STRATEGIC EMPLOYEE ALIGNMENT WITH ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE OBJECTIVES AND ITS EFFECTS ON AFFECTIVE COMMITMENT
‘An investigation how executives should contribute in creating strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives, and how this will optimize the affective commitment
to organizational change’.
Master thesis, MSc Human Resource Management
University of Groningen, Faculty of Management and Organization
October 8th, 2007 ANNET ANDRINGA Studentnumber: 1349813 Feikemastraat 28 8801 BM FRANEKER Phone: +310628423214 e-mail: A.E.Andringa@rug.nl
First University Supervisor: J. van Polen
Second University Supervisor: G. van der Vegt
Supervisor Organization: E. van der Knaap
Rijkswaterstaat Department Northern Netherlands, Leeuwarden
Acknowledgments: Helpful comments on earlier drafts of this thesis were given by J. van Polen, for which I am grateful. Besides, I am thankful for the support of my closest family and friends, who kept me motivated to
ABSTRACT
Realizing the expected benefits from an organizational change, involves much attention to be paid to employees’ affective commitment to organizational change. The employees’ identification with, and involvement in the organizational change objectives deserve utmost priority, since employees’ actions and behaviours produce, ultimately, the desired outcomes of an organizational change. Strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives strengthens employees’ affective commitment, and has therefore gained importance in literature.
RWS, department Northern Netherlands, is interested how their executives can contribute in creating strategic employee alignment, and in which way this will optimize the employees’ affective commitment to organizational change. Drivers like transformational leadership, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives support employees’ strategic alignment, which influences the affective commitment to organizational change positively.
The research methods secondary data analysis, semi-structured interviews and focus groups resulted in several adjustments necessary in the executive position, mainly within the interrelated drivers transformational leadership style, and internal strategic communication. For optimizing the affective commitment to organizational change, executives need to be more inspiring, motivating, essential, and trustful. Structured small-group meetings combined with interpersonal communication makes employees feel trusted and informed, and consequently, strategically aligned with organizational change objectives. Additionally, people-oriented behaviour and openness about the distribution of group incentives deserve attention of the executive as well.
INTRODUCTION
Nowadays, commitment is arguably one of the most important factors involved in employees’ support for organizational change (Coetsee, 1999; Conner, 1992; Conner & Patterson, 1982; Klein & Sorra, 1996). Significant research attention has been given to the role of employees and their commitment in facilitating the attainment of organizational change objectives (Huselid, 1995; Lepak & Snell, 1999). The assumption is that an organization will be better able to reach its organizational change objectives, by achieving strategic employee alignment (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001). That is, enable employees to understand the organizational change objectives and by which actions or behaviours they can contribute to those objectives (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001). And, according to Boswell (2006), creating strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives will lead to a greater affective commitment to the organizational change. In addition to Boswell’s findings, Hackman & Oldham (1976), and Jackson & Schuler (1985) also suggests that if employees understand the organizational objectives as well as their role in contributing to those objectives, their work should be more meaningful, which, in particular, leads to an improved affective commitment.
Creating strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives has great importance for the Directorate-General for Public Works and Water Management (RWS), department Northern Netherlands (more in-depth information about RWS and department Northern-Netherlands can be found in Appendix A). Direct cause of the present study is the moderate affective commitment of their employees to the organizational change. Although the employees are willing to exert high levels of effort on behalf of the organization, and possess a great extent of loyalty towards their position, they are less affectively committed to the organizational change objectives. According to the executives, employees tend to hold on to the former tasks of their position and possess a self-opinionated attitude in regard to the desirableness of the organizational change objectives.
Therefore, this study will focus on the drivers of strategic employee alignment. In particular, this study investigates which adjustments are necessary in the executive position regarding each driver, so that the strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives can be created. Additionally, this study will also discuss which efforts RWS already made in the different drivers of the strategic employee alignment, and which pitfalls they came across in their attempts. According to Boswell (2006), enhancing employees’ understanding of organizational change objectives and how to contribute to those objectives can be difficult and should therefore be done by executives. Since executives can best provide structure and guidance by facilitating multiple formal and informal processes (Boswell, 2006), this study aims at the executive of RWS to contribute in creating strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives.
All together, this research will distinct itself from other relevant studies, in such that it focuses on adjusting the executives’ position regarding each driver, in order to create strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives. Ultimately, this leads to an optimized affective commitment to organizational change.
THEORY
The affective commitment to organizational change
Following Meyer and Allen (1991), commitment to organizational change can be defined as a force (mind-set) that binds an individual to a course of action deemed necessary for the successful implementation of an organizational change. According to Conner (1992), commitment to organizational change is ‘the glue that provides the vital bond between people and organizational change objectives’.
The most prevalent approach of commitment to change is one in which commitment is considered as an affective attachment to the organizational change (Allen & Meyer, 1990). Buchanan (1974) conceptualized affective commitment to organizational change as a partisan, affective attachment to the goals and values of an organization, and to one’s role in relation to those goals and values. The affective approach of commitment is perhaps best represented by the work of Porter and his colleagues (Mowday, Steers & Porter, 1979; Porter, Crampon & Smith, 1976; Porter, Steers, Mowday & Boulian, 1974) who defined affective commitment as the relative strength of an employees’ identification with and involvement in the organizational change. Another important definition of affective commitment to organizational change is the following: ‘a desire to provide support for the organizational change based on a belief in its inherent benefits’ (Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002).
