By Jerry H.Hall
The fundamental issue guiding the research of Rashid, Sambasivan and Rahman (2004) is whether organizational culture has an impact on attitudes toward organizational change, particularly in the Malaysian context, as the dynamics of the business environment is changing rapidly. This is especially true as the Malaysian economy had experienced slow economic growth in the last five years (since 1997 financial crisis), and followed with a short-term buoyant growth in the year 2000. These changes have forced organizations to consider restructuring and reengineering of their organizations in view of the impending merger and acquisition moves made in the last few years.
Innovation is the engine of change and the possession of positive cultural characteristics provides the organization with necessary ingredients to innovate. Organizational culture allowed an organization to address ever-changing problems of adaptation to the external environment and the internal integration of organization resources, personnel and policies. Therefore, it is expected that certain types of culture might facilitate the change process while other types of culture might not. The interesting question will then be which type of organizational culture favors organizational change. This can be a challenging task for top managers, as the managers have to decide how to implement changes in their organization. Some have argued that the process has to start at the top while others have suggested that it should also start with the bottom-up approach. As such, it appears that there may be a relationship between organizational culture and attitudes toward organizational change.
The types of attitudes toward change described in this study refer to affective, cognitive and behavioral attitudes. The important question is which of the three attitude types is more critical. One common obstacle of change facing by organizational members is fear of the unknown or unfamiliar situation, where the cognitive mode can be an effective mode to be addressed first. This is because once a person has information and knowledge of the potential changes that to be made, his or her feelings toward change may be adjusted to favor such changes. It should also be noted that handling the cognitive component on attitude toward change can also be a daunting task if it is not well communicated, and this will be demonstrated by the action or behavioral mode of the person in responding to the changes. As such, this model provided a comprehensive approach in understanding the attitudes toward organizational change.
The present research has several implications for managers. The findings showed that mercenary culture have strong positive attitude toward change. This is reasonable as the survival of mercenary culture depends on who rewarded them the most. In other words, in the present organizational context where survival is critical, the mercenary culture adopted well to ensure his/her survival. Therefore, as managers, the mercenary culture in an organization can ensure effective and efficient implementation of organizational goals and objectives. This type of culture will ensure that people will work hard, make things happen and hit the targets that were set. The largest percentage of Malaysian managers with this type of culture suggests the need to ensure achievement of organizational goals and objectives. As a result, some managers may be ruthless in handling the situation and have negative effects on other employees or organizations. Hence, this type of culture is most appropriate in a rapid changing business environment that required immediate action. Also, it is appropriate for short-term orientation and adopted in a non-complex environment.
On the other hand, network cultural groups had positive attitudes toward change. In this type of culture, the need to change the attitude of other members in the organization in order to adopt changes would not be difficult as they are among friends in the organization. This is a positive trait of a network culture. However, this type of culture may have difficulties in implementing changes that have potential effect on their friends in an organization, particularly when their friends are non-performers in the organization. Managers in this type of culture have to be skillful in handling sensitive issues so as not to arouse any negative impact on the organization. One way of handling change in this type of culture would be to use more informal networks and take time to introduce changes. In other words, time and patience is needed to prepare the employees to accept changes in the organization, if the changes are difficult for one of their friends. Finally, one managerial implication is that any form of changes to be made to an organization should be reviewed in relation to the type of organizational culture. Managers may need to understand first, the type of organizational culture prevalent in an organization, and then adopt one or several approaches to handle changes in the organization. In an organization where there is a dominant culture, it may not be as complex as compared with organizations that have weak cultures. This posed a real challenge to managers in introducing changes considering the rapid development in the current business environment. Since change involves people, handling them is critical when addressing change in the organization.
Organizational change implies a variation from the normal situation. As such, this finding has implications on organizational policy. In this study, the negative attitude toward change was not prevalent. This could mean that Malaysian leaders have fewer problems in introducing organizational changes. Nonetheless, the task of handling change in an organization can be difficult if the organizational policy is not well communicated throughout the organization. Effective leaders have to ensure that the proposed changes are accepted and committed by all members in the organization. Organizational reforms should not only be top-down, but also bottom-up to ensure its effectiveness in the long run. Besides, managers have to revise organizational policies at an incremental pace, and patiently make improvements leading to the intended change in the organization.
About the Author: Jerry H.Hall has an interest in Career Change Management related subjects. If you are interesting in finding out more information on Career Changes, please visit this successful Career Change site: http://CareerChange.smartreviewguide.com
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