THE CONTRIBUTION OF CHANGE AGENTS’ SENSEGIVING
PRACTICES TO RECIPIENTS’ CHANGE READINESS
Master thesis, MSc Business Administration - Change Management University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business
January 20, 2020
Marjolein Bloema S2544644
m.l.bloema@student.rug.nl
Supervisor: dr. B.J.M. Emans Co-assessor: prof. dr. J.D.R. Oehmichen
3
Abstract
This study focuses on how sensegiving practices of change agents contribute to recipients’ change readiness in order to show what a change agent can do to enhance change readiness. Therefore, a qualitative case study was conducted in a large municipality in the Netherlands. Five sensegiving practices were investigated, labelled: discursive practices (focus on providing clear information), symbolic practices (focus on using symbols), organizing events practices (focus on events to learn a skill or capability), situated discourse practices (focus on sharing experiences and have discussions), and designing structures practices (focus on new roles/tasks and provide time lines). The study findings indicate that symbolic practices and situated discourses, when present, had little to no effect on change readiness, while the other three, when present, contributed to change readiness. This contribution is shown e.g. by doing a training programme which helped in gaining the right capabilities for doing the job. This improved the self-efficacy of the employee and reduced the uncertainty. Besides that, three other practices emerged from practice which were seen as the most important factors changing the attitude of employees: showing support (being there for employees), show appreciation (giving compliments and comfort employees), and team support (support of the team). When present, these practices were named as having the most impact on change readiness. By this study, change agents are provided with specific practices they can use in order to enlarge the change readiness of the employees, and with that they may enhance the change success.
Keywords: change agent, change recipient, sensegiving practices, change readiness, change
4
Introduction
Although many factors determine organizational change success, there are only a few factors as critical as the employees attitude towards change (Jones & Van de Ven, 2016; Kanter, Stein, & Jick, 1992; Oreg, Vakola, & Armenakis, 2011; Rafferty, Jimmieson, & Armenakis, 2013; Vakola, 2013). This attitude is partly determined by the interpretation of a suggested change, which is called sensemaking (Armenakis, Harris, & Mossholder, 1993; Oreg, Bartunek, Lee, & Do, 2018). This means that in organizational change, employees try to interpret and give meaning to new, confusing events that happen around them in order to reduce their uncertainty caused by the change (Maitlis & Christianson, 2014; Weick, 1995). To affect the sensemaking process of employees, leaders may use sensegiving to influence the interpretation and meaning construction of the employees towards a “preferred redefinition of organizational reality” (Goia & Chittipeddi, 1991, p. 442). It may help to create a shared and coherent meaning and interpretation of a certain phenomenon among their employees (Kanter et al., 1992; Kraft, Sparr, & Peus, 2015; Mantere, Schildt, & Sillince, 2012). Part of the attitude of the employee is determined by his/her change readiness. Early research suggests that, -to create change readiness, proactive efforts from leaders are required to influence the attitude of the employee (Armenakis et al., 1993; Coch and French, 1948). Since the attitude of an employee is the major determinant of change succes, this research suggests that sensegiving of leaders is a crucial factor that may influence the change readiness of employees, and through that change success.
Although in recent years the concepts of sensegiving and change readiness have been examined more and more, there is little to no prior research about the impact of leaders’ sensegiving practices on employees’ change readiness. However, this subject is very important since the behaviour of a change agent, the leader, contributes to the emergence of change resistance or readiness among recipients, the employees (Ford, Ford, & D'Amelio, 2008; Vos & Rupert, 2018). Previous research only examined the relation between the contribution of change agents to recipients’ change resistance, and solely the impact on the negative side has been investigated, with recipients as malefactor. In this broad field of research, the focus was only on this aspect, while other aspects, as the change readiness, were forgotten. In answer to the call of Vos and Rupert (2018) to focus on the more positive
interpretation of resistance, this research will extend current literature by addressing the impact of sensegiving practices on change readiness. Therefore, the following question will be examined:
“
How do change agents’ practices to give sense to organizational change contribute to
recipients’ change readiness?”
5
to change (Ford et al., 2008; Vos & Rupert, 2018). Hence, the research shows practical relevance through that change agents are provided with information how their behaviour, consciously or unconsciously, may influence recipients’ change readiness. By creating an understanding about how sensegiving practices may influence the readiness, change agents may adapt their behaviour and strategies. Through a qualitative case study in a Dutch municipality sensegiving practices that change agents used in practice are examined, and their impact on change readiness.
The report is structured as follows: in the literature review, the main literature streams on sensemaking, sensegiving, and change readiness are discussed. Also, the relations between the literature streams are explained. Subsequently, the methodology shows how the study is conducted. This contains information about the research approach, the research site, the data collection and finalizes with the methodology of the data analysis. After that, the results of the interviews are logically structured in the analysis. The report finalizes with a discussion in which the conclusions, limitations and suggestions for future research are presented.
Literature Review
In this chapter, the concept of sensemaking and its relation to sensegiving is explained. Then, sensegiving is further explored, focussing on sensegiving practices of change agents. After that, change readiness is examined. Lastly, the suggested relation between sensegiving and change readiness is explained.
Sensemaking
Sensegiving and sensemaking are two strongly interrelated concepts. It is a continuously ongoing process in which senders and receivers keep influencing each other. (Goia & Chittipeddi, 1991; Kraft Sparr, & Peus, 2016; Maitlis & Christianson, 2014; Weick, 1995). It may become clear that one cannot be explained without the other. To start, the concept of sensemaking is explained.
Sensemaking. As already stated in the introduction, sensemaking means that actors try to
6
(Weick et al., 2005, p. 414). The difference in states are often ambiguous and give a feeling of uncertainty.
Sensemaking-sensegiving process. Although sensemaking firstly is an individual process, the
process is influenced by environmental factors surrounding the individual, including sensegiving. As shortly mentioned, sensemaking and sensegiving are in fact two interrelated processes in which the sensemaking process of a receiver is attempted to be influenced by a sender through sensegiving, towards a new organizational reality (Maitlis & Christianson, 2014). Although the definition suggests a one-way sequence, a senders’ sensegiving and receivers’ sensemaking together form a continuous, reciprocal feedback cycle. The process starts with the senders’ interpretation (sensemaking) of the change, and subsequently they start to make up their sensegiving, consciously or unconsciously, with the purpose of influencing the sensemaking process of receivers in the desired direction (Goia & Chittipeddi, 1991; Kraft et al., 2016). While the outcome of the sensegiving process may have the desired result, it may also result in unintended effects.
