Lewin’s three stage model of change is broken down into; unfreezing, changing, and refreezing (Pennsylvania State University, 2017). These stages serve as a framework of understanding how change needs to be implemented. Let’s look at the unfreezing stage to understand how it can be approached for better odds of success.

Organizational change needs to be planned (Pennsylvania State University, 2017). It might be tempting to just rush right into change but planning ahead for helping people change is important. People don’t like to be forced to do anything let alone change something they are already comfortable doing a certain way.

Unfreezing people is not without its challenges. Employees are creatures of habit who need to be warmed up to the idea that change might actually be better (Huppke, 2015). When our company was purchased by a much larger company last year everyone on the team had to come to grips with the fact that change eminent. I was truly shocked at the negativity around the office. People compared the new company leader to Hitler and other dictators. However, the more benefits the new company provided the more people started to like the idea of being a member of the new team.

If we were to step back in time and I had a voice in this matter I would offer some advice to the executives. One idea would be to hand out fun merchandize to people in the office. Help people see this as an exciting new time and an opportunity to be a part of a fun company culture. Don’t expect people to change, help them unfreeze by feeling that this new world could be even better than the old one.

A leader who can plan for change will have better luck unfreezing people. Getting a workforce ready to move forward is important and by offering a small glimpse of a brighter future people will be more open to changing. Don’t just tell people that change is good, show them.

 

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References

Huppke, R. (2015, June 06). Good ways to break bad habits at work. Retrieved February 13, 2017, from http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/careers/ct-work-advice-huppke-0608-biz-20150605-column.html

Pennsylvania State University (2017). Lesson 01: Introduction to Leadership in a Global Context [ ]. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1826457/modules/items/21654115

 

Which comes first, organizational learning or individual learning? “Some have argued that the question of “who” learns is a great myth in organizational learning”. (Seagal and Horne, 1997) “Organizations don’t really learn. Organizations are comprised of individual people. There is no such thing as an organization…learning simply refers to the processes of thinking and remembering that take place in any given individual’s mind.” (Moran, Abramson, Moran, 2014)

I submit organizations learn as individuals within the organization learn and therefore both happen simultaneously. The differentiating factor however, is that the organization and the individual are not learning the same thing at the same time or at the same speed. For example; I can observe someone facilitating a meeting with a small group and learn how that person; engages individuals, speaks to topics, manages time, etc.; then mimic that behavior in my own meeting. Whereas, if an organization holds a meeting (e.g. Town Hall) while it may fundamentally follow the same/similar process, could involve thousands of people, be broadcast globally, require translators and have dozens of people behind the scenes playing key roles necessary to execute such a meeting. As an individual, it is unlikely for me to observe the primary character in said meeting and then go replicate the event due on my own due to its overall complexity.

Both meeting types can be learned yet, since the larger scale of a town hall format may require dozens of people in order to execute, it is the organizations learning that makes it possible. Suppose one person leaves the organization and is replaced by someone new. It is the organization that has learned how to operate the town hall meeting and a new individual will have to learn the process and culture of the organization.

Bandura’s explanation of how people learn by watching others (Bandura 1986), also got me thinking about how I learn. If you consider basic learning styles including; visual, logical, verbal, physical, aural, social and solitary; these styles provide additional insight into how an individual might optimize learning through self-awareness. While each of us have a combination of styles, one or two are likely dominant. For me personally, I am a very visual learner (pictures, images, and spatial understanding) and a physical learner (using my hands, body and sense of touch). This ties back to the basic idea of social learning is captured in the name itself (Moran, Abramson, Moran, 2014); and arguably places a premium on the individual to be keenly aware of his/her style in order to achieve the best learning.

In “A social cognitive theory of personality” (Bandura 1999) Bandura talks about “The self-system” (aka; self-awareness) where “personal factors are very much involved in regulating attentional processes, schematic processing of experiences, memory representation and reconstruction, cognitively-based motivation, emotion activation, psychobiologic functioning and the efficacy with which cognitive and behavioral competencies are executed in the transactions of everyday life”.

These things coupled with the basic differences in cultural learning styles (Moran, Abramson, Moran, 2014) whereby comparative cultures such as European, American, Chinese and Japanese each have preferred learning styles and processes; make for a challenging yet dynamic scenario for global leaders.

