Change Management
Evidently, the Prime Mover Company is implementing a major change through the expansion of its operations in two other regions. If the change is not well implemented, there can be serious issues with the human resource management, especially given the fact that the company will be hiring some new employees to work in the new subsidiaries. The new employees will have to work with some of the workers, including managers, from the parent organization. There will also be the workers already employed in the subsidiaries, who will remain to work for the newly recruited ones. The change presents both an opportunity for increased productivity and a challenge regarding cultural, ethical, and human resource management. In fact, challenges may arise based on the potential for conflict relating to the management of employees from diverse cultures. Hence, it is critical to implement effective human resource management strategies to identify the possible issues and effectively manage them to alleviate more issues for the organization.
Tools for Use in Identifying Issues and their Impact
Research is the most effective tool for understanding the internal issues that are related to any change within an organization. The management will have to perform an organizational analysis through collection of data from the employees to establish the issues that are most likely to emerge in the change process (Cummings and Worley 2014). Data collection will be carried out in a structured manner from the employees within the parent firm and those within the subsidiaries that will remain to work for the company following the completion of the change process. It is through the data and its processing that the human resource management will identify the potential issues and problems, including resistance to change and any other concern that the employees might have in relation to the change (Benn, Dunphy, and Griffiths 2014). From the analysis, it might be possible for the employees to have concerns about the relationships that will have to be created following the coming together of the employees from different sources. With the information, the human resource management team will come up with strategies that will effectively manage the change and address the emerging issues.
HR Strategies
Following the needs analysis and identification of the organizational needs that require to be addressed, it will be critical to implement a number of human resource strategies to make the change effective. Diagnosis of resistance is one of the strategies that will be implemented (Langley et al. 2013). In the identified situation, there will be potential for resistance to change by all the employees, especially those working for the parent company and those within the subsidiaries that will be left to work for the Prime Mover Company. It will be necessary to identify the resistance and address it through, among other strategies education and communication (Bamberger, Biron and Meshoulam 2014). Provision of honest information will enhance integrity amongst the workers, this being one of the most important ethical aspects of the change. The human resource management has an important role of communicating the change and educating the workers on such issues as avoiding conflicts, being culturally competent and the importance of supporting the change among other issues.
Engagement and participation is another important strategy that will support the change and deal with the identified issue. It will be critical for the human resource management to engage the workers in the entire change process. Hence, the workers will own the change and support the management in implementing it. Decision making will be made with the participation and engagement of the employees for them to feel appreciated and part of the organization. While there are many other strategies that could be applied, the selected ones are the most critical in avoiding resistance and enlisting the support of the workers. Educating the workers about the change and involving them from the beginning to the end will play a critical role that will assist the human resource management to implement the change more effectively without unnecessary hurdles (Nielsen and Randall 2013). Various forums are useful in the process, including memos and reports, group discussions, and one-on-one discussions, among other approaches. These will provide a chance for the management to deal with the identified issues by working directly with those affected by the change process.
Team Work and Collaboration
The implementation of the strategies will involve a number of stakeholders in collaborative efforts. One of the stakeholder groups that will be involved are the human resource management team, from the three firms, including the parent company and the two subsidiaries. They will be responsible for implementing the programs such as the one to offer education to the employees. The employees will be a significant stakeholder group in the process of implementing the strategies. They will collaborate amongst themselves and work with the human resource team to implement the strategies. The collaborative efforts will be the most critical step in implementing engagement and participation of the workers in the change process (Bridges and Bridges 2017). The management will engage internal and external instructors to offer training to the employees on the importance of the change and the logic in supporting it. The trainers will engage the workers in training sessions which will be organized by the human resource team to educate the employees. All the stakeholders will have to work together, as a team, to ensure that the strategies are implemented successfully and that the change progresses effectively.
Potential Emerging Issues
It is possible for the proposed strategies to create other issues involving the employees. Ethical and cultural issues might emerge in the process of resolving the current ones in the process of conveying the information and engaging the employees in the change process. Education and communication could create interpersonal challenges, especially in the event that the cultures of the various parties are different or in the event of language barrier. Such barriers can also play out in the engagement of the employees in the change process. Such issues can create further delays because they will have to be addressed for the change to be fully implemented (Bridges and Bridges 2017). Mitigating such emerging issues involve anticipating them from the beginning of the process and enforcing measures to avoid or deal with them in case they arise. The most important way of mitigating the issues is ensuring cultural diversity in implementing the strategies. The human resource management should ensure that all the collaborators in the process are from different cultures, especially those represented in the workforce of the company. With such a diverse team, the ethical and cultural issues will be easy to deal with, and without leading to more serious problems.
Evaluation of Outcome
The most effective way of knowing if the decisions have achieved the desired outcome is to carry out an evaluation of the results. Just like the analysis of the needs, evaluation involves collection of data to compare the state before and following implementation of the strategies. Quantitative and qualitative data will play a critical role in providing the necessary evaluation results. The level of resistance to the change is one of the measures that will be evaluated. For instance, the evaluator will collect information to measure the level of resistance (such as the number of employees resisting the change) before and after the program is implemented. Therefore, if the level before is greater than the level after, then it becomes evident that the program will have achieved the desired impact. In case the opposite occurs, or the two are equal, it means that the strategies have not achieved the objectives and better ones should be implemented. Also, the level of interpersonal conflicts can be assessed before and after the strategies are implemented to measure their effectiveness.
Conclusion
Issues associated with change can make or break the change process depending with the way they are managed. In the change taking place in the Prime Mover Company, the human resource management team has an important role to play in identifying the issues and implementing the most effective strategies to address them. The issues relating to cultural differences, ethical considerations, and CSR can create resistance to the change, with negative outcome in the process of change. Hence, to address the identified issues, education and communication, as well as engagement and participation, are the strategies that will be critical to address the arising issues. Implementation of the strategies is expected to work positively in addressing the issues and making the change successful for the improved productivity of the company.
Reference List
Bamberger, P.A., Biron, M. and Meshoulam, I., 2014. Human resource strategy: Formulation, implementation, and impact. Routledge.
Benn, S., Dunphy, D. and Griffiths, A., 2014. Organizational change for corporate sustainability. Routledge.
Bridges, W. and Bridges, S., 2017. Managing transitions: Making the most of change. Da Capo Press.
Cummings, T.G. and Worley, C.G., 2014. Organization development and change. Cengage learning.
Langley, A., Smallman, C., Tsoukas, H. and Van de Ven, A.H., 2013. Process studies of change in organization and management: Unveiling temporality, activity, and flow. Academy of Management Journal, 56(1), pp.1-13.
Nielsen, K. and Randall, R., 2013. Opening the black box: Presenting a model for evaluating organizational-level interventions. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 22(5), pp.601-617.