Leading Positive Change in an Organization, Essay Sample

Change initiatives are quite common in many companies which normally may find themselves facing some difficulties to realize a successful ambition. For instance, some changes may have a negative impact on the employee morale because most people are used to working under specific rules and regulations which have formed a culture that is difficult to avoid. Also, some employees find it hard to engage in new regulations and policies and hence they find it difficult to succumb to change (Weber et al., 2016). It is because they have an established way of working in which they are well used to and would not want to change so that it does not affect their performance morale. Application of Kotter's 8 Step Change Model is crucial in bringing change in an organization. This paper seeks to discuss the implementation of this model in an organization and how change is met.

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The 8 step model entails a series of steps which enables a person to perform well in business. These steps are the urgency increase, building of a team for guiding, development of a vision, buy-in communication, empowerment of action, creating wins that are short-term, not letting up and the last is the making of a change stick (Juneja, 2018). These changes have been associated with various organizations which underwent the process of change. An organization can create urgency by investigating to learn more about the future repercussions which may occur. The building of a guiding team entails a company identifying its primary stakeholders, leaders and joining hands to form a dominant group which can help it achieve the process of change.

Developing a vision can be attained through identifying all possible strategies for implementing a change. Communicating for buy-in step involves joining the company's visions with essential aspects such as training to improve performance. Empowering action ensures that all the company's processes are aligned well with the vision. Creating short-term wins ensures that a company realizes success in the early stages of change (Heraclitus, 2018). Not letting up enables a company to achieve continuous improvement by concentrating on the failing departments. Lastly, making a change stick allows a company always to discuss a successful change whenever they find an opportunity.

An example of a change I experienced was in the IT department in my organization whereby new machines replaced the old ones. The difficulty was in these new machines that had new rules and processes that were different from the previous ones. Hence, I found it difficult to cope with using the new computers because they entailed the latest technology which I was not used to. The company set aside some hours for training on how to use these new machines and required each employee to attend and grasp something to make this change successful. Although the change brought about some difficulties, the company strived hard to ensure that the training processes were successful and each employee perceived something.

The company carried out an urgency process to determine whether the change could bring in adverse effects and the results were positive. Also, it applied the building of a guiding team which was ready to help with the implementation of the change, and it was successful because with time all employees familiarized themselves with the use of the new machines and the performance even improved. The company also used the communication step to ensure each member was well trained to result in better performance in the end. The company, therefore, could have improved on the training hours by making them longer for valid results to be achieved. These processes made the realization of the change more comfortable and more efficient, and at the end, all employees had a full clue of how to interact with the new machines.

In conclusion, the Kotter's 8 Step Change Model is essential in any organization. Application of this model helps in ensuring that all possible strategies of meeting the vision of the organization are used while engaging teamwork and active participation of the workers.

References

Heraclitus. (2018). "Kotter's 8 Step Model of Change." Mind Tools.

Juneja, P. (2018). "Kotter's 8 Step Model of Change." Management Study Guide.

Weber, E., Phillips, J. & Phillips, P. P. (2016). "What Change Agents Need to do to Yield Successful Change." Kogan Page.