Employees who are highly affectively committed to an organizational change and have positive attitudes toward it, should be more likely to contribute toward goal attainment (Steers, 1977). Thus, creating affective commitment to organizational change is important for organizations, if they want to realize the expected benefits from the organizational change (Armenakis, Harris & Mossholder, 1993).
According to Boswell, Bingham & Colvin (2006), the strategic alignment of employees with organizational change objectives contributes in actually optimizing this affective commitment to organizational change. Therefore, the following paragraph will further elaborate strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives.
Strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives
objectives, is referred as Line of Sight (Boswell et al., 2006). By creating Line of Sight, employees are strategically aligned with organizational change objectives.
Creating awareness about what is expected from the organizational change objectives and how to contribute to those objectives, will employees make better equipped to make the right decisions and to do what is in the organization’s best interest (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001). Accordingly, without Line of Sight to organizational change objectives, employees may develop other, perhaps conflicting, goals that interfere with an organization’s functioning and ultimately its strategic success (Boswell, 2006).
Arguably, whether employees behave in a way contributing to the larger objectives of an organizational change depends in a part on whether employees understand the organizational objectives and mostly, if there exists action alignment (Wright & Snell, 2000). That is, the alignment of employees’ actions with the objectives of an organization’s strategy (Colvin & Boswell, 2007). Indeed, it is ultimately the actions put forth by the actual employees that produce the desired outcomes of an organizational change (Boudreau & Ramstad, 2003). In other words, the realization of organizational change objectives is through individuals and their actions and behaviours. Here, Human Resource Management practices have only a supporting role (Boswell, 2006; Jackson, Schuler & Rivero, 1989).
Line of Sight involves employee depth (i.e. broad scope or detail), as well as direction (i.e. accuracy) of understanding. Line of Sight can be divided in several levels, which is visualized in figure 1.
FIGURE 1:
Employees’ understanding of strategic organizational objectives
Accurate Inaccurate
Deep
Shallow
(Source: Boswell & Boudreau, 2006)
1
3
Quadrant 1 of Figure 1 represents Line of Sight; employees understand the organizational change objectives as well as how to contribute to those objectives. Or, employees may believe they understand the organization’s objectives and assume they are effective contributors, yet they may be wrong in that assessment (quadrant 2, Figure 1). Even if employees do accurately understand the strategic objectives of the organization, they may not understand precisely how to contribute (quadrant 3, Figure 1). Logically, when employees do not understand the strategic organizational objectives and are unaware how to contribute, Line of Sight is far from created (quadrant 4, Figure 1) (Boswell & Boudreau, 2006).
Several theorists suggests that the level of Line of Sight to organizational change objectives differs among employees. According to Mintzberg (1983), top managers have most influence on organizational priorities, since they make strategic objectives operational and therefore, have greater Line of Sight. In addition, evidence exists that Line of Sight is typically weakest among the employees at the lower organizational levels (Boswell et al., 2006). More specific, Mintzberg (1983) argues that employees at the lower levels are likely to share or hear only vague echoes of organization’s objectives. Mostly, the management is unwilling to share key information, often due to the feeling that such employees are either uninterested or unable to accurately understand the organization’s strategic objectives (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001). This is surprisingly, since the understanding of organizational change objectives and how to contribute to those, is of utmost importance at specifically the lower organizational levels, where employees have most contact with customers, products and services (Boswell et al., 2006).
If employees are strategically aligned with organizational change objectives, it should be more likely that employees’ actions and behaviours will align with the organization’s interests and needs (Boswell, 2006). Here, Line of Sight relates to the concept of a shared mindset: an accurate and collective awareness of actions and behaviours that contribute to the organizational strategic success (Boswell, 2006). With a shared mindset, an organization will be better able to reach its organizational change objectives (Nelson, 1997; Ulrich, 1992; Ulrich & Lake, 1991).
Goal clarity and role clarity: a link between strategic employee alignment and affective commitment to organizational change
According to Allen and Meyer (1990), goal clarity and role clarity are significant antecedents for creating affective organizational commitment. Here, goal clarity can be defined as whether or not an employee finds himself working on assignments with a clear understanding of what he is supposed to do (Allen & Meyer, 1990). Next, role clarity is defined as whether or not an organization always makes clear what is expected from an employee (Allen & Meyer, 1990). Besides that goal clarity and role clarity are important antecedents of creating affective commitment to organizational change, they are as well related to the strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives (Boswell, 2006).
Thus, optimizing the affective commitment to organizational change can be done by focussing on the antecedents goal clarity and role clarity, which are, interestingly, related to strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives (Boswell, 2006). This linkage, based on above literature, is illustrated in figure 2, which I created for this study to visualize the relationship between strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives and affective commitment to organizational change.
FIGURE 2:
Linkage between strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives and affective commitment to organizational change
Prior research on goal clarity has found that the agreement between employees and organizational constituents (i.e. direct executive) on organizational objectives associates positively with work attitudes and increases commitment (Vancouver, Millsap & Peters, 1994). Moreover, the clarity of organizational goals has beneficial effects on the specificity of employee level goals, which affects employees’ commitment positively (Wright, 2004).
Role clarity is related to both the understanding organizational change objectives, as it is significant related to the employees’ actions and behaviours by which one can contribute to those objectives (Boswell, 2006). In other words, role clarity can be linked to strategic employee alignment, because of the employees’ understanding how to support the organization in achieving strategic success (Boswell, 2006).
