Key Points
Organizational change, at its simplest, is the transition between two points — where you are now (current state) and where you want to be (future state). A good understanding of both is necessary to manage any change.
The success of an organizational change is influenced by three interrelated but distinct factors: content, context, and change management process.
It’s important to recognize that a single change can play out differently at the organizational, group, and individual levels. What happens at each of these levels impacts how the change takes hold in the company as a whole.
What is Organizational Change?
Change is the transition of a person or organization from its current state to its desired future state.
If we break down that statement, we can see it has a lot of implications for our understanding of organizational change.
For instance, in order to transition between two points, we have to have a good understanding of each of these points — where we are now (current state) and where we want to go (future state). Only when we define the starting and ending place for our journey can we gauge the distance between them, which is the gap we need to fill by implementing a change.
It's common to have some uncertainty about these points, particularly about the future state. But we must at least define future success in broad terms to clarify why changing is worth the effort.
The Three Components of Change Success
Success in bridging the gap between our current and future state depends on a variety of things, which we can summarize in terms of three influencing factors:
Content — Why we are changing and what the change solution is
Context — The internal & external environment in which we develop and implement the change
Process — The change management approach we use to implement & sustain the change
Because these three factors have been found to influence the success of any change initiative, we can use these components to develop a comprehensive change management approach and to troubleshoot when things go awry (which they often do!) Let’s review each of them in greater detail.
Change Content — What and Why
Content reflects two things:
Why we need to change, including the rationale and strategic vision for the change
What the change is (e.g., a process, policy, system, practice, etc.)
Rationale and Vision — Why
The rationale and vision in organizational change management are our way of explaining the need for change or why the company must change. 'The Why' of the change defines the gap between the current and future states.
It explains two things:
The problem we need to address by changing (the rationale for changing)
The benefits we will see by changing (the vision for the change)
'The Why' of change is essential because it provides the requirements for developing the change solution. For example, if the goal of the change is to reduce costs, the solution we develop may be quite different than if the goal is to increase quality.
Usually, the rationale and vision for the change are developed as part of the change initiation process. 'The Why' is also a key message in change communication— the one question we will hear more than any other during organizational change implementation is "Why are we doing this?"
The Change Solution — What
"The What" of change is the innovation or solution that we implement to bridge the gap between the current and future states.
The change solution addresses the problems identified with the current state and produces the results or benefits associated with the desired future state.
When identifying the solution(s) we will implement through the change management process, it's important to consider the capacity of the organization, which relates to our context (see below).
Research in decision-making suggests it's a good idea to identify several options for our change solution rather than assuming there is only one. (To pressure test the likelihood of adoption of a change solution, check out our free assessment.)
Change Context — Where
Context reflects where we are implementing the change. It is made up of a variety of internal and external factors that can affect our ability to successfully change our company. Contextual factors include things such as the level of expertise of end-users, the recent history of the organization with changes, the resources available to support the change management process, as well as external factors such as regulations or the health of the economy.
The factors that are most significant will vary with each organizational change. What will be consistent is the importance of identifying the most significant contextual factors for any given change so that we can use them to inform our efforts. This is generally done through a context or readiness assessment at the start of the change but can also be conducted when troubleshooting a change that has gone off course.
Process of Change Management — How
The process of change is essentially about change management. What is change management? In short, it's the processes, people, and tools we use to develop and implement our change solution so that it creates the benefits we desire in our future state.
Defining our change management approach includes how we'll structure the effort (e.g., governance, change team, etc.) and core components we'll use to support all phases of the change: decide, prepare, execute, improve, and maintain.
(Want to learn more about what change management is? Explore our in-depth article here.)
Thinking across levels when managing change
Finally, if you are involved in implementing a large-scale change, it’s helpful to recognize that change is not a single thing that happens uniformly across the entire organization. Rather, it plays out in different ways at different levels. What happens at each of these levels then impacts how the change takes hold in the organization as a whole.
Conceptualizing the change process as being enacted at different levels reveals a few things that can inform our practical approaches. They include:
There is often a time lag between activities at each level, which has implications for the total timeframe necessary for the change process. For instance, an individual may first hear of a change only months after those leading the change started discussing it. For this reason, those most deeply involved in implementing the change at the organizational level may need to make a concerted effort not to get too far ahead of other levels. Patience is a requirement. Each level needs time to digest and work through the change.
The vision for and communication of the change needs to be clear and powerful enough to carry across these levels. Key messages will likely be translated and modified at each level; simplicity and clarity can help to ensure the core message withstand this translation across levels and groups. Feedback between levels can also help to improve the messages over time, ensuring messages are relevant at all levels, not just to those who initially created them.
We all experience the individual level of change. As individuals, we process change in different ways due to our personality, job type, and current circumstances. No one expects change leaders to attend to the specific needs of each person impacted by the change. However, at a minimum, it’s important to be aware and acknowledge that there will be a diversity of individual reactions to change. It can also be worthwhile to include in your change approach practical tools to assist individuals in coping with a change.
These levels are also relevant outside of the construct of organizational hierarchy. For example, while top management often directs change, executives are usually also affected by the change. Top management is comprised of individuals who have to go through the personal process of change. Regardless of where one sits in the organization, she will likely contribute to and be affected by the dynamics of change at each of these levels.
If you’re looking to make an organizational change, it’s important to understand what change is and the three factors that will influence its success. Change is difficult, but with the right tools and knowledge, it can be done.
References
Al-Haddad, S., & Kotnour, T. (2015). Integrating the organizational change literature: a model for successful change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 28(2), 234-262.
Armenakis, A. A., & Bedeian, A. G. (1999). Organizational change: A review of theory and research in the 1990s. Journal of Management, 25(3), 293-315.)
Pettigrew, A., & Whipp, R. (1992). Managing change and corporate performance. In European industrial restructuring in the 1990s (pp. 227-265). Palgrave Macmillan, London.
Walker, H. J., Armenakis, A. A., & Bernerth, J. B. (2007). Factors influencing organizational change efforts: An integrative investigation of change content, context, process, and individual differences. Journal of Organizational Change Management.
Whelan-Berry, K. S., Gordon, J. R., & Hinings, C. R. (2003). Strengthening organizational change processes: Recommendations and implications from a multilevel analysis. The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 39(2), 186-207.