HRM - Leading Through Change: Victoria Police Culture Transformation

This report analyzes the transformation of the Victoria Police force, focusing on the role of Human Resource Management (HRM) in leading through change. It examines Christine Nixon's attempts to alter the organization's culture, addressing issues of gender inequality, racial discrimination, and sexual harassment. The report explores the impact of these changes on various groups and individuals within the organization, as well as the different change models implemented, including Kotter's model. It also discusses leadership change strategies and the principles of leading change management, such as the need for urgency, forming powerful coalitions, and the importance of employee involvement and behavior change. The report highlights the challenges faced, the strategies used, and the outcomes of these efforts to create a more inclusive and effective police force. The analysis includes a discussion of both top-down and bottom-up approaches to change, emphasizing the importance of adapting traditional models to achieve lasting improvements. The report concludes with an assessment of the successes and ongoing challenges in transforming the Victoria Police culture.

HRM- Leading through
Change

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Analyse Christine Nixon’s attempt to transform the culture of Victoria Police....................1
Impact of change on groups, individuals and section in the organisation..............................4
Change Models.......................................................................................................................4
Different principles of leading change management............................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Human resource management plays an important role in staffing, controlling, manging
and coordinating different activities. It is mainly responsible for managing the employees in the
organisation and looks after various their training, recruitment, rewarding and the performance
appraisal policies. The main role of the human resource manager to maintain effective
environment in the company and provide resources which are essential for the growth and
development. It motivates employees and develop workplace policies which can benefit the
organisation to raise their sales and profits. Victoria police force is public organisation and was
established in 1853 (Keil and Ndou, 2016). It has 18,146 sworn members, 109 recruits and 1355
protective service officers. Along with this, the organisation has 3198 staff members and 329
police stations. The annual budget of this company is $2.51 billion.
In this report the main concern is given on analysis of culture of Victoria Police. Impact
of change program on groups, individuals and section in the organisation is seen. Further,
leadership change strategies and styles and conceptual approaches to changing culture are
described. The need for change and different diagnosing changes like functional analysis,
organisational improvement analysis are discussed. Further, Change models like planning,
implementing and evaluating are discussed.
Analyse Christine Nixon’s attempt to transform the culture of Victoria Police
In Victoria Police force, the employees are generally males when it was newly
established in Australia. The diversity changes in the company has came slowly with the change
in the culture. Only man works and women are not involved in staff members of the company
during first 100 years (Janićijević, 2017). Further, the females cannot look into this as their
career option. After, 50 years, the organisation has faced the problem of staff shortage due to
which it has cast various recruitment of the male. The female candidates are then selected to
fulfil the shortage of staff shortage. The organisation has given tough responsibilities and task to
the women candidates as compared to males.
Female employees were not given same rankings and positions as male candidates and
they are considered separately as policewomen. The organisation has then faced the problem of
racial discrimination in the company has taken place. Additionally, the case of sexual harassment
incidents and absence of flexible policies and negative behaviour of male officers towards
females have been increased (van der Voet, 2016). This information of wrong policies and
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harassment cases are spread in news and media which has negatively affected the reputation of
the organisation and people lost their confidence and trust from the organisation and police force.
Victoria police force culture was entrenched and they have lost their effective image in front of
the public.
After 1990, Victorian government and leaders of community has tried their best to bring
they change in the culture of Victoria Police force. This has affected the whole population of
Australia as the company has involved more participation and employment for women
candidates (Maria Stock, Zacharias and Schnellbaecher, 2017). This has increased the
participation of stakeholders pressure in more accountable, effective and capable police force.
The organisation has also developed the environment which has encourages the employees to
respect female workers and give them equal power as male employees. This has increased the
employee's performance and their attitude towards female candidates. The recruitment of women
candidate has been increased to 16.4% which has shown increase in the female employees in the
organisation but it is not reached upto the expected data.
Combined bottom down and top up approaches to change
Victoria police force, the leader has used top down approach which is mainly related to
the modification of the structure of the company. The leader has tried to modify the policies and
plans of the organisation and also analysed that the unions, government and other staff members
plays an important role in managing the quality and sustainability of changes which are
implemented. It has used bottom up approach by developing coalition of changes with the
executive members (Prabhakar and Yaseen, 2016). It has been used to increase the positive
response from political factors so that they can make strong system against the system. The
leader has to valued the changes from all the stakeholders including community members, union
officers, government representative which are in relation with public status within the
community. These coalitions are complex at all stages of the change process wherever it is
necessary.
