Report on Managing Organizational Change: Company A Case Analysis

This report examines the organizational change that occurred at Company A, an Australian online business operating under the NDM umbrella. The case study focuses on the transition from a newspaper-based operation to digital services, including the restructuring of senior management and the implementation of new strategies to meet the demands of the online market. The analysis covers various aspects of the change process, such as aligning values, structure, and culture, employee motivation through rewards and training, and the role of leadership in driving the transformation. The report applies Kotter's eight-step change model to evaluate the effectiveness of the implemented changes, highlighting the importance of communication, employee empowerment, and short-term wins. It also discusses the use of Kurt Lewin's force field analysis to identify and address resisting forces. The conclusion emphasizes the significance of strategic change management, effective communication, and the adaptation of organizational structures to remain competitive in a dynamic business environment. The report provides recommendations for successful change implementation, emphasizing the need for a combination of strategies and continuous evaluation.

Running head: MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 1
Managing Organizations and Leading People
Name
Professor
Course
Date

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 2
Managing Organizations and Leading People
Background information
Company A is among the fastest growing Australia based, online businesses having a
directory service website. The company operates as a privately functioning business but operates
under the NDM (news digital media) organization umbrella. It was formed by NDM in 2005 as
one of its business operations of online data websites that provide a variety of services such as
magazine and news websites, online weather and sports information, and search engines of
comparing shopping rates, online recruitment and travel related search engines. The company is
located in Sydney with other sales branches in Melbourne and Brisbane. It has employed over
150 members of staff which is an approximated 50% increase over a period of two years
(Werani, et al. 2016, p. 596). The case study involves an organizational change that happened in
company A that involved the replacement of almost all the senior management staff including its
CEO several years ago.
Company was initially involved in the production of information and news through
newspaper. There was pressure for the firms to implement a business change that involved
expanding their services to the production of information and news online in digital formats
(Teece, 2010, p. 183). This includes Company A which had to decrease its operations involving
newspaper and increase the digital services. Being an employee at Company A for more than six
years, I was able to acquire this content through observation, interviews with the management,
company information internally from within the firm’s sales department when working in
various roles as a senior retention account, account and sales executive manager.

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 3
Discussion and analysis
a. Structure
The company had to align its values, structure and culture of the parent firm so as to meet
strategic goals of growth a short time after its founding. To manage the strategic change like that
of Company A, experts have identified three fundamental change sets in the approach such as
political allocation, ideological or culture, and technical design mix problems. One of these
issues becomes a pressing problem at any given time and leads to change. In Company A’s case,
several changes evolved which involved culture issues (Abbas, and Asghar, 2010, p. 92). The
company has been experiencing growth in size since it was established related to various
acquired website services that operate as separate business units being supported by Finance,
human resource (HR), commercial services and other operations that are offered by NDM. One
decision within the Company A involved aligning the firm in based on culture, strategy and
operations so as to focus on performance and innovation towards attaining the objective of being
the top business providing online services (Kotter, 2012, p. 27). Due to this goal, company A’s
management redesigned its structure and merged units together to operate as single businesses.
Shortly after the relocation, the company started flattening out structures under new CEOs and
management teams. Since then, the company has been constantly changing trying to achieve its
goal and continue growing in performance and in number of workers (Christin Jurisch, 2014, p.
53). This was done to allow them become as competitive as Sensis the leading company. The
company experiences a performance gap which is described as the change from a desired state of
less level to another (Amit, and Zott, 2012, p. 47). This is noted in the increased performance in
the company after the structure and culture changes were implemented.
b. Motivation

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 4
The most important aspect of change involves staff motivation which involves
reinforcement and evaluation of the changes that were implemented by using tactics that leave
the staff committed and focused to adapt to the changes (Žabjek, Kovačič, and Indihar
Štemberger, 2009, p. 592). This would also involve training people to get used to the new
changes taking place. Since the old operations involved the use of newspapers, most staff is not
aware of the technical know-how of the change to digital media and would need to be oriented to
the new operations including the new ways, procedures and processes of doing things. The staff
also needs to take their customers through the new system and this requires them to be well
knowledgeable so that they transfer the same to the customer (Husain, 2013, p. 43). The
company used rewards, improved salaries, promotions and tips to ensure that workers attained
weekly set targets. This led to more sales and profits out of increased work output and customer
loyalty achieved from the hard work.
c. Leadership
The new managers recruited in the company were selected based on type of profession,
level of performance they had, the corporate environment that the company desired and those
coming from the competitor firm, Sensis as would act as a potential source of useful skills in
management and carrying out various operations such as production and sales. The new
management required to execute the whole of the processes of change on their own (Edmonds,
2011, p. 351). A change agent includes people or group of people who take responsibility for any
changes in behavior or existing patterns of operation in supportive ways. A change process
involves risks and key among the perceived risks include the responsibility that organizational
leaders take in deciding the direction for the change (Rainey, and Fernandez, 2012, p. 13). The
change led to increased sales and general performance regardless of any challenges involved

