MISSION TRANSPARENCY
Case study on strategies and tools driving transparent communication during organizational change
Marzena Mikolajczyk (11767294) Master’s Programme in Corporate Communication Thesis supervisor: Dr Anna Berbers
University of Amsterdam Date: 28.06.2019 Word count: 9460 TRANSP AREN CY
Abstract
Major attention was lately brought to change in an organizational context. Researchers and practitioners make efforts to bring innovative ideas and strategies how to approach
organizational changes in the best way possible, avoiding resistance and embracing change among employees. As transparency is lately one of the “trendiest” corporate concepts in a workplace, it is important to research how practitioners approach and conduct transparent communication. The current study explores these strategies in a qualitative way based on a case study. 14 semi-structured interviews were conducted in a company that recently implemented a major organizational change to explore their perceptions of transparency, resistance and how to drive transparency in practice. The results of the study highlight the importance of involving employees into decision making and taking into account the concepts of organizational culture and leadership during organizational change. In addition, using multiple channels and tools assures transparent flow of communication. The current paper provides the suggestion on how to implement an Agile change in the IT departments. This study contributes to the current, growing body of research on organizational change by highlighting the importance of internal communication and transparency. Further research should be performed on the audience’s perspectives to explore the effectiveness of given tools and strategies and explore further the role of transparency in organizational changes in other type of organizations than IT. Among the limitations of the research there are lack of respondent validation and findings not applicable in other organizations. Guidance for the future research is provided.
Keywords: organizational change, resistance to change, transparency, internal communication
Introduction
“I think actually quite often people quite like change and they like changing and moving forward. But people don't like to be changed,” said one of the participants of this study. As this opening line hints, change is considered as a challenging process in
organizations. Growing resistance and the need for managers to intervene are inevitable elements during organizational changes. What makes people dislike a change? What are the common causes, and how is dislike demonstrated? Finally, how should resistance be
handled? These questions might be relevant for many change agents in organizations. The world around is changing rapidly. From the business perspective it is crucial to identify these changes and take action to change as well to assure the company growth (By, 2005). Lüscher and Lewis (2008) signal, that organizational change might be even a
requirement for competitive dominance of an organization and its long-term success.
However, change managers encounter resistance to changes and the challenge to deal with it to assure a successful change (Val & Fuentes, 2003). They need to set the priorities and create a strategy to take employees for a journey and walk them through change phases.
Lewis (2011, p. 24) implies, that internal communication is “at the heart of change processes” during change times. It is an important factor creating readiness to change and fighting resistance (Elving, 2005). Lack of communication among employees might cause negative emotions, perception that senior management has a clear and honest vision (Proctor & Doukakis, 2003). It can have a serious effect on employee satisfaction and the performance of the change. Despite of suggestions of focusing on communication as a part of change management, research indicates around 70 per cent of change projects is unsuccessful (Balogun, Hailey & Gustafsson, 2016). The most prominent reason for that was poor or lack of internal communication strategies.
Transparency recently became a key topic in organizational studies, serving as a potential solution in generating employee’s trust. Promoting transparent communication becomes more and more popular in organizational and governmental environment
(Christensen & Cheney 2015). However, there is a research gap in studying this topic in the context of organizational change.
The current study was conducted in the information-services department of a multinational Dutch company that recently moved to Agile ways of working. “Agile” is a framework used in software development aiming at faster product delivery, working in empowered and multidisciplinary teams, and relentless learning (Hekkala, Stein, Rossi & Smolander, 2017). Although the changes had a positive impact on the organizations, some resistance has naturally appeared. The team responsible for implementing the change faced a pivotal challenge in transparent communication. This research project is a case study on
transparency from a managerial perspective explored through semi-structured interviews. “Case study” is defined as “an empirical enquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon in depth and within its real-life context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident” (Yin, 2009, p.18). The aims of this study are to examine the idea of transparency and the exact tools and strategy that were used to achieve it in depth. This paper will be an overview of the work being done during organizational change, including examples of techniques that were used in order to assure transparency. In addition, resistance will be discussed, because it is one of the main reasons for the change managers to intervene.
Considering the importance of communication and maintaining transparency during organizational change, this paper aims to explore and provide answers to the following research questions:
1. What does transparency mean during organizational change?
3. What tools and practices were used to manage the transparent process of implementing the change from a managerial perspective?
Providing answers to these questions will serve as a professional guideline to help change practitioners recognize the common causes of resistance to change and use
transparent communication to overcome them. Previous research has highlighted the importance of using empirical research methods to study actual communication rather than stimulated conditions and survey data. In order to fully understand change dynamics, it is crucial to focus on actual change implementation, strategies, actions and variables affecting change implementation in a qualitative way, as there is still not much research done on this topic (Jones, Watson, Gardner & Gallois, 2004). Moreover, a critical review on change management (By, 2009) recommends further research on empirical change management practices and points out the lack of a valid framework for change management. These studies will enable factors for successful change implementation. As communication is a critical part of every change, it is a valid decision to conduct research on implementing organizational changes in a transparent manner.
Change-management researchers suggest a number of approaches and suggestions regarding communicating organizational changes and managing resistance. However, there are no specific examples of techniques and strategies that could be used to involve employees in decision making and sharing information in a transparent manner. Therefore, participants of this research will be asked to share their tools and practical projects used during
organizational change.
Theoretical framework Organizational change
The processes of organizational changes and how they can be handled are explained in a three-step model by Lewin (Schein, 2010). This paper serves to explore the
communication strategies necessary during the unfreezing and change steps, as these two elements crucially shape the success of the organizational change.