In summary, strategic employee alignment is related to goal clarity and role clarity. The understanding of organizational change objectives fits most with goal clarity (Boswell, 2006). By which actions and behaviours an employee should contribute to the organizational change objectives, matches most with role clarity (Boswell, 2006). Thus, creating strategic employee alignment is related to goal clarity and role clarity, which in turn are important antecedents of affective commitment to organizational change (Allen & Meyer, 1990).
Now, this study turns to its essential part in which several drivers of strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives will be fully discussed. In addition, the facilitating role of the executive in each driver will be explained.
Drivers of strategic employee alignment and facilitating role of executives
This study emphasizes the inevitably of creating strategic employee alignment in order to optimize the affective commitment to organizational change. Several drivers make possible a culture of strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives and therefore, the focus of this study lies on these drivers. Specifically, since research has shown that creating strategic employee alignment can be difficult (Boswell et al., 2006), the facilitating role of executives regarding the interrelated drivers: transformational leadership style, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives, will also be discussed.
1. The transformational leadership style. Boswell and Boudreau (2001) state that
some leadership styles drives strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives. In the interest of this study, the transformational leadership style is especially important, because of its focus on increasing the affective commitment to organizational objectives (Bass, 1985). Specifically, transformational leadership aims at providing a sense of direction in clear, understandable language, which is crucial for the integration and strategic alignment of employees with organizational change objectives (Den Hartog, 2002).
their own actions and behaviours as well (Stoker, 2005). Therefore, modelling their own actions and behaviours is important, as the executive provides an ideal point of reference and focus for employees’ emulation and vicarious learning (Den Hartog, 2002). Interestingly, some authors even state that executives’ behaviours are the number one cause of organizational change failures (Buchanan, Claydon & Doyle, 1999). This, once again, confirms the organizational importance of executives during an organizational change.
Transformational executives broaden and elevates the interests of employees, stimulates awareness and acceptance of organizational objectives, and motivates employees to go beyond their self-interests for the good of the organization (Den Hartog, 2002). By appealing to employees’ ideals and values, transformational executives enhances commitment to a well-articulated vision and inspires employees to develop new ways of thinking about organizational priorities (Piccolo & Colquitt, 2006). Here, constructive feedback of executives is a needed condition (Bass, 1985).
Processes by which transformational leadership affects employees’ actions and behaviours during an organizational change, are examined by Bono & Judge (2003). There are three key ways in which transformational executives can motivate and inspire employees to create strategic alignment (Bono & Judge, 2003). First, by providing a sense of direction and expressing high expectations and confidence in employees’ ability to meet these expectations, transformational executives increases employees’ self-efficacy (Bono & Judge, 2003; Eden, 1992). Secondly, transformational executives should increase employees’ social identification with the organization (Bono & Judge, 2003). Social identification is the process by which employees identify with the organization, feel pride in belonging, and see membership as an important aspect of their identity (Bono & Judge, 2003). The third way that transformational executives influence employees, is through value internalization and self-engagement with work (Bono & Judge, 2003). When transformational executives describe work in ideological terms, and focus on higher-order values, employees come to see their work as congruent with personally held values and thus as more meaningful (Bono & Judge, 2003).
2. Internal strategic communication. In a report by Right Management Consultants
and IABC Research Foundation, nearly two-thirds of the 472 organizations state that aligning employees to organizational objectives is their number one goal in their internal strategic communication (Stinson, 2006). Boswell (2006) also states that internal communication is an important driver of strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives.
Through internal strategic communication, information is shared to provide a fundamental understanding of change objectives to which an organization is striving for (Van Vuuren, De Jong, & Seydel, 2007). Moreover, purpose of internal strategic communication is to shape employees’ behaviours (Lee, 1997).
Executives have an important role in the internal strategic communication process, since they posses a central position to provide a bigger picture of organizational change objectives (Robson & Tourish, 2005). Nevertheless, executives must let go of directing and scripting the strategic alignment of employees (Stinson, 2006). Instead, it is the executives’ job to help employees create understanding themselves, facilitating them, and providing employees space to translate the strategic framework into concepts that are meaningful to them (Stinson, 2006).
According to several researchers (Boswell et al., 2006; Stinson, 2006; Thatcher, 2006), internal strategic communication about organizational objectives is an important driver for strategic employee alignment, provided that an organization takes into account the following communication model and its striking truths (Stinson, 2006).
Strategic business plans. Strategic business plans, a comprehensive strategic planning document that capture the essential organizational objectives, need to be detailed (Stinson, 2006). Indeed, organizations that succeed in strategic employee alignment all share the ability to articulate the strategic objectives in simple, clear language everyone can understand (Thatcher, 2006).
Coaching executives. Executives must come to see that interpersonal communication is an essential tool of their leadership during an organizational change (Thatcher, 2006). Training sessions for executives make visible the impact of the executives’ position in the internal strategic communication process (Lee, 1997). Indeed, internal strategic communication requires an extensive involvement of executives, as they should breaking the organizational strategy into key messages (Lee, 1997; Thatcher, 2006).
Involving employees. According to Boswell et al. (2006), greater employee involvement helps to foster the strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives, by getting employees connected to the functioning of the organizational change. The importance of involvement as a driver of strategic employee alignment will be discussed in a following paragraph.
Measurement. The executive must continuously measure and recreate the strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives, since alignment is not self-sustaining (Stinson, 2006) More specific, consequent inquiries should be used to measure how well informed employees feel on organizational change objectives, how deeply engaged employees are in the priorities of the organization, and whether employees understand how they can personally contribute to the organizational change objectives (Stinson, 2006).
