AN AGILE IMPLEMENTATION:

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AN AGILE IMPLEMENTATION:

How do different organizational groups’ composite narratives

influence organization-wide change through sensemaking and what

are the implications for the change outcome?

Author:

Ali Amierie

Student number:

S3528529

Course:

MSc thesis BA Change Management

Student email:

a.amierie@student.rug.nl

Supervisor:

dr. Cees Reezigt

Co-assessor:

dr. I. Maris-de Bresser

Research stream:

Qualitative research

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ABSTRACT

Organizational change is crucial for any organization’s continued existence. Therefore, implementing organizational change is one of the most important undertakings of an organization. Successful implementation of organizational change can reinvigorate a business, while failure can lead to catastrophic consequences including the death of the firm. It is clear that a significant contributor to change failure is overlooking the impact of social components. Many organizations do not seem to be fully aware of these soft processes. This research study adds to existing organizational change literature by examining, through sensemaking, whether lead level and squad level narratives are distinct from each other, and how this influences the outcome of an organizational change initiative.

This qualitative and exploratory research was conducted at a financial institution, more specifically retail banking, which had implemented the agile way of working. To grasp the composite narratives of lead level and squad level, data was collected through 12 semi-structured interviews. The gathered data was transcribed and coded using Atlas.ti so composite narratives could be formulated for each organizational level. The results reveal that while composite narratives have similarities, they are also distinct from each other. Lead level has a positive perspective and emphasizes change implementation as a cultural change, while squad level has a somewhat negative perspective.

The managerial and theoretical implications of this research provide insights into the reduction of challenges in practice for realizing and being aware of softer aspects during organizational change. Organizations may benefit from this research by becoming aware of the existence of different narratives on different levels.

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INTRODUCTION

Organizational change is essential for short-term competitiveness and long-term survival (Leana & Barry, 2000). Implementing organizational change is one of the most important

undertakings of an organization. Successful implementation of organizational change can reinvigorate a business, while failure can lead to negative consequences including firm death (Sonenshein, 2010). The literature on project management for managing change initiatives in organizations describes two main but distinct approaches: the hard approach and the soft approach (Crawford & Pollack, 2004; Henrie & Sousa-Poza, 2005; Atkinson, Crawford & Ward, 2006; Farkas, 2016).

Crawford and Pollack (2004) provide clarification on the use of the terms hard and soft in the context of project management. Although hard and soft are treated as a dichotomy, it is not a true dichotomy; rather, hard and soft are two opposites on a continuum (Crawford & Pollack, 2004). The hard paradigm relates to projects for which the goals are clearly defined, and which require no further examination (Atkinson et al., 2006). This approach emphasizes technical performance and how to efficiently achieve the defined objective (Crawford & Pollack, 2004). It is easier to measure the success of hard projects because of the preliminary defined goal; in these cases, success can be measured in quantitative terms (Atkinson et al, 2006). The soft end of the continuum relates to projects for which the objectives are unclearly or ambiguously defined at the beginning of the project. This is more applicable in situations that are unclear and that involve human beings and cultural considerations, values and meanings (Crawford & Pollack, 2004; Atkinson et al., 2006), and where success is measured in qualitative terms (Atkinson et al., 2006).

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(2007) suggest that a significant contributor to change failure is overlooking the impact of social components.

The transition process of moving from traditional project management toward agile project management is complex, and both the scope and the scale of the agile transformation are extensive (Dikert et al., 2016), which results in uncertainty for the people involved. The complexity of this organizational change requires adapting to the new form of project management and adopting an agile mindset (Denning, 2016) as the people involved are not used to agile work processes. Daily routines and activities are affected by a number of significant changes. For instance, by shifting to a short-term execution, the processes and practices (Paterek, 2019) are incrementally adapted to each subsequent iteration (Solinski & Petersen, 2016). This is where the process of sensemaking unfolds (Weick et al., 2005).

Sensemaking is the process by which people understand events or make sense of events that are novel, ambiguous, or confusing (Maitlis & Christianson, 2014). Research indicates that

sensemaking at all levels of the organization is crucial in producing or inhibiting change; when sensemaking fails, so too may a change initiative (Yu et al., 2005; Nag et al., 2007; Mantere et al., 2012). Sonenshein’s (2010) research reveals that the sensemaking lens is closely related to a

narrative. A narrative is interpreted as a construction that involves communication patterns (Balogun & Johnson, 2005) that can be used as a tool to shape one’s understanding (sensemaking), but also as a tool to influence others’ understanding (sensegiving) (Sonenshein, 2010). Sensemaking through a narrative is the preferred currency for human interaction in organizations (Soneshein, 2010; Boje, 1991). However, the current literature provides a limited explanation of the importance and functions of narratives in organizational change (Salouki, 2017).

To complement contemporary literature on organizational change, narratives and sensemaking, this research aims to answer the following research question: How do composite

narratives of different organizational groups influence an organizational change through

sensemaking, and what are the implications for the change outcome? The purpose of this research

is to describe the team lead and team members’ composite narratives about the organizational change occurring at different organizational levels and subsequently define how these levels make sense of the organization-wide change, whether the narratives are different and how this influences the implementation of the organizational change. This thesis also aims to clarify what the

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THEORY

This section provides an overview of the prevalent areas of literature that elucidate relevant concepts and insights. Therefore, the literature streams about project management, sensemaking and narratives are elaborated.

Two ends of a continuum – hard and soft

The literature distinguishes two paradigms in project management, the hard approach and the soft approach (Crawford and Pollack, 2004; Henrie and Sousa-Poza, 2005; Atkinson, Crawford & Ward, 2006; Farkas, 2016). Crawford and Pollack (2004) further categorize these approaches within a framework based on seven dimensions, as outlined in Figure 1. The dimensions are: 1) goal/objective clarity; 2) goal/objective tangibility; 3) success measures; 4) project permeability; 5) number of solution options; 6) degree of participation and practitioner role; and 7) stakeholder expectations. These dimensions are elaborated upon in the following paragraph.

