Some people want to be successful but do not understand what goals they need to set or how they may achieve them. Also, in some companies, there are severe issues that violate their success and need to be eliminated. This course taught us about change management and its effectiveness in solving a company’s problems, changing its status, and achieving goals. The purpose of this paper is to tell about the most compelling topics learned in the course and describe how participating in discussions helped my understanding of the subject matter. Also, some approaches that could have yielded additional valuable information will be suggested.
To begin with, I need to admit that participating in discussions was rather helpful as truth is born in a dispute. When we discussed change management models, expressed our opinion, and shared our thoughts, there came an additional understanding of the topic. Moreover, when I spoke out loud about my idea about change management, I could realize I was wrong about something and corrected myself. While learning about critical change management models, there were two of them that seemed to me rather motivating and worthy of note. The first is Lewin’s change management model that consists of three stages.
The unfreezing step refers to the perceptions and process and is about “analyzing every step and human interaction for potential improvements, no matter how in-depth you have to go and how much you need to unearth” (“Change management,” 2019, para. 3). This step is vital as all the commonly accepted mistakes and the company’s existing bias have to be eliminated at this stage so that they are not a hindrance on the way to changes.
Moreover, after that, the perspective that is needed to get rid of the problems’ roots and causes instead of their symptoms appears. Besides, another reason for me to admire this management model is that it demonstrates that it is crucial to care about the company’s team and employees. This unfreezing step is a perfect opportunity for them to realize what are the drawbacks of the current process, why it has to be changed, what modifications are the best, and what advantages they may bring.
The second step, making changes, refers to deploying the approved changes and guiding the company’s team. At this stage, extra training and education, support, and communication are of great consequence because it will ensure that any transition challenges are limited, and all the issues are addressed. The final step is to refreeze the new status, in other words, to ensure that everyone follows the new rules and that all the changes will now disappear. It is compulsory to carry regular reviews, reward those employees who coherently keep to the new model, and update and check all documented processes.
The other change management model that impressed me is the ADKAR model that was created by Jeffery Hiatt. It is “is a bottom-up method which focuses on the individuals behind the change” (“Change management,” 2019, para. 6). This model is aimed at helping people to understand, set, and reach their goals. According to Mulholland (2017), “to manage change successfully, it is, therefore, necessary to attend to the wider impacts of the changes” (para. 2).
The ADKAR model suggests focusing on accomplishing five goals and can be used to effectively understand plan out the needed changes on both an organizational and individual level. These goals are awareness of the necessity to change, desire to support the team and participate in the change, knowledge on how to do that, the ability to implement compulsory behaviors and skills, and reinforcement to sustain the change.
As for the additional approaches that could have helped during the course and yielded valuable information, I have just one suggestion. In my opinion, it would be rather useful to create severe management situations in classrooms and ask the students to imagine themselves change managers. This approach would provide us with additional experience, and we would have to come up with plans, use the information about the models, and do our best to suggest an effective solution.
References
Change management: Making organizational change happen effectively. (2019). Web.
Mulholland, B. (2017). Eight critical change management models to evolve and survive. Web.