In summary, the internal strategic communication is an essential process creating strategic employee alignment (Boswell, 2006). Together, large group interventions, small group meetings, and merely, interpersonal conversations contribute in creating successively awareness, understanding, acceptance, and commitment (Lee, 1997). This process is also referred as an communication process including the stages of informing (awareness), involvement (understanding and acceptance), and integration (commitment), which is visualized in figure 3 (Dublin, 2007).
FIGURE 3: Change Communications model
Most important, executives must recognize the importance of expressing only key messages, through which employees can find space for strategic alignment themselves (Stinson, 2006). For this, the involvement of employees is a necessary condition, and as a third driver of strategic employee alignment, will it be further explained in the following paragraph.
3. Employee Involvement. Employee involvement describes practices which are
initiated principally by management and are designed to increase the amount of essential information employees receive about their organization (Parkes, Scully, West & Dawson, 2007). Ultimately, this enhances employees’ commitment to organizational objectives (Parkes
et al., 2007). According to Boswell et al. (2006), employee involvement practices helps to foster the strategic employee alignment with organizational objectives, by getting employees connected to the functioning of the organization. Moreover, employee involvement practices during an organizational change helps to reconcile inconsistency between organizational objectives and individual objectives (Colvin & Boswell, 2007).
Employee involvement practices range from gain sharing, employee ownership, problem-solving groups, quality circles, and participation (Cotton, 1993). Here, participation of employees is most important, since it facilitates the internal communication and increases commitment to organizational change (Locke & Sweiger, 1979). Besides, participation also provides greater opportunities for employees’ input and self-development (Lawler, 1986).
Participation aims at stimulating employees’ understanding of organizational change objectives (Boswell, 2006). Participation is generally defined as giving employees the opportunity to influence decision-making processes (Cotton, 1993), though in a public environment, influencing decision-making processes is rather a myth (Horton, 2003). Therefore, in this study, participation is seen as a method to share key information in several discussion groups, which improves organization’s performances effectively (Ahlbrandt, Leana & Murrell, 1992). Besides for sharing key information, participation can also be used for bottom-up communication flows (Locke & Sweiger, 1979). By this, the overload of top-down communication patterns are burst through (Locke & Sweiger, 1979).
internal communication and interpersonal management skills are needed from the executive (Fenton- O’Creevy, 1998). Executives should therefore be trained in their internal communication skills and interpersonal skills (Buchanan & Preston, 1991).
Lawler (1986) argues that employee involvement should be accompanied by incentives, so that employees’ initiatives for being involved with organizational objectives are rewarded. Due to the interrelatedness of employee involvement on the one hand, and incentives on the other hand, this latter driver of strategic employee alignment will now be discussed.
4. Incentives. Incentive pay systems are important practices organizations focuses on
in relation to strategic employee alignment (Boswell et al., 2006). According to Boswell & Boudreau (2001), incentives are useful in fostering desirable behaviours, particularly if pay is linked to the strategic success of an organizational change. Indeed, one primary goal of incentives is linking pay to organization-wide objectives, so that all employees will be working in the same direction (McDonald & Myklebust, 1997; Plishner, 1995). Thus, organizational incentives foster strategic employee alignment (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001).
Organizations can build their incentive pay systems to encourage strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives (Boswell et al., 2006). For instance, programs can be designed to persuade employees to share important information with their colleagues for which incentives will be assigned (Boswell et al., 2006). Here, organizational-level incentive pay systems are effective and motivating for employees (Boswell et al., 2006). Though, the extent in which incentives are motivating depends, in part, on whether there is a clear link between individual behaviours, organizational change objectives, and reward outcomes (Boswell, 2006).
Again, the role of executives is crucial in an incentive pay system (Vaitkus, 2001). Effective communication by the executive helps every employee to understand the incentive pay policies and engage them to participate in it (Vaitkus, 2001).
In summary, the strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives means employees can readily recognize the connection between what they do and the larger organizational objectives (Boswell et al., 2006). Ultimately, incentives can motivate employees to enact accordingly the organizational change objectives, by using simple, specific and concrete performance criteria (Schaffler, 2004).
Through the studied literature, more insights are given in the affective commitment to organizational change, the strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives, and the related goal clarity and role clarity. Obviously, the focus of this literature part lied on the interrelated drivers of strategic employee alignment, namely: the transformational leadership style, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives. Here, the facilitating role of executives within each driver is elaborated also. In continuation of this literature part, will now be presented: the methodology used for answering the research question of this study.
METHODOLOGY
In this methodology part, a description will be given of the qualitative research methods used in this study. Before explaining the research methods and each purposes, first, some important remarks with respect to the research process of this study are given.
First remark, in retrospection to figure 2, this study focuses on the creation of strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives. Once the improvement of the different drivers of strategic employee alignment is realised, goal clarity and role clarity will follow. As can be seen in figure 2, goal clarity and role clarity strengthen the strategic employee alignment, though most important, it leads to affective commitment to organizational change. Therefore, it is reasonable that this study only focuses on the creation of strategic employee alignment, since its different drivers start the process of strategic employee alignment which, via goal clarity and role clarity, automatically results in affective commitment to organizational change.
analysis, semi-structured interviews, and focus groups are being used in this study. The use of qualitative research methods in this study can be justified by two reasons. Namely, the use of qualitative research methods connects with existing research in the field of strategic employee alignment (Boswell et al., 2006; Boswell & Boudreau, 2001; Colvin & Boswell, 2007). Furthermore, due to the descriptive and exploratory nature of this study, qualitative research methods can be used perfectly (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001).
