According to a Greek philosopher Heraclitus, change is the only constant. But, can we submissively accept the changes that may happen or just happened in our life and even in the organization where we belong? Many of us people may be very open-minded to whatever changes may happen, but, what if it is against the principles we believe in. Are we still willing to embrace the changes? These are the questions that hooked up when we talked about change.
As what I have read from the site http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_82.htm, there are eight (8) steps on implementing change powerfully and successfully. These are the following:
1. Create Urgency
For change to happen, it helps if the whole company really wants it. Develop a sense of urgency around the need for change. This may help you spark the initial motivation to get things moving.
In the organization where I belong, step one is really lenient. They make things very urgent as it was like a chili that automatically savors its hot. One of the changes I encountered lately was the academic loading. They really want that faculties should only have 24 units and 6 units overload without considering that it’s second semester and if they want to limit the loading from 36 units to 24 units, the result is, lack of faculty member. But the transition is only two weeks (semestral break), how can we find new instructor for that time frame? Consequence is, up until now there is one instructor lacking that has 27 units. Who suffers? The students and we - co-faculty that alternately teaches the subject load. Imagine in my case, I have 24 units load and 3 units overload but I took the 6 units of 27 units every week without pay. For the case of my co-faculty, she took 12 units of 27 units every week without pay also. The advantage is for them, they can have less expense paying a single employee. It is really unfair for us, holding a class without pay.
2. Form a Powerful Coalition
Convince people that change is necessary. This often takes strong leadership and visible support from key people within your organization. Managing change isn't enough – you have to lead it.
You can find effective change leaders throughout your organization – they don't necessarily follow the traditional company hierarchy. To lead change, you need to bring together a coalition, or team, of influential people whose power comes from a variety of sources, including job title, status, expertise, and political importance.
Here, identifying true leaders is very essential. But, what happen in our organization is managers appointed by Head Office are not leaders. No possess leadership. As the situation I mentioned above, they did not take the full responsibility on how we can acquire new instructor. Like no job vacancy posters were being posted. They just want some kind of referrals. Pitfall is hesitant to refer because we do not know if higher position found new instructor already. I personally do not want that my referral is expecting too much yet unable to be accepted.
3. Create a Vision for Change
When you first start thinking about change, there will probably be many great ideas and solutions floating around. Link these concepts to an overall vision that people can grasp easily and remember.
Well, for what happened to us we cannot grasp the drastic change because what we figure out to the vision is the pitfall that might happen considering that no proper hiring of new instructor and transition period is very short.
4. Communicate the Vision
What you do with your vision after you create it will determine your success. Your message will probably have strong competition from other day-to-day communications within the company, so you need to communicate it frequently and powerfully, and embed it within everything that you do.
Don't just call special meetings to communicate your vision. Instead, talk about it every chance you get. Use the vision daily to make decisions and solve problems. When you keep it fresh on everyone's minds, they'll remember it and respond to it.
It's also important to "walk the talk." What you do is far more important – and believable – than what you say. Demonstrate the kind of behavior that you want from others.
On this step, “walk the talk” is not applied. Why? For the reason that no meetings, no update, no proper dissemination of information is given to us from the higher ups.
5. Remove Obstacles
Put in place the structure for change, and continually check for barriers to it. Removing obstacles can empower the people you need to execute your vision, and it can help the change move forward.
Here, Obstacles are barriers that hinder the change but how can we remove it when it is a psychological infection of the administrator. It is somewhat monopolizing his subordinate like political agenda.
6. Create Short-term Wins
Nothing motivates more than success. Give your company a taste of victory early in the change process.
Now, how can we taste the victory when the main thing that motivates us was deprived? We are not well-compensated knowing that up until now we are suffering to teach the 27 units of the new instructor.
7. Build on Change
Change projects fail because victory is declared too early. Real change runs deep. Quick wins are only the beginning of what needs to be done to achieve long-term change.
On this step, after every win, what went right and what needs improving must be analyzed. Learn about Kaizen, a Japanese term which means change for the good. Well, we appreciate the change they want to implement. Thinking that we will only have 24 teaching load every week is much easier and hassle-free. But thinking also to the other side of the coin like what if there will be no new instructor, what will happen - which was actually what is happening. Time frame and transition must be considered when building on change.
8. Anchor the Change in Corporate Culture
Finally, to make any change stick, it should become part of the core of your organization. Your corporate culture often determines what gets done, so the values behind your vision must show in day-to-day work.
Well then for this step, change was actually anchored in our organization because we do not have any choice since the Head Quarter want this new policy to be implemented this second semester for the reason that it is mandated by CHED. But since we are educational center (offer 2-year program), some of those items on the policy were compromised. The one that is most affected is us – faculty members.
Knowing those steps makes me realize that my organization where am into is really havoc. Implementing change without organizing it leads to failure. I am an open-minded person, I can submissively accept change if its projection is clearly for good and in the proper organization under effective leaders. Since, it is the opposite; I cannot really embrace the change that is happening to us right now.