Given the complexities around a single topic such as “learning” and considering a global leader must be; aware of their personal learning style; able to chart a new course for the organizations’ learning style and influence existing cultural learning styles, one might argue that it indeed takes a special brand of leadership to teach an organization to unfreeze, change and refreeze. (Lewin 1952)

 

 

Bandura, A. (1999). A social cognitive theory of personality. In L. Pervin & O. John (Ed.), Handbook of personality (2nd ed., pp. 154-196). New York: Guilford Publications.

Burnes, B. (2004), Kurt Lewin and the Planned Approach to Change: A Re-appraisal. Journal of Management Studies,

Moran, R. T., Abramson, N. R., & Moran, S. V. (2014). Managing cultural differences. London: Routledge.

Seagal, S. and Horne, D. Human Dynamics: A New Framework for Understanding People and Realizing the Potential in Our Organizations. Waltham, CA: Pegasus Communications, 1997.

 

The last time I heard Sheryl Crows “A Change would do you good,” was walking through the closing sale of my local Blockbuster.

Looking back at that day, I remember it for not feeling at all bad that Blockbuster was closing its doors for good, and that I used it to clean them out of all the Merchant/Ivory period pieces that I could.  Oh, it’s that Remains of the Day for 3 dollars? Sold.

The Blockbuster chain was truly an MNE, with stores all over the world, it changed the movie business entirely; making the video rental market thrive, it was blamed for the fact that summer blockbusters had to become bigger and badder by the summer or lose business to rentals, and tv networks panicked pushing the boundaries of television stories.

And yet, the company did not see a reason to change after all they held control of the market.

That is until a year 2000 when Reed Hastings, took a proposal to Dallas, in hopes of saving his fledgling company. Blockbusters would offer to buy his company, a company that was being done in by the price of postage and the replacement of broken DVD’s.

Blockbuster turned Netflix away at the door.  But then Netflix saw something that it adapted to its business model, by creating something akin a professional and private YouTube in which people would pay to stream the videos directly into their homes.  It turned the entertainment business on its head.

Blockbuster had also seen YouTube, but thought nothing of it but an innovation for sharing cat videos.

The last Blockbuster closed on January 12^th 2014.

If there is a company that exemplifies this week’s chapter on change, adaptation and learning is the story of Blockbuster.

Netflix now is worth 28 Billion dollars, which is about “Ten times what Blockbuster was ever worth.” (Satell, 2014)

And one of the things that brought down Blockbuster was their own business model.  Its growth had been so vast, at one point, that when growth slowed, rather than looking around for the reason and tackling it, they turned to late fees to carry their business.

“Netflix had certain advantages.  By eschewing retail locations, it lowered costs and could afford to offer its customers far greater variety.  Instead of charging to rent videos, it offered subscriptions, which made annoying late fees unnecessary.” (Satell, 2014)

Blockbuster, rather than gathering outside data, looked inside to solver their problems, but the world was changing a clipped pace and their technology was quickly becoming obsolete. They had gone through such a change before however, when VHS, their bread and butter, gave way to DVD’s, why did they believe that it couldn’t happen again?

By the time Blockbuster started their own DVD subscription business, they were in crisis change, “a situation where a company’s performance has declined substantially either because of poor products and or services, a poor competitive strategy, or an inability to drive the strategy because of inconsistency between strategy and the company’s internal capabilities.” (Moran, Abramson, & Moran, 2014)

But Blockbuster had warning, even Hastings, in the conference in Dallas told them this was the way of the future.  That while he didn’t have the resources to carry the weight on his own, someone would see this was the way to go.  Someone did, but it was not Blockbuster.

Let that be a lesson to all business people, to always stay curious, always be on the lookout, always be “reinventing,” your business and yourself; and if someone comes to your door with a creative opportunity, do not turn it away so easily, question it, is this a solution to a problem you haven’t thought about yet.  If the answer is YES, adapt it quickly to your business, or someone else might.

 

Works Cited

Moran, R. T., Abramson, N. R., & Moran, S. V. (2014). Managing Cultural Differences. London: Routledge.

Satell, G. (2014). A Look Back At Why Blockbuster Really Failed And Why It Didn’t Have To. Forbes, 23-26.