Third remark, while there is no variation in true strategic change objectives within RWS, the understanding of organizational change objectives and by which actions and behaviours to contribute, varies across employees. Specifically, according to different management rapports, the lower-level employees in the road and water districts are less strategically aligned with the organizational change objectives. For maximal benefits of this study, the qualitative research methods are used among these employees and their executives.
Fourth remark, candidates for the semi-structured interviews and focus groups were, in consultation with their direct executives and HRM-advisors, approached by e-mail and telephone. In case employees did not respond to their e-mail, they were approached by telephone asking if they were willing to participate in either a semi-structured interview or a focus group.
Fifth remark, it is import to note that all results of the semi-structured interviews and focus groups are kept anonymous. Since this study investigates which adjustments are necessary in the executive position in order to create strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives, employees must feel they could tell their view in a confidential environment. Naturally, notes have been made during the semi-structured interviews and focus groups, though these are not personally recognizable. Specifically, notes of the semi-structured interviews were directly converted into the computer, which enabled the participant to control whether his view and arguments were well-interpreted. In fact, this process strengthens the intern validity of the results of semi-structured interviews (Baarda & de Goede, 2001).
Seventh remark, the semi-structured interviews and focus groups consists of questions directly targeted to each of the four drivers of strategic employee alignment. These comprehensive questions were used as a guideline, where indirect and detailed questions leaded to more essential answers. Here, a private overview of core terms was used, to investigate partial elements of the transformational leadership style, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives.
Now, a description will be given of the characteristics and purposes of each research method used in this study.
Secondary data analysis.
Secondary data analysis involves the use of existing data, collected for the purposes of a prior study, in order to pursue a new research question (Hinds, Vogel & Clarke-Steffen, 1997).
Qualitative data sets. Qualitative data sets of RWS are a management contract 2007
and training programs for executives. The analysis of both the management contract 2007 and training programs is focused on the presence of a transformational leadership style.
Quantitative data sets. Quantitative data sets of RWS, involves employee satisfaction
inquiries of 2005 and 2006. From these quantitative data sets, results can be derived about the extent in which employees feel if internal strategic communication between them and their executives is present.
Semi-structured interviews.
Semi-structured interviews are conducted within a fairly open framework which allows focused, conversational, and two-way communication (Hoskins, 1986). Purpose of a semi-structured interview is to obtain specific qualitative information from a sample of all employees, and to gain a range of information on a specific topic (Hoskins, 1986).
Thus, a semi-structured interview can be used perfectly for discussing sensitive topics, such as the role of executives creating strategic employee alignment.
Semi-structured interviews with employees. The open-ended questions in the
change objectives?’ Using this question as a guideline, participants could tell whether or not they perceived the internal communication as detailed and essential. Besides, employees were asked which communication methods, such as departmental meetings, were used during the organizational change and which of them were (un)successful. This question about internal strategic communication let also room to discuss the executives’ interpersonal communication skills. Together, relevant information is gathered concerning the presence and advancement of the internal strategic communication at RWS.
The semi-structured interview also contains the question: ‘to which extent are incentives being used to create strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives?’ Here, the interviewees were asked to share their opinions about the clarity of performance criteria. Besides, employees could give their view about the effectiveness of incentives. In other words, are incentives being used to optimize the strategic alignment of employees? Furthermore, the executives’ openness about incentives is discussed.
In addition to the questions regarding the presence of each driver, the participants of the semi-structured interviews were also asked how they would like to adjust the executives’ position regarding each driver in such a way, that employees would understand the organizational change objectives more clearly. In retrospection to the theory section of this study, the understanding of organizational change objectives and how to contribute to those objectives (also referred as Line of Sight and visualized in figure 1) should be facilitated by the executive. Therefore, this question is asked so employees could tell which adjustments where needed in this facilitating role of executives. The exact semi-structured interview plan can be found in Appendix B.
In total, 13 employees participated in an individual, semi-structured interview. These interviews were held in Haren, Assen and in Grou and were kept with 4 female employees and 9 male employees. The mean age of the participating employees was 45,4 years and they possessed an educational background ranging from LBO to HBO. These employees were positioned in a traffic control or administrative function.
Focus Groups
The use of focus groups, with employees and executives separately, can be justified, since focus groups are useful for exploratory studies, developing and evaluating organizational processes (Morgan, 1988).
Focus groups consisting of lower-level employees. The open-ended questions in the
focus groups were aimed at which efforts already have been carried out in the creation of the transformational leadership style, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives. The focus group contains the following question about the creation of employee involvement: ‘which efforts have been made in order to create employee involvement, with for instance, participation groups?’ Important information which was needed regarding the driver employee involvement, was whether or not RWS had tried to create participation possibilities for employees. Additionally, employees were asked about their access to resources, access to information, and access to support. The participants also expressed their thoughts about their executives’ openness in respect to the organizational change objectives.
Furthermore, the employees were asked which adjustments they thought were necessary in the executive position regarding each driver, so that they would understand the organizational change objectives more clearly. Since this question has great relevance in regard to the research question of this study, it returns in the semi-structured interviews and in both focus groups. The focus group plan can be found in Appendix C.
In total, 4 focus groups took place in the road and water districts located in Grou, Assen and Buitenpost, with 20 participants totally. On average, a focus group consisted of 5 employees, most of them male employees. More precisely, only 2 participants were female. The mean age of the employees was 47,2 years. The participants possessed an LBO or MBO educational background, and were positioned in a traffic control or administrative function.
Focus groups consisting of executives. Here, the open-ended questions were aimed at
The executives also discussed which adjustments they thought were necessary in their own position to make employees better understand organizational change objectives. The exact focus group plan can be found in Appendix D.