Sensegiving
A component to influence the behaviour of a receiver is through sensegiving. Sensegiving is an attempt to influence the meaning construction of others. The preferred result of a sensegiving process is a change in how receivers think or what they believe, resulting in a “preferred redefinition of organizational reality” (Goia & Chittipeddi, 1991, p. 442).
Sensegiving in change situations
.
Although sensegiving happens in all types of situations, it is especially important during organizational change and therefore is an essential leadership activity (Goia & Chittipeddi, 1991; Maitlis & Lawrence, 2007). Organizational change is an event that may trigger sensemaking because employees often perceive a difference between the current and the expected state which may cause uncertainty (Weick et al., 2005). There are several reasons for this uncertainty: 1) employees are not able to decide about the direction of the change, 2) employees receive less information than their leaders and/or 3) they do not have the ability to shape the implementation process (Bordia, Hobman, Jones, Gallois, & Callan, 2004; Kraft et al., 2016; Sparr, 2018). As Kraft et al. (2015) state, a change agent, the sender, tries to reduce this uncertainty by influencing the sensemaking process of a change recipient, the receiver. The sensemaking-sensegiving process in change situations is shown in Figure 1.7
Previous research indicates that the attempt to influence recipients’ beliefs, feelings and thoughts may help to increase their shared commitment to the organizations’ aims. It may also help to take a positive stance towards the new direction of the organization (Foldy, Goldman, & Ospina, 2008; Mantere et al., 2012). Sensegiving may affect this by trying to influence the sensemaking process of the employee in facilitating their interpretation process, which helps to construct a new reality.
Role of change agent
.
Although sensegiving happens on all hierarchical levels of anorganization, change agents specifically are enabled to execute sensegiving practices. They officially represent the organization and have access to necessary information which gives agents a privileged position (Kraft et al., 2015; Ravasi & Schultz, 2006). Besides this, recipients often expect assistance when confronted with ambiguous events such as organizational change. For assistance, they turn to their change agent (Sparr, 2018).
While most of the literature suggest that the change agent is part of the top management in an organization, more and more research points out the specific role of the middle manager in
sensegiving (Rouleau, 2005; Sharma & Good, 2013; Smith, Plowman, & Duchon, 2010). While the middle managers receive information from top management, they try to make sense of this
information. At the same time, this information needs to be proceeded towards their employees. The middle manager may be in a difficult position since he is, on the one hand, a recipient of the
sensegiving attempts of the top-management while at the same time he/she is asked to be a change agent for his/her employees. Herein, they will attempt to influence the sensemaking process by using sensegiving practices.
Sensegiving Practices
In order to guide the recipient towards the new representation of organizational reality, and therefore through the organizational change, a change agent has multiple practices he/she may use. A change agent adjusts these practices to the current needs of the recipient (Foldy et al., 2008; Kim, Hornung, & Rousseau, 2011). These needs can vary between recipients but also change over time for an individual recipient (Hemme, Bowers, & Todd, 2018; Kraft et al., 2016). When the change agent anticipates on these needs, he/she may provide recipients with the right cognitive models in order to help understand the change and respond to it (Kraft et al., 2016; Mumford, Friedrich, Caughron, & Byrne, 2007). A shared reality may be constructed which means recipients share the same interpretation of a change (Mantere et al., 2012).
8
to be labelled here, successively, as 1) discursive practices, 2) symbolic practices, 3) organizing events practices, 4) situated discourse practices, and 5) designing structures practices. Below, the essence of these five practices in the context of organizational change will be elaborated on.
Discursive practices. Within the literature, discursive practices are described as sensegiving practices. Forms of this practice are e.g. a meeting, memo, newsletter or a proposal (Goia et al., 1991; Kraft et al., 2015). The purpose of this tactic is to inform people in a clear and consistent way. It includes all communicative practices with the intention to give an opinion or explain the
circumstances (Maitlis, 2005; Sonenshein, 2006) Thus, in this research, the following definition of discursive practices is used: all forms of one-way communication that intends to clearly inform employees in order to reconstruct their organizational reality.
Symbolic practices. According to previous research, besides the discursive practices, also non-discursive practices are used. Forms of non-non-discursive practise are e.g. rituals, objects, storytelling, workshops, trainings, and seminars (Kraft et al., 2015; Sonenshein, 2006). These practices include “words, actions or objects with a wider meaning than their original one” (Alvesson, 1991, p. 214). Although these forms of practices in literature are combined under one name, the rituals and objects have another purpose than the workshop, training and seminar. The purpose of the rituals and objects is to create symbols by making things tangible and visible. In this research, therefore, a distinction is made in the non-discursive practices and this part will fall under the name symbolic practices. This research defines symbolic practices as follows: all forms of communication that are expressed through the use of symbols to explain organizational change to employees in order to reconstruct
organizational reality.
Organizing events practices. The other part of the non-discursive practices, the forms
workshop, training, and seminar, have a different purpose (Kraft et al., 2015). The goal of a workshop, training, or seminar is to organize an event that teaches a new skill or capability to people with the intention to help people adapt to the new organizational reality. The organizing events practice is in this research explained as: all forms of events that help people developing certain skills and
capabilities resulting in a new organizational reality.
Situated discourse practices. Whilst the discursive practice focuses on one-way
9
Designing structures practices. The final practice, the designing structures practice, focuses on achieving the goal of the change by structurally defining the expectations. Forms of this practice are the creation of roles and clear time lines (Sharma & Good, 2013). The purpose is to change the organizational structure through the before mentioned forms which may trigger sensemaking. It tries to affect the sensemaking process by providing a change in roles or making time lines which helps to give clarity, and with that define the expectations for the employees. Within this research, the practice is defined as: all forms of a change in structure design that focus on providing clarity and defining what is expected of the employees in order to redefine organizational reality.
Change Readiness
“Readiness is the cognitive precursor to the behaviours of either resistance to, or support for, a change effort” (Armenakis, Harris, & Mossholder, 1993, p. 682)
Many factors have a share in determining change success, although a recipients’ reaction to change is one of the most important and critical ones (Miller, Johnson, & Grau, 1994; Rafferty et al., 2013; Rafferty & Minbashian, 2018). The focus of this study is on recipients’ attitude towards change, particularly on change readiness. Change readiness is defined as “an organizational members’ beliefs, attitudes, and intentions regarding the extent to which changes are needed and the organization’s capacity to successfully make those changes” (Armenakis et al., 1993, p. 681). It is seen as the most positive attitude towards change (Bouckenooghe, 2010).