The first phase, unfreezing, describes how to reduce resistance and involves
establishing motivation and readiness to change. At this stage, employees start experiencing denial, uncertainty or doubt. From the managerial perspective, it is crucial to involve
employees and communicate the changes in a clear and transparent way, so that employees will be willing to accept the transformation and trust the new status quo. The second stage, change, is about the actual change and moving to a new state. During this phase, people start living or working according to new policies or rules. It does not always run smoothly, and sometimes employees need more time to understand how the change will benefit them. This phase is characterized by communication and enabling servant leadership (Levasseur, 2001), which focuses on people’s values, development, building community and sharing power (Houben, 2013). The last element of the model, refreezing, refers to the stabilization after the change is implemented, including evaluations and monitoring new ways of working.
Adjustments can be made at this stage if necessary to assure the success of the change. It is crucial to measure sentiment toward the intended changes, ensure awareness and explain why the change must be applied (Schein, 2004).
Resistance to change
Organizational change has been always considered a challenging process in
organizations. There is a growing body of research studying resistance to change (Ford, Ford & Damelio, 2008; Erwin & Garman, 2010, Rafferty & Jimmieson, 2016). There is an
irrational fear of dealing with the unknown; therefore, communication specialists face a lot of resistance and lack of trust when implementing an organizational change (Elving, 2005; Bovey & Hede, 2001). Rather than paying attention to technical elements, some research suggests it is crucial to focus on cognitive and affective human processes (Bovey & Hede,
2001). Expectancy theory refers to individual motivation toward some elements and the following outcomes. A potential outcome’s desirability is determined by motivations and expectancy that a certain effort will serve better outcomes (Wabba & House, 1974). According to this theory, resistance might impact negative thinking toward the change, including uncertainty toward the process (Hope & Pate, 1988).
Resistance to change was also examined from other viewpoints. A number of scholars have focused on organizational cynicism as a change-resistance factor (Stanley, Meyer & Topolnytsky, 2005; Dean, Brandes & Dharwadkar, 1998). Organizational cynicism is defined as follows:
Organizational cynicism is a negative attitude toward one's employing organization, comprising three dimensions: (1) a belief that the organization lacks integrity; (2) negative affect toward the organization; and (3) tendencies to disparaging and critical behaviors toward the organization that are consistent with these beliefs and affect” (Dean, Brandes & Dharwadkar, 1998, p.345).
One of its causes is people’s general attitude toward life (i.e., pessimistic or optimistic). Another antecedent could be an employee's previous experience in the company and with past reorganizations and to what extent management listened and informed them about coming events (Reichers, Wanous & Austi, 2000).
Other researchers have suggested that a major factor is lack of employee involvement in decision making and avoiding two-way communication during organizational changes (Ford, Ford & Damelio, 2008; Kuhn & Deetz, 2009; Lewis, 2011). Lewis (2011) refers to this as solicit input, which means participation in decision making, employee empowerment, positive climate and feedback that helps to address feelings and concerns about the change. Lewis (2011) points out that the common organizational practice causing resistance is involving employees in a symbolic form of participation, which is only an impression of
being involved. Rather than giving employees decision-making power and asking for feedback that will later be implemented into strategies, they are only told they are important and given vague channels to share their information.
There is some substantial scientific evidence that change resistance is caused by an uncertainty state (Dent & Goldberg, 1999; Dovers & Handmer, 1992). Uncertainty is one of the most frequent emotions mentioned when talking about organizational change. Lewis and Seibold (1996, p.135) defined uncertainty concerns as ‘‘a heightened state of awareness of, or anxiety regarding, one’s own and others’ information access and information use.’’ This anxiety might be caused by missing information regarding cause-effect processes, lack of knowledge about how the future will look after implementing the change and also not
understanding the purpose of an organizational change itself (Bordia, Hobman, Jones, Gallois & Callan, 2003; Kiefer, 2005). Furthermore, another causal factor could be a fear of losing something valuable (e.g., position, salary), lack of trust in the leadership team or
management, opposing perspectives of a given change and a natural low resistance to change (Kotter & Schlesinger, 1989).
When resistance might be caused by uncertainty and a lack of communication, information overload also leads negative outcomes. Lewis (2011) discussed equivocality, which means various interpretations and vague meanings of messages and events
communicated during change times. It is suggested that equivocality leads to negative social sensemaking behaviors in organizations. In order to help people to overcome it, instead of providing more information, it is advised to guide them and set values, priorities and preferences to support people in making sense of what is important (Lewis, 2011). The concept of equivocality is related to the transparency paradox. The transparency paradox (Stohl, Stohl & Leonardi, 2016) illustrates that availability, accessibility and information approval only give the perception of overload. Using this information in an effective manner
is perceived as transparency. It is suggested to focus on how relevant information is before officially revealing it in order to avoid unnecessary confusion due to overload. Therefore, information will be not only technically available, but also relevant and accurate.
Based on the explored literature, we can state that change resistance is an inevitable phenomenon, and there are different factors that lead to employee’s negative reactions. To map the field of transparent communication during organizational change, it is necessary to examine the cognitive and affective human processes. For this reason, participants were asked about characteristics and employees’ attitudes, problems or perhaps positive factors. We aim to explore and define the sentiment around this organizational change, considering the antecedents of change resistance indicated in the literature but also recognizing the possible causes in this particular case.
Transparency
Transparency appears as a prominent topic in all kinds of organizations – from government to nonprofits and businesses (Auger, 2014). Transparency is essential for creating support for a change and trust toward the change agents and management
(Christensen, 2002; Rawlins, 2008; Crumpton, 2011, Schafer, 2013). Rawlins (2009, p.75) defines transparency as “the deliberate attempt to make available all legally releasable information - whether positive or negative in nature - in a manner that is accurate, timely, balanced, and unequivocal, for the purpose of enhancing the reasoning ability of publics and holding organizations accountable for their actions, policies, and practice.” Although this definition fits into organizational settings, there was no material found on transparency specifically in the context of organizational change during the literature review for this project.