In total, 2 focus groups have been arranged among the executives. These focus groups were held in Assen and Grou. Each group consisted of, on average, 5 executives. From the 10 participants in total, 2 executives were female. The mean age of the participating executives was 46,7 years. The executives had an HBO or academic background, and were positioned in an executive function.
Data analysis
Now the different data collection methods are explained, there is also a need to explain the data analysis. Obviously, due to the descriptive character of this study, there are no quantitative measure scales or numeric answer categories. The semi-structured interviews and focus groups consisted of open-ended questions, which means that the answer possibilities are not measurable. Instead, only recurring and striking results of the data collection methods are written down in the upcoming results paragraph.
RESULTS
In this paragraph, most relevant results of the different research methods are given. Per driver of strategic employee alignment can be read which results were most striking and most recurring among either the employees or executives. Additionally, the results of the question: ‘which adjustments are necessary in the executive position regarding each driver, so that employees understand the organizational change objectives more clearly’, will be presented per driver in tables, followed by some further explanations.
Transformational leadership style
Presence of the transformational leadership style. From the executive training
According to the interviewed employees, the transformational leadership is insufficient present at RWS. Unfortunately, 11 employees do not perceive their executives as inspiring and motivating. Besides, 9 interviewed employees emphasize their executives’ lack of visionary skills regarding the organizational change objectives. According to them, the executives possesses technical expertise and misses the interpersonal management skills to be inspiring and motivating.
Attempts and pitfalls in the creation of a transformational leadership style. From the
focus groups with executives can be derived that efforts have been put in changing the executives’ leadership behaviours. Management meetings, confidential group settings, and a strongly support of HRM-advisors were focused on the development of a transformational leadership style. All employees in the focus groups confirm these attempts to create a transformational leadership style, although they have not seen strong improvements yet. A striking pitfall was the confidential group setting, since it did not receive the time, structure, continuation and priority it deserved.
Necessary adjustments in the executive position. The participants of the
semi-structured interviews and all focus groups agreed on several essential adjustments which are necessary to create the transformational leadership style at RWS. These recurring and striking results are visualized in table 1, followed by some further explanations.
TABLE 1
Necessary adjustments in executive position to create a transformational leadership style
Essential adjustments 1 Create inspiration and motivation 2 Develop the visionary skills
3 Set high expectations, give feedback regularly
Second adjustment, the visionary skills of executives need to be trained, since 9 interviewed employees found that their executives do not pay attention to the organizational strategic direction regularly. Instead, executives are focused on the daily course of events, where the strategic direction has less priority. Furthermore, executives do not support their employees to link their own core actions and behaviours with the strategic objectives of RWS. Third adjustment, executives must set clear and concrete expectations within the scope of the organizational direction. According to 4 participants of the semi-structured interviews, executives make concessions to often for stubborn employees. The creation of employees’ acceptance that the organizational change objectives are inevitably and permanent, is a responsibility executives must work on. Therefore, executives need to clarify organizational objectives in clear and concrete expectations, without making concessions. Here, constructive and regularly feedback is a necessary condition to constantly realign employees’ actions and behaviours in accordance with the organizational change objectives.
Internal strategic communication
Presence of internal strategic communication. Results of the question to which
extent clear internal strategic communication is present (see Appendix B, question 2), are ambiguous. At the organizational level, internal strategic communication can be found. For instance, strategic business plans, intranet, CD-ROM’s, posters and brochures are available to create employees’ understanding of and commitment to the change objectives. According to the employee satisfaction inquiries, on the other hand, the presence of internal strategic communication between executive and employee is mediocre. This judgement is confirmed by 13 interviewed employees, who state that regular one-to-one communication misses.
Attempts and pitfalls in the creation of internal strategic communication. Employees
and executives in the focus groups mentioned the existence of a comprehensive strategic business plan, in which the organizational change objectives are clearly formulated.
Striking pitfall in the internal strategic communication process, is the organizational tendency to formulate too much plans, regulations, agreements and evaluations related to the organizational change. By this, new perceptions of organizational change objectives find their way in the organization, through which the true change objectives are not seen as detailed and essential any longer.
employees in the focus groups emphasized the shortage of structured small-group meetings and face-to-face discussions about change objectives. Small groups meetings, such as departmental meetings, were not used regularly for their strategic alignment.
Necessary adjustments in the executive position. From the semi-structured interviews
and both focus groups, now will be visualized in table 2, the most important adjustments necessary to create the internal strategic communication at RWS.
TABLE 2
Necessary adjustments in executive position to create internal strategic communication
Essential adjustments
1 Coaching needed in the interpersonal communication skills 2 Support employees to link their actions and behaviours to
the organizational objectives
3 Keep internal strategic communication detailed and essential
First adjustment, the employees in the semi-structured interviews and focus groups agreed upon the importance for executives to optimize their interpersonal communication skills. The question which adjustments are necessary in the executive position regarding the internal strategic communication (see Appendix C, question 5), resulted in the need for executives to work on a trustful relationship, to be made possible by small group meetings and one-to-one communication. More specific, the strategic communication at the management level must be broken down by the executive into key messages more often. Structural and returning departmental meetings and interpersonal conversations can be used to translate management communication into essential and concrete information. Here, trust and respect are important values to be honoured at RWS, both by employees and by executives.
Third adjustment, 5 interviewed employees feel that the organization tends to overload them with a succession of business plans, agreements and evaluations. The ongoing process of strategic documents related to the organizational change leads, as a consequence, to confused and even careless organization members. Instead, the executive can contribute by bringing back the internal strategic communication to its essence, translating only the most important organizational decisions to concrete information for employees.
