How to achieve employee commitment to
organizational change
A study of change leader behaviour and its influence on
the interaction between change leader and employees
Master thesis, Master Business Administration, specialization Change Management University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business
Marlieke Molenaar
Student number: 1462245 Melissekade 292 3544 CX Utrecht Tel: +31 (0)621423762 E-mail: S1462245@student.rug.nl Supervisors/University of Groningen Dr. Joyce Rupert Dr. Janita Vos Supervisor/Company X Director of Company X2 ABSTRACT
A case study has been performed at Company X to investigate factors influencing employee commitment to change. Interviews have been conducted with four change leaders and their recipients. Employee commitment to change was found to be influenced by the interaction between change leaders and their employees or recipients. This interaction is defined as formal communication about the change and employee participation in decision making. The results of the interviews showed that the behaviours of change leaders influence this interaction. Shaping behaviours correspond with formal communication about the content of the change and a lower level of employee participation while framing change and creating capacity behaviours relate to formal communication about the context of the change and a higher level of employee participation, which in turn lead to higher employee (affective) commitment to change. Additional findings suggest that the experiences of the recipients about change leader behaviour do not always match the perspectives of their change leaders on these behaviours. Also, the stage of the change influenced the relationship between the interaction between change leader and employees and employee commitment to change. The implications are discussed.
3 1. INTRODUCTION
Nowadays, in order to be able to successfully compete in the European economy, organizations are pressured to improve their performance. Due to the increasingly dynamic environment they face, organizations feel the need to implement changes, whether it is to their strategy, culture or process (Armenakis et al., 1993; Oreg & Burson, 2011). These initiatives deliberately change the everyday work processes and professionals are needed to implement these changes successfully (Neuber & Cady, 2001).
A change approach is successful when it meets the objective(s) that have been set before hand by the implementers of the change approach (Sirkin, 2005). Bennis (2000) states: “No change can occur without willing and committed followers.” According to Sirkin et al. (2005), commitment of employees influences the successfulness of the change. Employee commitment is a success factor in organizational change according to change management literature published the last decades (Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Conner & Patterson, 1982; Armenakis & Bedeian, 1999; Neuber & Cady, 2001; Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002; Cummings & Worley, 2005; Sirkin et al. 2005;Burnes, 2009). Despite the fact that there is a considerable amount of undisputed literature on the subject of organizational change and the importance of commitment, commitment to organizational change seems to be rare (Herold et al., 2007). Employee acceptance of change is crucial for the success of a change initiative and therefore it is important to understand what makes employees commit to change (Parish et al., 2007).
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how employees are affected by the change and how their commitment can be obtained (Parish et al., 2007).
1.1 Case study
One of the organizations that finds itself in need of implementing a new work process is Company X. Within Company X, consultants are responsible for attaining certain targets. In order to increase the efficiency of the work process, the management of Company X introduced a Change Project (referred to as CP) to its organization. New employees are assigned to work at a new unit in the organization and are responsible for some of the tasks that were formerly assigned to the consultants. The members of this new unit have to work together with the consultants in order to attain the wanted outcomes.
The Change Project started as a pilot in Amsterdam in November of 2011 and has since then been introduced in several regions that are together responsible for two-third of Company X’s turnover (see figure 1).
Figure 1, the regions of Company X where the Change Project concept has been implemented, in order from 1-4 Figure 1 visualises the four regions where the Change Project (CP) concept has been (planned to be) implemented and the order in which this happened or will happen:
1 Region Amsterdam, implemented the CP concept in November of 2011 2 Region Den Haag, implemented the CP concept in November of 2012
3 Region Leeuwarden/Groningen, implemented the CP concept in December of 2012 4 Region Utrecht, will implement the CP concept in February/March of 2013.
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Leeuwarden/Groningen, the change is in the moving phase, since the consultants are moving to a new set of behaviours without knowing the specific outcome, while in Utrecht it is in the unfreezing phase, since the validity of the status quo is disconfirmed (Burnes, 2004).
In order to successfully implement the new work process that the CP brings about for the existing employees, four change leaders have been appointed, who are responsible for implementing the change in their own region. This is represented in figure 2.
Figure 2, organization chart Company X,, departments involved in the change
The management of Company X has the ambition to implement the CP concept in the rest of the Netherlands. In order for this initiative to lead to the intended outcomes, the consultants of Company X need to be committed to their new work process. Therefore, the management problem of Company X is: how can we increase the success of the implementation of the CP by influencing the commitment of the consultants to this change initiative?
1.2 Research questions
Although the importance of employee commitment to change has received a considerable amount of attention in existing literature, the understanding of how this commitment can be achieved is lacking. The role of the change leader in organizational change has been researched during the last four decades, but it is still unclear for those responsible for organizational change how to interact with their employees in order to achieve a high level of commitment to change, resulting in poorly implemented change initiatives.
Director Company X region North
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In this study, the influence of change leader behaviour on the interaction between change leader and employees and its relation with employee commitment to organizational change will be investigated. This is done in order to provide change leaders with insights on how to get a handle on increasing employee commitment to organizational change. The interaction between change leader and employees will consist of communication and participation. The context variable, stage of the change, will be researched as a moderating variable for this relationship. The change at Company X is at different stages of the three-step model created by Lewin (1947). The influence of the stage of the change on the relationship between the interaction between change leader and employees and employee commitment to change is investigated. The main research question of this study is: How does change leader behaviour influence the interaction between the change leader and employees and how does this interaction in turn influence employee commitment to organizational change?
In order to provide an answer to this research question, the following sub questions have been developed:
1. How does change leader behaviour influence the interaction between change leader and employees?
2. How does communication as a part of the interaction between the change leader and employees influence employee commitment to organizational change?
3. How does employee participation in decision making as a part of the interaction between the change leader and employees influence employee commitment to organizational change? 4. How does the stage of the change influence the relationship between interaction between the change leader and employees and employee commitment to organizational change?