Many senior executives know this and worry about it. When asked what keeps them up at night, CEOs involved in change often say they are concerned about how the work force will react, how they can get their team to work together, and how they will be able to lead their people. They also worry about retaining their company’s unique values and sense of identity and about creating a culture of commitment and performance. Leadership teams that fail to plan for the human side of change often find themselves wondering why their best-laid plans have gone awry. Yet companies will reap the rewards only when change occurs at the level of the individual employee. No single methodology fits every company, but there is a set of practices, tools, and techniques that can be adapted to a variety of situations.

The saying “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” is something everyone hears when change is on horizon. When Shein’s (1980) planned theory arouse, it derived from this very idea that people are resist to change.  His theory encompasses three main stages to enact change, in essence teaching an old dog new tricks. Stage 1 – becoming motivated to change, known as the “unfreezing” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017), the learning phase. This phase of change is built on the theory that human behavior is established by past observational learning and cultural influences (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017) and utilizes three essential mechanisms. The first mechanism is “Disconfirmation is the process of showing organizational members that their current behaviors or attitudes are incorrect, and that continuing to behave in those ways will not only harm the organization, but themselves as well” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017). People will react to what they see and hear around them, and need to be involved in the change process. Highly visible rewards, such as promotion, recognition, and bonuses, should be provided as dramatic reinforcement for embracing change just as dogs react to the barrage of treats when they learn a new trick. Now that previous beliefs now being seen as invalid, “anxiety or guilt in organizational members will motivate them to change their behavior” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017) the second mechanism to this stage. And the final mechanism is “creating psychological safety” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017).  This safety net is utilized in order for those in the process of change, to see the new behaviors as those that will cause less anxiety therefore viewed as positive solutions to their old behavior.

Stage 2 of Schein planned change theory is that change what needs to be changed, unfreeze into a new state.  “Once that positive end goal has been established, change is possible” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017). Once there is sufficient dissatisfaction with the current conditions and a real desire to make some change exists, it is necessary to identify exactly what needs to be changed. Three possible impacts from processing new information are: words take on new or expanded meaning, concepts are interpreted within a broader context, and there is an adjustment in the scale used in evaluating new input. “The official message from the organization is only one source of information. That is why going back to stage one and creating the motivation to change is so crucial; it becomes easier to control the message if everyone sees the need for change in the first place” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017).

Stage 3 – making the change permanent, “refreezing” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017) or the maintenance phase. Refreezing is the final stage where new behavior becomes habitual, (no treats necessary). However, “It is important to note that just because people show the changed behavior once or even a few times, that does not necessarily mean that it is a permanent behavior. They can regress to the old ways if that supportive environment is not present” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017). So keep the treats and clicker handy!

“Change process involves learning something new” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017) while “unlearning something that is already present and well integrated” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017). Company culture is an amalgam of shared history, explicit values and beliefs, and common attitudes and behaviors. Change programs can involve creating a culture (in new companies or those built through multiple acquisitions), combining cultures (in mergers or acquisitions of large companies), or reinforcing cultures (in, say, long-established consumer goods or manufacturing companies). Understanding that all companies have a cultural center — the locus of thought, activity, influence, or personal identification — is often an effective way to jump-start culture change. No change program goes completely according to plan. People react in unexpected ways; areas of anticipated resistance fall away; and the external environment shifts. Effectively managing change requires continual reassessment of its impact and the organization’s willingness and ability to adopt the next wave of transformation. “The leader must motivate people in the organization to want to change (by overcoming the perception of threat and pain). Help them unlearn old behaviors, help them learn new behaviors, as well as make sure that there are support system (infrastructure, training, people, etc.) to make sure the change actually goes beyond lip service” (Penn State, Planned Change, 2017).

References

Pennsylvania State University (2017). Leadership in a Global Context –Learning and Change in a Global Setting, Organizational Change. OLEAD 410. Online course lesson, Penn State World Campus, The Pennsylvania State University. Retrieved February 11, 2017, from

https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1826457/modules/items/21654115

Pennsylvania State University (2017). Leadership in a Global Context –Learning and Change in a Global Setting, Planned Change. OLEAD 410. Online course lesson, Penn State World Campus, The Pennsylvania State University. Retrieved February 11, 2017, from

https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1826457/modules/items/21654116

Learning from other people, picking up bad habits as well as good ones seems to be a deliberate action according to our Lesson and Albert Bandura. As naturally social creatures we help each other and we also learn from each other, (PSU, WC, L.4, P2). Modeling, a certain type of social learning identified and coined by Albert Bandura is so practical, easily implementable and effective; organizations have put this into action for changing work environments (PSU, WC, L.4, P2).