The literature review on transparency by Albu and Flyverbom (2016) draws a
advise focusing on verifiability approaches, which build on the informational elements. According to this approach, focus on information quality and quantity allows for interpreting organizational events and serves as a solution to solve corporate and societal problems in a practical way. Further work on this aspect of transparency has tremendous importance, as it becomes a central element in organizations’ communication. Previous research has already explored the mindset and general principles that communication specialists should follow during organizational change (Lewis, 2006; Kitchen & Daly, 2002; Barrett, 2002). However, they have proposed only overarching ideas behind this kind of corporate communication without focusing on the practical side.
Method
Qualitative research was chosen to conduct the current study. For the purposes of the research questions, it was crucial to analyze the phenomena happening in the very specific context of organizational change. Personal interviews provided the opportunity to uncover rich and detailed information about individuals’ experiences and perspectives (Braun & Clarke, 2013). Moreover, processes like transparency might be difficult to be conceptualized in a quantitative way. Furthermore, the topic of communication about changes might have a harmful effect on some individuals, as it could be considered sensitive. This method gives the possibility to check what participants meant when saying something and also ask unplanned questions, which contributes to the explanatory nature of the research (Braun & Clarke, 2013).
Sample
A targeted sampling method was used for this study, which means that certain members of the population were chosen to participate (Tongco, 2007).In order to exhaustively answer the research question, the interviews were conducted among
responsible for implementing the organizational change. The participants were approached via email, with an invitation for a one-hour interview in which the research topic was explained. Out of 15 recruited, 14 people agreed to answer questions during a personal interview. The interviews took place in the headquarter office of the Amsterdam company between 16 April and 20 May 2019. Each meeting was in a closed meeting room to assure a comfortable and open conversation. Participants varied in age, gender, career span and background. However, to protect the anonymity of the participants, these elements are not included in the analysis. The demographic did not add value to the data.
Interviews
The interviews were semi-structured, held in English and lasted an average of 35 minutes; the shortest took 21 minutes, and the longest was 55 minutes. Descriptive questions began the interview to identify each participants’ background, age and a specific role during the organizational change. Moving further, the evaluative questions were asked and used to gain insight about participants’ strategies, experiences, thoughts and emotions during this organizational change. Some unplanned questions were additionally asked as a result of what participants implied during the conversations. The interview guide for this research consists of three topics (see Appendix 1). The first one is about change resistance and aims to explore how resistance was observed and what its possible causes were. The second topic focuses on examining the definition of transparency and its potential importance and challenges. The third and the last part of the interview subsequently focuses on specific strategies and tools used during this reorganization. The goal of this part is to describe in as much as detail as possible what steps were taken to provide employees with transparent communication. Each interview was closed by asking the participants for their feedback on the interview and if there was anything else relevant they wanted to add.
Ethical considerations
Prior to the interviews, the interviewer informed the participants orally and in writing about the research procedure and recording the interviews. By signing the consent form, the participants indicated that they agreed to participate in this study and be recorded in the interviews. In addition, they were informed that quotes of what they said could be included in the final paper results. Moreover, as little identifying and specific information as possible was collected to assure anonymity.
Data analysis
The grounded-theory methodology was utilized in producing a well-founded theory, which should be based on systematically collected and analyzed data (Strauss, 1987).Three concept indicator models (CIMs) have been developed in order to visualize the various ideas gathered in the interviews in a concise and well-organized manner. According to Strauss (1987), this is a common way of conceptualizing representation when the goal is to develop a theory. Before a model could be developed, however, the data had to be thoroughly analyzed. All interviews were transcribed and subsequently analyzed in Atlas.ti. This is a software for managing data and increasing efficiency in the coding and analysis process (Braun & Clarke, 2013).
Three levels of coding were used to analyze the interviews, starting with open coding, where segments or quotations were marked and informant terms were identified. The
theoretical framework and research questions were used as a guideline for this process. Once the categories were identified, axial coding took place to search for links and distinct ideas. Axial coding structures the data in a new manner by making links and pointing out the differences between categories (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Focused coding was subsequently performed. Codes with the same meaning were merged, and code groups were created based on a total of 856 codes. Relationships and similarities among codes and concepts were
ultimately investigated in order to create categories that referred to the same dimensions. In this way, the answers to the research questions were found. In the last phase, three CIMs were drawn to illustrate the findings that emerged from the analysis.
Techniques to optimize quality criteria
Qualitative rigor reflects excellence in research methods by discipline, scrupulous adherence to detail and strict accuracy (Cypress, 2017). To consider rigor and measure quality, the research’s degree of trustworthiness, ecological credibility and transferability must be determined.
Trustworthiness in qualitative research refers to providing detailed information about the paper’s procedure, so other researchers can follow it and generate the same results (Van der Goot, 2018). To assure this characteristic, memo notes were written during the interviews as well as while analyzing the data. In addition, using qualitative data analysis software helped provide structure in the codes and filing memos. By reviewing the memos and records from the software, other researchers can see in detail how the project was conducted.
Several techniques were used to serve ecological credibility, which reflects
confidence in the results (Van der Goot, 2018). First, prolonged engagement helped in that the interviewer worked with the participants before the study. Thus, the discussed topics were familiar to both parties. In addition, participants were at ease talking about their feelings and experiences, especially when asked about potentially sensitive topics around organizational-change processes. Because the participants were interviewed in their own environment and in a semi-formal way, they were observed and assessed in the best possible manner (Braun & Clarke, 2013). This has provided valuable data that best reflect the participants’ perspectives and thus increases the results’ ecological validity (Van der Goot, 2018). Last, the project supervisor and one other student’s review gave additional feedback on the data and enhance the research’s trustworthiness.
