Implementing Agile Approach to Change Management: A Study of Lewin's 3-Step Model

This essay explores the implementation of Agile approach to change management using Lewin's 3-step model. It discusses the stages of the model, challenges, feasibility, and the complexities of the original model. The essay also highlights the importance of communication, motivation, and project planning in the change process. The study focuses on the MBA course and is relevant for students studying change management.

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Introduction
In the course of this essay the 3 step Change management model of Lewin have been
considered by the researcher. The three stages of this model, namely unfreezing, changing
and refreezing have been contextualised with the change approach, namely, Agile approach
of change procedure. Hence in the initial part of the essay, the ways in which the change
procedure would progress in the freezing and changing stages of the model have been
highlighted. The challenges as well as feasibility is regarding the implementation of agile
approach based on the theoretical overview have been identified here also. In the next stage
the difficulties that the organisations need to overcome in the course of implementing Agile
approach have been referred to in relation to the third stage of the Lewin's model. In the final
part of this is a, the journal article of Study and Grey have been considered. In the light of the
research conducted in the article, the researchers have analysed the complexities and
limitations of the original model that has been discussed in the course of this essay.
Thesis Statement: The Lewin's Change Management model have been identified in this
essay for the purpose of contextualising the Agile approach to change with the
organisational work structure. In this context the states of implementing the Agile
approach to change have been demonstrated based on the three step Change management
model. The Change management ideologies of the journal article by Sturdy and Grey
heaven consulate and the limitations of Change management model of Lewin have also
been identified here.
Discussion
Lewin’s Change Management model have been selected as the preferable change
management model in order to address the change initiative, as in ‘Moving towards Agile’.

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This model is primarily concerned with the ways of overcoming the resistances that comes in
the way of implementing change management in the scope of any organisational change. As
advocated by Cummings, S., Bridgman and Brown (2016), many of the internal and external
stakeholders of any agency would resist any new change. Therefore, the first stage of the
change management process, as advocated in this model should be unfreezing wherein the
change managers of any organisation attempts to recognise the agents that resists the change
in the organisation. As advocated by Bakari, Hunjra and Niazi (2017), the resisting agents to
change can be perception or thought process of the people in the organisation, old mode of
organisational behaviour and organisational structure.
Communication is an essential factor at this change of the Lewin’s Model. This is
because the employees as well as the other stakeholders need to be informed about the
imminent change, the logic behind the need to implement the change and how the employee
would be benefitted out of implementation of the change (Hayes 2018). The principle idea
behind this stage of the model is to increase the awareness related to the change and in turn
make the employees perceive that the change is necessary as well as urgent. As such, all the
organisational forces would be highly motivated to implement the change.
The change initiative that is undertaken for analysis in this essay is ‘Moving towards
Agile’. This change initiative necessitates the organisations to shift from the traditional
methods to the agile methods for increasing the alignment with the client needs, reduction of
risk cover as well as increase the speed to value in the course of the lifecycle of the project.
That is why, Serrador and Pinto (2015), suggests that pilot projects need to be undertaken by
the organisation involving the project managers so that they understand the importance of
agile approach. As an impact of the pilot project launch, the organisational managers who are
handling the projects would be able to understand how to handle the employees in the course
of the project life time.

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The next stage of the Change Management process is “Changing”. As the stakeholders have
already been unfrozen in the previous phase, they are now ready to start moving. The second
stage that is the changing stage is the Lewin’s Change Management model, is associated with
the implementation of the process of change. This is the high time when the people who are
concerned with bringing about the change, struggle most with the dealing with the new stage
of reality in terms of operations in the organisation (Rasnacis, A. and Berzisa, S., 2017). The
stakeholders tend to learn the new behaviours, ways of thinking as well as process that are
involved in the new operations in the concerned departments. There is an immense impact of
the previous stage on this stage. The implementation of this stage, as in the acceptability of
the stakeholders to learn and eagerly implement the new change procedure depends on how
well they have been groomed in the previous stage. This is why, Larson and Chang (2016),
professes that in this stage, that the agents of change in any organisation, for evidence the
project planners who are bringing about new changes in the methodology of project
execution, should take regular sessions of the employees or the other stakeholders associated
with the process of new change.
The Changing phase for the Move to Agile mechanism is the most important phase of
change management. There are two aspects that needs to be considered in this phase for
moving with agility. The first part is concerned with how to overcome the barriers to manage
the people (concerned with implementing the change procedures) effectively. The second part
is accepting feedback from the concerned stakeholders regarding their feasibilities or
challenges in the way of implementing the change procedure. So far as moving with agility is
concerned, it requires specific mention that, the project planners as well as executive
departmental heads should be keeping in mind that it is essential to identify three different
key motivating factors so that moving with agility can be considered as an absolute enterprise
approach (Rasnacis and Berzisa 2017). The factor is enhancing the speed of deliverance of

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the projects, so that the organisation is able to serve a wide base of clients and the revenue
generate rate of the organisation is also impacted, in a positive way. As such, the employees
who are participating in the change mechanism will be compensated in a better way also. The
second factor is enhancing the rate of client satisfaction. The project managers have to keep
an eye on the progress of the work of the employees in order to ensure that the clients’ needs
are properly addressed in the course of the projects.
The last factor is the most important and this is related to the optimisation of the
efficiency as well as flexibility. In the Changing phase, the motivating factor plays the most
crucial role since in the way of moving to agility, motivation of the employees is a highly
significant intrinsic factor that plays a crucial role in the context of building commitment
among the employees which would help in making the task of the project managers in
managing the employees in a better way. In order to drive change in a better way, it is
essential to focus on the fact that motivation should be broadly spread among all the members
of the organisation and not selectively among few employees only (Bakari, Hunjra and Niazi
2017). The motivation factor is also essential for the project managers and it is essential for
them to ensure that they answer some of the key questions that various researchers like Hayes
(2018), deemed important. These questions are why the change is being implemented, why it
is implemented now and what consequences can arise if the move to agility is not
implemented now. However, researchers like Rasnacis and Berzisa (2017), have also
accepted the fact that implementation of a new system of change, whether that is the Agile,
Total quality or Lean Six Sigma, it requires a lot of accumulative effort as well as energy.
Surveys conducted by scholars like Larson and Chang (2016) and Rasnacis and Berzisa
(2017), shows that in 71% of the organisations who adopt the movement to agility, the factor
of sponsorship is a crucial factor. This is because increase in the rate of sponsorship will
allow the organisation to take up bigger and higher number of projects. The second most

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crucial factor that is an important aspect of the Changing phase of the Lewin’s model is
formal project planning. In organisations that practice this, the level of success in
implementation of the Agile model is highly successful. The efficiency of the project team is
an equally strategic and relevant factor that impacts the successful implementation of the
Movement to agility model.
Figure 2: Factors related to the structuring of Agile Transformation
(Source: Larson and Chang 2016)
The last stage of the Lewin’s model is Refreezing. This stage is associated with
reinforcing, stabilising as well as solidifying the state of new operations after the
implementation of the change, properly. In this stage, a new organisational norm and status
quo is created involving the organisational processes, offerings, Organisational goals as well
as other essential features. The step of refreezing is essential for ensuring that people do not

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tend to revert back to their old ways or perception, or doing the projects in a way prior to
implementing the change. This stage is associated with cementing the change procedure of
the organisation with that of the current organisational set up and culture. In most of the
organisations, there are some or the other agents who resist the change even after the
successful implantation of the second stage of the Lewin’s change model. Many of the
organisations overlook the refreezing step since the change have already been in to
implementation.
In the pathway of transforming into Agile Movement in an organisation, some greatest
obstacles might come in the third stage of the implementation process of Lewin's model of
Change management. The project planners might demonstrate the application of agile
movement once or twice. However in the professional implementation of the process the
project team might like adequate knowledge that would be needed to handle bigger projects
in a short time. The Other obstacles that might come up even after successful implementation
of the movements to agile change procedure are mainly the lack of the capability of the
employees to foresee the value of the Agile approach. How many employees might be still
favouring the waterfall approach that has been in book for so many years and might presume
that it is impossible to bring about effective organisational change through the
implementation of the agile approach? As an outcome, in spite of the implementation of a
successful Change management process, the execution level of the employees in window and
does the rate of success of the projects might be numbered as an outcome of this (Andrew
and Christopher 2003). Again, specific departmental head might be against the
implementation of this process. As an outcome of that they will be referring to carry on the
implementation of the waterfall approaches only. Set the whole organisation has changed on
to adopt the new change procedure, their communication level with other departments will be
low and as such the synchronisation of whole business project will be hampered.

