Ch. 14

• Sacred Cow Hunts


  Organization-wide attempt to get rid of the practices that are no longer useful
• Sacred Cow Hunts


  1. First step towards organizational change

  2. Paper Cow - unnecessary paperwork - usually forms and reports that organizations money to prepare, distribute, and read

  3. Consider the extent to which the paperwork increases efficiency, productivity, or quality

  4. Meeting Cow - number and length of meetings

  5. Speed Cow - unnecessary deadlines
• Stages of Employees Acceptance of Change

  • Denial
  • Defense
  • Discarding
  • Adaptation
  • Internalization
• Evolutionary Change


  • Continual process of upgrading or improving processes
• Revolutionary Change


  • Drastic changes
• Types of Change Agents

  • People who enjoy change and often make changes just for the sake of its
  • Not afraid to change or make changes but want to make changes only if the changes will improve the organization
  • Probably will not instigate change but are willing to change
  • Not instigate or welcome change, but they will change if necessary
  • Hate changes
• Implementing Change


  1. Create dissatisfaction with the current system

  2. Reduce fear of change by providing emotional support

  3. Employees should be aware of and involved in all aspects of change from initial planning to implementation

  4. The longer it takes to change, the greater opportunity for things to go wrong and the greater chance that employees will become disillusioned

  5. Train employees after major change
• Organizational Culture


  • Corporate climate
  • The shared values, beliefs, and traditions that exist among individuals in organizations
  • Establishes workplace norms of appropriate behavior and defines roles and expectations that employees and management have of each other
• Steps in Assessing the New Culture

  1. Needs Assessment

  2. Determining Executive Direction

  3. Implementing Considerations

  4. Training

  5. Evaluation of New Culture
• Rewarding current employees for successfully participating and cooperating with the new system is imperative
• Selection of employees must be based on how well they epitomize the new culture
• Organizational Socialization


  Process whereby new employees learn the behaviors and attitudes they need to be successful in the organization
• Rituals


  Procedures in which employees participate to become "one of the gang"
• Symbols


  Communication tools that convey certain messages to employees
• Factors in Making the Decision to Empower

  • Importance of Decision Quality
  • Leader Knowledge of the Problem Area
  • Structure of the Problem
  • Importance of Decision Acceptance
  • Probability of Decision Acceptance
  • Subordinate Trust and Motivation
  • Probability of Subordinate Conflict
• Decision-Making Strategies using the Vroom-Yetton Model

  • Autocratic I - leaders use the available information to make decisions without consulting their subordinates
  • Autocratic II - leaders obtain necessary information from their subordinates and then make their own decisions
  • Consultative I - share the problem on an individual basis with some or all of their subordinates
  • Consultative II - share problems with their subordinates as a group
  • Group I - shares the problem with the group and lets the group reach a solution
• Levels of Employee Input

  • Employees at the Following level have no real control over their jobs
  • When employees have ownership of their own product, they are still told of what they should do but they are responsible for the quality of their output
  • At advisory level, employees are asked to provide feedback, suggestions, and input into a variety of organizational concerns
  • At Shared/Participative/Team level, employees are now allowed to make decisions but as a group
  • Final level of Employee Input, Absolute, allows an employee to give full authority to make decisions on their own
• In this chart, for each task/level, range of control/input is allowed
• Higher level of control/input

  Many positive aspects = increased pay, job security, and increased potential to find other employment = increased stress, responsibility
• Flextime


  Work schedule in which employees have some flexibility in the hours they work
• Bandwidth


  Total no of potential hours available for work each day
• Core Hours


  Everyone must work and typically consist of the hours during which an organization is busiest with its outside contacts
• Flexible Hours


  Remain in bandwidth and in which the employee has a choice of working
• Gliding Time


  Employees can choose her own hours without advance notice or scheduling
• Flexitour or Modified Flexitour


  Employee enjoying greater flexibility in working hours, although it must be scheduled in advance
• Compressed Workweeks


  Deviation from the typical five-day workweek and usually involve either 10-hrs a day for four days or 12-hrs for 3 days
• Peak-Time Pay


  Employees are encourage to work only part time but are paid at higher hourly rate for those hours than employees who work full time
• Casual Work


  Employee works on an irregular or as-needed basis
• Job Sharing


  Two employees who share work hours
• Telecommuting


  Employee uses computer to electronically interact with the central office
• Reducing the Impact of Downsizing

  1. Freeze hiring new permanent employees

  2. Outsourcing - using outside vendors to provide services previously performed internally

  3. Encourage employees to change careers and then help them to learn skills needed for the career change

  4. Offer early retirement packages

  5. Ask employees to take pay cuts or defer salary increases

  6. Adjusting work schedules

  7. Layoff announcements must be done in person

  8. Outplacement programs: Emotional Counseling (Denial, Anger, Fear Acceptance), Financial Counseling, Career Assessment and Guidance
• Increased headaches, stomach upsets, sleeping problems, cholesterol levels and etc. due to downsizing
• High level of stress, substance abuse, marital problems, depression due to downsizing
• Survivors from downsizing suffer psychological trauma and worries that their future productivity is related to the way in which they and their not so fortunate counterparts are treated during the downsizing process