Study transferability indicates to what extent the findings could be applied to a broader or different population (Van der Goot, 2018). To assure high transferability, this study aimed at developing a rich and detailed description of the sample and findings. Notes and memos were taken during the interviews, and additional notes were taken during the transcribing process, which could be considered the start of the analysis.
Results
After data coding and analysis, CIMs were created to illustrate the findings. Each of the models describes various dimensions and indicators related to the research questions: transparency in the context of organizational change (Figure 1), resistance toward organizational change (Figure 2) and driving transparency (Figure 3). Other specific findings are additionally defined in this section.
Transparency in the context of organizational change
The discussion about transparency was aimed at exploring what transparency means in the context of this project. Besides describing the values related to transparency and main components of this concept, challenges that the participants encountered are mentioned.
Figure 1. Concept Indicator Model of transparency in the context of organizational change.
Definition. During the interviews, the participants mentioned a number of values related to transparency. As a result of the analysis, the main components of transparency are defined as genuineness, honesty, respect, trust and fairness. To maintain transparent communication, the content should additionally be readily accessible and presented in a way that everyone understands. Therefore, it is important that it will be visible and clear. It could be sometimes difficult during organizational changes in the Netherlands as the processes have to be aligned with the Dutch law, so there are a lot of legal and HR-related elements involved.
Transparency in context of organizational change D1. Definition of transparency I2. Availability of information I1. Values I3. Two-way communication
I4. Sharing what is not known D2. Challenges I1. Timing I2. Sharing personal and HR information
I3. People always want to know more
The team driving this change recognized that understanding these operations might hard to comprehend. Therefore, they decided to provide the information in a clear and digestible way, as quoted: “we also made a very conscious decision to ensure that whatever information was there about the reorganization or about the future organization design, that we would put in the effort to make it as understandable as possible.”
Furthermore, transparency means a focus on two-way communication and dialogue. As one of the participants said, it is “having an open take communication and dialogue… Not only sending information, like we do a lot, but actually also making sure you have enough routes…for employees also to be transparent in their concerns and their points of view.” Therefore,
transparency is considered as helping to bring openness and make people feel at ease about sharing their feelings during change. As the interviews proceed it appeared it was not always applicable. One of the transformation leaders called it a “non-negotiable transformational step that we are going to make.” It might cause resistance when people do not have a say in the initial decision of the organizational change occurring. Another participant said, “But people don't like to be changed. They don't like it when things happen when they don't have any control in it or when they're not the person making the decisions.”
“So, I think transparency is not only being clear about what you know and being quite open around it. But it's also around clearly communicating about what you don't know, how you're going to get the input…” said one of the organizational-change leaders. The finding that transparency is also saying explicitly what is not known yet and what cannot be shared was unexpected. Next to informing people that some things are difficult to foresee is being open to their feedback and applying their ideas about how to solve problems. Informing them that processes are still in progress and providing an expected timeline is a sufficient solution when information is not set in stone. Showing leader’s vulnerability in being unsure about some elements might be beneficial, according to the Agile framework.
Challenges
Knowing what transparency mean to the team and setting goals is a crucial step during organizational changes. However, honest intentions in being transparent are sometimes challenged due to mechanisms, legal regulations and human behavior.
Timing. Timing was one of the major challenges in communicating changes.
Communication is experienced as transparent when the information is fully confirmed, rather than when it is shared and might change again. The reason for that is that “transparency can have a dark side meaning lots of unrest, lots of chaos, lots of confusion…” among the employees. It was stated that sometimes, in order to avoid assumptions, it is worth prolonging the time until the information is set in stone. As one of the participants said, “that's where the complains are about because people want to know that because they want to have clarity as soon as possible…It’s only creating more noise yeah instead of getting the people more involved.” Another person shared,
You want to share it as soon as it's known and be as transparent about that as possible. But for example, if there is a first draft and you know is going to change significantly within the next week, you're not sharing it yet because it will only create a bit of confusion and probably also lack of trust in.
It was concluded: “So there's always this fine balance between being confident enough that this is.”
Sharing personal and HR information. Interviewees shared that in the entire process of communication, there is content that is easier and more difficult to share. It might be difficult to stay transparent when communicating details about HR processes and “actual reorganization type of aspects, changing roles job grades, HR, job paths, selection committees...” It was shares, that “the closer you get to “individual” type of consequences it becomes more difficult to do because then you are governed by rules and regulations.” In this kind of situations, it becomes difficult to
be transparent because sharing information is limited by organizations like Works Council, which is a group of stakeholders representing the entire organization during change times. Before
announcing each update, it has to be confirmed with the Works Council, and sometimes these updates took longer.
People always want to know more. Study participants stated that sharing more information and being more transparent about the processes never sufficiently satisfies
employees. Especially when talking about the HR procedures, answering some questions always brings even more doubts. Rather than sharing too much information, the greater solution would be informing them when a certain decision will be announced. Setting a proper timeline avoids creating unrealistic expectations and assumptions.
Resistance to change
“People talk about it… People talk about it and then, when it's in writing then all of the sudden it looks like: boom! A formal document and people get nervous,” shared one of the participants. The intent for organizational change was shared some time before it was officially implemented. It gave people time to get familiarized with Agile and prepare for change. It
appears, that during the phase before official announcements, resistance levels are quite low. This changes when people are informed that real steps are being taken to change a company.
