Change Management in Sainsbury's and Asda

This assignment examines the influence of change on individual, leader, and organizational performance within the context of Sainsbury's and Asda. It delves into the various barriers to change that affect leadership decisions in these companies. The report analyzes different leadership theories and strategies employed by Sainsbury's and Asda management to navigate change effectively.

Understanding and leading
change

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
TASK 1: Managing the Impact of Change......................................................................................3
P1 Impact of change on an.....................................................................................................3
organisation’s strategy and operations..................................................................................3
P2 Internal and external drivers of change affecting leadership, team and individual
behaviours within an organisation..........................................................................................4
P3 Measures that can be taken to minimise negative impacts of change on organisational
behaviour................................................................................................................................6
P4 Different barriers for change and their impact on leadership decision-............................7
making in Sainsbury ..............................................................................................................7
P5 Different leadership approaches to deal with change within Sainsbury’s........................9
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES .............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Change management is very essential in handling the change that needs to be
implemented in an organisation. Implementing any change within a venture affect the business
operations or activities both negatively and positively. The report includes a brief comparison of
two firm regarding the impact of change. Sainsbury’s and ASDA are UK based supermarket
chains which are considered in this report. This report will help to understand the change within
an organisation affecting the operations and strategies The study also identifies and determine
the various measures that can be taken by a company to minimise the negative impact of the
change on the organisational behaviour. Furthermore, the report determines different barriers for
change and how they affect the decision making in a cited organisation.
TASK 1: Managing the Impact of Change
P1 Impact of change on an organisation’s strategy and operations.
Different organisations implement or faces various types of changes which can affect them in
both negative or positive way. ASDA and Sainsbury’s are the firm which are greatly affected by
any changes. These firms face various changes which are sometime beneficial for the business or
negatively affect the same.
Impact of change on Sainsbury
Planned change - Planned internal change can be regarded as a strategic move by the
organization implemented with the objective of changing the nature of the business itself or the
way in which an organization is doing its business. For example - Changes in the Services or the
Products, Changing the Administrative Systems. Planned External Change refers to Various
factors like technological innovation and advancements in the communication and information
processing field come under this category such as Technological change.
Unplanned Changes: Two crucial factors like economic uncertainties and changes in the
government regulations, play a crucial role in compelling organizations to change are the
Unplanned external changes such as Governmental regulation. Unplanned internal change can be
regarded as a change which takes place within an organization not in a planned manner or as a
strategic intervention, but are introduced in an unplanned manner in response to either a change
in the demographic composition of an organization or due to performance gaps. Such as Gap in
performance, Change in demographic composition.

 Technological change –Sainsbury’s is enhancing its technology and digital team as it
helps the shoppers to buy the products wherever and whenever wanted. This supermarket
is a leading retail company according to the (Internet re-tailing's Top 500 research). The
people or buyers within the market gets highly addicted to the use of new and innovative
technologies and they are using internet of things to buy or sale the different products.
Sainsbury’s understood this change in the shopping methods of the buyers and adopted
this change within their business operations. This change of technology within the UK
market affected Sainsbury's business strategies as they decided to expand their
technology and digital team or staff. The organisation planned to hire new intelligent
coaches and software developers to effective engineers in order to develop a more
effective workforce or technology team. Sainsbury’s created around 500 digital and
technology jobs opportunities in Coventry and London.
 Chang in economy – The economic change is the most common one that affect each and
every business or organisation. Sainsbury’s faced a huge challenge due to the change in
economy within UK. As the firm is working within a highly competitive market then they
need to face economic downturn. Sainsbury used the low cost strategy which leads to the
change in purchasing power and enabled the company to reduce the cost of the
production. With that it helps in directly decreasing in the price or value of then products
or goods. Low price and cost of production is beneficial for both the customers and the
company (Lee, Latif and Khattak, 2013).
Impact of Change on ASDA
 Political changes – There are various changes affecting an organisation such as rate of
unemployment, taxation policies, food laws, pricing policies etc. ASDA needs to adopt
these changes in order to run their business smoothly. The company is effectively aware
of planning permission regulations. The company analyse and find out important
planning laws and regulations which they need to consider while expanding their stores
in order to reduce any issues or disruption by the government authorities. Political factor
usually have the negative impact over the organisation. Sometime it serves the positive
impact to the venture. When the political party is giving any subsidy to the resources
which is being used by the firm. In such cases the cost of the procurement and production