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 5
d. Management of change
Kotter’s Steps What was done Evaluation regarding what
was done
Recommendations
1. Establish
a Sense
of
Urgency
Company A terminated the
services of almost half of
incompetent staff some
resigned and new staff was
enrolled on merit. Switching
to online technology
Yes. Amendments were done
on the wearing code, change
reporting and leaving times
and incompetent people were
sacked.
Sack incompetent
management and
install new structure
that works
horizontally rather
than top down.
2. Form a
guiding
coalition
The various stakeholders
were informed of the need to
change including the staff
and management
Yes. The management
ensured that people
understood the need for
change before it was
implemented.
Seek support from
the management
and do away with
resisting members
3. Create a
vision
Focus on customer
satisfaction by setting
customer feedback channels
Yes. Commitment was done
to improve quality of
services via online websites
Committing to
ensure that the
vision controls all
operations
4. Commun
icate the
Vision
Communication channels
were set through social
media platform which
communicated the vision
Yes. Customers, employees
and management could
interact frequently ensuring
that issues were identified in
time and solved
Evaluating the
channels to ensure
that information
communicated
reaches the right
recipients and
feedback given in
time
5. Empowe
r people
to act on
the
vision
Yes. Horizontal management
allowed employees to give
views regarding issues
arising. Employees reminded
of their role in decision
making (Bigliardi, and Ivo
Dormio, 2009, p. 47).
Yes. Employees were given
the power to come up with
creative and innovative ideas
that could help the company
achieve its objectives by
working together as a team
Ensure that there is
job specialization
based on skills and
strengths and that
the staff
communicates ideas
which the
management
reviews through a
vetting process to
select the best
6. Create
short
term
wins
Weekly reviews would be
done instead of the quarterly
ones so that operations
would be constantly
evaluated.
Yes. Targets were set and
employees encouraged
through motivational talks,
rewards, tips and increased
salary and promotions
Maintain the
employee and
customer
motivation program
that increases
loyalty and
commitment among

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 6
them promoting
output
7. Capture
gains to
generate
more
change
Recurrent issues identified
and solved, training and
motivation talks done to
avoid mistakes and changes
implemented on weekly
basis
Yes. The new management
team tried implementing new
changes identified to solve
issues once and for all.
Doing constant
evaluation and
testing alternatives
to solve recurrent
problems
8. Institutio
nalize
new
approach
This was to be done when
necessary and in time
Yes, evaluations made to set
standards of work leading to
continued growth
Job specialization,
creativity and
innovation would
lead to continued
growth.
Constant staff training, staff motivation, stakeholder involvement and constant evaluation
ensured that the change was implemented successfully and a state of adaptation was achieved
(Al-Haddad, and Kotnour, 2015, p. 243).
Kurt Lewin’s force model helped identify resisting forces and driving forces for the
change. Resisting forces which included fear for change and lack of cooperation were eliminated
by laying off staff not employed on merit and those that resisted for change (Dalby, et al. 2014,
p. 473). Drivers included the need to adopt online technology, willing customers, training,
rewarding staff and motivating them.

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 7
Conclusion
The various changes carried out by the management through the use of combined
strategies of implementing change. These include the forced method of top-bottom commanding,
coercive, direct communicating to employees, rewarding and punishing method, and decision-
making through sharing, rationalization method and empowered approach (Eckartz, et al. 2009,
p. 1601). Out of the various strategies there is no one that organizational change researchers have
deemed it the best but they usually advise for a combination to occur. However, change
managers and agents are given some guidelines to follow so that they implement change
successfully and avoid disappointment.
There are various things to carry out from this case study including the fact that as far as
businesses are bound to continue, changes are also bound to be there and it is most critical to
know how to implement changes so as to remain relevant in the market. For instance, employees
will not always be ready for any business change and will resist. Thus it is the responsibility of
the business management to know how to take the business and staff through change and avoid
compromising its goals on performance and growth. It is always advisable to implement change
using the various models of change most of which have proofed to lead business in
implementing organizational change successfully. Usually an organizational change is a critical
step to make in business life but the right strategies lead to successful end. The process requires
proper and timely communication of the need for change to the various stakeholders involved,
employees being the most important team.
A team that does not see the reason for change will always resist. This is why
communication is critical. Again, the change process needs to be well implemented in various
stages most of which involve freezing, change implementation and refreezing. The management

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 8
needs to identify ways of doing away with the resistance to change especially when the change
needed is key towards making the company to continue existence in the market. The process may
involve changing the whole management team and staff so as to see change implementation
success that yields fruits. The case of change in Company A can be said to have had lesser
challenge had the management applied the right change model to implement the change.
Changes in technology are the main causes of change in business. The reason is that as
globalization continues taking place, technology is bound to change due to continued innovation
and the efforts of remaining highly competitive in a highly competitive business environments.

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 9
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