Implementing Change Management to Resolve Employee Issues at Apple

This report examines the application of change management principles to address employee-related issues at Apple Inc. The report highlights a lawsuit filed against Apple for labor law violations, including denial of lunch breaks and unpaid wages. Kotter's eight-step change management model is proposed as a framework for implementing changes to improve employee relations and ensure compliance with labor laws. The model focuses on creating urgency, building a team, developing a clear vision, communicating effectively, empowering action, creating short-term wins, sustaining momentum, and embedding changes within the organizational culture. The successful implementation of this change management program is crucial for maintaining sustainable operations and a positive work environment at Apple.

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Introduction
As opined by Al-Haddad and Kotnour (2015), change management is considered to
be a systematic process that helps the organizations to deal with transformation or transition
that takes place in the overall goals, technologies and processes. The main purpose of the
change management process is based on the implementation of strategies that can affect the
employees and the organization as a whole. The strategies that are developed as a part of
change management process are able to play a major role in the ways by which changes can
be requested.
The organization that will be taken into consideration for the purpose of change
implementation is Apple. Apple is a multinational technology based organization of
American origin. The headquarter of Apple is located in Cupertino, California which mainly
designs, sells and develops different products like, computer based software, consumer
electronics and the online services (Anderson, 2016).
Analysis of the implementation of change
As discussed by Burke (2017), Apple has been highly successful in its operations in
the technology based industry and has developed a premium position in the market with the
help of its unique products. The products and services that are offered by Apple have been
able to gain a huge customer base in various countries of the world. The organization has
however faced some major issues based on the lawsuits that have been filed by some
employees. The lawsuit that had been placed by the organization in the year 2014 was based
on the denial of lunch breaks to the employees, that is considered to be against the labour
laws.

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According to Cameron and Green (2015), the violation of labour laws that have been
performed by the company are said to affect more than 20,000 employees of Apple Inc. The
lawsuit had claimed that the employees were forced to work for long hours without proper
food and breaks that were required by them. The employees were also not provided with
timely wages for the services that are offered by them to the organization. The model that can
be implemented for change process in Apple is Kotter’s eight step change management
model (Galli, 2018). The implementation of the change management model will be used for
solving the employee related issues in the following way,
Increasing the urgency – This step is based on the ways by which a change
environment can be developed in Apple and including the management team in the process
(Helfat & Martin, 2015).
Building the team – The team needs to be developed in such a manner that is able to
play the most important role in the ways by which changes can be made in relationships that
can be developed with the employees in Apple (Helfat & Martin, 2015).
Getting the right vision – The vision of the change program will be developed in this
step of the change model. The team in Apple will develop a vision that is based on the ways
by which effective relationships can be developed with the employees. This will help them to
understand the demands and needs of the employees (Pollack & Pollack, 2015).
Communicating for buy-in – The communication process is considered to be the
most important part of the change management program that has been developed in Apple
Inc. The issues that are being faced by the employees will be solved effectively with the help
of proper implementation of the changes (Helfat & Martin, 2015).

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Empowering the actions – The actions that are required to be taken by the change
management based team of Apple need to be communicated and training needs to be
provided to the members of the team. The training program will help the members of the
management team in order to develop the relationships that have been developed (Cameron
& Green, 2015).
Creating the short term wins – The short term based goals need to be developed by
the management team in an effective manner. The goals are mainly related to the different
operations that are performed in the organization. The development of short term goals is
based on the ways by which feedback can be received by the management team based on
different parts of the change program (Al-Haddad & Kotnour, 2015).
Don’t let it up – The sustainability of changes that have been implemented with the
help of change implementation based program. The sustainability levels of the changes can
be affect the ways by which the employees in Apple can be managed in an effective manner
(Pollack & Pollack, 2015).
Make it stick – The change based efforts that have been implemented by the
management team of Apple need to be embedded within the culture. This will play a major
role in the ways by which Apple will be able to maintain the collaborative culture and
manage the employee relationships (Galli, 2018).
According to the change management process that has been described by Kotter and
Cohen, the change leaders are able to play a major role in finding the issues that are being
faced by the employees within the organizations. The employees in Apple have been facing
major issues based on the work environment and different benefits that are provided to them
(Money.cnn.com. 2019). The implementation of change is required in order to maintain the
operations of the organization successfully in the technology based industry. The requirement

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of changes in Apple is important for the maintenance of sustainable operations in the
competitive technology based industry (Money.cnn.com. 2019).
Conclusion
The analysis can be concluded by stating that the issues related to wages and work
environment that have been faced by Apple can be solved with the help of proper change
management programs. The proper implementation of change management program is based
on Kotter’s 8 step change management based model. The implementation and development
of changes is considered to be a major factor that is able to affect the relationships that have
been developed with the employees. The change process is thereby considered to be highly
important for the ways by which the culture of an organization can be improved.

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References
Al-Haddad, S., & Kotnour, T. (2015). Integrating the organizational change literature: a
model for successful change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 28(2),
234-262.
Anderson, D. L. (2016). Organization development: The process of leading organizational
change. Sage Publications.
Burke, W. W. (2017). Organization change: Theory and practice. Sage Publications.
Cameron, E., & Green, M. (2015). Making sense of change management: A complete guide
to the models, tools and techniques of organizational change. Kogan Page Publishers.
Galli, B. J. (2018). Change Management Models: A Comparative Analysis and
Concerns. IEEE Engineering Management Review, 46(3), 124-132.
Helfat, C. E., & Martin, J. A. (2015). Dynamic managerial capabilities: Review and
assessment of managerial impact on strategic change. Journal of management, 41(5),
1281-1312.
Money.cnn.com. (2019). Apple sued by employees over labor issues. Retrieved from
https://money.cnn.com/2014/07/23/technology/apple-labor/
Pollack, J., & Pollack, R. (2015). Using Kotter’s eight stage process to manage an
organisational change program: Presentation and practice. Systemic Practice and
Action Research, 28(1), 51-66.