Becoming more open to change: recommendations for a change management program

Abstract

Resistance to change is a major problem in today's workplace. Organizations go through change on a regular basis. Unfortunately, whether the changes are minor or major, employees generally resist it. There are many reasons for this resistance, including: fear, habit, or lack of information provided to employees about the change. Whatever the reason, this resistance is felt throughout the organization and can be extremely detrimental to business productivity. Because everyone deals with change differently, it is difficult to help each individual overcome their resistance to change unless we know the specific reason for resisting. The purpose of this project was to develop and analyze an Organizational Change Survey so that types of resistance to change could be defined. Once the main types of change were discovered, recommendations were developed as a guide for the development of a change management program. A full census of 160 Student Life Services (SLS) staff was conducted to best profile what factors make the staff resist change. A total of 58 surveys were returned for an overall response rate of 36%. A survey containing 48 items rated on a 5-point scale was developed for use in the study. In addition to this, each employee's manager was given a rating from that indicated on a scale of 1-5 how well each person dealt with change in the organization. This rating was then correlated with the ratings of the employee survey. The quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics, correlations, and factor analysis. Results revealed the following eight components, which identify the different types of resistance to change: valuing employees, job satisfaction, management style, autonomy, confidence, urgency, anxiety and fear and future job. Of these eight significant components job satisfaction was found to be the most significant component. Further research is recommended with a larger sample and in a different setting to determine the components of job satisfaction and its relation to resistance to change. This information will continue to provide for useful recommendations for a successful change management program.