Book Review: Leading Organizational Change - Chapters 1 & 2

This report presents a comprehensive book review of chapters 1 and 2 of 'The Change Monster: The Human Forces that Fuel or Foil Corporate Transformation and Change' by Duck (2002), focusing on the critical aspects of organizational change and stagnation. The review summarizes the author's key arguments, emphasizing that organizational change is essential for survival in a dynamic environment, and highlights the external and internal signs of stagnation, such as outdated products, falling sales, and lack of motivation. The report explores the stages of organizational change, including planning, implementation, determination, and fruition, as well as the importance of leadership in guiding employees through these phases. The review also discusses the two forms of stagnation, depressive and hyperactive, and provides an analysis of the dimensions that influence the impact of change initiatives, such as strategy, business model, and workforce size. The author's personal experience as a leader in a fundraising group is shared, illustrating the practical application of the concepts discussed in the book. The report also provides a reflection on the strengths and weaknesses of the book, and concludes with an action plan for facilitating organizational change based on the insights gained from the text.

Running head: ASSESSMENT ON LEADING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE
Assessment on Leading Organizational Change
Name of the Student:
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Author Note:

1ASSESSMENT ON LEADING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE
Book Review (Chapter 1 and 2)
According to the author, Duck, (2002) organizational change is mandatory for any
enterprise to be able to compete in this changing times. Every kind of organization face a
period of stagnation during their life time and if not taken care of immediately it might lead
to a complete shutdown. Even the companies like IBM and Gillette faced similar challenges
when they became too rigid in their approach. The writer classifies the signs of Stagnation
into External and Internal signs. On the other hand, “the external signs of Stagnation are
obvious: outdated products or services, falling sales and share price, customer desertion, and
talent drain (Duck, 2002, p.20).” Sometimes, some enterprises may suffer from delusions of
non-stagnancy. This poses a threat to the company as the managers are not being able to
recognize the under lying problem of the organization and by the time they realize it might be
too late. This phenomena is known as Internal stagnation. The ways to end stagnation in an
enterprise can be categorized into two similar parts. The methods that can be adopted to end
External stagnation are, takeover, merging and acquiescing, restructure and privatization and
the Internal stagnation can be eradicated with organizational transformation, reorganizing the
structure, cutting cost and reengineering the process. The first phase, planning, is the most
challenging as here the plans are formed and aligned with organizational structure.
Sometimes it might go for too long and bring further stagnation of the process. The next
phase is the implementation where the most turmoil take place. When the plans are unfolded,
all the emotions that appeared during the preparation phase are joined with much complex
emotions like, volatility, exhilaration, apathy and many more. People are not completely sure
of their ability to be able to work in the changing system. It is the duty of the leaders at this
point to assure the subordinates about the changes, to give them confidence and boost up their
energy. This motivation is necessary to implement the changes effectively. The next phase
that follows is the determination phase: “Now comes the most critical phase of the change

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process—the phase in which the initiative is in the most danger of failing.” (Duck, 2002,
p.30). Here, reinforcements are necessary in this stage or the employees may revert back to
their old practices ort leave the company. This now leads to the next phase of Retreat. In
many cases, employees grow a cynical attitude towards change and might leave the
organization in numbers. The last stage is Fruition, where, all the plans have been
implemented and the necessary follow ups have been done, the employees have been trained
to follow the new methods and the operations are running smoothly. This is when most
organizations stop making further changes which is detrimental to the process (Schaffer,
Sandau & Diedrick, 2013). The organization must evolve continuously to incorporate
changes that are happening in the market.
The two forms of Stagnation: Depressive and Hyperactive, necessary classification
that will give the readers ideas on how to recognize them and determine the planning
according to the type. Any organization that is going through stagnation, will fall into either
of these categories. In case of Depressed companies, the tell-tale signs are the loss of
direction, operational slowness, decision making inability, lack of motivation and energy,
hopelessness and a sense of inadequacy among the workers. The Hyperactive organizations
on the other hand, “Hyperactive companies, by contrast, engage in frenzied activity. But
although the activity consumes enormous amounts of energy, it generates, at best, only minor
successes (Duck, 2002, p.41).” Despite that they are unable to do anything to resurface from
the situation. Companies going through the process of privatization and consolidation might
face this problem. For example, Micro Switch Company faced stagnation when, a Japanese
competitor became one of the leaders in their industry and people started to buy from them
due to their modern design and lower prices. The manager realized that the company was in
stagnation and implemented changes that were hard on the employees at first but were
effective in the long run.