The relationships proposed above will be elaborated in the theory section of this report and examined by executing a case study at Company X.
1.3 Contribution of this research
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Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002). A contribution will also be made to the research on change leader behaviour, mostly performed by Higgs and Rowland (2000, 2001, 2005, 2010, 2011), since Higgs and Rowland have investigated this change leader behaviour from the perspective of the leader and this research focusses on the perspectives of both the change leader and the employees.
1.4 Structure of this report
8 2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
In order to understand how change leader behaviour influences the interaction between change leader and employees and how this in turn can influence commitment, this section explores the concepts mentioned in the sub questions. The relationships between the concepts are displayed in a conceptual model.
2.1 Commitment to change
Commitment to organizational change covers the intentions of employees to support the change, their willingness to make it successful and merging their personal goals with those of the change (Herold et al., 2007). Herscovitch and Meyer (2002, page 475) define commitment as “a force (mind-set) that binds an individual to a course of action deemed necessary for the successful implementation of a change”. Commitment in general always leads to focal behaviour: “that course of action to which an individual is bound by his commitment” (Herscovitch and Meyer, 2002, page 475), which is the opposite of resistance to change. Herscovitch and Meyer (2002) claim that commitment can take different forms: compliance or cooperation. The latter means that individuals not only do what is required of them to implement change, but feel ‘the spirit of change’ (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002, page 475): they are willing to make more of an effort to make the change work or even sell the change to others. Herscovitch and Meyer (2002, page 475) state that commitment to change for an employee can be: “(a) a desire to provide support for the change based on beliefs in its inherent benefits (affective commitment to change), (b) a recognition of the costs associated with failure to support the change (continuance commitment to change), or (c) a sense of obligation to provide support for the change (normative commitment to change).”.
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towards the change. In order to understand how employee commitment to change can be influenced, it is important to realise why employees are committed to a change initiative.
Affective, continuance and normative commitment clearly differ in the way an employee is driven, or motivated, to commit to a change initiative. As Gagné and Deci (2005) explain in their article on self-determination theory, there is a distinction between autonomous and controlled motivation. Autonomous motivation means that someone is motivated to do something because he wants to, while controlled motivation means that someone feels he has to engage in something (Gagné & Deci, 2005). Meyer and Becker (2004) argue that continuance and normative commitment are the result of controlled motivation. Continuance commitment is the result of externally regulated behaviour, meaning satisfying an external demand. Normative commitment is the result of engaging in socially acceptable behaviour and is experienced to be less controlled (Meyer & Becker, 2004). According to Gagné and Deci (2005), affective commitment, a state of emotional attachment, is facilitated by autonomous motivation.
In literature, a link between employee commitment to change and change leader behaviour is identified. Gagné and Deci (2005, page 342) state that autonomous motivation can be influenced by giving employees choice, enabling them to give constructive feedback, but also by the interpersonal style of change leaders: “that is, to understand subordinates’ perspectives, encourage their initiative, and provide feedback in an autonomy-supportive rather than controlling way”. Fedor (2008) confirms this. In conclusion, change leaders can influence the form of commitment to change of the employees. This can be related to the leadership style of a leader.
10 2.2 The role of the change leader
2.2.1 Leadership style
Change leaders are responsible for the successful implementation of change and as has been described above, influence the different types of employee commitment to change through their leadership behaviours. The difference between leadership styles is illustrated by transformational versus transactional leadership. According to Bass (1990), transformational leadership is when a leader supports employees to think beyond their own interests and makes them aware of the group’s mission and stimulates them to support it. A transformational leader can do this by inspiring employees, by meeting their emotional needs or intellectually stimulating them. He takes the different individual needs of employees into account (Bass, 1990). If a leader is concerned for the welfare of the members of his team and shows people-oriented behaviour, employee commitment increases (Lok & Crawford, 1999). Yang (2012) found in his empirical research that a transformational leadership style directly enhances employee change commitment. He found also an indirect relationship, namely that job satisfaction is a mediator for the influence of a transformational leadership style on employee change commitment. Yu et al. (2002) also found a relationship between a transformational leadership style and commitment to change of the followers of this leader: in this research, teachers turned out to be more committed to change when their principal had a transformational leadership style. Transformational leaders should set forth a vision and involve employees in this vision and the execution of the change in order to increase their
commitment (Yang, 2012). Peeters and Meijer (1995) found that a leader that gives social
support, communicates in an open way and encourages employees to come up with new initiatives increases employee commitment.
In conclusion, the interactions between leaders that have a transformational leadership style and their employees can increase the commitment to change of their employees. In the next paragraph, the behaviours of change leaders are discussed in more detail, in order to gain a deeper understanding of their influence on the interaction between change leader and employees.
2.2.2 Change leader behaviour
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complex overview of change leadership in literature, Higgs and Rowland have explored the change leader behaviours associated with (successful) organizational change implementation (Higgs & Rowland, 2005). They look beyond the overarching descriptions of transactional and transformational leadership and zoom in on the specific behaviours a leader displays, which makes the leader behaviours more concrete. Another trait of their research is the focus on change leader behaviours, whereas transformational and transactional leadership are not specifically change related concepts. Therefore, the change leader behaviours Higgs and Rowland distinguish are suitable for researching the relationship with the interaction between change leader and employees. Higgs and Rowland (2005-1, 2005-2, 2009, 2011) indicate three broad types of leader behaviour: shaping, framing and creating capacity. They explain these concepts in their 2009’ article (page 48):
“1. Shaping behaviour: The communication and actions of leaders related directly to the change; ‘making others accountable’; ‘thinking about change’; and ‘using an individual focus’.
2. Framing change: Establishing starting points for change; ‘designing and managing the journey’; and ‘communicating guiding principles in the organization’.
3. Creating capacity: ‘Creating individual and organizational capabilities’ and ‘communication and making connections’.”(Higgs & Rowland, 2009, page 48).
