Mark DeVolder- Organisational Change & Employee Engagement Specialist

Summary

The video discusses the most effective change management techniques. The speaker begins by arguing that the way people evaluate change is how it affects them personally. The speaker reviews the concept of managing change by focusing on how the transition can be managed to avoid resistance and negative outcomes. He plays different songs to demonstrate how people respond to change differently and demonstrate that differences in taste and preferences may affect how people perceive and embrace change. He considers change as a process that involves moving from one stage to another. According to him, the most challenging situation with change is that in between the transitions, the idea is that there is work that needs to be done in each stage. Every stage is also dependent on the other because you can only progress to the next stage after doing the work required in the previous stage.

The speaker also argues that accepting change does not always mean that you like the change and condone it, but it means accepting that it has happened. Effective change management requires understanding how the change affects people in terms of what they gain and lose and how difficult it may be for the people to implement the change (DeVolder, 2014). The speaker also argues that when the change goes well, people stay engaged and disengage when it does not. He defines engagement as dedication, motivation, and a sense of belonging and is founded in relationships. He argues that if people know what causes disengagement, we can solve those issues and re-engage people. Most disengaged people started off engaged but may not have gotten what they needed, thus losing engagement.

Application

The course content relating to the things discussed in the video is change management. Therefore, the leadership video is connected to the course content because it expounds on how organizations should approach change. The course content and the video argue that engagement is one of the main factors contributing to successful implementation. Further, the illustrations in the course content on change management and implementation in different organizations indicate that engagement helps in understanding concerns that people may have about the change based on how it will affect them and dealing with any issues that could lead to resistance to change. The leadership video is also connected to the course content by illustrating the role of a leader in the change implementation process. Both the course content and the video argue that leaders have a major role to play in the change implementation process. The main roles are initiating change, overseeing the completion of the work that needs to be done at every stage, and monitoring how people respond to change. Leaders can, therefore, contribute to the successful implementation of change or total failure.

The video and the course content also demonstrate that change generates mixed reactions. The video argues that the mixed reactions arising from change include embracing the change and disengaging, which creates resistance. On the other hand, Dawson & Andriopoulos (2017) argue that mixed reactions include anxiety and conflict, which could have a long-term impact on the organization. The course content and the leadership video also demonstrate that proper decision-making creates a solid foundation for the implementation of change because it ensures that the needs and concerns of those affected by the change are considered, hence avoiding disengagement and resistance to the proposed change.

Reflection

The leadership video enlightened me on different things relating to leadership during the change process and proper change management techniques. One of the lessons I learned was that the success of change is dictated by how an individual evaluates the change. Evaluating change includes determining how the change affects an individual. Focusing on the negative impacts of the change may result in failure and resistance, while focusing on the negative consequences may lead to disengagement and failure. The speaker gives an example of how disengagement may affect the organization by explaining how he went to a restaurant and requested the attendant to recommend a meal. Still, the attendant suggested that the speaker should go to another restaurant. This example enlightened me on how resistance to change and lack of employee engagement could create organizational failure without the leader knowing the actual course of failure because the manager could not have known what the attendant had done if the speaker had failed to inform him. The example also made me learn that employees are the most essential part of the change management process because their engagement dictates the outcome of the change.

Another lesson I learned from the video is that people react to change based on how it affects them. Therefore, people are likely to resist change if it affects them negatively and embrace it when it favors their interests. I also learned that change should be handled in stages, whereby people transition from one stage to another after completing the work needed in every stage. It is also important to ensure that people understand the requirements in each stage to avoid conflicts and contradictions that could create delays in the transitioning process.