Within the literature of change readiness, individual readiness has been researched the most. Early research solely focused on the individual readiness but recently it is acknowledged that, through interaction among individuals, a shared change readiness attitude emerges from the social process and therefore, also the team-level readiness may be important (Rafferty et al., 2013; Whelan-Barry, Gordon, & Hinings, 2003). Although change readiness is a multi-level concept, the focus within this research is on the individual level.
Individual change readiness. Early research by Armenakis and his colleagues (1993, 2007)
explain that there are four readiness beliefs. In later research, Oreg et al. (2018) and Rafferty et al. (2013, 2018) specified these beliefs resulting in five beliefs that a change agent can influence through communication: sense of discrepancy, belief of appropriateness, support of the principal, sense of efficacy, and the valence. The five beliefs are explained below.
10
sense of discrepancy means that one recognizes the change as a difference between the actual and desired state while also acknowledging its reasons are legitimate (Rafferty & Minbashian, 2018).
Related to this is the belief of appropriateness, the belief that the change is the right response to the situation (Armenakis, Harris, & Feild, 1999). It may be underpinned by explaining what the end-state of the change is or what will happen if the change is not happening (Armenakis et al., 1993).
The third belief focuses on the support of the principal received by the change recipient. Although in earlier research the principal was only seen as a person’s direct leader, later research shows that also a recipients’ colleagues and peers are able to influence the readiness of a recipient (Balogun & Johnson, 2005; Sonenshein, 2010). The principal can support the recipient through resources and information, but also in the form of psychological safety. The feeling of a recipient that he is supported may result in greater acceptance of the proposed change (Neves & Eisenberger, 2014).
The fourth belief focuses on the sense of efficacy of an individual. This means the change recipient perceives he or she has the right capabilities to implement the change (Armenakis et al., 2007; Oreg et al., 2011). It resembles confidence in one’s own capabilities and skills (Rafferty & Minbashian, 2018).
The final cognitive belief refers to the concept of valence: the benefits an individual perceives from the change (Holt et al., 2007). The individual determines to support the change based on a cost-benefit analysis. If the perceived advantages outweigh the perceived disadvantages, the individual is likely to support the suggested change (Vakola, 2013).
Although one might expect all cognitive beliefs must be present with a minimum threshold in a certain change situation, this mostly depends on the circumstances (Hemme et al., 2018). Together, these five cognitive beliefs may form a basis for change readiness.
Change Readiness and Sensegiving
In 1948, Coch and French (1948) already showed that to create change readiness, it requires proactive efforts from the change agent which may influence “the beliefs, attitudes, intentions, and ultimately the behaviour” of recipients (Armenakis et al., 1993, p. 683) Although researchers pointed out the importance a long time ago, the relation between sensegiving practices from change agents and change readiness of recipients has not been examined yet.
11
result in different kind of considerations in regard to whether someone does or does not have change readiness. Therefore, this research suggests a relation between sensegiving and change readiness.
All in all, this results in an extended version of the earlier mentioned research question. First, this study examines the impact of each separate practice: discursive, symbolic, organizing events, situated discourses, and designing structures, on the five readiness dimensions: discrepancy, appropriateness, principal support, efficacy, and valence, which results in 25 sub-questions. For the sake of clarity, one example of a sub-question is given: what is the impact of discursive practices on the change readiness dimension efficacy? For each practice in relation to each readiness dimension, such a question is formulated. Besides questioning which and to what extent sensegiving practices will contribute to the readiness dimensions of a recipient, also the lack of impact and the impact of the absence of a certain practice is examined. Finally, this study will also examine if there are other sensegiving practices besides the earlier mentioned ones, and what the impact of these practices is on the recipients’ change readiness.
Methodology
In order to gather information for answering the research questions, a qualitative case study was conducted in a large Dutch municipality in the Netherlands. This section highlights the research approach, research site, data collection and finalizes with the data analysis.
Research Approach
A qualitative research obtains a basis to understand the social processes because it provides narratives and detailed descriptions about people’s experiences (Blumberg, Cooper, & Schindler, 2014; Gephart, Jr., 2004). Since this research examined the relation between agents’ sensegiving practices and recipients’ change readiness, rich explanations regarding the dynamics and interaction between the agents and recipients were necessary. Quantitative research does not address rich explanations and narratives, so therefore a qualitative research was executed.
Research Site
To examine the impact of the contributions of change agents’ sensegiving practices to recipients’ change readiness, a municipality in the Netherlands served as research site. The municipality arose a year prior to the research, from a merger of four former municipalities. Before the merger, the former municipalities consisted of four to five general departments, each having their own manager.
12
To become a new municipality with a shared culture after a merger, the organisation decided to create a new organizational philosophy. One of the priorities was to create self-organizing teams, meaning they focus on strong, independent, vital teams with team development as focal point.
However, the employees of the former four municipalities were not familiar with this way of working. Therefore the managing board introduced the team leaders, who functioned as middle managers. The role of the team leaders was three-fold: their job was to prepare the individual employees prior to the merge, make the employees become a well-functioning team after the merge, and in the end stimulate the team to become a self-organizing team. The focus of this research is on the sensegiving practices of a team leader to prepare and support the team members with the cooperation in their new teams.
Data Collection
To collect the information about the impact of change agents’ sensegiving practices on recipients’ change readiness, fifteen interviews were conducted in October 2019. To get a complete picture, both team leaders (change agents) and employees of their teams (recipients) were included. Since the municipality has four different locations, one team of each location was included, resulting in four out of 21 teams being part of the research. Within these teams the team leader and two to three employees were interviewed. In total, four team leaders and eleven employees were included in the research. Every former municipality was represented at least twice.
As shown in Table 1, respondents were assigned a code. The first three letters represent the organisation, the first number, 1 to 4, represent a change agent while 5 refers to the recipients. The last two numbers refer to a specific recipient. Codes ending with 0 are always agents.
Table 1
Respondents with corresponding codes
Respondent Code Gender Agent or recipient
13
The teams that were involved in the research needed to meet a few requirements: the team leader and employees must have worked for one of the former municipalities, they had to work for the new municipality from the start, and the team must have at least four team members. When these requirements were met, a team was considered suitable for the research.