Employee involvement
Presence of employee involvement. The question in which extent employees feel that
they are involved with organizational change objectives, with for instance participation groups (see Appendix B, question 4), leaded to the confirmation of the shortage of employee involvement possibilities. Instead, national knowledge groups are dedicated to discuss the contents of daily work projects. In sum, no participation groups are arranged at RWS to create employee involvement with, in specific, the organizational change objectives.
Attempts and pitfalls in the creation of employee involvement. In the focus groups
with employees, a question is used to get insight in the attempts RWS had made to create employee involvement (Appendix C, question 3). From this, it can be derived that employees have access to resources and access to information, in respect to the organizational change objectives. Nevertheless, an employee must be the initiator in order to receive the information and support he searches for.
Executives in the focus groups emphasized that they supported their employees to put effort in their involvement themselves. In essence, for employees to get involved with the organizational change objectives, they should take the initiative using present information and resources. This change in employees’ behaviour still needs the executives’ support, especially since employees tend to be refusing towards the organizational change objectives.
All interviewed employees agree upon the lack of priority given to the organizational change objectives, which, ultimately, can be seen in the shortage of employee involvement efforts. Consequently, many employees are not enabled to burst trough the top-down communication patterns at RWS.
incapacity of some lower-level employees leads to a more careless attitude, in which distrust prevails. The educational background, many years of unilateral experience and enduring pampering of RWS of its employees, causes this rejecting attitude of employees.
Necessary adjustments in the executive position. From the focus groups with
executives and semi-structured interviews became clear that two essential adjustments are necessary in the executive position, in order to create employee involvement at RWS. These adjustments are presented in table 3, followed by some further explanations.
TABLE 3
Necessary adjustments in executive position to create employee involvement
Essential adjustments
1 Keep supporting employees to be an initiator 2 Create conditions for employee involvement
First adjustment, executives need to support their employees in taking initiatives constantly. Surely, the political environment RWS is surrounded with, influences the extent in which employees can actually influence organizational developments and decision-making processes. Nevertheless, employees need to be inspired and supported to think about and learn from the organizational change objectives. Therefore, participation groups can be used perfectly, since it will contribute in employees’ understanding of organizational change objectives. Provided that the executive takes into account the following adjustment.
Incentives
Presence of incentives. The question in which extent employees feel that incentives
are being used for creating strategic employee alignment (see Appendix B, question 5) clarified that RWS possesses an incentive policy, although it is not focused on rewarding employees on their strategic alignment with organizational change objectives. Instead, incentives are given because of employees’ extra efforts.
Attempts and pitfalls in the creation of incentives. The executives in the focus groups
were asked the question which attempts have been made in the creation of incentives to make employees understand organizational change objectives more clearly (see Appendix D, question 4). According to all of them, clear performance criteria are written down in every individual functional assessment. Both the employees and executives in the focus groups consider these criteria as the main guideline to receive an incentive. Nevertheless, 9 interviewed employees are not familiar with the incentive policies and 5 of them are suspicious about the distribution of incentives.
Another pitfall, according to all employees in the focus groups, is the lack of openness about who received an incentive and for what reasons that was. These outcomes were found by Appendix B, question 5, and Appendix C, question 4.
Both the executives and employees doubt the effectiveness of incentives. According to the executives in the focus groups, the distribution of incentives to individuals gives rise to dissatisfaction among other employees. According to 6 interviewed employees, money should not be the solution to create strategic employee alignment. Appreciation to a group of individuals would be more effective, because then, no envy will arise between individuals.
Necessary adjustments in the executive position. The essential adjustments necessary
to create incentive policies are visualized in table 4, followed by some further explanations.
TABLE 4
Necessary adjustments in executive position to create incentives
Essential adjustments 1 Create openness about incentives 2 Provide group incentives to enhance employees’
First adjustment, openness about incentive policies is essential. If executives nominate employees for an incentive, because they have contributed to the organizational change objectives in an effective way, openness of communication contributes to the organization wide understanding of organizational change objectives. Thus, openness about incentives will make more employees strategically aligned, because of their motivation to contribute to the organizational change objectives as well.
Second adjustment, incentives should be given to groups of employees who created strategic alignment with organizational change objectives together. Obviously, when groups of employees are rewarded for their efforts put in the strategic alignment, the understanding of organizational objectives and how to contribute to those will expand among other employees. In retrospection of this paragraph, most important results are given concerning the drivers transformational leadership style, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives. In the following discussion paragraph, one can read about the conclusions drawn regarding the research question of this study. This will be followed by the practical implications, in which is clarified how RWS should interpreter the results in practice. Next, some limitations of this study are presented and finally, also attention is given to related issues that may be addressed in future research.
DISCUSSION
Discussion of results
Purpose of this study is to provide an answer to the question: ’how should executives contribute in creating strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives and in which way will this optimize the affective commitment to organizational change?’ Priority of this study lies in heightening the employees’ affective commitment to organizational change at RWS.
The results of the semi-structured interviews and focus groups made clear that RWS should focus on adjusting the executive position regarding the strongly interrelated drivers transformational leadership style and internal strategic communication. This focus leads to their strategic employee alignment, and finally to an increased employees’ affective commitment to organizational change.
inspirational actions performed by the executive (Bass, 1985; Albrecht, 2005). In a recently published meta-analysis (Meyer, Stanley, Herscovitch & Topolnytsky, 2002), a mean corrected correlation coefficient of 0.46 between transformational leadership and affective commitment is determined. Thus, a transformational leadership style optimizes employees’ affective commitment significantly (Meyer et al., 2002; Shamir, House & Arthur, 1993).
