Analysis Of The BT Organizational Change

Analysis of the BT organizational change.

The challenges of effectively managing organizational change is of key importance within organization management theories and practice. Organizational change initiatives often arise out of additional problems faced by a company. In some cases, it includes the lack of knowledge, planning or wrong option which would not work well with the organizational resistance. However, the successful organizations of the future must serve customers better, create new advantages and stay competitive with their values (Chapman, 2002). Therefore, the successful management of organizational change becomes more important consideration than the option for change. The purpose of this essay part 2 is to analyse and evaluate the principles of the effective change management in organizations, including the BT experience.

The nature of organizational change includes the process of management related with culture, values, communication and leadership style that can be associated with the risk of failure. For some organizations it may bring satisfaction, better results and advantages, while for others this may bring disadvantages. According to Mitroff (1994), there are three factors to be considered in implementing the change processes successfully. This includes the technological, organizational and personal perspectives (Rashid, 2004). For example, the BT transformational change of its culture can be seen as the flexibility is more suitable for its’ innovative culture, however, the implementation of flexible working from the more bureaucracy structure was the major challenge. This included the potential investment on new learning and technological systems (BT, 2006). The flexible working structure requires adopting new technological systems which would allow the top and lower employees communicate effectively and maintain the focus on organization’s goals (Odel, 2001). This can be argued that the new system implementation may increase the level of uncertainty, investment and time for successful adoption. While the old system is not appropriate with the new organizational structure, the new system can require the employees to develop new skills and knowledge that also affects the additional expenses (Lau, 2001). Although, this also can be criticised as the BT employees are historically strong on the technological aspect and can be quick learners, the potential errors of new implementation can strongly affect the organization value to be focus on customer first. The employees with the lack of knowledge can dramatically affect the organization performance from the start (Odel, 2001). Therefore, the proactive planning and attitude changing approach is the critical point for every organization for successful change. Otherwise, the managing human part of the organizational change becomes a major challenge in handling the successful change processes (Rashid, 2004). Dunham (1989) suggested that this includes three types of individuals’ response to organizational change such as affective, cognitive and instrumental.