Shaping behaviour entails the change leader playing a central role in the implementation of the change. Framing change involves the change leader setting out the essentials for the change but giving employees space to obtain goals in their own way. Creating capacity are those change leader behaviours aimed at enabling employees to take part in the change. After reviewing the work of Higgs and Rowland (2005-1, 2005-2, 2010, 2011), the change behaviours have been extracted from their articles and are summarised as shaping, framing or creating. This overview is displayed in Appendix A, table a.
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the employees to change is more successful than shaping their behaviour, because it helps employees to understand what the change entails and why the change is necessary, which increases their commitment to the goals and stimulates them to develop their potential (Higgs & Rowland, 2011). Successful change leaders need to increase the capability of teams and individuals and facilitate communication and learning as well as carry out the principles and values underlying the change (Higgs & Rowland, 2007). Higgs & Rowland (2011) view these enabling behaviours of change leaders to be part of a transformational leadership style.
In this research, the change leader behaviours fitting into the shaping, framing and creating categories are investigated. Framing and creating behaviours enable employees to participate in the change initiative and have a positive influence on the success of the change. In the next paragraph, the participation of employees in the change is further discussed, as well as the communication between change leader and employees.
2.3 The interaction between change leader and employees
In this study the influence of change leader behaviour on the interaction between the change leader and employees is researched, by on the one hand looking at the communication between change leaders and employees and on the other hand, taking the participation of employees in the change into account. This interaction is also linked to the change leader behaviours that have been discussed in 2.2.2.
2.3.1. Communication
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Formal communication
Bouckenooghe (2012) divides communication in change in two forms: formal or programmatic change communication and participatory change communication. Participatory change communication involves letting the employees participate in the implementation of the change (Bouckenooghe, 2012). Participation in decision making is discussed in paragraph 2.3.2. Formal or programmatic change communication is focussed on “telling and selling” (Bouckenooghe, 2012, page 584). According to Kotter (1995), this communication is needed in order to ‘capture the hearts of the troops’: credible and extensive communication is a condition of obtaining employee commitment to a change.
According to Elving (2005), there are two types of communication within organizational change: the first one is about providing information to the employees; the second one is used to create a community. The first type means change leaders are giving information to employees in order for them to come to understand their tasks and why the change is necessary. Enhancing the understanding of the goals, vision and purpose of the change and the future of the organization is important (Lewis. 2006). Elving (2005) emphasises on the importance of this type of communication in creating the conditions for employee commitment. This can be achieved by sending information through formal channels. Formal communication may help employees to understand and appreciate the change initiative (Elving, 2005). Commitment is influenced by employees’ appreciation of management’s communication (Postmes, 2001). Employees’ perception of the communication is key in creating commitment and those who implement change should take into account the needs of their employees with regard to sending information. Communication provided by change leaders that gives employees information about the change initiative and the context of the change increases affective commitment to organizational change (Conway & Monks, 2007). Walker et al. (2007) found that when change leaders spent little time explaining to employees what the change entails and why the change is needed, affective commitment to this change is low.
Content versus context
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detail how the change is implemented’ and ‘personally controlling what gets done’. In other words, formal communication directly related to the subject of change.
Communication with regard to the context of the change can be related to behaviours within the framing and creating categories, for example: ‘stimulating employees to not only take their own responsibilities into account but the whole organization’, ‘communicating the vision and focussing on the future of the organization’ and ‘helping employees to see why things need to be changed and why there is no going back’. This is formal communication about the rationale of the change initiative.
In order to understand how communication influences employee commitment to change, in this research the focus lies on formal communication, which can increase employee’s (affective) commitment to change. It is examined in the case study whether there was formal communication between the change leader and employees, and whether this was effective in making employees understand why the change initiative is implemented (context) and what their tasks are in the new situation (content). Relating formal communication about the context or content of the change to the different change leader behaviours, shows that shaping behaviours link with communication about the content of the change while framing change and creating capacity behaviours relate to communicating about the context.
2.3.2 Participation
Participation is the involvement of lower level employees in decision making by individuals at a higher level with regard to areas of organizational performance (Lines, 2004), or, in the context of organizational change: allowing workers to have input regarding a proposed change (Wanberg & Banas, 2000). Change management literature undoubtedly confirms that employee involvement is crucial in successfully implementing organizational change.
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been made, or positively by having to concur in advance. (6) The decision is completely in the hands of organization members, with no distinction between managers and subordinates.” (Dachler and Wilbert, 1978, page 14). These levels of participation are taken into consideration in this research, in order to relate employee participation to employee commitment to organizational change.
Employees that are involved in a change feel a higher level of psychological commitment with this change (Lines, 2004) and they have higher beliefs of the change being beneficial (Wanberg & Banas, 2000). According to Wanberg and Banas (2000), employees that are allowed to participate in a change are more willing to accommodate the change. When employees are encouraged to participate in a change and their input is taken seriously, this increases their commitment to the change (Chawla & Kelloway, 2004). Nijhof et al. (1998) even state that participation in decision making is one of the most important influences on commitment. Another benefit of employee participation is that both parties receive more information and this leads to a more positive attitude towards the change (Reichers et al., 1997), since participation in decision making involves the two-way communication about the change (Bouckenoogh, 2012). Reichers et al. (1997) conducted an empirical study on organizational change and found that two-third of the employees who are facing a change value a high degree of participation in decision-making. Although there are different forms of involvement, it is key that employees feel that their opinions are heard and respected. This leads to higher commitment (Reichers et al., 1997). In particular, affective commitment can be fostered by increasing employee participation.
Meyer and Allen (1990) found that participation in decision making has a positive influence on affective commitment. Affective commitment can, as stated before, be influenced by enabling employees to give feedback and encouraging their initiative (Gagné & Deci, 2005). Involvement with the implementation of a change leads to higher affective commitment (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002). They indicate that letting employees participate in the change initiative increases their involvement, and thereby affective commitment is fostered.