Bass (1985) identified a number of sub dimensions of transformational leadership including idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration. Besides the executives’ need for inspirational motivation, individualized consideration is also of utmost importance for strategic employee alignment (Bass, 1985). This sub dimension of a transformational leadership style should allow executives to become familiar with employees, enhances a trustful relationship, strengthens the internal communication, and improves information exchange (Bass, 1985). The individualized consideration of an executive consists of emotional support of employees, which involves the provision of sympathy, trust, caring and listening (House, 1981).
Besides the emotional support, informational support also contributes to the strategic alignment of employees (House, 1981; Boswell, 2006). First of all, the creation and implementation of a clear vision is the main technique that transformational executives should use to inspire employees to perform accordingly the organizational change objectives (Awamleh & Gardner, 1999). Bennis and Nanus (1997) claim that executives can only make a difference when they structurally communicate the vision throughout the organization and if they effectively institutionalize the vision as a guiding principle. Second, the informational support also consists of the executives’ ability to sharply limit internal communication into key messages, since less is really more (Lee, 1997). Transcending most important strategic information to the lower organizational levels, on a structured and regular basis in small-group meetings and especially by one-to-one communications sessions, counts as an important requirement executives must keep hold on to (Bisogno, 2007; Boswell & Boudreau, 2001). Ultimately, the degree to which executives communicate about strategic change objectives influences the degree to which employees feel aligned with the organizational strategy (Farmer, Slater & Wright, 1998).
First, the effectiveness of employee involvement, and especially the participation of lower-level employees, can be ensured if their executives are people-oriented (Pitts, 2005). Indeed, a people-oriented executive emphasizes regular human contact, treats the lower-level employees in the official hierarchy as equals and shows empathy towards them (Fleishman, 1953; Halpin & Winer, 1957). Obviously, this people-oriented behaviour of an executive fits within the transformational leadership style and motivates employees to be committed to an organizational change.
Second, incentives are seen as an important organizational practice to create strategic employee alignment (Boswell et al., 2006). Provided that the organization makes clear they are enacting an incentive pay system and what the benefits will be for the employees (Vaitkus, 2001). Management openness about incentive policies and about the criteria for receiving an incentive, is essential (Vaitkus, 2001). Ultimately, openness about the reasons groups of employees are provided with incentives make other employees better aware of the strategic objectives the organization is heading for, which leads to the desired strategic employee alignment (Boswell & Boudreau, 2001).
Practical Implications
In general, four different drivers contribute to the creation of strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives. However, the results of the secondary data analysis, semi-structured interviews and the focus groups prove that RWS need to give priority to the interrelated drivers transformational leadership style and internal strategic communication in order to create their strategic employee alignment in practice.
Basically, optimizing the employees’ affective commitment to organizational change at RWS, depends on the executives’ capabilities to be inspiring, motivating, essential, and trustful. The results suggests that the interpersonal management and communication skills of executives need to be improved. For RWS, terms like transformational leadership, individualized consideration, informational support, and people-oriented behaviour are, in fact, all-embracing and stand-for the solution to strategically align the employees with the change objectives, which increases the affective commitment to organizational change.
executives at RWS to support their employees to create strategic employee alignment themselves. Because in today’s practice of RWS, employees do have an important responsibility to create their own strategic alignment with organizational change objectives. In other words, transformational leadership, internal strategic communication, employee involvement, and incentives can absolutely support the creation of strategic employee alignment, though in the long run, employees need to be the initiator to align with the organizational change objectives.
Limitations
Employees’ understanding of organizational change objectives probably unfolds over time, yet this study was not dynamic, since no investigation is made how this understanding of organizational change objectives develops over time. In other words, the presented results and chosen priorities for RWS to truly create strategic employee alignment are a product of the time. Therefore, RWS should investigate the four drivers over a few years again, so that the strategic employee alignment with organizational objectives can be attained and mostly, sustained.
Another limitation of this study is the shortage of statistical analyses, since this research possesses a descriptive and qualitative character. In other words, no quantitative analysis can be given of employees moderate affective commitment to organizational change at RWS. Instead, striking and recurring answers are used to formulate the priority RWS should give to the transformational leadership style and internal strategic communication.
The choice of research methods can be, partially, seen as a limitation as well. The amount of questions in the semi-structured interviews and focus groups in this study was limited. Instead of using semi-structured interviews and focus groups, questionnaires are, perhaps, more suitable to investigate the elements of each driver more extensively. At RWS, on the other hand, questionnaires would not have been a logical research method, because of the amount of questionnaires already used in other research, and the incapability’s of lower-level employees to concentrate on an extended, and perhaps difficult, questionnaire about strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives.
Future Research
organizational change. Perhaps it may be interesting for future research to investigate which other organizational factors can support the creation of strategic employee alignment. For example, it seems interesting how performance management or a Balanced Scorecard (Kaplan & Norton, 2007) supports the realization of employees’ understanding of organizational change objectives. Here, a more financial approach of strategic employee alignment can be emphasized.
In this study, a consideration is made concerning the capabilities of employees to understand the organizational change objectives and how to contribute to those objectives. Therefore, an interesting subject which can be addressed, is whether strategic employee alignment with organizational change objectives does depend on employees’ capabilities, and if so, which human capabilities are truly necessary for strategic employee alignment.
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