Study participants observed a number of negative emotions shared by colleagues in the organization. They mentioned that people reacted to change by being mad, nervous, frustrated, but some of them were initially silent: “There's some people you don't hear them. But then later on, they start making a lot of noise.” People shared their concerns in many ways: “So people express their feelings during just a cup of coffee. But also, during formal meetings.”
Figure 2. Concept Indicator Model of resistance to organizational change
Causes of resistance to organizational change
The potential causes of resistance during organizational change were discussed in the theoretical framework of this study. Participants of this study mentioned some of them, like the uncertainty about people’s jobs and impact on duties. New potential causes were additionally defined, like lack of urgency and being proud of their job.
Lack of urgency. One of the potential causes of resistance in this case was “the lack of urgency.” While the leaders expressed the need to switch the organization’s way of working to Agile, employees did not see the necessity. As one participant explained, “And the problem is that actually, the company had its best year ever last year…But I don't know if that's proper English but in Dutch, it's an expression: you have to fix your roof when the sun is shining and not
Resistance towards organisational change D1. Causes I1. Lack of urgency
I2. What does it mean to my job?
I3. Being attached to job
D2. Positive sides
I1. Proof that people care
I2. Measuring sentiment
I3. Develeoping better strategies
when it is raining.” The need to be up to date with changing was recognized by the managers, but was not seen by the employees, which resulted in resistance.
What does it mean to my job? Organizational change often means that there is an impact on employees’ jobs – the duties, job grade, scope and, in some cases, redundancy. In this
organizational change, the impact on employees was not known for a long time: “A little bit more than a year and a half we were unable to answer, ‘what does it mean for me?’ (…) So that's a year more than a year and a half of an unclear and uncertainty.” There were periods of times when the team was waiting for the Works Council to communicate the work progress, personnel impact and what the HR procedures would look like. One of the participants said, “people were really a bit freaked out in a sense that you have been working on this for so long. ‘Can you please provide some transparency on how it's going to happen?’ and that took very long.”
Participants discussed that resistance might be greater for older employees. Once people become older, hold more senior positions and have more responsibilities, they might feel scared of losing their jobs. As one of the participants said,
And you never know. There's people who have a big mortgage and get to go to university or to go to school, and they're afraid of losing their jobs… Eventually, the personal situation of someone and also age when people are older, they worry: ‘Do I get a new job? Do I get the same pay grade?’
Another participant said, “I think definitely it depends on where you are in your career, right. I think that that's one of the most important elements of resistance a change…I know what are my capabilities. I'm still relatively young.”
Being attached to job. People’s passion and true interest in their job might also cause resistance. As one of the interviewees said, “They feel strongly about their work but also, they feel very passionately about the work that they do.” Feeling attached to the work people have done, sometimes for a very long time, made change difficult because employees “put so much
energy and maybe even love into the work that you do, so that was also difficult to see that it won't last like that in the future.” In addition, in an organization where people care about their jobs, they also feel concerned about their colleagues, as it was said, “I think they were also concerned for disruption of the work, not necessarily for themselves but a concern of what other stakeholders within company would notice how work pressure, of course, could and also
increase.”
Positive sides of resistance
The section above discussed the ways people have shown their resistance. Even though the first impression of resistance might be a negative one, this study explored positive aspects of this event. This section discusses how resistance helped in driving this organizational change.
Proof that people care. Resistance is a valuable source of information about what employees experience during the reorganization time. One of the beneficial parts of visible resistance is that leadership and management recognize that employees truly care about the organization’s future. As one of the participants said,
if there's no resistance, it means that people are probably either a bit indifferent to what's happening, and I think as an organization you want people who care, who are passionate, who are motivated by what they do, and you don't want them to be indifferent, because that's probably not the most highly effective organization.
Measuring sentiment. Another upside is that resistance helps management examine where employees are on the change curve. Knowing that allows them to tailor communication to address relevant concerns. As one of the participants said, “I like the resistance to change, because I like to hear points from our target group so that we know how to handle upon that.” Seeking resistance provides information about where it comes from. Once the cause is found, change managers can address the issues. People might appreciate when their worries are
acknowledged and become promoters themselves, which is an additional benefit for the entire reorganization.
Developing better strategies. When employees share their concerns, it pinpoints the vulnerable points of the overall strategy. From the coaching point of view, resistance helped identify what support people needed. Moreover, recognizing resistance and addressing the concerns helped improve the overall project outcomes and brought. For example, when the concerns become very serious, change management advised leadership to address it in person. As an outcome, it was pointed out that “We actually asked the CIO to address it. So, to make people feel a little bit at ease, yeah, and let them know that we do hear their worries.”
Driving transparency
The last part of the interview consisted of questions about how to communicate organizational change in practice. The study participants explained their approach from a strategical point of view and what kind of tools were used in order to apply the strategies. Furthermore, an overarching mindset toward organizational change and prerequisites of transparency are explained.
Figure 3. Concept Indicator Model of driving transparency
Strategies
The change and management team set a framework and overarching strategies for driving communication. These strategies were used in creating events, sharing information and involving people.
Involving people. All the way back at the beginning of the transformation, there was a design working group comprised of employees that brought input to Agile transformation. Inviting those subject-matter experts from the organization helped create the new structure and way the company would work. Asking people to bring their knowledge and experience to the table had two purposes. First, the team recognized the importance of involving people in decision making. Second, creating the detailed design of the new organization was possible only by including input from the people who know it best. Involving the design working group was the initial step of asking people for feedback.