Figure 1: The hard and soft dimensions framework, adapted from Crawford and Pollack 2004, p. 652

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are often more difficult to define as they rely on subjective interpretation and judgment (Crawford and Pollack, 2004). Third, success measures are the kinds of measures used to judge project success. Measures come in two forms: quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative measures are associated with the hard paradigm, while qualitative measures are linked to the soft paradigm (Jafaari, 2001). Fourth, project permeability refers to the degree to which a project’s goals, processes and outcomes are affected by influences outside the project’s control. The hard paradigm concerns a stable

environment and concentrates on the management of identified issues, whereas the soft paradigm seeks to determine a clear boundary between what will and will not affect a project that is more problematic (Li and Berg, 2001). When permeability is high, it will be beneficial to include a wide variety of stakeholders to gain insight from multiple perspectives on the situation. Fifth, number of solution options refers to the approach to exploring and refining the project’s goals. The hard

paradigm focuses on efficient delivery and optimization of the predetermined solution, while the soft paradigm focuses on the exploration of alternative options and emphasizes learning, participation, exploration and questioning the underlying assumptions about the situation (Midgley, 2000). Sixth, degree of participation and practitioner role refers to the roles that team members take on. Hard methods tend to be non-participative and team members are experts in their individual fields and have clearly defined roles (Jackson, 2000). However, the soft paradigm involves participation and collaboration, where many views are sought on many issues and people are encouraged to cross professional boundaries (Crawford and Pollack, 2004). Finally, for the hard paradigm of dimension of stakeholder expectations, it is assumed that people act in predictable ways and their actions are determined by their environment, resulting in a management style based on command and control (Lane, 2000). In the soft paradigm, the management style has culture, meaning and values as central concerns. People are understood to be part of a complex culture with individual expectations, desires, values, roles and norms of action (Checkland, 1999).

In summary, in the hard paradigm, projects have clearly defined goals that value technical performance and efficiency and are managed by monitoring and control. Success is measured only in quantitative terms in the hard paradigm. Conversely, in the soft paradigm projects have ambiguously defined goals that value relationships, culture and meaning and are managed by negotiation and discussion. In this paradigm, success is measured in qualitative terms (Atkinson, 2006). However, there is no distinct line between hard and soft when it comes to project management. Although hard and soft are treated as a dichotomy in everyday speech, it is not a true dichotomy. Rather, hard and soft represent two opposites on a continuum (Crawford & Pollack, 2004; Shi, 2011; Karrbom

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The hard and soft ends of the continuum indicate different working methodologies. For instance, the stage-gate model is said to be “hard,” while agile methodologies are said to be soft (Howell et al., 2010). Experts note that some projects based on traditional project management (i.e. the stage-gate model) sometimes fail to develop the project in a timely manner to satisfy clients’ needs (Sanchez et al, 2019).Due to concerns and the reaction to traditional project management, a more flexible method, called “agile,” has been developed and introduced (Cohen et al., 2004). This method promotes an adaptive, iterative, fast, flexible and effective methodology designed to deliver significant value quickly and throughout a project (Sanchez et al., 2019).

The concept of agile requires further explanation. According to Conforto et al. (2016), there is a lack of consensus in terms of a definition for agile. They state that the definitions are inconsistent, incomplete and lack clarity. Conforto et al. (2016) reviewed the literature in an endeavor to define agility and concluded that agility is: “the project team’s ability to quickly change the project plan as a

response to customer or stakeholders needs, market or technology demands in order to achieve better project and product performance in an innovative and dynamic project environment.” (p.667)

In the agile approach, work is coordinated by the self-managing team, whereby the team itself decides how work is coordinated (Boehm and Turner, 2003). The focus of the agile method relies on interaction, collaboration and situational action, acknowledging the “social factor” in project management (Howell et al., 2010; Karlström & Runeson, 2006).Self-management of teams is one of the greatest challenges when introducing agile (change-driven) development, as the mindsets of people cannot be changed easily (Moe, Dingsoyr & Dyba, 2010). This is where the process of sensemaking unfolds to deal with the new situation. The next section elaborates on the phenomenon of sensemaking.

Sensemaking

Organizational change implies a paradigm shift that involves transitioning from the current situation to another, new situation (Burnes, 2017). Sensemaking is triggered by these events, as it frequently violates expectations and generates considerable uncertainty, ambiguity, and confusion for those involved (Maitlis & Christianson, 2014). Sensemaking activities are particularly critical in dynamic and turbulent contexts where the need to create and maintain coherent understandings that sustain relationships and enable collective action is particularly important and challenging (Weick, 1993). Sensemaking allows people to deal with uncertainty and ambiguity by developing rational accounts of the world that enable action (Maitlis, 2005).

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ambiguous environmental stimuli, specifically involving the “placement of items into frameworks comprehending, redressing surprise, constructing meaning, interacting in pursuit of mutual

understanding, and patterning” (p.6). This occurs particularly “when an expectation is disconfirmed” (p.5).

After Weick’s introduction of sensemaking, multiple studies and various definitions arose in a theoretical overview of sensemaking. According to Cornelissen (2012), sensemaking refers to “the process of meaning construction whereby people interpret events and issues (within and outside) of their organizations that are somehow surprising, complex, or confusing to them.” According to Maitlis and Christianson (2014), “sensemaking is the process through which people work to understand issues or events that are novel, ambiguous, confusing, or in some other way violate expectations.” Cornelissen (2012) and Maitlis and Chrisianson’s (2014) definitions are taken into account for this research as they emphasize the nature of ambiguity with regard to the

organizational change that members must cope with. Furthermore, when organizational members encounter moments of ambiguity or uncertainty, they seek to clarify the situation by extracting and interpreting cues from their environment, using these as the basis for a plausible account that provides order and “makes sense” of what has occurred, and through which they continue to enact the environment (Brown, 2000; Maitlis, 2005; Weick, 1995; Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2005).

