Organizational Change

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Recommended: Contemporary issues in managing change

Organizational Change

Organizations today are going through constant change brought about by

competition, economics, business innovation and a realization that

remaining stagnant may mean organizational death. As the business

environment increases in complexity and changes rapidly, organization

and management consequently experiences significant transformation to

cope with these changes. On a micro level (company level), these

changes would include the transformation of the internal corporate

culture as well as enhancements in the management of human resources

in response to increasing workplace diversity and the evolving needs

of the workforce. Therefore, the ability to change is an important

part of the organization's business environment while the ability to

help it adapt to change is equally a critical business challenge for

the leadership.

Change is imperative

Organizations can't escape change. So what is change? - It is

adjustments, transformations, transitions, and revolutions which is a

never-ending cycle of birth, growth and death (Topping, 2002). Change

disrupts everyone's life; the only question is for how long.

Leader - the change agent

When an organisation is at the crossroad of change, it is in the

crisis stage. DuBrin (1989) defined crisis as a turning point for

better or worse, or a situation that has reached a critical phase.

When a company is in a crisis, it requires decisive and bold

leadership to identify, isolate and manage the crisis (Topping, 2002).

Leadership now requires very different behaviour from the leadership

tradition that we were used to. It requires leaders who are able to

speak to...

... middle of paper ...

...kills: A leadership wake-up

call, Available: http://www.selfgrowth.com.html, (Accessed: 2004,

April 8).

Robbins, S.P. (2002), Essential of organizational behavior, 6th ed,

Prentice Hall. New Jersey.

Sarantos, S.T. (1994), Managing change by creating a synergistic

environment, World Wide Web ed, Vol. 7, no. 11, Available:

http://www.league.org/publication.htm, (Accessed: 2004, April 8).

Schein, E.H. (1995), The leader of future, Working Paper 3832, MIT

Sloan School of Management, Available: http://dspace.mit.edu,

(Accessed: 2004, April 13).

Stoner, J.A.F. and Freeman, R.E. (1989), Management, 4th ed, Prentice

Hall, New Delhi.

Tichy, N.M. and Cohen, E. (2002), The leadership engine, 2nd ed,

HarperCollins Publishers Inc., New York.

Topping, P.A. (2002), Managerial leadership, McGraw Hill, New York.

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