Session Information
Paper Session
Contribution
The fact that various internal and external forces are pushing educational organizations to change structural-functional aspects makes organizational change (OC) one of the concerns in educational research. The internal and external environments which are characterized by high turbulence, velocity, and dynamism are no exception for educational organizations. Mastering change becomes crucial for the effectiveness of educational organizations. The efforts to understand and develop implementation guidelines have produced competitive theories and implementation models in the field of organizational change. (e.g., Gersick, 1991; Porras and Robertson, 1992; Armenakis and Bedeian, 1999; Beer and Nohria, 2000; Burke and Litwin, 1992; Van de Ven and Poole, 1995). Even though there is a wide theoretical and practical literature on OC the question of how to change is still at the core of organization science. There is not an integrated theory or framework to deal with change, which is believed to be one of the main reasons behind failure of change initiatives (Beer and Nohria, 2000). The fact that the majority of OC attempts fail is the reason behind the frustration of scholars and practitioners in the field because each failure brings serious damage to organizations’ financial and human portfolios (Clegg and Walsh 2004; Devos and Buelens, 2003; Whelan-Berry, et al., 2003; Beer and Nohria, 2000; Kotter, 1996).
Beer and Nohria (2000) stated that varied theoretical tools of change are available, yet the inability to read these perspectives and articulate a clear and focused change approach addressing what, why, and how to change is the main reason behind the failure of OC initiatives. Clegg and Walsh (2004) indicated that lack of an integrated change perspective and fragmented way of thinking about change is a limitation in the existing thinking of OC. Clegg and Walsh (2004) stated that such thinking lead to over concentration on technical aspects of change, while ignoring the human aspect of change, which inevitably results in failure.
In addition to these criticisms several other scholars advanced different limitations in the existing conceptualization of change. Over concentrating on stability rather than on change (Tsoukas and Chia, 2002; Brown and Eisenhardt, 1997; Orlikowski, 1996), perceiving change as an extraordinary preoccupation (March, 1981) and concentrating on dramatic change and ignoring micro-level changes (Tsoukas and Chia, 2002), conceiving change as a product of intentional plan or program and ignoring the unintentional and emergent side of change (Brown and Eisenhardt, 1997; Orlikowski and Hofman, 1997) are some of the criticisms advanced to the existing change approaches. These limitations clearly suggest the need for a different conceptualization of OC.
These criticisms suggest a pathway toward a new change perspective which is characterized as ongoing, evolving, micro-level, bottom-up and embedded in daily practices of organizational members (e.g., Weick & Quinn, 1999; Tsoukas & Chia, 2002; Feldman, 2000 Orlikowski, 1996). This study aims to study one aspect of this change approach in educational organizations. The study specifically studies the process factors (knowledge sharing, networking, social interaction, perceived autonomy, participation) as predictors of continuous change behavior.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Armenakis, A. A., & Bedeian, A. G. (1999). Organizational change: A review of theory and research in the 1990s. Journal of Management, 25(3), 293-315. Beer, & N. Nohria (Eds.), Breaking the code of change (pp. 1-35). Boston MA: Harvard Business School Press. Brown, S. L., & Eisenhardt, K. M. (1997). The art of continuous change: Linking complexity theory and time-paced evolution in relentlessly shifting organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42(1), 1-34. Burke, W. W., & Litwin, G. H. (1992). A causal model of organizational performance and change. Journal of Management, 18(3), 532-545. Clegg, C., & Walsh, S. (2004). Change management: Time for a change! European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 13(2), 217-239. Devos, G., & Buelens, M. (2003). Openness to organizational change: The contribution of content, context, and process. Vlerick Leuven Gent Working Paper Series. Feldman, M. (2000). Organizational routines as a source of continuous change. Organization Science, 11(6), 611-629. Ford, J. D., & Ford, L. W. (1995). The role of conversations in producing intentional change in organizations. Academy of Management Review, 20(3), 541-570. Kotter, J. P. (1996). Leading change. Boston: Harvard Business School. Lewis, L. K. (2000a). Communicating change: Four cases of quality programs. The Journal of Business Communication, 37(2), 128-155. March, J. G. (1981). Footnotes to organizational change. Administrative Science Quarterly, 26(4), 563-577. Orlikowski, W. J. (1996). Improvising organizational transformation over time: A situated change perspective. Information Systems Research, 7(1), 63-92. Orlikowski, W. J., & Hofman, J. D. (1997). An improvisational model for change management: The case of groupware technologies. Sloan Management Review, 38(2), 11-21. Tsoukas, H., & Chia, R. (2002). On organizational becoming: Rethinking organizational change. Organization Science, 13(5), 567-582.
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