Driving transparency D2. Tools I1. Offline communication I2. Online communication D1. Strategy I1. Involving people
I2. Using multiple channels
I3."Pull" type of communication
Later on, the feedback was asked on every occasion – after events and town halls and during the walk-in session. As a next step, a sounding board was established to gather feedback and sentiment from the organization (this tool will be explained in the later section). That
feedback on the processes improved strategies, active listening and recognizing concerns to help people accept the change. Especially in the event of accepting feedback on a major item, it brought even more profitable outcomes:
So, I think there we show it actually it was interesting because some people on the management team their initial reaction was: Now we need to change it, but we've already shared it. And my reaction was that's great. Yeah, we can really show that we're genuinely listening and adjusting it.
It is worth mentioning that the aim was to address all feedback, but not all of them could be processed without changing the planning of the reorganization.
Using multiple channels. As mentioned before, transparent information has to be readily accessible. Therefore, multiple channels were used to share the same information in order to reach everyone. Some items were firstly explained at the town hall, then repeated on the portal and screened on narrowcasting. Some information was presented in videos to make it
understandable. Employees were encouraged to join walk-in sessions in case they had any questions. When information needed to be shared immediately, a small town hall was organized to bring clarification on updates shared the same day. Another purpose of having multiple channels is related to the type of audience that needed to be reached.
“Pull” type of communication. The change-management team decided to frame the Agile workshops as voluntary to attend. As it was said during one of the interviews:
But also, we very consciously made the decision to do this in a pull way and not a push. So, we made it something which was optional people who were interested could come it wasn't something where you had to go… And I really believe in this approach because I
think when we're doing something very in a push way then you're actually feeding into resistance which is unnecessary.
Offering participation seemed to release tension and spark a real interest. Tools
This section explains how the strategies were transformed into tools and applied in practice. Overall, the practices are categorized as face to face or online. Face-to-face
communication occurred in sharing updates on the process but also when coaching and sharing knowledge about Agile ways of working. Information was additionally always available online to reiterate with usage of different channels.
Offline communication
Creating awareness events. Specially designed workshops and training were available for employees to get familiarized with the concept of Agile and get equipped with skills and
knowledge. After deciding to embark on the Agile transformation, the team tried to provide employees with opportunities to understand how Agile works. Regular events were organized in the office such as Agile boot camps, masterclasses, lunch-and-learn events, Agile meet-ups as well as certified Agile training. Workshops differed by advancement level, so everyone could choose the most convenient option. To put participants at ease, some of the events were less formal, including the LEGO game or when lunch was served during a lecture about an Agile topic. Informal drinks after the Agile meet-ups provided another opportunity for discussion and sharing feedback. Moreover, from the very beginning, the experimentation site on the Agile portal was available to facilitate e-learning about the basic concepts. Awareness of the
organization’s need to use Agile was also shared by inviting outside guest speakers to present real examples.
Tailored meetings. A tremendous number of meetings were organized to communicate the movement to an Agile organization and share official updates like HR procedures and the new
organization design. Meeting types varied by stakeholder group, information to communicate and main purpose.
The sounding board was a qualitative measurement of sentiment in the organization. Once a month, representatives from different sub-departments gathered together to speak with change managers about employees concerns. They brought feedback about how the reorganization was being done as well as complains and concerns about moving the company to an Agile way of working. The sounding board excluded the leadership team; thus the members could freely discuss their emotions and fellow colleagues’ worries.
Major announcements were presented during town halls that all the people who were in the scope of the reorganization were invited to. Among the variety of channels, the town halls were the moments of mass communication. During those meetings, the leadership team was on the stage explaining the next steps. The entire setting had a more formal character than any other type of communication. Most of the time, these town hall meetings were scheduled upfront; however, people were sometimes spontaneously asked to gather at the end of the day when clarification was needed about the newest information shared by Works Council. The main goals of those kinds of meetings were “to just set this expectation, putting the wrap on the timeline and then to sense the temperature in the organization.” The town halls ended with Q&A sessions, and attendants could vote on which question would be answered first. Every town hall was recorded and afterward sent immediately to those who could not attend.
The reorganization team assured that the feedback or questions could be presented face to face. Walk-in sessions were organized in case people had more questions on wanted to discuss their specific cases. Moreover, the sessions were to share feedback on reorganization processes. Walk-in sessions were held biweekly, hosted by an HR representative and an organizational-design expert . As time passed since the onset of the change, the walk-in sessions were attended less frequently, which was a sign that people had fewer questions.
Once the official decision to move to an Agile organization was ready to share, line managers were invited to be involved in the communication process. They were informed before every significant update was announced. At the end of every briefing, there was a Q&A session where managers could ask questions to understand better the timelines, organizational design or HR procedures. Thus, when the official town hall took place, they were equipped with additional knowledge and ready to support their teams. The organization line manager was the first point of contact in case of questions or doubts. Recognizing the key role of leaders was a crucial step in this reorganization, because it made them ambassadors of the change. The line managers were also given additional materials and some coaching on how to support their teams going through change phases. This transparency method helped “to create that common sense of ownership of the in our case workings of the organization.”
Online communication
Videos. One of the ways of presenting information in a clear and digestible manner was creating videos. Some of them were created with the support of external agencies, while others were produced by the team. Since some of the messages were quite complicated, presenting it in an animated video with a voiceover helped employees understand the HR procedures, the Agile Playbook (i.e. the document with the foundation about the new organizational design) or mindset and the pillars of the Agile way of working. All the videos were posted on social media, the portal and through narrowcasting in the office, so it was always present.
