and the operational dimensions primitively. Welch thus emphasized increase in productivity and continuous enhancement of quality of the service. The company decided to remain at the leading position by investing in its research and development functions so as to implement innovation in a systematic procedure. For instance, in 1994, Welch launched a new strategic plan aimed to reduce its dependency on traditional industrial products. It expanded its service business in the field of medicine as well, to mitigate market risks and fortify its goodwill in the global context. It developed medical equipments such as MRI devices, CT scanners and several other medical tools subsequently. Later, Welch also expanded GE’s business functions in the field of aircraft engines (Bartlett & Wozny 1-24). Hence, step 7 was successfully applied in GE’s change leadership practices, focusing on a well-organized chain of innovations. The successful implementation of change in GE’s culture can further be understood with reference to step 8. In the mid 1980s, Welch decided to form a team of managers with the determination to instill a new culture and adjust to the changes made within the organization efficiently. In his course of implementing change and nurturing a new culture, Welch rendered due significance to maintain the traditional qualities of simplicity and self confidence within the organization. Even though the process took considerable time, it rewarded success to the CEO in cultivating a new culture (Bartlett & Wozny 1-24). d) Recommendations as to how Welch could have implemented the steps more effectively: Welch had implemented the step 7 an effective manner, while managing GE. But the company also had to witness certain failures in its strategic change application such as the high attrition rates followed by the coaching mechanism implemented by Welch based on the notion of carrot-and-stick motivation. However, as the organization was in a changing process, the application of Don’t-Punish-Failure approach in the coaching process could have been more beneficial in reducing perplexity within the workplace (i.e. a commonly witnessed challenge in change implementation) and accordingly, encouraging greater participations from the employees to achieve the set stretch targets. Again, following the guidelines of step 8, one major challenge faced by the company in nurturing the new culture were the prolonged effects of cultural shock flowing within the newly restructured organizational structure. Hence, it would have been suggestible that both restructuring and cultural change could have been implemented alongside or Welch could have rendered adequate time for the cultural shock to settle within GE, prior to the implementation of step 8. CONCLUSION From the study of GE’s case example, it can be observed that changes in the organization culture are substantial influenced by the qualities of the change leaders. Farsightedness, evaluative nature and focus in attaining the determined objectives are few of the most essential characteristics required by change leaders to facilitate better organizational performance undergoing transformation. The key factors associated with GE’s success was certainly the competencies of Jack Welch as a change leader that can be apparently observed with reference to the learning obtained from steps 7 and 8. Works cited Bartlett, Christopher. A & Wozny, Meg. “GE's Two-Decade Transformation: Jack Welch's Leadership.” Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing, 2005. Print. Kotter, John. P & Cohen, Dan. S. “The Heart of Change.” Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2002. Print. Read More