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stimulates employees to cooperate with him in decision making stimulates employee commitment (Nijhof et al., 1998). Supporting employees to take initiative and providing suggestions for the change increases employee commitment (Peeters & Meijer, 1995).
Change leaders can allow employees to participate in decision making by demonstrating certain leader behaviours. Yang (2012) and Peeters and Meijer (1995) found that encouraging employee participation in decision making is part of a transformational leadership style. By looking at Appendix A, table a, behaviours falling within the framing and creating categories, stimulate the participation of employees, for example: ‘working together with employees’, ‘looking for creative solutions together with employees’ and ‘stimulating discussions about the change’. Higgs and Rowland consider the enabling behaviours of a change leader, framing change and creating capacity, to correspond with a transformational leadership style. So encouraging employees to participate in decision making about a change initiative relates to a transformational leadership style, and specifically to the change leader behaviours within the framing change and creating capacity category.
In this research employee participation in decision making is related to the change leader behaviours of the shaping, framing and creating categories and it is examined in more detail how employee participation influences affective, normative or continuance commitment to change.
2.4 Stage of the change
Above is described how the interaction between the change leader and employees influences employee commitment to change. In this paragraph, the stage a change is in, is related to the relationship between the interaction between the change leader and employees and employee commitment to change. One of the most well-known models that shows the different steps in planned change is Lewin’s (1947) three-step model of change. The three phases he identified are unfreezing, moving and refreezing.
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moving phase and the refreezing phase, commitment of the employees is required to support the change and achieve a successful implementation (Armenakis & Bedeian, 1999).
In order to understand how the influence of the stage of the change develops during the implementation of the change, a model created by Burnes (2009) is used. Burnes (2009) adds to Lewin’s (1947) model with Carnall’s (2003) Coping Cycle: a model that depicts how people react when facing a change. Figure 3 depicts these two models together. The Coping Cycle consists of five stages: denial of the need for change, defending old behaviours and practices, recognising that new behaviour is needed, adapting the change to the circumstances of the organization and finally internalising the change by accepting the new way of working to be normal (Burnes, 2009).
Figure 3, Lewin’s Three-Step model and Carnall’s Coping Cycle, by Burnes (2009, page 341)
The stages mentioned in the Coping Cycle show the way employees react to change and how open they are to it. Based on the Coping Cycle, the reaction of employees to change and their behaviour with regard to adjusting to change varies among the different stages of the change. Commitment will be different when people react to change with denial, defence and discarding than in the adaptation and the internalisation phase. In relation to the three-step model, this means that commitment develops during the unfreeze phase of a change, the moving phase and the refreeze phase.
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relationship differs per stage of the change. The same interaction will result in different employee commitment to change, depending on the stage the change is in. When reviewing to the model of Burnes (2009), interaction is likely to lead to the highest levels of (affective) commitment in the refreezing phase, where employees internalise the change. Interaction will have a smaller effect on employee commitment to change during the unfreezing stage, since the employees will be in a state of denial and defence to the change.
In this study, it is investigated whether the stage of the change has a moderating influence on the relationship between the interaction between change leader and employees and employee commitment to change.
2.5 Conceptual model
Below a graphic display of the conceptual model is shown, which displays the relationships as proposed above.
Figure 4, Conceptual model
19 3. METHOD
3.1 Data collection
In order to examine the relationships proposed in the conceptual model and provide an answer to the research question, a case study was performed at Company X. Four managers of Company X led the implementation of the Change Project for the consultants in their region. These managers are referred to as change leaders, while the consultants from here on are referred to as the recipients of change.
An in-depth case study can yield explanatory insights (Babbie, 2004). The choice for an explanatory case study has been made because the focus of the research is to answer ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions and to explain a presumed causal link between the implementation of a change initiative and the effects (Yin, 2003). In this case, it is a single case study with embedded units, since the topic of research is the same but various units are researched: the influence of four change leaders with various leadership behaviours is explored (Baxter and Jack, 2008).
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respondent is gained. In semi-structured interviews, the interviewer can ask supplementary questions in order to gain a clearer understanding of the answers and to obtain more information (Cooper & Schindler, 2008). The interviews were conducted face to face, in order to have the ability to observe and respond to non-verbal communication (Cooper & Schindler, 2008). They lasted between 30 and 80 minutes and were recorded and transcribed. The results were processed anonymously. Before starting the interview, an introduction to the research topics was given by the interviewer.
3.2 Selection and sample
First of all, the four change leaders at Company X were interviewed. Secondly, a total of fourteen recipients was interviewed, who were subordinates of these four change leaders. A selection has been made among those recipients that have been working in the position of consultant, since the consultants are the ones that are dealing with a new work process. Not all of these recipients were working at Company X before the Change Project was introduced; therefore a selection was made among those who were. After reviewing who were able and willing to participate by consultation of the recipients and their managers, recipients with variable attributes regarding gender, age, years of service at Company X and position (junior and senior) were selected. In region Den Haag, three of the six consultants were interviewed. In region Amsterdam, four of the seven consultants were interviewed. In region Groningen/Leeuwarden, interviews were conducted with four of the eight consultants and in Utrecht, three of the seven consultants were interviewed.
21 Recipients Gender Male 1 Female 13 Age Minimum 24 Maximum 32 Average 26.8
Years of service at Company X
Minimum 1
Maximum 7
Average 2.75
Years of service total Minimum 1
Maximum 10
Average 3
Position Junior 6
Senior 8
Table 1, characteristics of the recipients
3.3 Measurements
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Change leader behaviour
Change leader behaviour was measured based on the dimensions formulated by Higgs and Rowland (2005-1): shaping behaviour, framing change and creating capacity. Open questions were used in the interviews, in order to find out which leader behaviours the change leaders displayed and which leader behaviours were perceived by the recipients.
