Resistance in Organizations: Useful Insights for Managers Essay

This essay critically discusses the statement that resistance in organizations provides useful insights for managers, drawing on concepts from management psychology. It explores organizational control, the impact of change, and employee behavior. The essay examines different perspectives on control, including the "iron fist" and "velvet glove" approaches, and analyzes how resistance can lead to improved communication, coaching, and empowerment within organizations. It also acknowledges the potential negative impacts of resistance, such as disrupted work environments and reduced efficiency, while emphasizing the importance of understanding and managing resistance effectively to achieve better change outcomes. The essay utilizes concepts like Kurt Lewin's model of organizational change and explores how resistance can inform and refine management strategies.

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Resistance in organization provides useful insights for managers
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Resistance in organization provides useful insights for managers
1. Introduction
Resistance in organizations is a phenomenon that has been described as a process that
obstructs the management process in the organization since it affects the ability to achieve the
intended changes. However, others have argued that resistance is not always negative since it
seeks to maintain a status quo within the organization. This means that the role of resistance is
based on the fact that there is a need to observe the resistance that the organization receives and
how people within the organization respond. In other cases, resistance is a way of ensuring that
management can explore the issues within the change process. This means that the control
process is supposed to be viewed as part of the management process that creates insights on the
change process and what needs to be done to address the said changes. The insights that are
provided by the resistance to change form the basis on which to address the change management
process. Kurt Lewin's model of organizational change requires the unfreezing of the issues
within the organization that need to lead to organizational change. Thus resistance is a way of
provides insights on how the change needs to be done and how it will meet the needs of the
organization. This essay argues that resistance to change provides useful insights that can be
utilized in the organization to achieve better change outcomes.
2. Key concepts
Organizational control
Organizational control looks at the way agents within the business can establish and
maintain control over the organization. This is based on the existing rules, guidelines, and
procedures for directing work and business processes for employees. This means that rules are
set for employee behavior and organizational practices that set regulations and internal controls
that define the business processes. Control is achieved by maintaining authority over the whole

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organization with systems that define business processes (Briand, 2016, p. 7). This means that
the role of control in the organization is to create a business environment with procedures that
determine and define business activities. In this case, control needs to be seen as something
different which is defined by organizational structures that are defined by the internal regulations
that have been put in place. To achieve control the organization must have clear guidelines on
business processes that define the specific requirements that have to be met in the organization.
To achieve control, the employee is positioned in the managerial discourse of work and must
obey the set rules and regulations (Alvesson & Willmott 2001, p.3). Resistance to organizational
change is mostly regarded as a reaction towards control that limits the abilities of the employees
to operate freely.
Resistance in organizations
Organizational change has the effect of shifting the status quo form the current position to
a new state that employees may not be aware of. Resistance is the inability of the employees to
adopt the proposed changes in the organization and the preference to stick to old tendencies.
Resistance is sometimes regarded as a functional conflict that arises from the reaction on the
proposed changes or reorganization of the structure of the organization. Pullen & Rhodes (2013,
p.90) add that resistance is supposed to be seen as ethics grounded in the freedom of the
individual to engage in alternatives that explore the undecided space within the business
environment to increase or reduce outcomes. The level of resistance in the organization varies
depending on the nature of the proposed changes and thus can be overt, implicit, immediate, or
deferred where the methods for dealing with such resistance vary from organization to
organization. This means that resistance can be attributed to control or opposition to the business
processes that are proposed by the organizational change process. To address resistance,

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management needs to look at the drivers of the resistance and address the implicit and explicit
issues.
Perspectives on control
Two perspectives of control have been argued in literature: the iron fist and the velvet
glove. The iron fist control is based on total absolute control that does not tolerate dissent. In
such an organizational system, there are strict laws and regulations with high bureaucratic chains
of command that are controlled by a dictator (Koslicki & Willits 2018, p.3). Iron fist systems fail
to recognize the role of employee voice and thus the rule of law and top management takes
precedence. In such a system, resistance to change is punishable based on the policies of the
organization. The velvet glove control is a move away from coercion to a system that allows
liberty and employee voices to shape organizational change (Jermier, 1998, p. 241). It comes in
different sizes and shapes which take the carrot and stick approach to change. This means that
resistance to change is reviewed based on employee needs to determine the best way to deal with
the issues of change that exist in the organization.
3. Analysis and discussion
Resistance in organizations can be meaningful in different ways that lead to ultimately
succeeding in the change management process. One argument that supports resistance is that it
allows management to justify the controls that exist making it easy for employees to understand.
In most cases, the rationale for change is not clearly justified and thus the only that employees
can understand the change process (Fleming & Spicer, 2003, p.159). This implies that leaders are
supposed to ensure that the management control process aligns with the required business
process. Sometimes management controls can be unethical or fail to use an ethical approach to
management control when managing issues within the organization. Employee resistance is the