Modeling in a social environment allows for creativity in addition to learning from others, (PSU, WC, L.4, P2). The person or group learning replicates certain actions but also exhibit modification based on their own experiences and desires, (PSU, WC, L.4, P2). These socially learned behaviors happen in a four step process proposed by Albert Bandura, which involve attention, retention, reproduction and motivation (PSU, WC, L.4, P3). In this case I would like focus on social learning from an organizational perspective, in which groups adapt to meet changes in the work environment. Keeping up with technology in an organization is very critical in the world we live in today.

In my own experience; I have worked for the government for most of my adult career in some way, shape or form. My current official title is a Financial Systems Analyst. My directorate concentrates on a debit card program that is owned by the United States Department of the Treasury and is fiscally managed by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and proliferated and implemented by us for the different military branches of service.

I am responsible for the direct management of the program for the continental United States, my colleagues are responsible for Europe, the Southern and Western parts of Asia and the Gulf Cooperation Council, GCC area, which is a fancy way of saying the Middle East. The U.S. government as a whole tends to keep up with the latest in technology. As a directorate, as a small part of the military industrial complex, we have had to change our mind set as an organization to come up with better, more efficient ways to run programs through technology for the U.S. government. As a group it can sometimes be hard to agree on how this can be done.

Some argue that it is the individual who learns in a group and not the organization as whole but according to R. Moran, people tend to learn differently in a group, people appear to think in conjunction with others and with the help of culturally provided tools. Look up the word organism, you will find varied definitions but one definition I found at Dictionary.com had to say an organism is: any complex thing or system having properties and functions determined not only by the properties and relations of its individual parts, but by the character of the whole that they compose and by the relations of the parts to the whole. This is not a far cry of what a business organization is made up of or how it functions and the end state is to do it together because one person, one piece cannot.

Electronic commerce is an initiative that has been directed to us from as far up the chain as the President of the United States. Where we had free reign to change as much or as little of the program as we decided, collectively we are now obligated to come up with more cost efficient ways through technology to administer the governments programs across the board. The status quo is no longer accepted in these parts. There had to be a total change in mind set starting from the top tier of management to the lower echelons of personnel. Unfortunately, sometimes this change even meant getting rid of personnel that were no longer suited or had the capacity to lead us into the 21 century.

This is what it has come to in big business and sometimes it is not so nice. Technology is essential to every business, even if they are not considered a “technology company”. To compete in today’s business world, keeping up with the technology “Joneses” is important. It is now part of the social fabric of our lives. The issue is not necessarily the technology itself but how to systematically keep up with it in efficient ways.

References:

Pennsylvania State University, World Wide Campus (2017). OLEAD 410 Lesson 4: Global Communication. Retrieved on February 8, 2017. https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1826457/modules/items/21654116

Moran, Ph.D., R. T., Abramson, Ph.D., N. R., & Moran, MA, S. V. (2014). Managing Cultural Differences; Ninth Edition. Chapter 4: Global Leaders Learning from Others and Change. New York, NY, USA: Routledge: Taylor & Francis Group.

 

In my career and personal life, change has sometimes been a difficult notion to embrace, as I’m the type of person who, once organized, likes to stick to a fixed schedule and not veer off into uncertain territory. For the most part, this resistance is derived from my fear of ruining the established practices I have set, as I make an effort to find an efficient way of doing something, then stick to doing it that specific way as to not upset the balance I have achieved. However, outside circumstances can sometimes force our hand and make us change our ways, lest we risk self-inflicting harm or hardship by refusing to adapt to a situation. This same conundrum can be expanded outward towards businesses and organizations that find themselves in situations where they need to find a way to change or risk losing money, employees, or even the organization itself.

Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) explain that “if a company’s performance starts to go downhill, good personnel may begin to leave in search of better opportunities. Banks and financial institutions either don’t want to lend to companies doing poorly, or the rates they charge become higher and higher as the company’s credit rating declines”. So what is a company to do to bring about change on an organizational level? Some organizations are turning towards a practice known as gamification in order to motivate their employees and direct them towards specific goals or behaviors, and I believe that this practice can be used to instill the structural change needed to help a business adapt in our ever changing world.

So what exactly is gamification? Gamification is the “use of game mechanics and game design techniques in non-game contexts” and it “applies to non-game applications and processes, in order to encourage people to adopt them, or to influence how they are used” (mashable.com, 2017). In simplest terms, the practice basically entails “pretending” a task is a game (or a part of a game) and once that task is completed you are given a reward (this all takes place in the abstract world of one’s mind usually supported by a visual representation like an app or game board). Technology writer Sarah White (CIO, 2016), explains that “the concept of gamification operates under the same science as video games, which are specifically designed to activate human reward centers”. An example of this would be, that I need to make ten phone calls to vendors in order to gather product information, I would view each of these ten phone calls as a step on a journey I am on, and once those ten calls are completed I have succeeded in my journey and have thus earned a “badge” of honor.

Applying gamification towards organizational change would help in the changing process as motivation is a key part of getting individuals to adopt a different way of doing things. White (CIO, 2017) explains that “some workers are motivated by achievement, others by power, some by a feeling of affiliation with a group or a sense of competence”, and gamification can be utilized and modified to align with each of these personality types. A business could utilize a leaderboard that shows each individual’s progress in adopting a new sales strategy, or an app that rewards participants with a special badge for each employee training course they complete that correlates to a specific change to the business. I know for me personally, having a system that tracks my process would be an interesting twist to learning a new business practice, and would be preferable over simply being told to perform a task differently. While I am one that is hesitant towards change, I love games and competition, so seeing the change through that lens would be helpful in my motivation. Moran, Abramson, and Moran (2014) explain that “organizations don’t really learn. Organizations are comprised of individual people. There is no such thing as an organization. The term is just a short-hand for groups of individuals working together in a division of labor”.  With this in mind, while gamification may not be a cure-all to provoking employee motivation (and easing the pain that comes with change), it certainly is a viable option that should be considered with any organization that wants to encourage motivating their employees.

References

Mashable.com. (2017). Gamification. Retrieved on February 11, 2017 from http://mashable.com/category/gamification/

Moran, R., Abramson, N., and Moran, S. (2014). Managing cultural differences. (9th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.

White, S. (2016). How to use gamification to improve employee engagement. CIO.com. Retrieved on February 11, 2017 from http://www.cio.com/article/3143955/gamification/how-to-use-gamification-to-improve-employee-engagement.html

The topic of social learning can be viewed in so many different ways and interpreted in the same manner. We can easily say that we are our own person and that we all learn differently which could very well be true. However when we look at society we can see how our environment can shape our behavior. With social learning, we learn by watching others and how they behave, Bandura in one of his articles he mention how people produce and are products of their own environment. When I comes to scenarios like this I always think of how people act when they grow up in certain areas. On a global setting this can be a challenge to global leaders because of the different cultures from around the world that as leaders we have to sensitive to.

In order to learn we have to make sure that the culture doesn’t feel offended by the way we deliver the message and make sure that the company interest doesn’t conflict with their everyday lives. Multinational Companies with businesses overseas have this very same issue when operating abroad. However, motivation can be a useful tool in order for people to learn from each other, people see how others are focused either here or abroad and they can feed into the same energy to push themselves. People will give themselves goals and think about the consequences if they don’t execute their plan. Schein mentions that “no change will occur unless there is motivation to change” which I can defiantly agree with. Change has to come from within and consequences of not changing is probably what will drive that change, so with social learning this will also help others do the same.

At the end when it comes to change Schein’s three changes which are freezing, changing and refreezing are stages in which organizations and society can lock in a specific behavior. The ultimate goal here will be to have everyone with a different mindset then in the beginning and freezing it in that stage. This would give someone a clear direction as well as embracing change and learning from one another with all the things that might get introduce during the course of the these stages.

 

 

Bandura. (1996). Retrieved 1996, from https://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/Bandura/Bandura1996SCT.pdf

 

Canvaslearning management system. (n.d.). Retrieved February 09, 2017, from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1826457/modules/items/21654113