will slow down and the venture can able to gain the high profit margin on their products
and services.
 Environmental changes – A major threat to the environment is global warming which is
caused due to heavy discharge of carbon dioxide by various organisation or
manufacturing industries. ASDA in order to protect environment started supporting
carbon reduction activities. They planned and introduced ozone-friendly stores in the
market. These stores discharge 50% less carbon dioxide and are 40% more energy
efficient as compared to any other newly build store. Firm need to focus on the different
Corporate social responsibilities so that they can reduce the negative impact over the
environment. In order to do so they need to invest in the production system so that less
wastage can be done. Other than that firm can also make use of those resources which
can be re-cycle again.
P2 Internal and external drivers of change affecting leadership, team and individual behaviours
within an organisation.
There are generally two kinds of leaders Proactive and Reactive leaders as described
below -
Proactive approach - A proactive approach focuses on eliminating problems before they have a
chance to appear.
Reactive approach -Reactive focuses on doing something, either before, after, or during an event
or problem is occurring.
 Internal and external drivers of change affecting Leadership behaviour – The
internal change mostly affecting the behaviour within an organisation is the change in
technology. These technological changes play an important role to redesign the whole
structure of a firm such as ASDA or Sainsbury. The leadership behaviour also gets highly
affected by the change in technology. The venture adopts this change in order to fulfil the
current trends in the market. Leaders such as the mangers, head of departments also needs
to adopt the change in technology, they start using internet of things, technological
elements in the meetings such as projectors etc to easily hare their views or information
to other staff members or employees. External factor of change affecting the leadership
behaviour within ASDA or Sainsbury is competition in the market. The Managers and the
higher-level professionals adopt the change in competition to effectively sustain or

survive within the competitive market (Bateh, Castaneda and Farah, 2013). The
organisation faces many issues while facing the high competition in the marketplace.
Managers or leaders make effective and impressive plans or strategies such as low-cost
strategy, creative marketing plans etc to attract more customers and increase profitability
of the business.
 Internal and external drivers of change affecting Team behaviour – The technology
also affect the team behaviours of the organisations like ASDA and Sainsbury’s. The
changes in technology also have a great impact on the team behaviour within a venture.
The new technologies are used at each and every level or department of an organisation,
the teams make use of these technologies in order to bring efficiency in the business
activities. Teams or staffs within a firm uses technologies such as new machines,
equipment, software to complete their tasks effectively and efficiently. External factor of
change such as competition also affect the team behaviour in a venture, each and every
staff or team of a company develops various plans and strategies to effectively compete
with other competitors in the market. The organisational teams or groups focus on
increasing or improving the overall performance of every team member within the team
to increase the firm performance or profitability (Kovač, 2017).
 Internal and external drivers of change affecting individual behaviour – There are
various changes within a business environment or marketplace that affect the individual
behaviour of the employees within an organisation such as Sainsbury’s or ASDA.
Considering the technological change an individual's behaviour is also highly affected,
every employee working within an organisation adopt new technologies in order to
improve and increase his or her performance as well as productivity. The technological
changes such as new equipment or machines helps an individual to effectively increase
the productivity and reduce the time consumed in order to complete a specific task which
positively affect his or her working behaviour. The external change such as the
competition also have a great impact on the individual behaviour or working process.
Due to increased competition, an individual need to increase his or her performance and
productivity in order to efficiently achieve personal as well as organisational goals and
survive in the competitive market.

P3 Measures that can be taken to minimise negative impacts of change on organisational
behaviour.
In an organisation change is a most common factor that influence the behaviour of employees,
groups and staff within the firm or workplace. Change influences the firm to develop and
implement new plans or strategies in order to overcome the changes or reduce negative impact of
changes on the organisational behaviour. There are various strategies or measure that the
company takes in order to minimise negative effects of the change; these measures are as
described below -
 Creating an effective way to interact or communicate with the employees regarding the
new changes or initiatives as well as their development. The management of an
organisation can instruct and provide effective guidelines to the employees with regular
updates within the team meetings or discussions.
 Promoting new business plans and strategies to each team can help the employees to
understand the changes and their impact on the organisational behaviour and
performance. The management can explain the new strategies in a simple language to
each and every staff in order to let them understand the positive impact of the new plans
and how they will make their jobs easier and better. The organisation needs to
communicate current business objectives and plans to achieve them to perform
effectively (Cameron and Green, 2015). It is being known that there are several new
plans that are made by the venture so that they can able to gain the competitive advantage
and fight with the uncertainty. When they are making the new plans, they used to produce
the new products for the customers so that they can cater the needs and wants of the
customers. If they will invest in the different promotion activities they can able to
promote their new product and able to create the awareness of the new product and
services.
 The management should invite a team or group member from each and every department
of the organisation to contribute and participate in meetings or discussions. The
management of the firm must provide a well-structured seminar for each team in order to
promote new business strategy.
 Selecting a team of change agents from key positions to assist managing planning and
implementing. Management needs to identify an individual form each team who is