The development of sensemaking research has shifted over the course of decades. The research transitioned from a cognitive perspective in the 1980s to including more subtopics in the literature regarding various aspects of sensemaking, such as critical events, culture, social influence, and (strategic) change in the 1990s. From the 2000s onwards, it transitioned towards a greater focus on the social processes through which sensemaking occurs, and the relationship between

sensemaking and language, narratives and discursive practices became more important (Maitlis & Christianson, 2014). Furthermore, Balogun and Johnson (2005) argue that change is underpinned by a wide range of social interaction. The social processes of interaction are of different types, varying from formal, such as mostly written, to much more informal communication in the form of

storytelling and gossip.

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are intertwined and therefore it is relevant to examine the narrative literature stream to deepen the understanding of this concept.

Narratives

In recent years there has been an increasing awareness of the importance of narratives in organizations. The enactment of plausible and coherent narratives is a critical tool for organizational elites. Weick (1995) asserts that narratives can be used as a device for making sense of ambiguous organizational situations. In addition, the performance of narratives is a key aspect of organizational members’ sensemaking (Boje, 1995), the analysis of which permits one to identify and analyze what people agree on and where understandings differ. Narratives help organizational actors make sense of their successes or failures because they contain indicators of who and what is causing the

observed outcomes (Martin et al. 1983; Pentland, 1999; Vaara, 2002). Furthermore, narratives allow for multiple perspectives regarding change (Buchanan & Dawson, 2007) and broad types of meaning, both of which can play a vital role in change (Heracleous & Barret, 2001). Moreover, Vaara,

Sonenshein and Boje (2016) contend that narratives provide an essential means for maintaining or reproducing stability or promoting orresisting change in and around organizations. These studies demonstrate that narratives have implications for managing change. Consequently, narrative analysis has the potential to advance our understanding of key issues related to stability and change in organizations, but this potential has not yet been fully realized (Maitlis, 2014).

Based on the above observations, it is clear that a more in-depth examination of what “narratives” entail is required. There are various definitions in the theoretical overview of narratives. According to Sonenshein (2010, p.480), “narrative is a discursive construction that actors use as a tool to shape their own understanding (sensemaking), and as a tool to influence others’

understandings (sensegiving), and as an outcome of the collective construction of meaning.” This suggests that narrative and sensemaking are somehow intertwined. Dawson and Buchanan (2005) strengthen this claim, stating that narratives provide a particularly compelling and powerful tool not only for communicating meaning but also for establishing the hegemony of particular interpretations of, or perspectives regarding, a sequence of organizational change events. Brown, Stacey and

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definition cannot be ignored, since it is relevant to how both concepts influence change implementation.

Although narratives are sometimes more fully elaborated upon by one person or piece of discourse, most narratives are “fragments of stories, bits and pieces told here and there, to varying audiences” (Boje, 2001: 5). Dawson and Buchanan (2005) describe narratives as the vehicles through which organizational values and beliefs are produced, reproduced and transformed. They shape organizational meanings by functioning as retrospective sensemaking, serving as the premises of arguments and persuasive appeals, acting as implicit mechanisms of social control, and constituting frames of reference for interpreting organizational actions.

Vaara et al. (2016) suggest three distinctive approaches to organizational narratives: a realist approach, a poststructuralist approach and an interpretative approach. In the realist approach, narratives are used to study things that exist independently of the narratives themselves. The poststructuralist approach focuses on uncovering the complexity, fragmentation and fluidity of narrative representations (Vaara et al., 2016). The interpretative approach is the primary focus of this research. In this approach, narratives are conceptualized as people’s constructions of organizational phenomena and play a central role in organizational narrative analysis (Czarniawska, 2004; Gabriel, 2000). In organization and management studies, the interpretative approach has frequently been linked with sensemaking as an overall theoretical framework. It comes in two primary forms: individual narratives and composite narratives (Vaara et al., 2016).

Individual narratives focus on individual accounts or stories, while composite narratives focus on interpretive patterns to build a narrative that captures the collective meanings of a group of organizational members (Vaara et al., 2016). Composite narratives are the focus of this research. Given the complexity of change, a single narrative rarely captures the expansive nature of change. Therefore, during organizational change a composite narrative can reveal alternative meanings that impact change that may otherwise go unnoticed.

Narratives exist as an inherently untidy phenomenon where organizational change unfolds with multiple narratives offered by parties with their own agenda. These narratives exist in distinct hierarchical levels within organization, namely management level and lower level (Dawson & Buchanan, 2005). Scholars usually create a subset of these levels, particularly the role of the top leader’s narratives. There is a need to connect these multiple voices to better understand organizational change (Vaara, Sonenshein & Boje, 2015).

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organizational values and beliefs are produced, reproduced, and transformed, while sensemaking is the cognitive or social process by which people make sense of (ambiguous) events. These two concepts are important for understanding how organizational members cope with events and ambiguity, such as an organizational change, and the implications for the change outcome.

Based on the theory, the research question is stated as: “How do the composite narratives

of different organizational groups influence an organizational change through sensemaking, and what are the implications for the change outcome?” The purpose of this research is to describe the

composite narratives about the organizational change by team leader and team members that occurs at the two organizational levels and subsequently define how these levels make sense of the

organization-wide change, whether the narratives are different, and how this influences the

implementation of the organizational change. The next section elaborates on the case selection, data collection and data analysis. The methodology section is provided to assist with understanding of how the research was executed.

