Organizational Change - Essay Example

The Architecture of Change by Erik Van Slyke Summary: It does not take only technical leadership and methodology to implement the change successfully. The methodology generally considers all change to be the same which is actually not the case. Change has to be implemented in a diverse environment and upon the stakeholders who differ in their concerns towards the change. However, methodology does play in an important role in change management in that it lays down the design objectives and the course of action that would minimize the inconveniences and improve the efficiency of the process of change implementation.

However, it is important to keep modifying the original plan in accordance withy the growing objectives of the project. Technical issues can be dealt with expertise while others require the managers to make use of emotional intelligence to control the matters. In a vast majority of cases, both occur together in the change implementation cases. Flexibility is the key to success in change management. Certain adaptive and technical competences are vital to be successful as a change manager. These competences have been presented in this article after a thorough analysis of past research pertaining to the subject.

Change science is fundamental to bringing about the behavioral change in the workforce. It enables the leader to define the objectives, tasks and milestones in a way that is conducive for higher motivation in the workforce. Change art is required to manage the factors that are driven by behavior and emotions. Change leaders can get to know their initiatives more clearly using change art. Change art collects information from the surroundings, evaluates it and generates useful information for the change leaders so that they may realize the measures needed to raise the motivation of workforce.

Change art places more emphasis on behavioral goals than technical goals and hence, may compromise upon technical specifications as deadlines and milestones. The art makes schedule useless because of its extreme flexibility and biasness towards behavior. The lack of structure in change art draws the change leaders’ attention towards contextual cues so that they understand the actions that need to be taken to raise the morale of the workforce for bringing about the change. The adaptive strategies ingrained in the use of art make the change leaders good managers of resistance.

The improvisation allows managers to modify the original plans as per the need of the changing circumstances so that the change remains relevant, and proves beneficial for the organization if brought. The Architecture of Change educates a change leader on all skills that are normally required for bringing the change. Quite often, managers fail to apply a technique rationally, and thus, it does not work for them. Finally, art needs to be integrated into science in order to introduce the change.

In the process of change introduction, implementation and management, art is as important as the science. Art handles the behavioral aspects of the process whereas science deals with the technicalities involved therein. These elements need to be balanced in order to implement the change successfully. References: Slyke, E. V. (2010). The Architecture of Change. Human Resource Executives Online – Story. pp. 1-4.