The interaction between change leader and employees
In this research, the interaction between change leader and employees consists of employee participation in decision making and communication. Communication is measured by establishing if there was formal communication and whether the information send by the change leader to the recipients was effective in making employees understand why the change initiative is implemented and what their tasks are in the new situation (context and content). Interview questions were based on these topics. Questions were asked about the goals of the implementation of the CP, whether recipients believe if it was necessary to implement this change initiative, about the communication regarding the change and the satisfaction of the recipients with the interactions with the change leader. Employee participation in decision making is measured using Dachler and Wilpert’s (1978) continuum, which has been discussed in paragraph 2.3.2 and consists of : “(1) No (advance) information is given to employees about a decision to be taken. (2) Employees are informed in advance of the decision to be made. (3) Employees can give their opinion about the decision to be made. (4) Employees' opinions are taken into account in the decision process. (5) Employees have a veto, either negatively by blocking a decision that has been made, or positively by having to concur in advance. (6) The decision is completely in the hands of organization members, with no distinction between managers and subordinates.” (Dachler & Wilbert, 1978, page 14). This continuum is depicted in Appendix C, table c. Open questions have been formulated in order to establish the level of employee participation in decision making.
Employee commitment to organizational change
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on the items of Herscovitch and Meyer’s (2002) scale. In Appendix C, table d, it is shown how these questions were formulated.
3.4 Data analysis
The interviews resulted in a large amount of data. In order to reduce this data to its essence, the data has been labelled and aggregated to meaningful results. The interviews were analysed using labels. These labels were based on the literature study performed on the topics of employee commitment to organizational change, the interaction between change leader and recipients and change leader behaviour. A template approach was used to include the relevant answers derived from the interviews in a coding frame, existing of all these labels (Baarda et al., 2009). In case the results could not be captured by these labels and thereby did not fit the template, a new theory would be developed for these variables (Baarda et al., 2009). The next step in analysing the labels was to explore the connections between the themes in order to explain why a relationship exists (Baarda et al., 2009). This analyses leads to an answer on the main research question.
The labels regarding change leader behaviour are based on Appendix A, table a. The results of the interviews on the topic of the behaviours of the change leaders were described using quotes and can be found in Appendix C, table b.
The concepts with regard to communication were based on articles of Elving (2005) and Bouckenooghe (2012), which indicate that formal, top-down communication and employees understanding why a change initiative is implemented and what is going to change are important in increasing employee (affective) commitment to organizational change. In Appendix C, table c, it is indicated how the change agents and recipients experienced employee participation in decision making, based on Dachler and Wilpert’s (1978) continuum. Quotes are used to support the categorisation.
24 4. RESULTS
In this section the results of the interviews that have been conducted with four change leaders and fourteen recipients of change at Company X are given. This section is divided into five paragraphs. Paragraph one, two, three and four each give the results with regard to the variables that have been investigated in this research and that form part A, B and C of the interviews plus the moderating variable ‘stage of the change’. Paragraph 4.5 displays the relationships between these concepts and provides answers to the four sub research questions.
4.1 Employee commitment to change
Employee commitment to organizational change is defined as the willingness of an employee to make the change successful and behave accordingly. In the theory section, employee commitment to change has been linked to the successfulness of a change initiative. According to Herscovitch and Meyer (2002), there are three forms of commitment. Employees can support the change because they: believe that it is fruitful and want to make it work (affective commitment); experience that resisting the change is not an option (continuance commitment); or feel obligated to support it (normative commitment).
Within the four cases studied in this research, all change leaders indicated that they prefer their employees to feel affective commitment to the change. One of them stated for example: “I believe in passion and success, if you believe in something you will try to make it work.” The change leaders try to accomplish this by involving the recipients in the change initiative, by explaining why Company X has chosen to implement the change and by letting the recipients deploy the change process themselves. The change leaders acknowledge that affective commitment is a preferred end stage, but that during the journey, others types of commitment might arise as a transitional stage: “It takes time to get them to believe in it.” However, the commitment type experienced by the recipients varies.
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Three recipients experienced mainly normative commitment. One of these recipients told: “I have felt guilty. Not extremely guilty, but I have thought, if I am indeed not cooperating, they cannot succeed and that is really lousy. If I don’t do something and this imposes a burden on someone else… I feel bad about that.” Another recipient stated: “I feel responsible, towards myself and towards the CP.”
One of the fourteen recipients experienced a combination of affective, normative and continuance commitment. She said: “It was not possible not to cooperate with the CP. I believe in this initiative and promote it. I feel responsible to make this a success.”
In summary, seven of the fourteen recipients experienced affective commitment to change, three experienced normative commitment and three continuance commitment. One recipient indicated that she experienced all three types of employee commitment to organizational change.
4.2 Change leader behaviour
As has been derived from the literature study, the behaviour of the change leader influences the implementation of the change. Higgs and Rowland (2005) distinguished three types of change leader behaviour. Shaping behaviours are leader centric, while framing change behaviours refer to setting out the journey but leaving room for employees to work in their own way and creating capacity behaviours focus on enabling employees to participate in the change. The results with regard to change leader behaviour can be found in Appendix C, table b.
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that the change leader behaviours fitted mostly within the framing change category: “Up till some degree, it is determined: this is what we are going and have to do, but there is always room to give our insights or experiences.” Another recipient stated: “The change leader looks at the big picture and leaves the rest to the units and the spocs.” and a different recipient said: “We get a lot of responsibility.”
Two of the change leaders showed a substantial amount of creating behaviours as well. As one of the change leaders whose behaviour falls within the framing and creating category expressed: “I am clear in what I want, what I see and why I do things. I think it is important, to take time to explain why things are important. I see myself as a guiding coach.” The other change leader stated: “What helps is showing the success stories.” These examples can be categorized as: ‘coaching’ and ‘provides affirming and encouraging signals, creates ownership, trust and confidence’. The recipients experienced a combination of framing and creating too: “My change leader asks us; how do you feel about it, what is your opinion on the issue, what are appropriate goals for you, and then we make a decision to pursue those goals.” Another recipient stated: “It is very clear to me that my manager believes in the CP, she can justify why she feels this way.”