METHODOLOGY

Case selection

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Data collection

To answer the research question, a qualitative approach was used. This approach is

appropriate because the research area is under-explored and consists of new phenomena (Gephart, 2014). In addition, a qualitative approach enables the researcher to discover the how and why of participants’ perspectives about the transition to agile (Gephart, 2004). Therefore, data was collected through semi-structured interviews that were conducted as a means of capturing the narratives about the transition to the agile way of working.

A purposive sample was undertaken, wherein respondents were selected based on the following predetermined criteria (Blumberg et al, 2014) to ensure the context of the research. The first criterion was that respondents were experiencing the transition from traditional project management to agile project management. More specifically, people who had worked for five years before the introduction (in 2016) of the agile way of working and who were still working in retail banking. Based on the theory, the other criterion that was used was the job area – team lead and team members – to capture the narratives about the organizational change from different perspectives.

A starting point for gathering research respondents was through contact with a team lead from Retail Banking asking whether he would like to participate in this research. This team lead was asked because he works in retail banking, which is the research context. The team lead was also asked for new respondents who met the criteria. Each new respondent was asked the same question until 12 interviewees had accepted. This method of acquiring research participants is called snowball sampling (Blumberg et al., 2014).

Collecting data through interviews commenced in the last week of March 2020. Twelve individual interviews were conducted with informants from Retail Banking who have experienced organizational change. Four interviews were conducted with team leads and eight interviews were conducted with financial consultants, three of whom were senior employees (collectively referred to as financial consultants). All eight financial consultants work in the Daily Banking Department. These employees are responsible for helping clients face-to-face in a branch. The interviewees are

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or online via Skype. Appendix 2 lists the interview protocol and Appendix 4 lists the participant overview.

An interpretive perspective is used in this research. An interview method in which the researcher typically poses questions that respondents answer enables the researcher to understand the actual production of meanings and concepts used by social actors in real settings (Gephart, 2004).

With the permission of the respondents, the interviews were recorded. The respondents were advised that the information obtained from the interviews is confidential, and that anonymity with regard to their identity and the content of the interviews was ensured. Thereafter, the

interviews were transcribed, coded and analyzed, which is discussed in the data analysis paragraph. After transcription, the recorded interviews were deleted.

Data analysis

Following the data collection from the semi-structured interviews, the coding program Atlas.ti, version 8 was used to transcribe and analyze the gathered data and support the process of coding and identification of themes. This provides a clear trail of evidence for the credibility of the study (Fereday & Muir-Cochrane, 2006). The coding process has a deductive and an inductive nature. Deductive refers to the pre-set coding schemes based on the theory section. Inductive means that categories emerge from the transcribed interviews in the form of repeated patterns in the qualitative data (Thomas, 2006).

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Although it appears to be a step-by-step procedure, the data analysis was an iterative and reflexive process to ensure that the developing themes were grounded in the original data (Tobin and Begley, 2004).

During the process of the first five interviews with respondents, it became clear that the initial interview protocol was less effective in capturing the employees’ narratives during the change. These narratives are stories that employees have told to each other during the change. The

employees’ stories allowed the researcher to capture the social process during the change and obtain an overview of how this might influence the change. Two of the five interviews provided sufficient data for the research. Therefore, these two interviews are included. I revised the interview protocol to capture these literal employee narratives for the final seven interviews. Additional interviews conducted and included in the research study to complete 12 interviews. The initial interview protocol and revised interview protocol can be found in Appendix 2.

Controllability, validity and reliability

The use of explorative research as a methodology demands clear care to consider

controllability, validity and reliability of the study (Blumberg et al., 2014). Research results are valid when the way they are generated is justified (Blumberg et al., 2014). In this study, validity was ensured by the semi-structured nature and use of open questions during the interviews, which gave the respondents space to answer the questions openly and ensured they were not influenced by steering questions. This approach enabled the researcher to obtain the narratives about the

organizational change without any guidance. Validity was also ensured by conducting interviews with knowledgeable informants from Retail Banking who have viewed and experienced the transition to the agile way of working from diverse perspectives (Eisenhardt & Graebner, 2007).

The methodology section outlines in detail how the study was executed and how

controllability of the research results was ensured. By describing the study in such a detailed way, others will be able to replicate it. Furthermore, controllability was ensured by taking notes during and after the 12 interviews, keeping track of all the data in a logbook, as well as keeping track of the coding process via the coding software, Atlas.ti version 8. An overview of the logbook can be found in Appendix 3.

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the codes and analysis by a professional who has graduated in Master of Change Management and who is familiar with the agile way of working within the financial institution.

RESULTS

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Second-order codes

Sub-category

CHANGE GOAL AND APPROACH

This section describes the narratives of the team lead and squad with regard to the change goal and the change approach.

Change goal:

The perception of the purpose of the change and what the change should accomplish are similar for both team members and team lead. These narratives consist of words and phrases such as “responsibility,” “having autonomy,” “multidisciplinary teams,” and “self-steering.” However, it is known that the measure of success was not set clearly. As TL-04 relates about the change goal:

“Then I would say that you have to work together in multidisciplinary teams in short iterative sprints in order to respond better and faster to customer needs.”

This is in contrast to the work process used before agile, which had clear hierarchy and the manager told subordinates what and when to do things. Remarkably, some team members expressed that they favor direct leadership, as TM-07 illustrates: “I heard that some people liked being told what to

do. Then you know what to do and where you stand. Like the manager was doing before. Some colleagues liked that more.” These narratives are often expressed by employees who are older. TL-02

explained: “Well, I have heard that the most from older employees. The younger ones were more

flexible in that.”

