Reflect  on a change that you implemented or was implemented at an organization  with which you are familiar that was not sustainable.  

  1.  Read the article titled “Sustaining Change in Manufacturing Companies”. Next,
  • Review the list of eleven (11) factors which impact the sustainability of change.
  • Reflect  on a change that you implemented or was implemented at an organization  with which you are familiar that was not sustainable.
  • Comment on the factors of sustaining change that were not included in the change process.
  • How would you address the key factors which the organization missed and ultimately lead to the change being reversed?
  1. Please respond to this post. (DQ)

 

  • Read the article titled “Sustaining Change in Manufacturing Companies”.  Next, review the list of eleven (11) factors which impact the  sustainability of change. Reflect on a change that you implemented or  was implemented at an organization with which you are familiar that was  not sustainable. Comment on the factors of sustaining change that were  not included in the change process. How would you address the key  factors which the organization missed and ultimately lead to the change  being reversed?

The  company that I am employed with now is in the process of implementing a  change where they are going to change the whole organizational chart  for our division so that we can match the other divisions. This means  that we have to add new positions and re-class some of the positions  that we currently have.  The problem is that they are forgetting to  account for who are external customers are. I work in Annapolis and our  customers include legislators, senators, delegates, the Governor and Lt.  Governor and their staff whereas our other divisions don’t have such  high maintenance customers so the way the other divisions are doing  things won’t necessarily work for us. The other divisions don’t move  furniture or hang pictures or even have housekeepers or grounds keepers  those duties are all contracted out. So if we were to change to the new  way we would no longer be able to offer those services to our customers  and they would not be happy about that at all.

The factors of sustaining change that were not included in the change process are as follows:

Leadership  – They have a vision but they did not factor everything in with the  vision. They didn’t think about the differences in the clientele of the  divisions and when the managers had questions they couldn’t thoroughly  answer the questions.

Managerial  – Due to the leaders not being able to answer questions the managers  are not on board with the changes which makes it difficult to enforce  the changes. We also have a one Superintendent that is used to doing  things the same way and change isn’t easy for him. He has the mindset of  “this is how we always did it”.

Financial  – They also didn’t consider the costs of adding contractors to do the  housekeeping and the grounds work. It costs more to contract out than it  does to have the employees here doing it.

Political  – With the type of customers that we deal with they are used to things a  certain way and they always like to throw around who they work for

Processual  – They did not do a good job of explaining to the employees of what is  going on and what is expected of them and what is changing and what will  not be changing so some people really don’t know what they are supposed  to be doing.

The  way that I would address the key factors is first of all with the  leadership aspect they should have had meetings with the managers to let  them know what they wanted to do and to get feedback from them. Once  they got the managers on board and they had a solid plan it would have  been easier to present the changes to the employees. This way the  employees would not be confused as to what they should be doing. As for  the financial aspect they should of did a cost analysis to see if would  be feasible to keep the housekeepers and grounds crew that they have now  or to contract the jobs out. They could probably contract out some of  the buildings and keep the employees that are already doing the job.   When it comes to the political aspect since we have such high profile  customers they could have tried to prepare them to let them know that  the changes were coming tell them what changes they were going to  implement and let them know when the changes would start taking place.  I  think that by following these steps it would be easier to get everyone  on board with the changes.