Bottom line on change
The male culture plays in the Victoria Police force has created problems for the company
to increase its effectiveness. This culture can be changed to become more inclusive and bear the
changes in diversity. The leader has to use different recommendations from traditional models so
that they can analyse the impact of their new plans and strategies. Furthermore, the positive
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change in the organisation can be brought by modifying the culture and old trends and use social
and legislative system (Laureani and Antony, 2016). Additionally, changing the behaviour and
attitude of the organisational employees through role modelling.
Changes can be brought by combining the top up and bottom down approach so that it
can be analysed that rapid change is supporting the grass-roots of the organisation. It can bring
by using the incremental changes' strategy which helps in building later plans on its proper time.
Further, the complementary mix of traditional change will increase the effect of new plans in
better way. The organisation has to make the strategies in such a way that they are effective and
liked by everyone otherwise it will not bring any kind of change in the organisation.
Need of new approaches to change work
The new strategies of Victoria Police force has gained success as their new strategy has
focused on innovative and tenacious approach (Luo and et.al., 2016). These approaches help to
make new plans by analysing recommendations and findings of traditional model. Further, it has
focused on changing the culture of the company and has modified its mission and vision
statements to increase the effectiveness of the company. They have changed police dress,
reporting charts, appearance standards and firms artefacts to replace old values and establish new
system. Further, it has helped the employees to change their behaviour and attitude. Further, this
new system has focused more on changing the rude behaviour of the senior officials.
The organisation has viewed the changes positively and increased the value of their force
and other team members. It has used various methodology to modify their culture and old trends
and develop new changes in the company. The organisation has also been supported by the
legislative and governance members to implement new rules in the police force and military
system so that they can increase their efficiency and develop more powerful system against the
system (Shao, Feng and Hu, 2016). In order to make more durable and long lasting changes in
the company, the have also made changes to the policies of the employees.
In order to emphasize the behaviour change the behaviour, traditional model of VPF has
shifted their focus to traditional change models. It will help to determine the weak points of that
model and implement the strengths of it. The leader of the firm has used the employees
appraising policy in which they award the workers for their effective performance and positive
behaviour. This has helped the employees to boost up their confidence and increase their
potential to improve their performance. Further, the achievements and positive behaviour success
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results are published on the website and other social media sites which will help the employees
to feel proud on themselves and for the organisation as they are part of it (Prabhakar and Yaseen,
2016).
They also feel that they are considered as an important employees and treated equally and
fairly. This kind of model will increase the positive attitude of the officers and develop effective
and healthy environment in the organisation.
The male culture is changes by using the consultative and inclusive approach. The leader
has deleted the layer of discrimination and helped the women employees to put their views in
front of the management. It has helped the women to involve in decision making process and
make effective decisions. This has not only improved the mentality of narrow minded officials
but also helped VPF to increase their performance. This process has assisted in creating,
implementing and initiating change.
Impact of change on groups, individuals and section in the organisation
The significant changes in culture and behaviour of the police officials has affected the
environment of the company. The male employees have changed their views and opinion
towards the female police and they start giving them respect and dignity. The group members
and staff members of Victoria Police force has stopped harassing the women employees and help
them in facing difficult situations (Prabhakar and Yaseen, 2016). This has encouraged them to
make their career in police force and join military forces. Employees excluding the department
members have also changed their view and opinion and welcomed the female candidates to
perform their difficult tasks.
The people are more concentrating on accepting the changes and maintaining their
behaviour. The employees are focusing in implementing the new ideas so that they can help
others specially female employees so that they cannot feel depressed and uncomfortable in
solving their tasks. Further, the staff member of the organisation are behaving positively and
properly welcoming the new strategies of the organisation to bring change in their culture
(Laureani and Antony, 2016). They are also believing that the support and effective policies of
the company will help them to increase their standard by providing best rewards and exploring
their success among the public.
Change Models
Kotler's model of change
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Victorian police force is a public organisation established in 1853 had gone through
many changes to reach place its now. The major problem they were suffering were from lack of
women involvement in organisation and discrimination against them.