Moreover, organizational members were somewhat skeptical about the suitability of the agile approach for Retail Banking. Organizational members wondered whether the agile way of working would fit the activities and tasks performed within Retail Banking. As TL-01 noted: “… agile way of

working within sales does not exist one-to-one, in my opinion, because it is intended as an innovative tool, but we do not innovate that much” and “working completely agile in a sales organization as it is intended is actually not possible because we do not develop anything at all.” Furthermore, TM-10

stated: “I think the method of agile is vert good if you work with multiple disciplines within a

company, within a department, that you have more on a project base. You have project manager and you have an IT person involved, then you have a product developer, you have a marketing who is there and also think that it works well for that type of project groups. ‘’

Table 1: Narratives on the change goal

Team lead Squad

Respond better and faster to customer needs, skeptical about suitability in Retail Banking.

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Change approach:

With regard to the change approach, the focus of the implementation of the agile way of working, which took place in mid 2016, was to inspire Retail Banking about the new direction. As TL-01 illustrates: “That was an organized meeting. There where all kinds of movies

where stories were told to inspire the people…”

After the event, teams were composed in Retail Banking, which was the first time that organizational members experienced what the agile way of working entails. Organizational members were told by the team lead to create their own team and make their own decisions, which resulted in some light resistance towards the agile way of working, as TL-02 outlines: “…you actually heard some resistance

in the way of working because they indicated, for instance, ‘we have never worked this way before. We must now, we are now forced to make choices in a very short time, who to drop out of the squad, while we actually have too little information to make those choices’.” Moreover, during the transition

to the agile way of working, changes in team composition played a significant role, as TM-07 stated with a skeptical undertone: “Through those changes of team members you actually started to

discover agile again. The new people were not yet familiar with the new way of working, and to my mind, there was also some explanation missing before they started. I also think that the process towards agile working was delayed, because you did not go in a certain direction as a team with the same people.”

In terms of management’s change approach, organizational members understood both the freedom and the responsibility they receive in agile way of working, as the narrative of TL-04 illustrates: “In

the beginning, I let go of the team a bit more and let the team work together and interact and let them give each other feedback, so they could discover [agile] together. And from a coaching role, let everyone do that and, above all, continuously explain and tell what the why is; why we are working in an agile way and what it should look like. I have often said that. I think that is what agile is about; that you give the responsibility to the team.”

Table 2: Narratives on the change approach

Kick-off is about inspiring people, empowering people in responsibility and autonomy.

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AGILE IN PRACTICE

This section describes the narratives of the team lead and squad regarding the agile components and workplace environment.

Agile components:

A dominant topic was the agile coaches who were assigned to assist Retail Banking in agile way of working. The agile coach was introduced in an enthusiastic way, as TL-04 described: “I introduced [agile coach] as something fun and with enthusiasm and said that the agile

coach is going to help us to get more grip on the agile way of working and this is going to help us. So, I spoke positively about it because I also believed that the agile coach was needed to help us with the method and forms of the agile way of working.” However, both team members and team leads

expressed contrasting viewpoints on this topic. In contrast to what TL-04 said, TL-03 was somewhat skeptical about the added value of the agile coach: “Sometimes I had my doubts about the added

value of an agile coach.” Overall, team members where somewhat skeptical in the beginning when

the agile coach was introduced and perceived the agile coach as a “smart ass.” Voices heard about the agile coach as TM-06 tells: “…that she is going to tell us or whether she has the mental

capacity…”. As TM-02 resemble these voices heard: “That it is a busybody and a know-it-all. That he knows everything better.” On the contrary, team members expressed a positive narrative regarding

the clarification of the agile way of working that came from the support from the agile coach, as illustrated by TM-08: “You actually heard the positive sounds. That it is nice that [agile coach] is there

and that [agile coach] helps us in this change and helps us with structure and that we learn and understand the methods of the agile way of working.”

With regard to the perception on daily standup, both the narratives at lead level and team member level expressed the added value on day-to-day activities. As TM-06 stated: “Standing in front of a

board and discussing the day and making plans and discussing who does what, in my opinion, that provides guidance for that day. Sometimes you also find out that things do not work and that is what you talk about and you get better at everything and everyone became more and more enthusiastic about doing things.”

Conversely, team members expressed their concerns regarding the dominant presence of some colleagues who did not give space for the input of others in the squad meeting. These voices were heard by TL-02 and are illustrated by the following statement: “That a lot of equivocality was missed.

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about the retro is somewhat positive. Retro refers to the reflection about the team process. As TM-08 illustrates: “What you saw is that the moment something was going on among each other and the

collaboration did not work, we discussed this with each other during the retro. I did hear from colleagues that they liked to discuss things with each other and to be open about it.”

Table 3: Narratives on the agile components

Workplace environment:

The autonomy perspective relates to the freedom felt by organizational

members. The responses reveal similarity between the team members and team leads’ narratives. The perception within Retail Banking is that autonomy is a feature of the agile way of working and this is also felt by organizational members. However, the organizational members noticed that the autonomy is somewhat limited. TL-02 noted: “The new hierarchy is risky and I think the level there is

too low for an agile organization, because we say that we utilize the rules and policy, which I think is completely fine, but agile is about being maneuverable. If you have a policy and the situation says otherwise, what will you do then? Well now some exceptions are possible, but the freedom can be greater.” Team members felt there was limited autonomy because they experienced top down

decision making, as TM-08 illustrates: “I remember once that the manager suddenly indicated top

down, because sales were not going well, top down what our ambition should be for the coming quarter. Then I thought to myself, ‘Oh yes, but that is not agile working. Why is this decision being made top down by you?’” And as TM-09 tells: ‘’ Then they say yes that is not entirely according to agile or that is not agile at all. We are not allowed to do anything, we just have to listen. ‘’

As agile suggests, self-steering teams are able to determine their own decisions and activities. The perception of both team members and team leads was that there was an increase in collaboration within teams. As TM-08 explained: “I think we are now working together and communicating more

than before, although we were before as a team, you also communicate with each other. Through agile you are certainly talking more about who does what and you talk about the daily activities, the sprint and the improvements. Because there is now more structure in it, therefore you communicate more with each other than before.”