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to be done like this.” These are examples of the shaping behaviours ‘allocating tasks’ and ‘determining in detail how the change is implemented’.
Another finding was that change leaders and their recipients indicated different change leader behaviours, and this difference was the same in all four cases. As is shown in Appendix C, table b, the change recipients mainly indicated to experience, within the framing change category, the following behaviours: ‘communicating the vision and focussing of the future of the organization’, ‘helping employees to see why things need to be changed and why there is no going back’, ‘establishing direction and boundaries, an overall plan’, ‘giving employees space to obtain goals in their own way, within the scope of the business goals’. The change leaders agreed with this, but on the other hand indicated to show another set of behaviours, which the recipients did not support. These were behaviours within the framing and creating category, and within the framing category, for example: ‘is aware of own leadership and uses it for a specific goal’, ‘tunes in to day-to-day reality’, ‘is self-assured, confident and takes a stand for one’s beliefs’ and ‘makes it safe to say risky things, shows empathy’.
In conclusion, all change leaders and recipients indicated that the behaviours they showed or experienced fell mostly within the framing change category. Two of the four change leaders showed a considerable amount of creating change behaviours as well. In three of the four cases, recipients and change leader agreed on the change behaviours, but in one case, two of the three respondents indicated to experience shaping behaviours while the change leader indicated that she showed framing change behaviours.
4.3 The interaction between change leader and employees
4.3.1 Communication
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Higgs and Rowland (2011), and communication about the context to the framing change and creating capacity categories.
Communication about the content of the change
With regard to the content of the change, the change leaders and recipients experienced the communication differently. All the change leaders indicated that they explained to their recipients why the CP is implemented and what it can bring. One of the change leaders did not pay attention to the initiative at first, but ones it was implemented, she did start to communicate about the goals of the CP and what the results were: “Since last summer, there was more room for me to give leadership to the implementation of the CP and to set it out. I shared the results with them, to show the recipients what the CP brings.” The recipients of this change leader experienced the communication from the change leader in the same way. A recipient stated: “In the beginning, what we thought about the CP did not match what the CP did and was.” Another recipient said: “The change leader started to give more intense leadership.” For these recipients it was unclear in the beginning what their roles and tasks were in the new situation.
For all the recipients of the other change leaders, the content of the change was not obvious in the beginning as well. As a recipient stated: “The communication was unclear, also because the word ‘CP’ is unclear, ‘the CP is going to select candidates for you’, but then you still don’t know what exactly is going to happen. There is definitely a need for more information.” Another recipient explained: “Once the CP was implemented, all sorts of questions started to rise.” Four recipients mentioned: “I think there must have been an official moment when there was communication about the implementation of the CP, but I have no idea when this was, I was probably not there.” The recipients felt that more communication about the CP was necessary: “I have read about the CP on our website, that’s why I knew they were doing a good job, but I did not know what that job was exactly.” “It is a difficult concept. They talk about THE CP, but there are so many different initiatives and it is unclear which one this is.”
Communication about the context of the change
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results of the interviews show that all recipients understood the goals that management want to accomplish with the CP at the time of the interview, most recipients indicate that this was not due to the formal communication of the change leader. Two of the ten recipients indicated that there had not been communication with the change leader, while the other eight of the ten recipients indicated that they were not satisfied with the formal communication from their change leader about the context of the change. The fourth change leader did not communicate about the context of the change in advance, before the CP started. Although there was no formal communication about the context, two of the four recipients indicated that they were aware of the context of the change, because they were informed by other sources, for example members of the CP.
Once the CP was implemented (moving phase), all recipients of the three cases that are of have been in this stage of the change, indicated that they received information about the CP from other people besides the change leader, for example: the spoc’s, other colleagues and the members of the CP. The recipients of the case that is currently in the unfreezing phase also indicated that they received information from other sources. For ten of the fourteen recipients, this information was essential in understanding the context and content of the CP. This indirect information was received from different sources. One recipient mentioned that she heard about the change from different colleagues: “Secretly I already knew things from my colleague.” Another recipient stated: “We hear most information through the grapevine.” All recipients experienced that the communication with the members of the CP was very important in order to understand the content of the change: “The information relating to the content of the CP came from the manager of the CP.”, “If things were unclear, I could ask the manager of the CP questions.” A recipient stated: “When the members of the CP came to our office, we came to understand our tasks better.” The results show that formal communication was not only provided by the change leader, but by a variety of sources.
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statistics.” Another recipient mentioned: “It is still very unclear, everybody says: ‘You need to do different things with the extra time you have now.’, and I get that, but what? Something substantial has to be changed in our behaviour, but we don’t get an example and nobody leads this change in behaviour.”
In summary, for the recipients the content of the change was unclear when the CP was first implemented. The results of the interviews indicate that at this moment, the context of the change as well as the content of the change initiative of the CP are clear to all respondents. Communication with colleagues, spocs and the members of the CP filled in the gaps that existed when the CP was first implemented. However, the recipients still miss communication with their change leader with regard to the results of the change initiative and how to perform their role within the new situation. A consequence of the fact that the recipients communicate with different contacts, is that not all the information they have is shared with their change leader. One of the change leaders brought this up too. This shows that the overall communication between change leader and recipients is unsatisfactory to most recipients.
4.3.2 Participation
In the theory section of this study, participation was defined as allowing employees to have input regarding a proposed change (Wanberg and Banas, 2000). Employee participation in decision making is measured by using the scale of Dachler and Wilpert (1978), which can be found in Appendix C, table c together with quotes to support the categorisation of the results of the interviews.
