Given the times, I think the following text can be very useful especially for some of those who occupy leadership roles.
Linda Hoyle, from her experience participating as a consultant in a process of strong strategic change in two organizations, one related to the public health service and the other a private bank, proposes a model that helps lead a process of change and manage the expected conflict, understanding and anticipating the responses of those involved.
From flatterer to spoiler: responses to organizational change (1). Linda Hoyle.
Both in the Bank and in the Health Service, the workers and the senior management team demonstrated different responses to change that seemed to be a source of conflict between groups of people and between the workers and the management team.
The different responses can be represented on a continuum:
Organizational change and its consequences
Flattering response. The term describes a response to change that can be seen as unconditional support without accompanying reflection. The term captures how the behavior of others within the same organization was perceived and expressed by some people. For example, as subservience to the leadership; or also, referring to some managers, who only looked for their own interests.
Thus, in one case, top management behavior could be described as flattering about change. In this case, the top management, responsible for carrying out a change in the way the organization is managed to adapt to the new legal requirements, agreed with the proposed changes. However, it seemed that they did not want to hear any challenge or criticism that workers might have about the changes. Top management seemed to be reluctant to modify their views on how the change should materialize and how to carry it out. They were determined to drive this change without considering the impact it might have on workers.
Positive-committed response. This group of people offered positive support for change. Their attitude was participatory and they creatively thought about how they could influence and help their implementation.
Negative-compromised response. They are people who were against change in principle and offered reasons why they opposed it.
Saboteur response. The term describes a type of behavior where individuals or groups unconsciously try to make change fail. For example, through attempts to end discussion groups (2) or with a passive non-participatory attitude.
The flattering response represents extreme support for change and the spoiling response extreme resistance, yet they are similar in that the source of resistance appears to be that all of these people expressed fear-based anxiety about their personal survival in the organization.
The other two types, less extreme, show a range of responses depending on the degree of support for the change and, in particular, whether people personally supported the proposed change.
Experience showed that people have the potential to "move" from one response to another. For example, in the early stages of the change process at the Bank, some people maintained a negative-committed response. However, when the CEO prevented their concerns from being voiced, they developed a kind of sabotaging response. On the contrary, during the process of change in the Health Service, those with a type of negative-compromised response did not modify their response to a saboteur type because they were given the opportunity to publicize their concerns, even opposition, to the proposed changes.
Similarly, those with a positive-compromised type response had the potential to move into an extreme flattering position. Thus, the attitude of the senior management in the Health Service was positive towards the changes and they expressed their intention to start the process with a type of facilitating and "consultative" leadership. However, when they met with strong opposition from the employees, they admitted that they became more autocratic and tried to impose the changes. Her response seemed to evolve from a positive-committed one to a flattering type. The Bank's director of human resources had the same evolution.
In both cases, the flattering response was fed back into a circular pattern of behavior between employees and managers: For example, it seemed to employees that managers were imposing change (flattering response to change) in order to selfishly favor their own careers, increasing employee anger and hostility towards them. By showing employees such hostility, managers responded by avoiding contact and communication with employees. Which, in turn, not only reinforced employees' initial impression of that kind of flattering management response, but seemed to shift their attitude from a negative-committed initial to another spoiler.
It was also found that if the people involved in the change were offered the opportunity to express their concerns, their potential to maintain a constructive rather than catastrophic attitude towards the change was much greater.
In view of what has been found, it can be argued that senior managers would obtain a benefit if they offered employees an opportunity to communicate, get involved and commit to change in the form of some kind of mechanism that allows them to express their response to change, whether positive or negative, and reduce the chances of "moving" toward a flattering or sabotaging response.
It is important to remember that every adult who faces an anxiety-generating situation (and an organizational change of sufficient substance potentially is) has the ability to move, even temporarily, from a constructive position to another catastrophic one.
There was evidence in both cases that some people remained in extreme positions even when given the opportunity to voice their concerns. These people seemed to focus all their concern on their personal survival in the organization.
All of the above seems to show that, faced with change, there is a connection between the inherent capacity of each person to change, the degree of personal support for organizational change and the final resulting attitude. This idea led to the development of the following graphic model:
Organizational change and its consequences
In conclusion, the findings in the two cases could be used in an organizational change process as follows:
- Use the response continuum as a model when thinking about how people will respond to change Offer opportunities for those with a negative response - committed to expressing their concerns, allowing them to move to a more reflective and constructive one that reduces the tendency toward an answer saboteur. Allow those with a positive-committed response to make a valuable contribution to the content and implementation of change and to reduce the tendency to radicalize. Help change agents (managers-employees-consultants) to accept that there are people with a capacity limited to change and will not move from extreme positions: flatterer - saboteur.