Positive and enthusiastic about support of agile coach, sometimes skeptical about added value of agile coach, convinced of added value of daily stand up.

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Another challenging aspect of the workplace environment is the focus on sales in Retail Banking. Team members had the perception that they would only be assessed on their performance in terms of sales and therefore they only had to focus on the sales activities instead of other tasks.

Conversely, the team lead narrative reveals that this was not the case. As TL-01 explains: “People had

discussions that colleagues paid less attention to performing other tasks that were not necessarily commercial and attached less value to behavior aspects. Even though we explained that there are thee pillars we are looking at, so not just numbers, the focus really shifted to one pillar, to sales, and the rest was out of the picture. But then you had people who said, ‘well I am not going to take on an extra task, because at the end of year we will be assessed on numbers.’”

Complexity, which refers to the difficulty experienced in working in an agile way, is also a challenging aspect in the workplace environment. As TL-02 explains: “The lack of the agile coach, like I was

expected to lead while I still needed support [on agile]. Similar to the story, I also feel like a blind person who has to help others.” Overall, respondents felt the method used in agile way of working

was complex, as illustrated by TL-02: “They said that they struggled a lot with the methodology, such

as the post. It’s how to organize the squad meeting, how to determine sprints, and also what some terms in agile mean.” Consequently, some team members, specifically the older employees,

experienced complexity regarding the change in the role of management in the agile way of working. TL-03 stated: “You notice that older employees saw me as a direct manager. They really had to get

used to it and they also told me that they found it very exciting and found it difficult that I was now at a distance as a manager.”

Table 4: Narratives on the workplace environment

TRANSITION EXPERIENCE

This section describes the team lead and squad’s narrative regarding positive and negative experiences.

Positive experience: In terms of positive experience with regard to the agile way of working, both

team leads and team members perceived that autonomy, collaboration and initiating and

Autonomy is felt; however, it is perceived as somewhat limited. Perception of increased collaboration, the focus should not be only on sales, complexity felt about executing agile methods in practice.

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implementing their own ideas were advantages of agile. TM-03 stated: “Yes, fun. We are also getting

more freedom to initiate ideas with each other and able to do more outside the box. So that makes people enthusiastic.” Organizational members were also proud of company for initiating this

transition to the agile work method. TL-01 said: “I think people who were positive were also very

curious and really spoke about how cool it is that we as bank are trying this. They were very proud of company, and I am too, and I also speak out.” The positive experience is also supported by TM-06’s

narrative: “I am actually very happy that we work the way we do. I see that it has brought us

something and I say that to others.” In addition, TM-08 describes the autonomy perceived by team

members: “Well, that they can give their own input and that it is not just finding, but it is also just

contributing towards something. The squad meeting is a bit more dynamic.” Another positive

perception shared by team members is about the structure agile work brought to Retail Banking. TM-08 elaborated: “What they say is at first they needed to get used to the agile way of working, but that

they are now very happy with the structure and how it goes now and that they are doing it together, that it works well.”

Negative experience: Team members expressed a somewhat negative narrative about the role of

management, because management was not always up to date with regard to the processes of associated with the agile way of working, as illustrate by TM-07: “During the process and change

towards agile, he was sometimes impotent or not aware of the agile working processes and what was going on or going to play. Then I thought, ‘How can you say we should work agile and I am going to support you, while you do not know what it entails?’ What I heard was that the team became a bit restless.”

Team members were also skeptical about the transition as they had developed some sort of pattern over the years. As TM-07 explained: “Others were more skeptical, saying, ‘then why should we make

such a big change? How we worked before was fine.’” This perspective reveals some dissatisfaction

with the company “That is usually a reproach to company like, ‘I did not ask for this change, but the

company is changing, and I always did well, so why suddenly change?’ Things like that came up back then.”

In terms of negative experience, on both the team lead level and the team member level, people experienced uncertainty regarding the agile way of working, as illustrated by TL-02: “I remember that

I said to him [agile coach] every time that I am also still searching and I feel somewhat like a blind person who has to convey the agile working system, especially in squad meetings [product owner], while I also only have this image and it is very unknown to me.” This was also described by TM-07

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you heard that reciprocally and what exactly it would mean, nobody had that figured out, because it was still unknown.”

Table 5: Narratives on the transition experience

EVALUATION

This section describes the narratives of the team lead and squad regarding the change outcome and time.

In terms of change outcome, the team lead level has the perception that the outcome of the change is not completely successful. This is related to the aspect of the intensive collaboration between the financial consultants and other disciplines. TL-02 stated: “If I look towards the result now, then we

really work according to the agile method. Did it go exactly the way we had in mind? I do not think so. What we had in mind was that disciplines like Mortgages, Personal Banking, Private Banking and Business, that it would all be integrated as a squad. That did not work at all.” However, both the lead

level and the team member level have the perception that the agile way of working has brought a positive change to Retail Banking. TL-04 explained: “I think people have a lot more responsibility and

feel a lot more autonomy, that is what they say, and they are much more diverse in the number of competences that they can and may work on. It is an organization that is more dynamic and flexible and where responsibility is bottom up instead of top down. In my opinion, this has been a culture change for the team and it has done us good.” However, as noticed at team lead level as well as team

member level, agile is somewhat integrated in the day-to-day activities and is seen as something normal. TL-02 elaborated: “Maybe I would like that it would be talked about more with each other,

because even now we actually see the agile way of working as something normal, while that has really been a big change when I think back.” This is emphasized by team members, as the following

statement by TM-06 illustrates: “When I look back at many things, we now also say reciprocally what

a change we have made, and do you remember when we started agile? Now you do not even think about it [agile] and it is in our routine of day-to-day activities to do those things.”