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However researchers like Andrew and Christopher (2003), have went on to define that
the greatest risk of obstruction in the third stage of the Change management model of Lewin
in case of agile approach of change procedure is the fear of failure. Many organisations are
dubious about the outcome even before implementation of the Agile approach on a
professional basis. Hence the training the employees for this project takes place promptly, but
take a long time to implement it on the real time projects. As an outcome, major gap between
project planning and project execution comes into being because of the difference in
perception between the project planners who have modulated the project based on the Agile
approach and that of the executive who are still having the perception that a waterfall
approach will be off for any project task at hand. The project planners will be engaged in
taking up tasks from the upper hierarchy and distributing it to the project teams following the
same time same that they have scheduled as per the Agile approach. The listing of employees
to work on the projects will also take place at that rate only. On the contrary, the executive
will be making the employees work based on their traditional working schedule. This will
give rise to highly complex situation in the organisation, that, even after realisation of this
gap will not be able to properly and clinical implement the Agile approach out of the fear of
failure.
Sturdy and Grey’s perception analysis
The analysis has been conducted in the journal focusing on manufacturing companies in the
country. Change implementation and acceptances towards the change procedure serving
closely observed by the researchers in the selected Organisations. However, the contrast with
the Change management model of Lewin and that of Sturdy and Grey comes into being,
mostly in the context of the second and third stage of the implementation of The Change
management model of Lewin. The researchers hold that in the post structuralism period, the
project leaders seem to care less about the project management model that is being

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implemented or followed in the way of executing the project (Andrew and Christopher 2003).
As an outcome, the employees have to focus on reworking again and again. In order to avoid
reworking, many researchers like Bakari, Hunjra and Niazi (2017), advocates the iterative
model of change. In the iterative model of change, there is a planning and requirements
phase, applicable prior to the launch of the second phase of the Lewin’s Model of Change. As
evident, in the planning phase, the work flow is similar to the unfreezing phase of the
Lewin’s model. However, there is another phase called the requirement planning phase that
comes as a buffer to the first and the second phase of the Lewin’s Model of Change. In this
phase, the project planners are dedicatedly involved in an initial map work by means of
which specific documentation and blueprints are needed to be established regarding the
implementation of the new process of change. This is followed by the establishment and
incorporation of the other software and hardware that can help the executives to understand
the exact way in which they are going to make the employees work under the model of
change. In this context, this research work also highlights the classical contribution to the
sociology of deviance by Becker. The model highlights that reworking repeatedly brings
about interventions in the organisational development because of which are complex political
landscape is created that impacts conduction and motivation of the employees as well as their
identification with the new change model much critical and as such the new project models
developed as an outcome of the change process becomes the prominent sites of power
struggle. The various agents on individuals focus less on delivering the organisational
objectives. They start a tendency to undermine the work of the others and this is how an
attitude of clinging on to the waterfall approach rather than the Agile approach comes into
being (Andrew and Christopher 2003). This sentiment might arouse among the employees in
the third of the second stage of the Lewin’s Model. The flaws in managerialism and
universalism of the implementation of the change procedure have not been considered in the

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model of Lewin. This is however, applicable in the Iterative Model of Change. In this model,
the factor of design documentation have been considered explicitly, as an account of which
the best way of implementing the model can be determined and the deviations from this
framework that are being made by the project teams would be easily understandable.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is worth telling that various perspectives have been clearly
objectified in the journal by the two authors. The process that the positivist version of many
leaders might be soft and since they might be having radical or pragmatic intention regarding
their peers or subordinates. The three step Change management model that has been
discussed in this essay easy implementation model where the complexities in the internal
context of the organisation and not considered at all. It has been identified that process
followed for training and development is not appropriate enough as some employees find the
benefits, while others might be deprived from the training process.

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Reference List
Andrew, S. and Christopher, G. (2003). Beneath and Beyond Organizational Change
Management: Exploring Alternatives Imperial College London, UK, and University of
Cambridge, UK, 10(4), pp. 651-662.
Bakari, H., Hunjra, A.I. and Niazi, G.S.K., 2017. How does authentic leadership influence
planned organizational change? The role of employees’ perceptions: Integration of Theory of
Planned Behavior and Lewin's three step model. Journal of Change Management, 17(2),
pp.155-187.
Cummings, S., Bridgman, T. and Brown, K.G., 2016. Unfreezing change as three steps:
Rethinking Kurt Lewin’s legacy for change management. Human relations, 69(1), pp.33-60.
Hayes, J., 2018. The theory and practice of change management. Palgrave.
Larson, D. and Chang, V., 2016. A review and future direction of agile, business intelligence,
analytics and data science. International Journal of Information Management, 36(5), pp.700-
710.
Rasnacis, A. and Berzisa, S., 2017. Method for adaptation and implementation of Agile
project management methodology. Procedia Computer Science, 104, pp.43-50.
Serrador, P. and Pinto, J.K., 2015. Does Agile work?—A quantitative analysis of agile
project success. International Journal of Project Management, 33(5), pp.1040-1051.