In the interviews, the four change leaders indicated that the CP has been established based on the needs of the consultants of Company X: “When the CP was designed, it was inspired by what the consultants experienced. We heard that the biggest irritation was that it is very time consuming to call all the applicants. We took that into account when we designed the CP.” But they also acknowledged that there was not much room for the recipients to shape the change initiative once it had been decided by management that it was going to be implemented: “There was no room to deviate from the concept of the CP.”
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CP initiative is a result of this request, although they were not consulted about the shape of the CP. The other recipients mentioned the goals of the CP as a given, and not as something they had requested themselves. The results of the interviews show, that before the CP started, it was not possible for them to influence whether the CP was implemented or not, or to influence how the new work process would be shaped: “We were not involved in the concept of the CP. It was suddenly there, like a light that is switched on.” Another recipient stated: “You can tell people what to do, but for me, that does not work, and there are more people like me, because we need to know what the added value is.” The participation level with regard to the establishment of the CP, indicated on the scale of Dachler and Wilpert (1978), was 1: ‘no advanced information was given to the employees about the decision to be taken’. All recipients indicated that they were not included in the design of the CP.
With regard to the work process, questions could be asked, either to the change leader or to the manager of the CP. The recipients could discuss what they were satisfied about and what could be improved. Seven of the fourteen recipients indicated that they experienced the level of participation in decision making to be 3, with regard to fine tuning the work process: ‘Employees can give their opinion about the decision to be made.’ One of the recipients explained: “For example, we talked about the CP handling all the candidates. But our ideas fell on death ears: ‘this is what it is and we cannot change it’.” Another recipient explained: “Even though they ask us what we think, this is still what Company X wants and therefore we will just have to do it.” The other seven recipients felt that their input on the work process was taken into account and that their level of participation was 4: ‘Employees' opinions are taken into account in the decision process.’ For example, one recipient said that it is possible to shape the operational process a little: “The train is riding, and you can lie down in front of it, but it will just run you over. But it is possible to make little adjustments: you can advise to paint the waggon green, there is always room for good ideas.” Another recipient mentioned: "With regard to the use of Mondriaan, I have given some suggestions about the subsets and this was changed."
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CP and only six of the fourteen recipients feel free to start discussions about the change or bring up issues: “We can easily give feedback about how the CP is functioning through email or by phone, but this is not initiated by the management, I do not feel that the change leader is organizing this.” Another recipient stated: “There is room to express your feelings, but not everybody will do that.” A third recipient said: “We always take the liberty somehow, by saying: ‘If you do this, it will results in that, so maybe it is better if we do it like this…’ They don’t always ask our opinion but we give it anyway.” Another recipient stated: “I feel that we can contribute now, but you have to take initiative yourself, because nobody asks for your opinion.”
So although the four change leaders all indicated that they encourage their recipients to give feedback about the CP and believe that recipients share this information with them, the recipients said that they do not share all information with their change leader. The recipients communicate more often with their colleagues, the single point of contact for the CP and the members of the CP about the content and the context of the change. A recipient stated for example: “If I want to address something, I almost never go to the manager or the spoc, I call the CP myself.” The recipients value this direct communication with the CP as well: “Now that my colleague is appointed to be the spoc, I still like to contact the CP myself.” Another recipient stated: “I directly talk to the employees of the CP, I agree that appointing a spoc provides clarity but I like to do it myself.”
In conclusion, with regard to the implementation of the CP, the recipients experienced their participation level to be low, 1 on the scale of Dachler and Wilpert (1978). With regard to the new work process, the participation level is 3 or 4. Six of the fourteen recipients feel free to give their opinion about the CP to the change leader, and share this information with their colleagues, the spoc or members of the CP as well. The other eight recipients do give their opinion on the change, but they share their ideas only with their colleagues or the members of the CP. Half of the recipients feel that their opinions about the work process are taken into account in the decision making process.
4.4 Stage of the change
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between the interaction, between the change agent and employees, and employee commitment to change is influenced by the stage the change is in.
After reviewing the results of the interviews with the recipients, it turned out that the level of participation in decision making was the same at the four cases. Also there was no real difference between the communications in the different regions. Although the interaction between the change leader and the recipients was comparable in the four cases, there were different types of employee commitment to change.
Unfreezing stage
In one of the cases, the CP was not yet implemented at the time of the interviews in this region, and the change was in the unfreezing stage. All three recipients felt affective commitment to the change. The three recipients received information from the manager and members of the CP with regard to the content of the change. The change leader indicated that there had not been much interaction between her and the recipients of the change in this region. She explained that she believed that the communication with regard to the change will become more clear once the CP is actually implemented: “I think things will become more clear once everything is functioning well, but for now, everyone is fine with the implementation of the CP.” A recipient stated that he believes in this change initiative, but expects that more leadership with regard to the implementation of the change will be developed: “Right now, we don’t think that this will be a big change to us, this has probably to do with leadership, if management points out that this is important, it will come alive.” The recipients all believed that once the change was implemented, they would be able to participate in the design of the CP or choose not to participate in the change, but to keep doing things the way they used to do.
Moving stage
In the two cases in which the change was in the moving phase, there was a total of seven recipients. One recipient experienced all three types of commitment, one normative commitment, two affective commitment and three continuance commitment. It becomes clear from the interview results that the recipients feel that the change is still developing. As one recipient states: “We will have to wait and see if this change initiative is successful.”
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Of the four recipients, two experienced normative commitment and two affective commitment. One of the recipients that experienced normative commitment and one of the recipients that experienced affective commitment were satisfied with the formal communication from the change leader about the context of the change in advance, the other two not. The two recipients that experienced normative commitment had been sceptic about the change initiative from the beginning. Although they recognized the benefits of the CP, they still felt that the CP was imposed on them. They wanted to participate more in the change.
Both in the moving and the refreezing stage, half of the recipients experienced affective commitment to change, while in the unfreezing stage, all recipients experienced affective commitment.
4.5 Combining the results to answer the sub questions
In this paragraph an answer is provided to the sub research questions, in order to apply the relationships given in the conceptual model in figure 4 to the case study at Company X.