We will now show a practical example of some of the conclusions we just presented.
It is natural and expected that a substantial organizational change will generate internal conflict between employees. The example that the text will illustrate, although somewhat old, has been chosen by the evocative power of the story of its protagonist and because it brilliantly illustrates how a manager can, beyond managing the discomfort created by a process of change, take advantage of it to promote and lead it.
Bolman and Deal (2003) relate how in 1989, in response to an unsustainable loss of competitiveness, at a senior management meeting, the then CEO of Kodak, Colby Chandler launched an ultimatum: they needed a fundamental change or the company was doomed to dissapear.
The top management, based on the agreed strategic decisions and the initial impulse in the change process, decided that all employees should actively participate in its modulation and implementation.
Kodak's first structural overhaul in 100 years was announced at a meeting for all employees. The impact was reduced by ensuring that the initial changes were experimental and that significant changes would occur over a period of six months.
This gave employees an opportunity to model the transformation to fit local working conditions. The reasons for the change were clearly explained and reinforced by management.
Among other changes, several divisions emerged as a result of a structural review. One of these, the Black and White one, had Jim Frangos as director.
Before the changes were implemented, throughout 1989, Jim Frangos planned a series of meetings to listen to the reactions of employees to the planned changes. These are his impressions:
“The first of the meetings was much worse than I expected. Although I had shielded myself for the worst, the amount of anger and hostility that erupted like a volcano caught me by surprise. Many were suspicious and completely distrustful of another desperate attempt by management to save the company. Some were convinced that they were scapegoats for the poor capacity of top management. So during the first month of meetings I resigned myself to being skinned alive while trying to sell the change process and the improvements it would bring. ”
Later, in 1990, Frangos against his inner circle who asked him if he was a masochist, organized a second round of what was now officially called Las Charlas Directas. Frangos knew that even though the changes were taking place, the anger of the employees remained. In the 25 sessions for the 1,500 employees he led, he found people much less concerned with venting, more interested in knowing how things were going and what they could do to be part of the solution to the company's problems.
Two years later, the division exceeded the established economic objectives, was the most profitable division of Kodak and was awarded as one of the best places to work. (Bolman and Deal, 2003).
What did Frangos do?
He perceived the discomfort among the employees and recognized it as natural and understandable. He understood, although perhaps he was not fully aware of it, that they needed a space (a place and a time) to express their anguish and anger. As an authority figure in the organization, he granted them permission to "leave their daily routine" and spend time "vomiting" that anguish.
During the first round of meetings, Frangos had the ability not to rationally try to justify or defend himself from the attack he was subjected to. He, who symbolized and personified the “hated management” for the employees, drew all the criticism and, which was essential, assuming his managerial role, accepted it without “running away”. This provided them with a model with which to face the uncertainty in which the company and the employees themselves were immersed: if they remained firm, and did not run away from their responsibilities (including undertaking the necessary change), the company and themselves, they could survive. All of the above reinforced him as a leader against his team.
He thus led a transformation that made the bulk of those involved allies for change and led his organization to successfully complete its objectives.
On quite a few occasions, a manager, in opposition to what Frangos did, tends to ignore the anguish among his people and supposes that by denying it he will dilute himself.
It seems to me that, very often, this denial is not intentional, but the product of not knowing how to handle the discomfort of people and the manager's own, so much anxiety can be very intimidating! I trust that this article contributes to showing the existence of options that, taking into account people's feelings, are much more effective for the organization and the work entrusted to the manager.
Footnotes
- Linda Hoyle (2004). From sycophant to saboteur-reponses to organizacional change, in Working Below The Surface. London. Ed. Karnac. Translated, extracted and adapted by Javier Fidalgo. Groups formed to give employees a voice and facilitate the intended change process. The author refers to social, moral, ethical preferences, etc. from each person. The expected outcome promoted by the change may be aligned with or contrary to these personal preferences. GBolman and TE Deal. Reframing Organizations. Chapter 18, page 385 et seq. Ed. Jossey-Bass. (2003). Translated, extracted and adapted by Javier Fidalgo Fernández.