outspoken and also within the non-management department. It is important for the
management to communicate the changes to each and every individual as well as
department so that the whole organisational can work together to reduce negative impact
of the changes.
 Developing key objectives or outcomes for every person, department and organisation
involved in the new business plans. Each group or team must be familiar to the desired
outcomes or results. The various departments within an organization should target a
specific goal or objective in order to achieve it effectively.
 Management of an organisation should not only focus on the implementation of new
strategies or plans for managing the change. The management within the firm should
develop specific goals or milestone which are needed to be achieved in a particular time
period. The planning related to the change is very important and considering the goals is
an essential part which cannot be ignored (Matos and Esposito, 2014).
All the above measures are very effective in reducing or minimising the negative impact of
various changes within the business environment. The organisational behaviour is highly
influenced by the any change in the business environment, internal or external.
P4 Different barriers for change and their impact on leadership decision-
making in Sainsbury
The management of Sainsbury focus on implementing the change as they believe it has
an effective and significant impact on the overall organisational operations and performance. The
main motive of adopting and implementing the organisational change may help the company to
create, improve and maintain an effective business environment within a business organisation.
There are various barriers for change which Sainsbury’s faces, these barriers are as described
below -
 Lack of employee involvement or contribution – This the most common barrier to change
and its management. The employees working in a firm hesitate or fear of change due to
the lack in involvement within the change process. It is observed that even a most
effective and important or loyal employee of the Sainsbury’s resist the change. The
Sainsbury’s often makes mistake such as failing to involve the employees in the change
process. This leads to create a major barrier to the change. In order to successfully
introduce and implement the change Sainsbury’s needs to make sure that each and every

employee involves and contribute in the change process. The employees should be
involved in the change as much as possible, this involvement helps the management to
listen to their views and opinions, assuring the benefits of the change and accounting for
their outcomes. The management should take effective decisions to enable the
involvement of the employees in the change process and contribute their efforts in
adopting as well as implementing the change (Gattermeyer and Al-An, 2013).
 Lack of effective or proper communication strategy – The Sainsbury’s sometimes fails to
develop effective communication plans and strategy. The managers within Sainsbury’s
assumes that the employees will understand and adjust to adopt the change or new
business strategies. This is completely a wrong way to introduce a change and becomes a
barrier. The CEO or head of department within the organisation needs to avoid
introducing this method of communicating the change. The management conducts
various meetings and discussion in order to communicate and share the needs, benefits
and outcomes of the change. It helps the management in explaining the various aspects of
change to each and every employee of different department within an company.
 Bad culture shift planning – Sometimes, the management or planning team fails to
understand that the change may affect the employees or their behaviour within the
working environment. The planning team within Sainsbury’s fails to take effective
decisions or steps in the change process, the feelings of the employees or job
responsibilities forces the planning team inn shifting their plans and strategies. Therefore,
this becomes a barrier in the change process and resist the organisation to adopt the
change. The managers and higher authorities of the Sainsbury’s develops effective
strategies as well as focus on ignoring the feelings of the employees. They develop plans
and guidelines by preventing the traditions or emotions of an individual within the
workplace. The feelings of the employees should be considered and let them understand
the importance or significance of the change in order to implement change (Haslam and
et.al., 2014).
 Unknown current state – Adopting change and implementing it is difficult for venture
that lack the knowledge or idea of their current situation or state. The management
professional within Sainsbury’s often try to implement and introduce change without
understanding the current state and structure of the company or conducting an

assessment. The management do not recognize that the failing to analyse or identify the
current blueprint or state of Sainsbury’s can become a major barrier in the change
process. Therefore, management within the organisation try to understand and analyse the
current state of the firm or the blueprint of the company before introducing or
implementing the change within the business or workplace. It helps the management in
successfully adopting the change and implement it effectively to achieve the
organisational goal or objective (Doppelt, 2017).
 Organisation complexity – The organisations such as Sainsbury’s develops complex and
difficult processes which leads to the complexity in planning and implementing the
change. These complexities consist complex products, processes and system. All these
elements develop a major barrier to change as all the members or employees in the
company find it very difficult to understand. The management or leaders of the
organisation plans and make effective strategies in order to avoid this barrier. It is
important for the firm to manage the rapid growth and the complexity by developing an
effective and skilful approach. They try to make it simple by making easy plans and
letting the employees understand the change as well as the positive impacts.
P5 Different leadership approaches to deal with change within Sainsbury’s.
There are various leadership styles or approaches that can be used in order to deal with the
change within every organisation. Sainsbury’s goals and culture helps in determining the most
effective leadership approach or style that can be used to adopt as well as implement the change.
The various leadership styles are as described below -
 Kotter's theory of change- There are eight steps of this change theory as described below
-
1. Step 1: Create Urgency

2. Step 2: Form a Powerful Coalition
3. Step 3: Create a Vision for Change
4. Step 4: Communicate the Vision
5. Step 5: Remove Obstacles
6. Step 6: Create Short-Term Wins
7. Step 7: Build on the Change
8. Step 8: Anchor the Changes in Corporate Culture
 Lewin change model - The Kurt Lewin change theory model is based around a 3-step
process (Unfreeze-Change-Freeze)that provides a high-level approach to change. It gives
a manager or other change agent a framework to implement a change effort, which is
always very sensitive and must be made as seamless as possible.
 Situational leadership – This leadership approach refers to the leadership style which is
adopted according to the need of a specific situation or condition.
 Laissez-Faire – This theory or approach lack in direct management or supervision of the
employees. The leaders adopting this theory or approach cannot provide regular
feedbacks effectively to the subordinates. According to this leadership style the leaders
show very little efforts and contribution in the supervision which leads to poor
understanding of the change and adopting it effectively. Therefore, this leadership style is
not successful within the Sainsbury’s to introduce a change.
 Autocratic – The autocratic leadership approach states that the leader has a power to take
the decisions himself without the involvement of any other member. The leaders adopting
this leadership style impose their power or decisions on the employees and possess the
total authority. The manager following this theory take all the decisions in the change
process within the organisation such as Sainsbury’s. The change process includes many
important decisions which needs effective contribution of each and every member of a

group or team in an organisation. This leadership style lack in communication or team
decisions which negatively affect the adoption or implementation of the change.
 Participative – This is also known as the democratic leadership theory; this approach
gives importance to the contribution and ideas of each and every member in the
organisation. All the members within the firm equally participate and contribute to the
planning process to adopt as well as implement the change. The participative leadership
develops employee motivation and morale due to their involvement or contribution in the
change process. This leadership style ensures the effective knowledge and information
provided to the employees (Hayes, 2014).
CONCLUSION
The study concluded that the change is the most common element that affect the performance of
an individual, leader or the overall venture. The employees working within an organisation needs
to analyse the importance, negative and positive impacts of the change within a company. The
report also includes the various barriers for change affecting the leadership decisions within
Sainsbury’s. Furthermore, the study described various leadership theories and approaches that
are used by the management of Sainsbury’s and Asda in order to deal with the change.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals:
Hayes, J., 2014. The theory and practice of change management. Palgrave Macmillan.
Doppelt, B., 2017. Leading change toward sustainability: A change-management guide for
business, government and civil society. Routledge.
Cameron, E. and Green, M., 2015. Making sense of change management: A complete guide to
the models, tools and techniques of organizational change. Kogan Page Publishers.
Haslam, S.A., van Knippenberg, D., Platow, M.J. and Ellemers, N. eds., 2014. Social identity at
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communication nature influences resistance to change. Journal of Management
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Khattak, A.M., Latif, K. and Lee, S., 2013. Change management in evolving web
ontologies. Knowledge-Based Systems, 37, pp.1-18.
Gattermeyer, W. and Al-Ani, A. eds., 2013. Change Management und Unternehmenserfolg:
Grundlagen—Methoden—Praxisbeispiele. Springer-Verlag.
Bateh, J., Castaneda, M.E. and Farah, J.E., 2013. Employee resistance to organizational
change. International Journal of Management & Information Systems (Online), 17(2),
p.113.
Kovač, J., 2017. Dimensions of organizational change. Management: journal of contemporary
management issues, 5(1), pp.73-81.