Narratives about time are reasonably aligned on both lead level and team member level. Both levels agree that it is a slow process before the results are seen and also to get used to and work in an agile way. TL-02 explained: “Then it was also said from above, which I also passed on every time. ‘It takes

two years to get there, to the top, fully agile working teams.’” In addition, TM-06 emphasized that

Overall positive about the transition, somewhat negative about the lack of support.

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three and a half years after starting the agile way of working, they are still growing: “I thought that

the process took a long time before we really started working agile, we are still growing, so to speak. It is not agile working from tomorrow, and it works so and so, and that we all do that at once.”

Table 6: Narratives on the evaluation

COMPOSITE NARRATIVES

This section describes the overall composite narratives on lead level and on squad level about the transition towards the agile way of working. These narratives are concluding and general in their definition to illustrate the overall narratives of the two groups. Both levels agree on the perception that the agile way of working has brought a positive change. The composite narratives of both groups have general similarities; however, they differ on some topics. Table 7 outlines the composite

narratives.

Table 7: Overall composite narratives – lead level and squad level.

Perception that the agile way of working has brought a positive change in Retail banking, agile is integrated.

At the team lead level, the need for this change and why it needs to happen in Retail Banking is clear an widely expressed. However, team leads were somewhat skeptical about the suitability of agile in Retail Banking. They understand that to let teams work agile, they empower people to take responsibility and to use autonomy to become self-steering. This had a positive influence as they experienced increased collaboration within teams. However, autonomy in practice is experienced to be somewhat limited due to risk and regulations in Retail Banking. The complexity and challenges during this transition towards the agile way of working were perceived in terms of executing agile methods and lacking support. Team leads expressed positive narratives about the agile coach and emphasized the important aspects, but they were sometimes

At the team member level, the need for the change was not clear. Moreover, they were somewhat skeptical about the suitability of agile as Retail Banking is sales driven. Conversely, team members perceived advantages about the support of the agile coach, the added value of the daily stand up and the added value of the retro to collaborate more. Autonomy was perceived by team members; however, this was somewhat limited as the management’s style is generally perceived as top down and directive. This is aligned with the needs of older employee who favor direct management. The complexity and challenge during this transition to the agile way of working was perceived as executing agile methods and lacking support. The

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DISCUSSION

This research sought to answer the research question: How do composite narratives of

different organizational groups influence an organization-wide change through sensemaking, and what are the implications for the change outcome? To answer this question, different theoretical

perspectives were examined to give meaning to the results. These theories are: The actor-network theory (ANT) (Pollack, Costello & Sankaran, 2013), Weick’s sensemaking cycle (1995) and Burnes and Jackson’s value systems theory (2011).

Actor Network Theory

The ANT is one amongst a number of sociological approaches that view reality as socially constructed rather than naturally given or merely taken for granted (Steins, 2001). The theory primarily focuses on tracing networks of associations between actors, building understanding of interaction and organization without imposing pre-determined structure (Pollack et al., 2013). From an ANT perspective, the world is full of actors, both human and non-human. A fundamental quality of an actor is that it acts, resulting in transformation of something into something else, which may at some point also take action (Pollack et al., 2013).

This theoretical perspective is relevant because it is an instrument for the examination of the specific changing situation for the case selected for this research, which involves the translation process. Translation refers to the process of creating a temporary social order, or the movement from one order to another, through changes in the alignment of interests in a network (Sarker, Sarker & Sidorova, 2016). In this translation process, a “focal actor” comes into play. A focal actor is the key actor driving the process of the organizational change initiative (Sarker, Sarker & Sidorova, 2006). The translation process comprises four stages: problematization, interessement and enrollment (Sarker et al., 2006).

The organization analyzed in this research is clearly in a translation process, as the lead level is convinced, while the squad level is not yet fully convinced to behave consistently with the new way of working. Overall, the squad level is in the interessement stage. This study’s results, following the theme change approach, indicate that actors are convincing other heterogeneous actors that the skeptical about the added value of the agile coach. Overall, the

perception is that the agile way of working has brought a positive change in Retail Banking now that agile is integrated in day-to-day activities.

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interests defined by a focal actor (lead level) are in fact consistent with what their own interest should be (Sarker et al., 2006). The squad level perceived the responsibility given by the manager and the feeling of having freedom, which is aligned with the most team members interest. Considering the negative experience theme, older team members are struggling and stuck in the

problematization and interessement stages because they do not recognize the problem (the change project) as their own problem and the solution it will bring as it does not align with their own interest. Moreover, the enrollment stage has not yet occurred, as all team members do not fully accept the new role they have received and are struggling with it. With regard to the change

approach theme, the impact of the changes in team composition make it complex and problematic to align the interest of roles within this actor-network (Sarker et al., 2006) as “ordered networks of

heterogeneous materials that are constantly being shaped and reshaped as new human and non-human entities enter the arena” (Sarker et al., 2006, p.19). However, the lead level has reached the

enrollment stage as they define, coordinate and lock others into their definitions and network of interest by trying to align the interest of all the team members on squad level. Consequently, they believe and accept the roles they have received (Sarker et al., 2006).

Proposition 1: Change in team composition during the translation process is disrupting the creation of a new (shared) network of interest.

Sensemaking

According to Weick (1995), people interact with each other and create a reality that they experience as ordered and organized. Weick assumes that people actively produce reality and considers organizational processes as the result of interactions between actors who are constantly trying to understand the unpredictable and ambiguous reality, which he refers to as the sensemaking process (Weick, 1995). Figure 3 shows an overview of the sensemaking cycle.