Portal. The Agile transformation portal was a webpage built using intranet software accessible to all employees. The journey to become an Agile organization, it started with e-learning, experimenting about Agile. Once there was more information known about next steps, a whole section was added with information about the reorganization. The Agile portal was a single point of content about timelines, documents, HR procedures and job descriptions. In a visible place on the top of the page, the “frequently asked questions” document was attached. All
the tools and updates were shared through different channels, but the Agile portal contained all of them. As one of the participants concluded: “there was always a portal there for them to access and everything was accessible immediately on the portal, which was I think crucial to have one place to go.” In case of need to sign up for training, see the schedule of walk-in sessions or learn how the HR procedures will work based on a landing position, the Agile portal was a place to go.
Other unexpected findings
The initial interview guide consisted of three main topics – transparency, resistance and applying transparent communication in practice. As the interviews proceeded, it was recognized that the participants often mentioned other aspects that played a role during organizational change. It appeared that the type of change, moving to Agile ways of working, had an impact on choosing a specific approach. In addition, leadership and organizational culture were found to be important.
Agile approach. The type of change had a substantial impact on change leaders’ later approach, as transparency was one of the Agile values. Thus, it was decided to follow the Agile framework by dividing the transformation into phases and sharing information in sprints. In Agile terminology, a “sprint” is a period of time when delivering a product. The entire transformation was processed during sprints, which, according to Agile, gives space for predicting and adapting. Moreover, it was widely communicated that the official date of moving to an Agile organization was just a speculation, and the design would be adjusted.
In addition, the HR procedures were executed in a different manner than in previous reorganizations. This time, instead of having only a selection board, employees could bring input from an agility assessment. The agility assessment, conducted by an external agency, assessed employees on their personality traits and agility.
Leadership. The concept of leadership was not explicitly discussed in the introduction of this paper, however as research progressed participants often mentioned the role of leaders in
organizational change. Proper leadership is important; leaders are ambassadors of change and help their teams to embrace it. It might have a harmful effect on an event when the managers do not recognize it. The importance of leadership was also highlighted in creating the line-manager briefings and sessions with managers explaining the change curve. The overarching goal of the meetings was to equip them with sufficient knowledge on how to support their teams and address their concerns based on the current change phase. Another thing that was highlighted was that people wanted to be heard by leadership:
Also, because you as you say it's all people as good eventually people want to be heard. Want to be listened to too... And that is I think something which leadership has to do (…). You always have colleagues who you can talk to or reach out to eventually the leadership team really has to you know work together and move forward into this one direction. So, it's like together and then-then you can start to be successful in driving the change.
Lack of proper leadership might result in serious consequences for employees. One of the interviewees mentioned that when one of the management team members knowing that his position was lapsing left the organization, impacting significantly his teams. It was concluded that “it was difficult definitely difficult for those people (…), nobody was taking care of them.” The change and management team put an effort so that the layer below assuring that “would speak to them often and we would see where they could be and can be helped.”
Organizational culture. Another ingredient of successful change was the organizational culture. According to the participants, well-designed strategies and tailored tools will not bring transparency if the people driving the change do not have honest and genuine intentions. As mentioned during one of the interviews:
What are the factors that if you want to be very open and transparent because, in some cases, if those prerequisites are not there and then you start trying to be very open and transparent it might backfire, because you don't actually have the trust of the people yet.
Organizational culture is an overarching factor influencing employees’ behaviors. Furthermore, viewing the organization system as open spaces had an impact on perceiving shared information. As one of the participants points out, “I think in our case we did the whole building redesign where we went to a fully open workplace removed all the offices of the management team. I think it should not be underestimated that a lot of those more symbolic measures sometimes were already part of a broader maybe change management effort to get the organization into a different mindset.”
Discussion and Conclusion
“I think actually quite often people quite like change and they like changing and moving forward. But people don't like to be changed,” these words shared during the one of the interviews of this study remind about an important phenomenon appearing in the society and organizations. The current paper presents how this phenomenon appears in real settings – how do people manifest their resistance and what are the major causes toward these
behaviors. An answer is provided to the research questions about the meaning of
transparency and applying transparent communication solutions in practice. Therefore, the research gap in studying organizational change and transparent communication has been filled. This article presents how to approach people’s negative attitudes toward
organizational change and how to embrace it with use of transparent communication. The first research question about meaning of transparency during organizational change. Participants stated, that there is a number of values around that concept. In addition, communication is considered transparent when an audience feels also free to share openly concerns and opinions. In order to make communication transparent, it has to be readily accessible, visible and clear. Lastly, saying openly what is not known yet and being open about intentions is a component of transparency.
Resistance to change was explored and the answer for the second research question was provided. It is implied that resistance might be caused be caused by factors that were not explained in the theoretical framework such as being attached to a job and lack of urgency to change. In addition, a number of positive outcomes of resistance was called out like
measuring sentiment developing better strategies and resistance being a proof that people care about the organization.
These components of transparency definition could have been sensed when the participants discussed their strategies and tools applied during organizational change to assure transparency, answering the third research question, which was the main goal of this paper. The participants called out a great number of tools helping employees to feel involved and informed about the change.
One of the major findings regards involving people and gathering their feedback in order to use it in practice. In the analysis it was found that there are three major reasons for that. First, using expert input helps in shaping the new organization. Second, involving employees helps measure how they perceive the change and adjust the strategies to serve them. Third, people who have a chance to express their feelings feel more comfortable with the change. As mentioned in the theoretical framework, giving employees an opportunity to be involved and propose solutions might be a determinant of avoiding organizational cynicism toward change (Reichers, Wanous & Austi, 2000). These results are in line with theory discussed regarding solicit input (Lewis, 2011). By giving people genuine possibilities to participate in the change, provide feedback and share concerns, change agents assure that people feel more empowered and less resistant. The importance of asking for input was also discussed by Lewis (2006) who describes the guidelines for this kind of communication such as asking questions, listening and providing opportunities for employees to speak, and be open for feedback even when it is a critique. The participative-communication approach was
also discussed before as making sure that the “people” side is considered during
organizational change (Smith, 2005). It highlights the importance of involving people in decision making and empowering them to influence change rather than resisting. The current study builds the field by recognizing these approaches in the specific context of transparent communication and by providing tools how to facilitate it.