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Any change that comes in an organization takes time to affect. Some dimensions
affect the time and extent to which any initiative to change might affect the organization.
“These dimensions are: 1. Strategy 2. Business Model 3. Key Process and IT systems 4.
Organizational Structure 5. Roles and Responsibilities 6. Compensation 7. Location of
Operation and Facilities 8. Size and Capability of Workforce (Duck, 2002, p.47)”. The larger
the organization the larger these dimensions are and the longer it takes to affect changes to
the organization. For example, the greater the workforce the longer it will take them to be
able to adapt to the new changes. This is true for all the other dimensions. One of the most
important factor that drives organizational change is the vision or goal set by the leaders
(Carter et al., 2013). If the strategy to change is kept boxed up, the employees would not be
able to understand the aim of the change. It will create confusion and the venture will finally
fail. The time frame available is also an important factor to facilitate any change. Too little
time at hand is likely to tire people out easily while too much time taken to implement
changes will lead to loss of focus and energy.
The greatest challenge a merger can face is to take the organization out of the denial
phase. In most cases, large organizations do not accept the fact that their organization might
be suffering from stagnation issue. Sometimes they do but are unwilling to change their
methods or structure due to internal rigidity. While, “many high-performing companies have
been unable to avoid Stagnation, but a few have been able to do so for inordinately long
periods of time (Duck, 2002, p.60).” They have the ability to recognize potential threat and
reacting to it immediately. This ensures that the company is able to facilitate change at their
own terms and that the change is gradual so that the employees are able to adapt to it easily.
In order to diagnose the reason that is causing the stagnation of a company, quantitative hard
data, external qualitative data and internal qualitative data needs to be gathered and analyzed.
Input from the people, the stakeholders, the managers, the outsiders and the company

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business history will provide all these information that the mergers can use to reach to the
root of the problem that is causing the stagnation.
“When an organization stagnates, the individuals within it tend to stagnate as well
(Duck, 2002, p.74). As the employees are going through the same repetitive phase in their
workplace, it is likely that they will develop the same kind of habit internally as well. A
clearly drawn out strategy that is synced with modern day potential is necessary create
effective change. The starting point of any successful strategy should be the present working
culture of the organization. The outdated beliefs and practices that are there in the operation
of the organization must be recognized and changed immediately. Large companies generally
have the notion that their customers will remain loyal forever and no one in the market will
ever be able to compete with them as far as product is concerned (Hornstein, 2015).
Interacting and interviewing the customers can go a long way to realize what their opinions
are about. Some organizations may have leaders that have general affinity towards change
and can go to great lengths to facilitate the change. When stagnation phase is properly
determined and analyzed, it leads on to the next phase of Preparation. The two chapters give a
cognitive idea about the Stagnation phenomena that happen in organizations. Most
organizations are threatened by this and the understanding of the characteristics of Stagnation
and the possible solutions of it will go a long way in running the business for a long time.
Personal experience
While reading this book, I remembered an incident some years back. It was the first
time I became the leader of a fund raising group for distressed children. The members that
worked there had been doing the same work for the last ten years. I have been in the
organization for many years and have seen the work. When I joined as the leader of the team,
for the first few months all was going fine. After that I realized that the fund collection was

5ASSESSMENT ON LEADING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE
getting lower gradually. When I asked them about the reasons that was affecting the
collection, no one could come up with any plausible explanation. As that continued for a few
months, we decided to take a deeper dive into the situation. I started to accompany them
sometimes in their work to see what is causing the problem. I found out that during their
negotiation, they kept to their old style which did not impress most of the investors. After this
session I explained them this aspect. At first they were rigid in their thought process and
refused to account to the procedure. After much discussion and deliberation, they finally
understood the problem and accepted that the procedures must be changed. We prepared a
plan and incorporated many changes. We introduced new technologies that gave the investors
clear view of the work that we did. At first, many of the members were not completely
comfortable with these new technologies and changes. But slowly they recovered and the
collection increased.
Reflection on Positives and Negatives of the Book
The book provides a detailed description of changes in organization. In spite of that, it
has certain strengths and weaknesses that is apparent from the reading of the first two
chapters.
Strengths
The book is chaptered and structured professionally. The first chapter gives the
readers idea about the importance of organizational change and its different phases. In the
next chapter it deals with the first stage, Stagnation, and in the next the following stage,
Preparation and so on. This structure of the book enables the readers to be focused in their
study. There are plenty of use of examples. Each topic has been supported by many examples
that are apt for the topic and gives the readers a clear idea about what the author is implying.

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The abundance of the example also gives a clear idea about the many scenarios that any
organization might face and the different solutions that their problems might have. The
language has flow and cohesion. The central argument is clear that an organization must
facilitate change to be able to retain a competitive advantage in the market.
Weakness
There are also many weaknesses present in the book. The author uses a personal point
of view in the book. The problem with that is the universal contextualization of the
experiences that she had. The book does not give perspective to other alternative methods
that have been adopted by other specialists to facilitate change in the organization. Even after
much detailed description, analysis and evaluation some question remains unanswered. The
initial chapter talks about the detection of stagnation and procedure to end them, while
leaving out the process through which a leader or manager will be able to detect stagnation if
they have not done so. The book also does not give any insight about what possible exercises
could be followed to detect potential chances of stagnation before it happens or at an early
stage.
Action plan
From the reading of the text, an action plan can be created. When given an
opportunity to facilitate change in an organization, this action plan can be used to effectively
change the organizational procedure. The plan includes the following steps:
Preparation: this is the first phase of the process where all the aspects are analyzed
and the problems are detected (Al-Haddad & Kotnour, 2015).
Evaluation: the next phase will be the evaluation of the stagnating factors. This phase
will enable me to create a plan that will be most effective for the organization.

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Planning: the next phase that must be followed is the planning phase. To find out the
reasons for stagnation this phase is important.
Implementation: in this phase all the plans are now are placed into action. The
employees and managers are intimidated about the process (Jacobs, Witteloostuijn & Christe-
Zeyse, 2013).
Fruition: in the last phase the whole process is evaluated and the effectiveness of the
process is analyzed. The follow up procedures are also created in this final stage.

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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.
Carter, M. Z., Armenakis, A. A., Feild, H. S., & Mossholder, K. W. (2013). Transformational
leadership, relationship quality, and employee performance during continuous
incremental organizational change. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 34(7), 942-
958.
Duck, J. D. (2002). The change monster: The human forces that fuel or foil corporate
transformation and change. New York, NY: Three Rivers Press. ISBN-10:
0609808818 | ISBN-13: 978-060980
Hornstein, H. A. (2015). The integration of project management and organizational change
management is now a necessity. International Journal of Project Management, 33(2),
291-298.
Jacobs, G., Van Witteloostuijn, A., & Christe-Zeyse, J. (2013). A theoretical framework of
organizational change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 26(5), 772-
792.
Schaffer, M. A., Sandau, K. E., & Diedrick, L. (2013). Evidence‐based practice models for
organizational change: overview and practical applications. Journal of Advanced
Nursing, 69(5), 1197-1209.