1. How does change leader behaviour influence the interaction between change leader and employees?
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There was no difference in the employee participation in decision making between the recipients that experienced framing and shaping behaviours and the recipients that experienced only framing or a combination of framing and creating.
The recipients that experienced besides framing change behaviours also shaping behaviours stated that a lot of communication from the change leader was imperative and focussed on how the recipients should perform their tasks. These recipients experienced mainly framing change behaviours, but experienced more shaping behaviours than the others. This confirms the link between shaping behaviours and formal communication about the content of the change found in the literature study.
Among the recipients that experienced besides framing change also creating capacity behaviours, were the only two of the fourteen who were satisfied with the formal communication about the context of the change. Another four of the eight recipients that experienced besides framing change and creating capacity behaviours, were more satisfied than the others with the formal communication from their change leader about the context of the change and had less contact with other sources to obtain extra information than the other recipients did. This supports the believe discussed in the literature study that communication about the context of the change fits with behaviours within the framing change and creating capacity category.
2. How does communication as a part of the interaction between the change leader and employees influence employee commitment to organizational change?
Seven of the fourteen recipients experienced affective commitment to change, three experienced normative commitment and three continuance commitment. One recipient indicated that she experienced all three types of employee commitment to organizational change. The six recipients that indicated to experience normative or continuance commitment stated that there was a lack of communication when the CP was implemented. They indicated that although the content of the CP was clear they would have appreciated more formal communication from the change leader. Especially once the CP was implemented, formal communication about the results and improvements was lacking.
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that they expected that there would be more formal communication once the CP would get started. They believed that their change leader would start this communication at a later point in time and they were satisfied with this prospect. The other four of the seven were more satisfied with the formal communication than the other recipients. They indicated for example that there was formal communication with the change leader, although they believed that it could be improved, and they used other sources to get the information that they missed. Also, these recipients were the ones that indicated that they believed that the change leader communicated with the team, but believed that they were not there at the moment communication took place. They believed that there was communication while this communication did not really existed. This matches the finding in the literature study, which indicates that employee satisfaction with the formal communication leads to affective commitment to the change.
3. How does the level of employee participation in decision making as a part of the interaction between the change leader and employees influence employee commitment to organizational change?
The participation with regard to the design of the CP was overall low. Of the fourteen recipients, two indicated that they had been part of a brainstorm session that resulted in the design of the CP. However, they acknowledged that within this brainstorm session, they could not influence the design of the CP. These two recipients both indicated that they experienced normative commitment. All recipients stated that they were not included in the design of the CP. At a later stage, with regard to the work process, participation was indicated to be on level 3 of 4 of the continuum of Dachler and Wilpert (1978).
There were some differences between the regions. The biggest difference in terms of
employee commitment to change is between region Utrecht and region
Groningen/Leeuwarden. In the region Utrecht, where the CP was not implemented yet at the time of the interviews, the three recipients all felt affective commitment with the implementation of the new work process. The recipients believed that they will be able to participate in the future, once the CP has started. The recipients of region Groningen/Leeuwarden, which is in the moving phase, were positive about the CP at first and experienced affective commitment in the beginning, due to the fact that their change leader had a positive attitude about it and it was clear to them what the CP entailed and why it was
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change, because they felt these problems were the result of the fact that they were not included in the decision making and participation was limited. Currently, affective commitment is not experienced at all, but mainly continuance commitment is experienced. As stated above, seven of the fourteen recipients experienced affective commitment to change. The participation of these recipients with regard to the work process was level 4. The six recipients that experienced normative or continuance commitment indicated this participation to be lower, namely level 3. The difference between the recipients that indicated to feel affective commitment and the others, with regard to participation in the work process, were that these recipients believed that they could influence the work process, it just had not happened yet, according to some because it had not been the right time yet, to one recipient because she did not remember which suggestions and ideas had been hers and to somebody else because her suggestions had not reached the right person yet. These results support the findings in the literature study that state that a higher level of participation in decision making leads to a higher level of commitment and specifically affective commitment. It is noteworthy that in this case, the difference between the recipients who indicated that their participation level was 3 and those who indicated it to be four, is that the latter group believed participation was possible, and that there was no actual difference in participation.
4. How does the stage of the change influence the relationship between interaction between the change leader and employees and employee commitment to organizational change? The four change leaders expected commitment to rise along with the development of the change process, and believed that continuance and normative commitment were stepping stones for the achievement of affective commitment. The literature review indicated that the relation between the interaction between the change leader and employees and employee commitment to change is likely to be stronger when the stage of the change is developing. In this study, that was not the case. Both in the moving and the refreezing stage, half of the recipients experienced affective commitment to change, while in the unfreezing stage, all recipients experienced affective commitment.
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39 5. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
5.1 Summary of findings
The purpose of this research was to find an answer to the research question: “How does change leader behaviour influence the interaction between the change leader and employees and how does this interaction in turn influence employee commitment to organizational change?”. In order to provide an answer to this research question, the results of the literature study and the case study are discussed in this paragraph.
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The literature study indicated that formal communication about the change increased employee commitment to this change, and specifically affective commitment. A higher level of employee participation in decision making was also indicated to lead to higher levels of commitment and specifically affective commitment to change. The results from the case study show that the recipients whom believed that they would be able to participate in decisions about the work process, experienced affective commitment to the change. With regard to communication, the recipients who experienced affective commitment could be divided into two groups. Three of these seven recipients expected communication to develop in time and were satisfied with the prospect of the communication they were expecting for the future, and therefore they were satisfied with the formal communication. The other four recipients were more positive about the formal communication than the recipients who did not experienced affective commitment. Also, when these recipients experienced a lack of formal communication, they relate this to the fact that they were not present during this communication and believed that the change leader did communicate with their colleagues. In conclusion, if the recipients believed that there was sufficient (opportunity for) participation in decision making and formal communication, (affective) commitment was higher.