Another way of driving transparent communication was addressing different types of stakeholders with tailored tools. Briefings for managers, town halls for everyone to listen about the milestones, walk-in sessions for those who have questions or concerns and sounding boards for employees who want to be more involved. Literature discussed the stakeholder approach of internal corporate communications as the strategic management of connection and interactions between employees at all levels within an organization. Another study categorizes employees into the following groups: all employees, strategic management, line managers, work teams and project teams (Welch & Jackson, 2007). Acknowledging these groups suggests interrelated dimensions of internal communication. Lewis (2007) created an organizational-stakeholder model of change implementation based on stakeholder theory. According to the model, communication strategies might cause various outcomes for different employee groups. Therefore, a conscious decision needs to be taken when shaping certain communication tools. In addition, it is crucial to remember that stakeholders differ in personality characteristics, positional levels as well as ability to process information and manage uncertainty. Moreover, information was shared multiple times via various channels to assure that everyone was able to access it. It was considered that employees might have different behaviors of searching for information. The literature confirms that communication with several media should be considered. The use of several media is more effective than the use of just one (Klein, 1996). The information was also presented and repeated in many ways to ensure that people would understand.
This study emphasizes the concepts of leadership and organizational culture as the prerequisites for the transparent communication to occur. As mentioned in the introduction, leaders who do not listen and do not provide people with information might trigger resistance from employees. The available research discusses the importance of leadership for driving successful organizational change in aspects of leadership style (Eisenbach, Watson & Pillai, 1999; Nadler & Tushman, 1990; Groves, 2006) and leadership effectiveness (Gilley,
Mcmillan & Gilley, 2009; Gilley, Dixon, & Gilley, 2008). A specific leadership and communication style can refine trust toward an organizational change. Moreover, leaders have power to equip employees with the social and emotional maintenance they seek for overcoming resistance. Following the correct leadership style supports employees in accepting change and drives a more successful outcome (Bordia, Hunt, Paulson, Tourish & DiFonzo, 2004)
Furthermore, it appears that organizational culture is a determinant of driving transparent communication during changes. According to Schein, the organizational culture is defined as
a pattern of shared basic assumptions that was learned by a group as it solved its problems of external adaptation and internal integration, that has worked well enough to be considered valid and, therefore, to be taught to new members as the correct way to perceive, think, and feel in relation to those problems” (Schein, 2004, p. 17). It could be concluded that organizational culture is an essential component that integrates employees. This quality is tremendously desired during organizational changes.
Limitations and further research
Similar to most academic research papers, this study has its limitations. However, it is worth to acknowledge the benefits before. First, it needs to be highlighted that this study stands out with prolonged engagement. This research was conducted by a person who was
firstly a part of the change management team and could observe the events “from inside,” and then look at it from an academic point of view. Second, the purposive sampling served in providing accurate and specific data about organizational change processes. Moreover, saturation was achieved, which means that the sample consisted of 14 participants was sufficient to answer the research questions. Every step of the research process is finally presented in a detailed way which allows the whole study to be replicable in the future.
Turning to the limiting aspects of the paper, a few drawbacks have to be named. The study design could be considered as a potential limitation. This paper discussed the
transparency approach during an organizational change in an IT department with a scope of more over 200 hundred people. These findings of this case study might be not representative and applied other organizations, with different sizes, industries or organizational culture. In addition, as the Dutch law impacted the process, it has to be taken into consideration, that it might look differently in other countries. Since the current paper is a single study exploring transparency in a single company, it might affect the transferability of the research.
Another possible limitation of this project is missing respondent validation. Respondent validation, also known as member checking, is a technique for exploring the credibility and trustworthiness of results (Birt, Scott, Cavers, Campbell & Walter, 2016). Due to time limit, the participants did not have a chance to see the analysis, reanalyze their input and provide feedback on researcher’s interpretations. It would be advised to take this step into consideration if replicating this study or conducting further research.
Moreover, the respondents might have been biased when answering the questions. In the beginning, the participants thought that the name of the company and their position would be mentioned in the paper. Braun and Clark (2016) mention that face-to-face interviews are not ideal to explore sensitive issues. Respondents tend to feel more comfortable in groups or while disclosing information in anonymous survey. Therefore, it they might have provided
less open or detailed answers on sensitive topics like resistance, transparency or how do they perform their job than they would have provided knowing the company name would be anonymous.
In addition, looking at transparent communication from the perspective of managers and people executing the change might be limiting. To have a full picture, it would be valuable to conduct a mixed-method study and quantitatively measure how employees perceived transparency during this organizational change. Having a view on how people experienced it could have helped identify what tools did actually help them learn new information and overcome their change resistance.
The current study exploring transparent communication during organizational change toward an Agile change highlights transparency as an important value, as it is also a value of the Agile framework. Future research is advised to address the relatedness of values typical to modern frameworks and ways that organizational changes were communicated.
Organizational change is a regular phenomenon occurring in organizations.
Reorganizations, merges, and transitions always aim at improving the business’s status quo, but the changes itself do not always have a beneficial effect on the employees. It is crucial to continue research on ways to improve internal communication and provide a solution for driving transparency in the workplace. This paper is an example of the strategies, tools and potential challenges that occur during organizational changes toward an Agile organization. Other managers and practitioners may benefit from using it to make better decisions and drive their projects in more effective way.
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