After approval of the managing board and consultation with the secretary of the municipality, one team leader per location was approached to ask for participation in the research. All confirmed their willingness to participate and provided the names of participating employees. An invitation for the interview was send by the secretary and two days before the interview, the participants received an e-mail with two introductory questions to help the interview give a direction and run smoothly. In the table below, these questions are shown.
Table 2
Introductory questions sent by e-mail to respondents
Respondent Question
Recipient If you think about your attitude towards the change a year ago, and you compare it with your current attitude. What has changed? What remained the same? Recipient If your attitude changed, which factors contributed to this change?
Agent When considering your employees and think about a year ago, what was their attitude towards the change then and what is their attitude now? What has changed? What remained the same?
Agent If their attitude changed, which factors contributed to this change, according to you?
Since the perception of both the agents as well as recipients were examined, two interview schemes were used. The focus of the interview with the change agent was on the sensegiving practices and his experienced influence on recipients, while the interview with the recipients focused on their experience about the influence of change agents’ sensegiving practices on their change readiness. All interviews were executed in the same way following the same script in order to increase the reliability.
Both interview schemes consisted of two parts in which the first part was similar. It began with open and general warming-up questions about the attitude of the employees and the factors that had influenced this attitude. These questions are shown in Table 2, which are the same questions as were sent by email to the employees.
14
Subsequently, the focus was on the presence or absence of the five sensegiving practices as distinguished in the research questions, together with the impact those practices had had. Firstly, five cards were shown with a textual explanation of each practice. A sixth card was added in which respondents could add an extra practice they had experienced. In the table below, the text on the cards is shown.
Table 3
Text cards used during the interview for sensegiving practices
Title of card Text below title
Spreading clear information E.g. through a meeting, newsletter or memo (one-way communication)
Organizing events E.g. a workshop, seminar or training
Making things tangible and visible E.g. through storytelling or rituals
Sharing experiences and have discussions Two-way communication
Grounding rules and assigning tasks E.g. through creating new tasks or making time lines
Other Is there a new type of practice you would like to add?
After showing the cards, respondents were asked if a practice was present or not during the last year. If a practice was present, further questions were asked about the impact of the practice on the attitude of the employees. What was the exact impact? How did it affect the attitude? If a practice was absent, further questions were asked about the impact of the absence of the practice on the employees’ attitude. The interviews finalized with a question about which practice had had the most impact on a change in attitude, whether they were on the cards or not.
In both parts of the interview the respondents were induced to tell about concrete experiences they had had as regards the practices of their team leader and the impact thereof. Rich explanations and examples were asked to support their experiences.
Because of the choice to divide the interview in two parts, the respondents started with an open mind. They weren’t influenced or guided by the questions of the second part and were able to answer the questions from their perspective. The interviews took place in separate rooms in the building where the team was stationed. The duration of the interviews ranged from 37 minutes to over an hour. In order to facilitate the interview analyses, all interviews were recorded with permission of the respondents.
Data Analysis
15
Within this research, both deductive and inductive coding was used. Prior to the research, pre-conceived codes were already determined based on the elaborated research questions regarding the impact of the presence or absence of the five practices on the change readiness dimensions. These are named deductive codes and are related to the five sensegiving practices and change readiness dimensions as shown in Table 4.
Table 4
Deductive codes from the literature
Impact of practices: Impact on change readiness dimensions:
Discursive practices Sense of discrepancy
Symbolic practices Belief of appropriateness
Organizing events practices Sense of efficacy
Situated discourse practices Support of principal
Designing structures practices Valence
Besides that, as mentioned in the elaborated research questions, this study also examined if other practices influenced change readiness besides the theorized practices. Additional information came forward analysing the transcripts of the interviews and therefore extra codes regarding three new sensegiving practices were added. These extra codes are inductive codes, originating from the
interviews. The results of the deductive and inductive codes combined represent the experiences of the employees regarding the impact of the sensegiving practices on the change readiness. After the
analysis was finished and the codebook was completed, a comparison with current literature has been executed. These findings are summarized in the discussion.
Analysis
The results from the interviews are shown in this section. The first part shows the results regarding the five sensegiving practices as specified in the research questions. Both the impact of a practice as well as the absence of a practice on change readiness are explained. Thereafter, evidence about the presence and impact of additional practices that came forward during the interviews is shown. To substantiate the findings, quotes from respondents are used. After each quote a code is shown which corresponds to a certain respondent. At the end of each practice, a summary of the results is shown in a table. In this table, a ‘+’ means a positive impact, a ‘0’ shows non or negative impact, a ‘?’ explains multiple varying results, and ‘-’ means that no results came forward.
Discursive Practices
16
Table 5
Forms of discursive practices
Practice
Form
Discursive practice
Personal meeting Weekly meetingInformative meeting of managing board
Weekly meeting. The weekly meetings are defined as team meetings held every week in
which information, work-related as well as private, is provided by the team leader. As the respondents explained, the provided information came from the managing board, but also information about team-related matters was discussed. Ten out of fifteen employees mentioned discursive practices being present though they differ in the extent of impact.
Although the literature defines the use of discursive practices as solely informing employees, a number of respondents explained there was more than just exchanging information. A team leader mentioned: “The meetings aren’t just about spreading the information but also have a social aspect, you try to create a social connection” (GWK410). Also quote 1 in Table 6 shows that it helps to ‘creates peace’ (GWK514) while the second quote shows how a respondent likes the informal part of the meeting since people are able to share their personal story ‘so colleagues know how you’re doing’ (GWK512).
Both quotes indicate a change in attitude. The first quote shows that the change agent brought peace through communication instead of the unrest that was present previously. The quote of
GWK512 shows that the team leader provides room for people to share personal stories which aren’t work related and not solely about the exchange of information. He/she felt heard if he/she wanted to share something private. One may say this is a sensegiving practice from a team leader, influencing the principal support dimension. By having a weekly meeting, the change agent supports his
employees and it helps to bring peace, by knowing how colleagues are doing or knowing what to do in their job. Enriched with information, the organizational reality of employees was reconstructed.
Personal meeting. The personal meetings were mentioned by three respondents and are
defined as an individual conversation between a team leader and an employee about personal matters, ranging from circumstances in the private life to discussions about the content of the work.
17
Informative meeting of managing board.Besides the positive experiences, the absence of a previously held informative meeting by the managing board was discussed by three respondents. Prior to the merge, the managing board held an informative meeting every month on every location, and respondents refer to this meeting in which they received information about the state of affairs regarding the merge. Directly after the merge, this stopped. One respondent mentioned: “These sessions were always really good and appreciated and everyone was informed well, but this
attenuated. I need these sessions to get a form of direction where we, as an organization, are heading on to” (GWK517). This quote indicates a lack of impact regarding sensegiving due to the absence of a discursive practice. The original idea was to inform employees in a clear and consistent way.
However, by ending the monthly meetings, the information flow was cut-off and therefore it does not reflect sensegiving. Besides that, it resulted in a negative impact on change readiness because the respondents felt lost and did not feel having the right capabilities him/herself to know where the organization was heading to. There is a degradation of self-efficacy because of the lack of direction and also in the principal support because the managing board lacks in the provision of information.
Table 6
Statements of interviewees regarding discursive practices
Number Quote Respondent
Q1
“The weekly meetings, the being together creates peace, which is needed in times of change. For me, making things negotiable and provide information helps being able to do my job. We also learned that not having an answer at that moment is also an answer. However, in the end
you always have to communicate and that is what he (the change agent) does well.”
GWK514
Q2 beginning of the week. That feels really good because there is room to tell “We use a board with smileys to see how everyone’s doing in the how you feel. If it is okay, it is okay. But if you’re not doing so well, we
take that into account”
GWK512
Q3 “A personal meeting is, especially for me, about the content of my job. For me, he (the change agent) then is a real sparring partner. At that moment, I do not feel the hierarchical levels, I feel as an equal and I like that. He gives me a feeling of trust”
GWK521
The results regarding the impact of discursive practices on the five change readiness dimensions are summarized in Table 7:
Table 7
Summary results impact of discursive practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Discursive practice Principal support ?
Efficacy ?
18
Symbolic Practices
Symbolic practices were not mentioned often in the interviews. The only form was storytelling.
Storytelling. Storytelling means someone uses “words or objects with a wider meaning than
the original one” to spread information (Alvesson, 1991, p. 214), often from a personal point of view. This form of symbolic practices has been explained twice by two change agents. As shown in Table 8, a change agent explains in quote 4 how he uses storytelling. He explains the four core values, repeats them, and even visually represents them. As experienced by this change agent, his team already recognizes these values because of the repetition and the visual representation. Another change agent explains in quote 5 his version of storytelling. However, none of the employees refer to this form of the symbolic practice nor experienced any kind of impact.
As already mentioned, the symbolic practice is not used a lot. As seven of the respondents responded: “I can’t think of any form of this practice” (GWK513) or “making things tangible and visible, if my team leader does that? No, and I do not miss it either” or “it does not ring a bell.” (GWK514, GWK516, GWK518, GWK519, GWK521). When asked what impact the absence of the practice has on their attitude, all respondents answered that it does not matter if they use it or not, they do not miss it.
Table 8
Statements of interviewees regarding symbolic practices
Number Quote Respondent
Q4
“I really like this one, I like storytelling, why do we want to be *name organization*? We are here for our inhabitants, but how do we do that? Well, by being: connected, moving, close, and personal leadership. If you
tell it many times, it becomes anchored. Three weeks ago, we had a so-called soap box session in which we did scrabble with person-sized letters and we made the four words that form our four core values.”
GWK110
Q5 explain through stories and from a personal point why we’re doing this, “I’ll just go to the people, I take them with me through the process, why I want to see it going like this, why the organisation asks this, I’ll
show them the added value.”
GWK210
In Table 9, the results regarding the impact of the symbolic practice on the five readiness dimensions is summed up. Since change agents explain there is positive experience with the use of the practice, but employees do not, the positive impact as well as no results are included:
Table 9
Summary findings impact of symbolic practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -/+
Appropriateness -/+
Symbolic practice Principal support -/+
Efficacy -/+
19
Organizing Events Practices
This practice was mentioned by ten out of fifteen interviewees. Forms of this practice that were mentioned by the respondents are shown in Table 10.
Table 10
Forms of organizing events practices
Practice Forms
Career-coaching
Organizing events practice Team outing
Training programme
Career-coaching. Career-coaching is a trajectory with the purpose of self-development and
career-development. This form of an organized event is mentioned by one employee. As Q6 in Table 11 shows, having the chance to follow a coaching trajectory created the peace he/she needed to know his/her role in the team because it took away the restlessness and insecurity (GWK512). It created a major change in his/her self-efficacy since he/she now knows what he/she wants and what his/her capabilities are. The career-coaching provided him/her with new insights, and reconstructed the organizational reality. The fact that the team leader completely supported him/her by facilitating this trajectory, changed his/her attitude in the team. We may call this sensegiving since, by offering the employee a training, the change agent supported the employee and as he/she mentions: “he added to my work-peace by offering this coaching” (GWK512). Both the efficacy and principal support dimensions were positively impacted.
Team outing.Also a team outing was mentioned multiple times, namely six. A team outing is defined as a team-gathering outside the office in order to do some informal activities, sometimes work-related, to create a team-feeling. As one employee explains his/her feelings about the impact of the team outing: “I think ‘together’ is important, getting to know each other. That gives a we-feeling. We can solve things together, we’re there for each other” (GWK522). A change in behaviour was created because team members got to know each other which resulted in a team spirit and a ‘together-feeling’. Another respondent mentions that it helps that the team leader ‘takes the initiative to create a team feeling’ and ‘going on the road together’ to develop the team (GWK513 & GWK519). This shows a positive impact of principal support. As employees explained, it helped to reduce the uncertainty which they felt in their new team and it created a team feeling. This may be called
sensegiving because the team leader used the team outings to influence the sensemaking process of the employees by creating a team feeling. It reconstructed organizational reality.
Training programme. A final form of organizing events is the training programme. With
this, all trainings are meant that have the goal to improve or add new skills or capabilities for
20
capable doing his/her job (GWK516). Offering these training programmes affected the employees. First, employees weren’t certain about their capabilities and did not know how to perform their job. However, through a training programme the change agent tried to reconstruct the organizational reality, and the employees now know how to do their job, which improved the self-efficacy: “Before I had no idea how to work with *name of programme*. My team leader told me to take lessons so I did two trainings and now, if I need it in my job, I have the knowledge to run this programme. I feel more secure now because I have the right capabilities.” (GWK516).
Absence of practice. Some respondents explain that their team leader does not organize
events though he facilitates the events and stimulates people to join. Within these teams, the initiative for a team outing or workshop comes from the team itself (GWK511, GWK513, GWK517,
GWK521). Others say that it is not necessary because they did not need it. If needed, they can ask for it. It does not change the attitude (GWK511, GWK518).
Table 11
Statements of interviewees regarding organizing events practices
Number Quote Respondent
Q6 “This year I’ve been seeking a little bit, what do I want and what is my role in the team? That’s why I’ve tried career-coaching, it helped me a lot. It created a lot of peace about my role in the team, I now know my capabilities, but it also helped me to find what really makes me happy.”
GWK512
Q7 “I asked my employee how he/she felt in his/her new job and he/she told me he/she wasn’t very happy. We spoke about a training to improve his/her way of working. Later he/she came to me and told me he/she was very happy because he/she felt someone had listened to him/her.”
GWK210
In Table 12, the summary of the results regarding the impact of the organizing events practice on the change readiness dimensions is shown.
Table 12
Summary results impact of organizing events practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Organizing events practice Principal support +
Efficacy +
Valence -
Situated Discourse Practices
21
Table 13
Forms of situated discourse practices
Practice Forms
Situated discourse practice Sharing rationales Sharing experiences
Sharing rationales. The first form of the situated discourse practice is the sharing of
rationales. This is defined as sharing the ideas behind a decision that has been made. Quote 8 shows that the change agent shares the rationales by taking employees on ‘the journey of the change’, as he calls it. The reasons why certain choices were made are shared with the employees. By sharing the reasons for choosing a certain direction, the change agent tries to give sense to his employees by providing a new organizational reality. Although the change agent explains this, no employee referred to this practice.
Sharing experiences. The final form of the situated discourse practice is sharing experiences.
Sharing experiences is defined as the ability of an employee to share his/her side of the story and discuss about this experience. Quote 9 shows that, when unrest in a group is detected, the change agent asked them to come together in order to share their side of the story. As the change agent mentions, this affected the attitudes of the employees since all function well again now, while before this intervention it wasn’t that well. Regarding sensegiving, this form influences the sensemaking process of the employees because, by taking away the unrest through discussing and sharing experiences, the tranquillity returned. However, no employee referred to experiencing this practice.
Table 14
Statements of interviewees regarding situated discourse practices
Number Quote Respondent
Q8 “What I do to is taking them on the journey of the change. I explain why we’ve made certain choices and share the reasons for why we
work in four locations right now.” GWK210 Q9 “When there is something going on, because I feel that there is confusion and unrest, I want everyone to come together so we all can
share our experiences. This often helps to clear the air. At least, last time this helped and these particular employees function very well again.”
GWK210
22
Table 15
Summary results impact of situated discourse practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Situated discourse practices Principal support -
Efficacy -
Valence -
Designing Structures Practices
Within this practice, three forms of designing structures were identified. Eleven out of the fifteen respondents spoke about one or multiple forms of this practice. The forms are shown in Table 16.
Table 16
Forms of designing structures practices
Practice Form
Providing new roles/offering chances Designing structures practice Making a team plan
Changing current roles
Providing new roles/offering chances. The form providing new roles was mentioned by five
respondents. With this form, all ways of providing extra tasks besides someone’s original tasks are meant. Respondents describe this also as offering chances. One change agents explains he consciously gives certain people certain tasks by taking into account their qualities, shown in quote 10. As he says: “I try to inspire and motivate people.” (GWK110). By doing this, a change agent provides an
employee with a new organizational reality since it broadens their tasks. He gives those people the extra tasks who he thinks is capable and enjoys doing it, which helps in job satisfaction. As shown in quote 11, 12 and 13, it creates a change in the attitude of employees because they feel enriched and their self-efficacy grows. Or, as another employee says: “I think he really utilizes my talents and that gives me a really good feeling.” (GWK522).
Making a team plan. Another form of designing structures was making a team plan. This
form is defined as a time path that is created by the team and for the team in which goals and priorities for the upcoming year are described. It was mentioned by five respondents. One respondent states that, through making a team plan, he/she knows how to divide the limited time, as shown in quote 14. A like-wise answer was given by two other respondents (GWK511 & GWK519). The team leader supported the team with providing information which resulted in the employees reconstructing organizational reality by having their priorities straight, also shown in quote 15. Employees were able to focus on important tasks which also improved the self-efficacy.
Changing current roles. The final form is changing current roles. Although it may look
23
a happier and better employee. It has been mentioned by three respondents. Two change agents changed the task of their employees in order to improve the well-being and the performance of the employee, as can be seen in quote 16 and 17. As quote 18 shows, it helps employees to improve their work well-being. The change agent purposefully changed the tasks, and with that tried to reconstruct the employees’ organizational reality, which affected the self-efficacy. It actually changed the attitude of the employee because “now he/she is very happy” and “he/she enjoys the work and performs well” (GWK210 & GWK410). Since the team leader also supports an employee by a change in tasks, also principal support is present.
Table 17
Statements of interviewees regarding designing structures practices
Number Quote Respondent
Q10 qualities, then I give this person the task, of course after consulting with “If I think someone is very suitable for a certain task based on their this person first and taking the current workload into account. It helps
my employees to keep having fun in their job.”
“I try to inspire and motivate, not through finding the information internally, but especially outside. I hope someone then returns and he saw something, discovered it and developed it, that’s how I would like
to see it.”
GWK110
Q11 “Look, his (the change agent) goal is not to create a new role or task, it is to give people faith and let them stand in their own power, and I
really feel it that way”
GWK511
Q12 help fixing it. Because of your qualities I think you are perfectly capable “My team leader just said: “Look, we have a problem, I see you can
of doing it, do you have time to do it?” GWK515 Q13 developments. I was able to go to a conference the whole day in order “My team leader is very forward-thinking and open to new
to see the new developments and bring them back to the organization and that’s what I enjoy doing.”
GWK514
Q14 “It provides clarity in having our priorities straight, which means it is more concrete how to divide the limited time we have. Before having this plan, it was sometimes hard to divide the time and trying to focus
on our main task instead of the smaller, less important tasks.”