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only way that the employees can make the organization to understand the issues that exist. The
resistance to management control means that management need to understand the changes that
need to be put in place. Since employees experience fears over management controls, it means
that it is natural for employees to resist management controls that they feel are above them.
Lewin’s model of change requires that the business environment needs to unfreeze so that the
issues that can affect change are reduced. Thus through resistance, management is forced to
communicate the issues within the management process that need to be addressed when the
business processes take place. By working with other employees, it becomes easy for
management to achieve the management control process since resistance creates an environment
that addresses the concerns that may have been left out.
Resistance in organizations forces management to address the communication issues that
exist and putting measures in place to improve communication issues in the organization. In
most cases, the nature of the management structure can limit the flow of information from the
top to the bottom. This implies that resistance forces management to slow down the controls that
are put in places and create risk plans that need to be put in place before the management
controls are rolled out (Pullen & Rhodes 2013, p. 791). Sometimes, management controls fail to
identify the pertinent issues that relate to employees and business process which are only
addressed when there is resistance. The role of resistance is to reinforce a communication and
management plan that reflects the needs of the employee (Yılmaz & Kilicoglu 2013, p.19). This
shows that by resisting, employees are trying to raise concerns on the best way to deal with the
business challenges that may arise when the changes are implemented. Once the issues have
been resolved management then finds the best way of bringing the employees on board and
working with them in the in executing the required control processes.

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Resistance leads to the development of coaching and empowerment plans for different
stakeholder needs. In most cases, change is an upper management initiative and not an
organizational initiate. Thus the purpose of resistance is to raise concerns on the lack of
preparedness of relevant stakeholders for the change process. The outcome is the development of
a coaching and empowerment plan that addresses the issues within the organization that may not
have been addressed (Franklin & Aguenza 2016, p.29). For example, resistance can lead to the
development of an employee development program which can be used to empower them and
improve their abilities. The resistance of employees has been attributed to the fear of
management controls which affect their freedom and affect the status quo in the organization.
Coaching is an empowerment approach that increases the ability of employees to deal with the
challenges that can be associated with management.
Resistance in organizations provides room for management to listen and gather
constructive feedback on the best way to manage the organization. By resistance, it means that
the employees have not been involved and are trying to raise their concerns over the best way to
deal with challenges that they face in the organization. Collinson (1994, p.29) adds that
resistance is an element of consent that is used to raise concerns on whether the processes reflect
employee consent. For example, when employees resist management controls, management will
be forced to listen to their concerns which can lead to proposals on the best way to implement the
controls. This involvement generates ownership of the management process and proposes the
best way that employees can take part in the management control process. In this case,
management is supposed to deal with the issues of resistance within the organization by listening
to employees and determining the best way that employees can be involved in the process. By

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exploring feedback, management can get the best insights on how to deal with the change
process to ensure that the change process takes place effectively.
Despite the benefits of resistance, sometimes it can lead to a disrupted work environment
by creating conflict among employees and between employees and management. In most cases,
any management control initiatives has a timeline on which they need to be achieved and thus
resistance affects the estimated time which also affects the expected business outcomes.
Management controls are supposed to lead to greater business benefits once the process has been
fully implemented. This implies that when resistance is realized within the organization it
disrupts the work environment which creates unrest within the organization (Jones & Ven, 2016,
p.5). This implies that any resistance affects the business processes and reduces the benefits that
were supposed to be reaped from the new management processes. Thus resistance should be
avoided by all means and management needs to unfreeze any form or source of resistance that
can be experienced in the organization. In most cases, employee participation is the best way that
management can work with employees to identify any issues that need to be addressed.
Resistance leads to reduced efficiency by harming the organizational processes. This is
because management spends a lot of time focusing on the resistance rather than implementing
the management process or running other business processes. The outcome of resistance is
reduced efficiency and output of employees which can lead to business losses (Boohene &
Williams, 2012). Resistance can also damage the reputation of the organization if it is not
adequately implemented and employee issues become a public concern. For example, when
employees resist too much, it can create negative publicity for the organization which can, in
turn, affect the brand image of the organization. Thus resistance needs to be avoided since it can
lead to business outcomes that are not intended.

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4. Conclusion
Resistance within the business environment can be understood based on the nature of the
organization and the way management controls are implemented. Management needs to
understand that resistance is common during organizational management process and thus
measures need to be put in place to reduce resistance. In this case, it means that management
should look at resistance from both positive and negative benefits that arise from the process.
The benefits that arise from the process need to be reviewed so that they can be capitalized on to
improve business processes. However, the resistance needs to be minimized at all costs through
communication, and employee involvement which ensures that employees understand the
purpose and implications of the change process.

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References
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