Free Managing A Dynamic Environment Essay Example

Organizational change does not augur well with every employee across the organization. Employees have an incentive to resist change in fear that perhaps they will lose their job positions if they welcome the change initiatives. Some employees resist change in a bid to save face in regards to the inadequacy in job skills. Change is also resisted because of employees’ inability and unwillingness to adapt to whatever is novel to them. In this sense, it is justifiable to argue that the employees do not resist the change itself; rather, they resist being changed. It is human nature to be content with the status quo, and hence, it is very rare for people to accept the ‘torture’ of learning new things. In fact, the employees regard it easy to cling to what is known as compared to novel things. Besides, cultural and attitudinal factors emerge as primal barriers to change in organizations. Employees accept change that adheres to their cultural norms and protest the change that goes against these norms by creating a negative attitude. Economic factors can also serve as a barrier to change in the organization. Nevertheless, the resistance and existing barriers to change is no reason for the organization to tune out continuous change initiatives across the firm since this will spell the end of the entire company. The management of the company ought to undertake various strategies to overcome the barriers and resistance to change in order for the company to succeed (Hall, 2008). Saudi Aramco has undertaken sizable change initiatives over the years; however, there have been resistance and barriers to this change. This discussion will describe the various strategies in the disposal of Saudi Aramco in its attempt to subdue the resistance and barriers to change.
The change in Saudi Aramco has been defined in every aspect of it. The initiative to integrate women into the workforce of the company has been resisted by the male employees, as well as the inexperience of the women themselves. This situation makes it difficult for empowering women since change should be initiated by the female gender in the society. Moreover, the Islamic culture has been a roadblock to the success of this initiative since it encourages the treatment of women as inferior beings. The initiative to capitalize on human capital through training and development has been resisted by those in the managerial position, as well as the negative attitudes among the employees. Also, the company’s initiative to become environmentally conscious apart from upholding its corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been hindered by the dropping oil prices across the globe. However, this does not mean that Saudi Aramco is down the road to its failure and eventual closure. There is room for improvement, and this can be made possible through a myriad of strategies that concern for this problem.
The change manager at Saudi Aramco ought to increasingly rely on education and communication to overcome the barriers and resistance to change in the company. The employees have to be convinced that there exists a problem; the problem is real and that it is only through change that the problem will be solved (Manuela, 2011). For instance, the shortage of skilled employees at Saudi Aramco is a real problem, and the change manager should communicate this to the employee. Subsequently, he or she should suggest that through exploring the untapped talent of women in Saudi Arabia and the rest of the world, as well as investing in training and development, the company will be able to get the better of this situation. The change agent could propose that the idea of integrating women into the workforce is aimed at helping the modern families to keep up with the rising cost of living in the sense that the salary of the father is complemented by that of the mother rather than having the mother as a housewife. In essence, the change manager will be seeking to generate support from the employees, and thus, convincing them to embrace the change.
Saudi Aramco could also use the participation and involvement strategy to surmount the barriers and resistance to change. Employees need to have a great stake in making the decisions that breed change in the organization (Hall, 2008). The change initiatives are implemented by the employees, and by welcoming their participation and involvement in the making the change decisions, the level of resistance is scaled down. For instance, when making decisions concerning the taking advantage of human capital through training and development, the entire workforce should be invited to be involved, allowed to give feedback followed with continuous encouragement of the employees to own the change process. In so doing, the abilities and intelligence of the employees are respected and appreciated (Michalak, 2010). The employees lack any incentive to resist change when they consider the change initiative as their own through participation and involvement in the decision-making process.
The facilitation and support strategy egresses as an ideal strategy for Saudi Aramco to overcome resistance to change. It has been hashed out that the women who are indicted into leadership positions and the workforce of the company, in general, have experienced difficulties in undertaking their roles due to the lack of prior experience with men. The change manager should facilitate and support these women by forecasting the potential difficulties they may encounter in the course of the change process followed by a plan on how to tackle these adversaries (Yilmaz, D & Golhan, 2013). For instance, the women leaders could be encouraged to punish those employees who do not respect their orders on gender grounds. They can do this by using the legal power to persecute the employees through arresting and charging them to the rule of law.
What is more is that Saudi Aramco had better keep the degree of bureaucracy and hierarchy down to get over the resistance to change. Rigidity in Saudi Aramco seems to be the force behind the resistance of capitalization of human capital through training and development. It is because the employees are unable to communicate, both horizontally and vertically. Given this, it is difficult to share ideas and grievances. Failure to address grievances and concerns of employees engenders a negative attitude towards the change initiative. According to Lenz (2010), through embracing flatter hierarchies and leaning out the excessive bureaucracy, the communication network in the Saudi Aramco will be ameliorated and, therefore, the roadblocks to change are obviated.
Conversely, the economic barrier to organizational change in Saudi Aramco is beyond the control of the company. However, through the negotiation and agreement strategy, the change manager is able to spawn a significant impact in bringing down the consequences of the dropping oil prices in implementing economic conservation and corporate social responsibility change in the company. The change manager should negotiate with those employees who fail to recognize environment conservation and CSR initiatives as a matter of priority and reach an agreement. Having adopted and participation and involvement strategy, it is well-conceived to compliment it with a negotiation and agreement strategy in the sense that the change manager helps the resisting employees to delimitate the importance of being conscious about the environment and giving back to the society (Yilmaz and Golhan, 2013). By so doing, the budget of the company can be adjusted in such a way that CSR and environment conservation programs are given much weight, and in this way trivially affected by the global drop in oil prices.

References

Hall, A. (2008). Overcoming Resistance to Organizational Change Initiatives. Minneapolis, MN:
Capella University Press.
Lenz, R. K. (2010). Post-LBO development: Analysis of changes in strategy, operations, and
performance after the exit from leveraged buyouts in Germany. Wiesbaden: Gabler Verlag.
Manuela, P.V & Clara, M.F. (2011). Resistance to Change: A Literature Review and Empirical
Study. Spain, Valencia: University of Valencia.
Michalak, J. M. (2010). Cultural Catalysts and Barriers of Organizational Change Management:
a Preliminary Overview. Journal of Intercultural Management, Vol. 2 (2), pp. 26–36
Yilmaz, D & Golhan, K. (2013).Resistance To Change And Ways Of Reducing Resistance In
Educational Organizations. European Journal of Research and Education, Vol. 1(1), pp. 14-21