GWK517
Q15 “We together created a team plan with a time-line and priorities for the coming year in it. If a team leader says, this task has the priority now, even if I think that is not really true, I would still contribute to make it
happen.”
GWK511
Q16 wasn’t suitable for the role he/she had. Now he/she is very happy with “I changed the job of one of my employees because I thought he/she
what he/she is doing and not sick anymore.” GWK210 Q17 “There was one employee who wasn’t satisfied nor happy with the task he/she needed to do. So we decided to move away from the original job
description and changed the job. Now this person enjoys the work he/she is doing and performs very well.”
GWK410
Q18 to do. He understood it immediately and decided to split my official task “Well, for me personally, he saw me struggling because I had too much
24
In Table 18, the results regarding the impact of the forms of the designing structures practice on the readiness dimensions is summed up.
Table 18
Summary results impact of designing structures practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Designing structures practice Principal support +
Efficacy +
Valence -
It is worth noting that one employee says that the team leader did not use any practice. This has not affected the attitude since the employee did not need the support either (GWK518).
In addition to the five practices discussed above, three other practices surfaced in the whole of interviews held, to be labelled, successively: facilitation practices, appreciation practices and team support practice. In the following paragraphs, the results regarding these practices are shown.
Facilitation Practices
Facilitation practices are defined as supporting people by listening and providing solutions for the employee when faced with difficulties, in work or private life. This is a sensegiving practice because, by supporting someone, the team leader tries to influence the sensemaking of an employee towards a preferred new organizational reality. Two types of facilitation practices are identified, as shown in the Table 19.
Table 19
Forms of facilitation practices
Practice
Form
Facilitation practice Showing support Feeling heard
Showing support. The form showing support is defined as the feeling of the employee that
25
Feeling heard.The form feeling heard is mentioned by five respondents. It is defined as listen and give attention to employees with the purpose of letting employees feel heard. The second quote by an employee shows that, because of the listening of the change agent, the peace and calm returned after the holidays and the third and fourth quote show that the employees ‘feel heard’ (GWK522) and they ‘get a good feeling’ (GWK513). As shown in the fifth quote, the change agent notices that people contribute because he really listens to them. The change agent influenced the sensemaking process of the employees by listening to employees and through that, a new organizational reality was created for employees. This is shown in quote 2 because the team leader took away the restlessness by listening and peace and calm returned. This equalizes principal support. It must be mentioned that, as
experienced by the employees, feeling heard does contribute for a change in attitude.
Table 20
Statements of interviewees regarding facilitation practices
Number
Quote
Respondent
Q1 there for us. It makes me feel positive and I think this is part of the team “He really defends our interest at the managing board and tries to be
leader’s job.” GWK517
Q2 “After summer holiday, the peace and clam returned. My team coach did that through really listening, giving attention and taking things
seriously. Often by talking with us personally or in the group.” GWK514 Q3 “His open attitude and loose way of communication helps that we feel
heard.” GWK522
Q4 “He is very accessible and I really feel like, yes, I can tell my story. It
all has to do with the good feeling I get.” GWK513 Q5 “I’ve tried to be as much open as possible in communication, I think it
creates an “open” environment in which the employees can contribute thing and they feel I actually do listen to them. I kind of feel that they
find it pleasant.”
GWK410
Table 21 shows a summary of the results regarding the forms of the facilitation practice.
Table 21
Summary results impact of facilitation practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Facilitation practice Principal support +
Efficacy -
Valence -
Appreciation Practices
Appreciation practices are defined as the change agent recognizing the value of the employee and expressing this. It reduces the uncertainty of employees by confirming their value, which results in a redefinition of their organizational reality. Under appreciation practices, one form can be
26
Show appreciation
.
With showing appreciation, giving compliments by comforting people or rewarding people is meant. It is referred to by four employees. An employee said he/she wascomforted because his/her team leader said ‘to worry a little less and lower my standards’ (GWK516). He/she explained it helped in growing his/her self-efficacy since the feeling of pressure to perform perfectly, while there was so much still unclear about the job, was causing stress and the team leader took that away. This shows sensegiving because the team leader supported him/her to get him/her in the right direction by taking away uncertainties and showing it was okay to perform the way he/she did. It impacted the dimensions self-efficacy and principal support. Two respondents mentioned showing appreciation because the employees got a task from the change agent while he asked: ‘can you take care of this because I know you’re really good in doing this’ (GWK511), or ‘he asks me for advice and I appreciate that a lot’ (GWK522). The employees told they felt more appreciated because of receiving this task which resulted in growing confidence about their capabilities. A change agent mentions he misses the practice of naming the successes because ‘sharing successes with each other, show what we made of the things we only worked out on paper at first’ (GWK210).
Table 22 shows the summarized results regarding the appreciation practice.
Table 22
Summary results impact of appreciation practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Appreciation practice Principal support +
Efficacy +
Valence -
Team Support Practice
Although the previous forms of practices all focused on the team leader, the respondents often referred to their team as an important factor influencing their meaning construction. The team members
supported each other in the period of uncertainty after the merge, as shown in quote 6 and 7.
27
Table 23
Statements of interviewees regarding team support practice
Number Quote Respondent
Q6 “The vibes in our team were very good, that really helped in having fun
on the job and also helped us getting through the turbulent period” GWK511 Q7 “I think as team members we supported each other in the many
insecurities after the merge and we together tried to find our ways” GWK410 Q8 “As a team we have a lot of fun, everyone is committed and enthusiastic
and it gives a really good vibe. It helps being open and committed yourself. My team really helped me getting through the rough time I had
before”
GWK512
Q19 “There is just chemistry between us, and I’m really proud of my team. Even if you feel down, there is room for that too. That changed my
attitude a little because I feel more comfortable now.”
GWK513
In Table 24, the results regarding the team support practices are summed up.
Table 24
Summary results impact of team support practices
Practice Readiness dimensions Impact
Discrepancy -
Appropriateness -
Team support practice Principal support +
Efficacy -
Valence -
Most Impact Practice
28
Discussion
The aim of the research was to find out to what extent the sensegiving practices of a change agent contribute to the change readiness of recipients. In the first part of the discussion, the main conclusions about the theorized and the emerged sensegiving practices are addressed. After that, the theoretical and managerial implications are discussed, followed by the limitations and future research. The section finalizes with a short conclusion.