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According to the results, at squad level people are shifting back and forth between the enactment phase and the selection phase. The squad level is trying to engage in enactment and making sense of the ambiguous situation – the change – while also trying to realize selection, but struggles with the definition of the situation. Team members are unchained to discover the ambiguity and notice new information that is puzzling and interpret what it means. Enactment occurs through behavior and action. Through this, team members are perceiving and acting on ongoing information and changes. Under this circumstance, uncertainty and perceived complexity increases and this negatively influences their perception and commitment and they continue to struggle to get used to the new way of working and working methods.

The need for change on squad level was felt less as the narrative about the importance of the change did not match the execution in practice. The squad level raised concerns about not having the proper support from the agile coaches (in the beginning) while the narrative of team lead indicates the importance of the agile coaches. This matter influenced team members’ understanding

negatively. The perception of team members indicates whether this change is important as it was suggested top down, which fueled skepticism and distrust. In addition, team members raised concerns about the lack of support from the team lead level. The lead level narrative reveals that they were also struggling to make sense of the ambiguity and complexity that occurred due to this change. This preserved the uncertainty at both squad level and lead level.

Furthermore, both lead level and squad level raised concerns about the interpretation of paradoxical information. On the one hand, the goal of the change was to give teams autonomy to make decisions from the bottom up. However, the experience and practice reveals that decisions were made top down and low autonomy was experienced, which fueled their ambiguous experience about the work roles. As the theme evaluation suggest, at both lead level and squad level, the narratives reveal that agile is somewhat integrated in day-to-day activities and these new situation is seen as something normal. This results demonstrate that both lead level and squad level perception have reached the retention phase, which indicates that selected interpretations have been

integrated into the group’s identity, interwoven into the narrative of the environment and prior experiences are used to make sense of the situation.

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Value alignment and narratives

According to Burnes and Jackson (2011), a potentially significant reason for the acceptance of change intervention by organizational members is value alignment. They argue that, to execute a successful change, a significant factor is the degree of alignment between the values of the

organization, the values of the objective or content of the change and the values underpinning the approach to change. Examining the empirical results, the values of the organization and its members refer to the narratives regarding agile components and workplace environment. The values of the change content (or change result) refer to the narratives regarding change goal, workplace environment and change outcome. The values of the change approach refer to the narratives regarding the approach to the change. As the results demonstrate, the narratives of both

organizational levels on different dimensions of the value alignment are divergent. The visualization of the value alignment is illustrated in figures 4 and 5.

Figure 4: Value alignment lead level Figure 5: Value alignment squad level

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Proposition 3: Non-alignment between the values of organization, change approach and change content of groups in the transition towards a new way of working can lead to limited acceptance of the change.

Managerial implications

The reported outcomes of this research study are valuable for managers and employees within organizations as more organizations may make the transition from traditional working methodologies to softer working methodologies. In doing so, an important implication for managers is the challenge of the social process that comes into play and, more specifically, the notion of sensemaking and narratives, as this research demonstrated that it clearly influences the change implementation.

For managers, it is important to align the understanding of the new way of working and clearly explain the why and what the new way of working entails. In addition, practical training for all team members about the agile method is necessary to reduce the ambiguity and reduce the

complications regarding the integration of the new way of working. This research showed that, team members perceived uncertainty and complexity, because of the lack of training and support towards the new way of working.

Consequently, managers need to be aware of the conscious sensemaking processes that are continuously taking place within the organization. It is important that managers pay attention to understanding the top down decision making, which influences employees sensemaking about the change and their created reality, interpretations and actions. Managers should more often verify and involve team members what their thoughts are about the changes and decisions made during the transition towards the new way of working in order to reduce ambiguity.

Another important implication of this research study is that organizational members should realize the different realities during the change and the different values within the organization. This study demonstrates the importance of aligning the values of the organization, the change approach and the change content to execute a successful change. It is recommended that managers make sure that organizational members’ values are aligned to increase the acceptance of the change initiative. As this study also demonstrated, non-alignment of values can hinder change acceptance and support, which is important for managers to control.

Theoretical implications

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This research adds to the existing body of knowledge regarding organizational change success and failure. Firstly, the actor-network theory (Pollack et al., 2013) revealed that during an organizational change, the interest of organizational members needs to be aligned in the translation process as it will contribute creating a new (shared) network of interest. This research creates a new insight, namely that change in team composition hinders the translation for creating a new (shared) network of interest.

Burnes and Jackson’s (2013) value system theory was used to address the importance of value alignment (i.e., hard and soft) to enhance change acceptance. The results of this study are congruent with Burnes and Jackson’s (2013) proposal. This research adds to this existing body of literature as the results demonstrate that non-alignment between the values in the transition towards a new way of working may lead to limited change acceptance and hence, the call for further research.

Finally, Weick’s (2005) sensemaking cycle was used to address and explain the sensemaking process of this change, which indicated the challenge of a softer way of working in an ambiguous situation. When examining the results, new insights are captured and will be further elaborated and thus adds to existing literature. The lead level narratives revealed that they were also struggling with making sense of the ambiguity and complexity which occurred due to this change. Lead level were still in the middle of their own sensemaking while they are also expected to give sense to squad level, which appeared to be an impediment for the change process.

Limitations and future research

Although this research addresses aspects of validity, reliability and controllability, the study was subject to certain limitations. Firstly, the respondents who were chosen to participate were provided by the organization and partly selected by the researcher, because the researcher used the snowball sampling method. This may have led to some biased views about the organizational change (Blumberg et al., 2014). Another limitation is caused by the area of research within Retail Banking, which is composed of different branches spread across the central and western parts of the Netherlands. However, results may differ if research is conducted across all regions within Retail Banking.

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This research demonstrated that managers were active in the sensemaking process regarding the organizational change and this topic could be examined in greater depth in future research. This research also explored whether managers are still in the middle of their own sensemaking while they are also expected to give sense to squad level. Future research should focus on how managers can cope with the ambiguity that is inherent in a change and how managers could reduce the ambiguity for the squad level.

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AN AGILE IMPLEMENTATION: