Organizational change describes the process of transformation within an organization that is seen to occur at any level of it operations or departments that may take place in any given area (Kouzes and Bulker, 2007). It is a concept that challenges nurses to “become comfortable with chaos and disequilibrium and adopt a new perspective on change” which Grossman and Valiga find to be essential qualities for nurturing change within an organization (2005). In undertaking the process of change in organizations there are factors that one needs to consider which have implications in the way that change will occur within the organization. One of the most important factors that I realize to be crucial to the process of change within an organization is the form leadership that is flexible and collaborative and which promotes change across boundaries through partnership (Grossman and Valiga, 2005). Based on my leadership style which I have previously determined to be democratic, the result of the scores that I obtained from part 1 and part 2 Readiness-to-Change quotients indicates that both I and the organization are in a state that would greatly support any form of organizational change (Grossman and Valiga, 2005).
Some of the most important insights that I gained through this assessment and throughout the study of the resource material for this exercise is that there are five steps that are integral in the process of managing chaos and thereby effect change within an organization, that is; improvisation, regeneration, co-adaptation, time-pacing, experimentation (Grossman and Valiga, 2005). Other factors that influence change are resistance and inertia; resistance in this case refers to the way that people refuse to respond to the process of change in toto, while inertia is when personnel in an organization are unable to adopt to change because they are unable to break away from the routine of everyday work processes (Bertolotti, Macrì and Tagliaventi, 2002; (Keen, 1981). In the context of the health facility in which I work, all these factors interact together to influence the way in which change takes place within the health facility in which I am the director.
Because my leadership style plays an important role in influencing the environment in which change should ideally take place within this health facility, an example of an area that I would therefore like to focus my effort in order to influence my readiness to change would be on my leadership style. As a leader I will put more efforts in adopting the five-step strategy for managing chaos and preparing for change in work place. Some of the things that I will undertake in the facility is reforming of the surgery programs that we run to be more aligned to the changing trends of the society lifestyles, particularly having to prepare the facility to provide more cosmetic plastic surgeries rather than plastic surgery for medical reasons than is currently the case while at the same time change the negative perception on cosmetic surgery that most people still have. A major obstacle that I will have to overcome during this process is promoting the use of cosmetic plastic surgery especially among men which I hope to achieve by showing its positive impact.
On the other hand, in promoting my health facility readiness to change I will seek to make sure that both employees as well as my management style facilitate change within the facility. This could involve implementing specific training programs for employees to empower them in changing client’s negative perception of medical surgeries for cosmetic reasons. In addition I will implement other reform programs such as recruit more cosmetic surgeons and put in place facilities that would cater for a wider range of cosmetic surgeries which is bound to become more popular in future. Because I have acquired new knowledge on the subject of change in organization, I believe I have been empowered as a health professional to take a more proactive role and explore innovative methods that I can apply within this health facility to bring about the desirable change process that I envision for it.
References
Bertolotti, F., Macrì, D. & Tagliaventi, R. (2002). Spontaneous Self-Managing Practices in Groups: Evidence From the Field Journal. Web.
Grossman, S. & Valiga, T. (2005). The New Leadership Challenge: Creating the Future of Nursing New York: Fa Davis Co.
Kouzes, J. and Bulker, P. (2007). The Leadership Challenge. California, CA: Jossey Bass Publishers.
Keen, P. (1981). Information systems and organizational change. Web.