Main Conclusions Theorized Sensegiving Practices
The study findings showed presence of all five practices, although not every practice is equally present nor contributes to change readiness as much as the others. Neither do the sensegiving practices
influence all dimensions of change readiness.
Regarding the discursive practices, outcomes of the conducted interviews showed that all three types of meetings: weekly, personal and informative sessions, are of great importance. Current
literature suggests that the purpose of this practice is to provide people with clear information (Maitlis, 2005; Sonenshein, 2006). However, the findings of this research imply that, besides the sharing of information, the meetings are especially important because of the social aspect. Respondents explain that it changed their attitude because uncertainty was reduced and peace was brought by the change agent and also the connection with team members is important. The results indicate, when present a positive impact on the readiness dimensions principal support and efficacy. This is consistent with the literature about perceived organizational support (POS) which explains that POS fosters change readiness (Gigliotti, Vardaman, Marshall, & Gonzalez, 2018). However, in case of the absence of a previously present meeting of the managing board, a negative impact on change readiness was suggested. Respondents indicate they did not have a sense of direction anymore. Therefore, the findings on the discursive practices show ambivalent results regarding the impact on the readiness dimensions principal support and efficacy. No results of the impact of discursive practices on the dimensions discrepancy, appropriateness or valence came forward.
29
The outcomes of the conducted interviews regarding the organizing events practice, show a positive impact on the efficacy of employees. By organizing trainings or career-coaching employees redefined their organizational reality by gaining new capabilities which made them more secure in the job. The form team outing contributed to the dimension principal support. The team leaders facilitate the team outings by providing resources, but do not organize the team outings themselves. This result is consistent with existing literature of Rafferty et al. (2013), which shows that principal support is done through providing resources. It shows an impact on the sensemaking of the employee because the team outings contributed to the creation of a team feeling, which suggests a change in organizational reality. There are no results of the presence of the impact of this practice on the other three
dimensions.
Unlike the findings of the previous practices, the findings of the research regarding situated discourse practices show less strong contributions to change readiness, and are therefore ambivalent. Even though the change agent noticed a positive change in attitude after he used a form of situated discourse practices, recipients do not indicate a contribution to the readiness dimensions. However, one change agent mentions contributing to change readiness by sharing the rationales behind the decision by explaining why the change is necessary, and therefore adds to the sense of
appropriateness. This is in congruence with the literature of Dutton and Ashford (1993), which explains that the use of the practice contributes in understanding the issue. Thus, this practice may be helpful when one tries to influence the change readiness of an employee but this study cannot confirm nor reject this.
The last practice from theory, the designing structures practice, enhances change readiness when the practice is present. All forms: providing new roles, making a team plan or changing current roles, changed the readiness of the employees and influenced the self-efficacy of the employee. Especially the provision of new roles and the change of current roles created a redefinition of organizational reality because it created more confidence and greater self-efficacy since employees were asked to broaden their current tasks. In one case, it even showed a change in principal support because the team leader saw the struggles of the employee and decided to split his/her tasks. He/she felt the support of the team leader because he had listened to him/her. There are no results regarding the impact of this practice on the discrepancy, appropriateness or valence of the employee.
30
Main Conclusions Emerged Sensegiving Practices
Besides the five sensegiving practices that were found in the literature, the results from the interviews showed three other important sensegiving practices. Although the word ‘practices’ is used for the theorized practices, some respondents suggested to name the emerged practices qualities instead of practices. This is because the results do not show a practice, but more a certain skill or personal characteristic of the team leader. However, for the sake of clarity, the emerged practices, will still be named ‘practices’.
Within the facilitation practice, respondents explained that it was important that their change agent facilitates them by showing support and listening. As a matter of fact, when asked what practice had had the most impact on the attitude, showing support was the practice that was mentioned the most. The feeling of someone having their back and having employees’ best interest in mind created a change in readiness. It reduced the uncertainty employees were faced with, which suggests a
redefinition of organizational reality. Although prior research suggest principal support is only shown by providing resources and information (Armenakis et al., 1993), later research adds psychological safety (Sonenshein, 2010). This research confirms this addition and shows, by providing room when things privately aren’t going well, or when interests need to be defended, the change agent influenced the employee in providing psychological safety.
The second practice that emerged from the interviews is the appreciation practice. The study findings indicate that, by rewarding or comforting people, change agents can influence the change readiness of employees. It reduces the uncertainty of employees by confirming their capabilities, which results in a reconstruction of organizational reality. This practice does not relate to any of the theorized practices although it is important to include since it contributes to the self-efficacy of employees. As part of the definition of self-efficacy explains, it gives people confidence in their capabilities (Holt et al., 2007). Through showing appreciation change readiness is influenced.
31
Theoretical Implications
In current literature, there is little to no prior research which examines the contribution of sensegiving practices to change readiness. Although the contribution of sensegiving practices to change resistance is researched (Vos & Rupert, 2018), the effects on the positive side, the change readiness, has not been examined. By executing this research, the use of five theorized sensegiving practices was investigated, while three new practices came forward that a change agent can use to enhance change readiness. The findings confirm the use of discursive, organizing events, and designing structure practices and its impact on the self-efficacy and principal support dimensions. This results in a number of theoretical implications.
This study shows that discursive practices, organizing events and designing structures are important practices that should be taken into account when one tries to affect the change readiness. This partly confirms the work of Sharma and Good (2013) and Kraft et al. (2015). They argue that also symbolic practices, and situated discourse practices are sensegiving practices that may affect the sensemaking process of the employee. However, the study findings regarding the situated discourse practices do not provide substance of the effects on sensemaking, neither is it clear if it affects change readiness. Regarding the symbolic practice, employees did not mention the presence of the practice, nor the effects. To conclude, the study shows no results regarding two theorized sensegiving practices that change leaders can use to influence the change readiness of recipients. However, the three other theorized practices show a positive impact on sensemaking, and through that on change readiness. While the findings show that the practices do influence the change readiness dimensions self-efficacy and principal support, the sense of discrepancy, the appropriateness and the valence have not been mentioned.
While the above-mentioned sensegiving practices focus on the formal and practical side, theory on sensegiving practices may be extended by including also personal qualities of the team leaders with including the facilitation and appreciation practice. Employees emphasize the importance of these practices by naming these the actions of the team leaders that had the most impact on their change attitude and readiness. One may even notice that the theorized sensegiving practices resemble the task-related, transactional leadership style while the emerged practices focus on the