1. Create urgency:
Every one were able to see the condition of VPF and how it wads crumbling under the
pressure but still people were turning blind eye to it. It was later in 20th century that people
became aware and accepted that yes indeed they need women in there organization for there
smother working but it was not only the sex discrimination they have to fight but also racial, age,
and sexual (Wierenga and van der Lans, 2017). Kotler said that visible problems are proved to be
helpful in attracting more people and pushing them into urgency levels. The organisation was
criticised by the local media people as the company's environment is deteriorating by the male
employees. The cases of harassment and negative attitude of male employees towards female are
increasing. Further, Comrie approach of changing culture was proved to be unsuccessful in the
organisation. It was strict leader and brought frequent change in organisation structure and given
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Illustration 1: Kotler model of change
(Source:Ramakrishnan, 2014)

more attention to manage the culture change among the employees (Lipskaya-Velikovsky,
Kotler and Krupa, 2016). It has only focused on the short term solutions and long marches
which are not liked by the staff members of the company.
2. Form a powerful coalition:
In year 1980s and 1990s government and regional leader came together so they could
fight against it. They encourage women by recruiting them more in no. special training were
provided to them they try to bring many people together but it does not lead to big change as
people were scared and still reluctant to change specially male dominant society.
The change in the organisation needs participative approaches which helps in controlling
and effectively managing the approaches. The leader has made teams and distributed the work so
that they can achieve their targets. Police stations of Victoria police force are changed in ordered
to build bands with the officers. Team working has helped in creating 293 recommendations and
other changes are defined by stakeholders, community members and government representatives.
Senior officers are also supporting in making change in their culture (Wong and et.al., 2017).
This has crested a major change in organisation culture and make people believe that change will
bring new trend in the organisation. This coalition has helped in creating, implementing and
initiating the change.
3. Create a vision for change:
The biggest change they could bring was to appoint a woman at higher level. Christine
Nixon was the first female Chief Commissioner (Vignali, 2015). This change brings new light in
organisation with Christine work women were started seeing in new light, that even from
different background women can still work efficiently.
The vision helps the organisation to motivate and coordinate the activities to achieve their
targets. Nixon in its speech has given focus on cultural diversity of the company and visits
different branches in order to clear the vision. Nixon's leadership has included the nearest
community into direct consultations which has helped it in leading the cultural change. Further,
symbolic activities have played an important role in maintaining the vision of the organisation to
overcome the future obstacles. The vision message was communicated in evry meeting and
events so that it can be clear to all employees. Nixon has introduced bottom up and top down
approach in managing the culture (Achrol and Kotler, 2016). Kotler has said that trends and
tradition of the company will change only when the boss is powerful and supportive in nature.
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4. Communicate the vision:
Nixon for better improvement try to connect with public and try to reach the roots of
problem, she makes many appearances and speeches so that people can also understand her view
and more involvement of public could be made towards the problems.
The organisation leader is focusing more on communicating their long term vision to the
employees so that they can mentally prepare themselves for fighting the challenging tasks. Nixon
has communicated the vision inside and outside of the company so that they can collect the
feedback of local community and police officers (Ainsworth and Ballantine, 2017). These
feedbacks will help the leader to make their policies which can remove the obstacles.
Communicating change will encourage VPF employees and other members that change is
attractive and help them to bring effective policies in their environment.
5.Remove obstacles:
When meeting the public and listening to them the major problem they came across was “
flexible work arrangement and staff deployment “ To solve all this problem more than 30 project
teams were made, which look through every issue and make recommendation for its more
efficiency, and flexibility. Nixon has clearly identified the goals and challenges before
implementing the new policy in the organisation (Kanagal, 2016). Further, this had made
enormous change in the company as now leader is giving more concentration to the problems
and challenges and taking effective steps to solve them. It has also identified the things which are
responsible for affecting the attitude and behaviour of employees and Victoria police force.
6. Create short-term wins:
The biggest change was the equity in recruitment where men and women were given
equal to fight for any position (Giora and et.al., 2015). For better relationship regular visit were
made between team and senior, it also leads to increase credibility and trust. Kotler has said that
changes can be more effective when proper attention is not given to short term results. Nixon has
given more attention to short term outcomes in controlling the culture of VPF. It has given more
focus to high masculinity culture to remove crises and pressure from the environment. The leader
has developed incremental approach by developing long term strategy approach. This has helped
the leader to permanently change the structure of the company (Xia, Deshpande and Bonates,
2016). It has also given proud feeling to the employees by showing that their efforts are helping
in changing the culture of Victoria police force.
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7. Build on the change:
With all the change going on another big change was made by “ community and cultural
division in year 2001-02. This particular division help the multi cultural and gay people to be
part of diversity, special moves were made so that these people can also be involve in
organisation. Nixon has encouraged the people to accept the change in the organisation so that
they can bring the change in the company (Vardi and et.al., 2017). Its continuous efforts has
gained success and it was successful in changing the attitude and culture of the employees.
8 Anchor the change
New policies were made for recruits which can provide them bigger benefits so they can
handle there work and life efficiently. Difference were made in working were only big cases
were handled by VPF and other were handled by local police. This changes were result of many
people coming together and choosing right way for development.
When changes are made, the employees face difficulties in accepting them frequently and
they are subjected to regression. Kotler has tried to bring new culture in the organisation. Nixon
has also made the best efforts in changing old dysfunctional activities. It has brought new
dysfunctional practises by changing the behaviour of the employees (Chu and et.al., 2017). The
culture will change only after the people change their actions and methods of completing tasks
and solving problems. This will help them to implement the new culture among groups and staff
members of the organisation. This has helped the organisation to increase their profits and its
effectiveness.
This model helped Victoria police force in preparing and accepting new changes. Further,
transition is easy with this model. Changed culture in the organisation has helped the employees
to bring different changes in their behaviours and working style. This model has helped the
leaders to follow the guidelines and ability to find out the expected results. It has also directed
the correct methods and strategies to follow in making effective plans for the welfare of the
people lives (Mendonca and et.al., 2016).
Jhonson web cultural model:
This model is adapted by Victoria police force focusing more on the culture and its
impact on strategic issues. It helps in identifying the barriers to facilitators of change so that the
police department can enhance its performance and competitive advantage. There are mainly six
components which are described as follows:
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The paradigm:
The organisation has male dominated culture in beginning. The the women are also
involved in the company. Further, female leadership and diverse policies are discussed.
Routines:
It is the culture in which the organisation work daily and accepts the behaviour of the
company's structure (Alhouti, Johnson and D'Souza, 2016).
Ritual and myths:
This focuses on activities and events and which are the important things which highlights
the culture and trend of the organisation. Myths are converted among the current and other
external factors which focuses essential events and values.
Symbols:
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Illustration 2: Jhonson web cultural model
(Source:Richard S., 2014)

These are the logos, dress codes and visual representations which are developed by the
leaders and company's officials which convey important message over the functional purpose.
Organisational structure:
It defines the structure of the company by organisational charts and some quotations of
the company that indicates the contribution of the employees and people.
Control systems:
It includes functional, quality and reward system of Victoria Police force. The
organisation controlling methods are described in these systems (Lewandoski and et.al., 2017). It
includes what is important for the company to monitor and essential things which requires more
attention to be developed.
Power structure:
It includes the powerful executives and group of senior leaders which operates the major
tasks of the organisation and take effective decisions.
Dysfunctional Johnson’s Cultural Web model under VPF Comrie leadership
This is male dominated leadership model in which female employees are not supported
and the organisation lack diversity policies. This has created the environment of male dominated
and there was no one to raise the voice against the harassment of the women. This model focuses
on the main obstacles of the future plans. VPF lacks frozen culture values with respect to female
friendly policies (Lee and Johnson, 2017). Further, the company has faced the negative attitude
of the employees towards female workers. Comrie leading of cultural change not gained success
in the company and has lead to negative environment in the company. This has created negative
impression in the company.
Furthermore, this leadership has not developed any institutional position which cooperate
the company to extend it outside the company to stop wrong behaviour inside the organisation.
The commander is not able to implement new culture which female friendly and not developed
policies which fulfil the gap between male and female employees. It does not gain the confidence
and trust of the workers as they did not accept the new culture and rules of its leadership ( Ayers-
Johnson and et.al., 2017). On the other hand, Nixon's attempt to change the culture of Victoria
police force was successful and was accepted and followed by the employees.
Nixon's paradigm and culture change management
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