August 2022

In my current workplace, we are undergoing a change that will see more structure implemented. The organization is growing very rapidly, and the number of employees is necessitating the change. With over thirty employees (and soon, even more), the leadership team is striving to create a structure that addresses the unique characteristics of our organization. The organization works across BC (and increasingly in Alberta and the Yukon) and works across a number of different climate change initiatives (for example, our work covers topics such as building retrofits, electric and active mobility, and greenhouse gas emissions inventories). The leadership team is working to create a structure that ensures that each team can develop expertise in a certain topic area, while cross-fertilization can happen across teams to combat the effect of siloes. While topic areas are the defining factor in determining team composition, there is also consideration given to organizing employees based on regional affiliations, so that employees can develop networks and capacity in certain geographic areas. Lastly, the leadership team is considering opportunities for effective mentorship within the organization.

Change leadership can operate in a number of ways, including directed change, planned change, and iterative change (Kerber & Buono, 2018). To date, the process described above has occurred as directed and planned change. To begin with, the leadership team noted that structural change was going to be implemented and detailed which people on the executive team would lead the change. This is an example of directed change, where the “the role of the change leader  is  to  decide  and  announce  the  change” (Kerber & Buono, 2018, p. 57). However, as the change process moved forward, there was opportunity for all employees to provide feedback on draft plans and engage with the leadership team on the topic of the change initiative. This is an example of planned change, where the process involves flexibility and wide participation (Kerber & Buono, 2018, p. 57). 

It makes sense that the process began as a directed change, as it simply may not have been initiated without clear direction from the executive team. However, once initiated, the process may have been best suited to iterative change. Kerber and Buono (2018) note that problems with high business complexity and high socio-technical uncertainty are appropriate to be dealt with through iterative change (p. 58), where the process is based on a direction rather than a specific goal (p. 57). In the case of my organization, there is an element of high business complexity; although the organization is not large or transnational, it does deal with many topic areas across a number of provinces and territories that have their own unique characteristics. The socio-technical uncertainty is reasonably high as well, as creating a new organizational structure is a problem that could have a number of different outcomes and the exact solution is unknown at the outset. 

It will be interesting to watch this change initiative through to its conclusion and identify how the process unfolds with the lens of different types of change leadership.

Reference

Kerber, K., & Buono, A. (2018). The rhythm of change leadership. Organization Development Journal, 36(3), 55-72.