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Beginning Spanish for the Native English Speaking Adult Learner – Lesson 3: Common Greetings and Salutations
March 6, 2013 By
Why is Turnover a Serious Problem?
February 4, 2013 By
- What does it take to retain people in an organization?
- What do you do to try to retain the best people?
- What are your processes for getting the best and the brightest?
- Who in the organization is primarily responsible for retaining employees?
- What are the important elements of retention?
- What are your concerns about retention in your organization?
Organizations are constantly struggling with attracting and maintaining the best employees, while trying to keep costs at a minimum. Not putting enough effort into retaining employees is a mistake that is made over and over again because the impact of turnover is not always directly evident. Organizations have seen that a poor economy does not mean quality people automatically come flooding their direction. Although most managers and leaders are aware that there are consequences of high turnover, many have not taken the time to view them all at once.
These include:
- High financial cost
- Survival mentality
- Loss of productive time and quality of work
- Poor customer service and organizational image
- Heightened administrative time
- Infected culture
The impact of turnover on an individual is also important to note, particularly if it is a problem that could have been avoided. Through turnover, individuals experience:
- Loss of status and benefits
- Disrupted finances
- Wasted efforts
- Burned bridges
- Career gaps
At some point, myths in an organization will surface. Many people will believe theses myths are true. These myths can have detrimental effects. Ask these questions to help your organization tackle the serious problem of employee retention:
- Are your employees recognized for their accomplishments?
- Are they encouraged to set career goals?
- Are they placed in projects or assignments that match their goals and help them grow in their career?
- Are they challenged?
- Is the training they want available to them?
- Does their manager give them regular, honest performance reviews?
- Do they feel supported and well balanced?
- What do they struggle with?
- What would make their work easier?
Summary
Managing people can be one of the hardest jobs in the world. Trying to meet the needs of and make a group of people feel comfortable and at ease, all while maintaining a productive environment, may seem impossible. But it’s not! Taking retention seriously can, in the end, be the best management strategy that you have ever tackled.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M.A., Human Resource Development
Organizational Culture and Its Role in Change
January 3, 2013 By
The culture of the corporate culture of an organization is a factor to consider when instituting and managing change. On an overt level, an organization operates along the lines of its belief and observable behavior. Covertly, the organization is influenced by people’s collective assumptions. Though the combination of these elements can be blatant or subtle, culture is a true part of organizational life that can be conveyed by a number of practices, including:
- Oral and written communications, such as presentations and memoranda.
- Organizational structure, as reflected by line and staff relationships.
- The way power and status are defined both formally and informally.
- What is measured and controlled, such as time and quality.
- Formal policies and procedures found in employee manual and official communication.
- Reward systems, such as compensation plans and supervisory techniques.
- Stories, legends, myths, rituals, and symbols, such as company heroes, award banquets, and corporate logos.
- The design and use of physical facilities, including how space is allocated and furnished.
During periods of major change, cultural boundaries are seriously strained. While this has always been true, the increasing volume, momentum, and complexity of change in combination with the shifting demographics of today’s workforce are intensifying and the challenge of maintaining cultural cohesion is rising exponentially. If an organization’s cultural environment is not managed well, people will feel that changes are coming at a greater volume, momentum and complexity than they can adequately assimilate. These feelings hinder the process of absorbing change for many organizations. Therefore a key element to enhancing resilience and minimizing the change of dysfunctional behavior is to actively manage the organization’s culture.
Your organization’s cultural traits must be consistent with what is necessary for driving new decisions, and/or those decisions will not be successfully implemented. But the overlap between the existing behaviors, beliefs and assumptions and those required for your changes to succeed may vary greatly. Whenever a discrepancy exists between the current culture and the objective of your change, the culture always wins. The effective management of your corporate culture is an essential contributor to the implementation success. It cannot be left to chance. When facing an organizational culture that may hinder a desired change, your options are to:
1 Modify the change to be more in line with the existing behaviors, beliefs and assumptions of your culture.
2 Modify the behaviors, beliefs and assumptions of the current culture to be more supportive of the change.
3 Prepare for the change to fail.
Summary
You can’t change a culture without strong resolve from the top management and a wide-angle view of the situation. Developing a plan to implement a new definition of customer relations, for example, must include clear statements of vision (why the organization exists), mission (what it is going to accomplish), and strategy (how it is going to work toward its objectives). Assessing the degree of consistency between the existing culture and the kind of culture needed to implement the change is critical to success of any new organizational focus. If the existing culture is inconsistent with the behaviors, beliefs, and assumptions necessary for success, that culture must be altered or the effort will fail.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M.A., Human Resource Development
Synergistic Relationships
November 27, 2012 By
Planned organizational change is one way to focus the magnificent energy of an organization so it can be harnessed for the good of all persons involved. To harness all of this energy really requires a strong look at the relationships among the project’s key sponsors, targets, agents, and advocates. These relationships can be viewed as self-destructive, static, or synergistic. Self-destructive relationships consume more resources than they produce and the result of their joint effort is a net loss. Static relationships involve an even mix of unproductive, back-stabbing behavior and productive, team-oriented behavior. What is desirable is synergistic relationships where individuals work together to produce a total effect that is greater than the sum of their separate efforts.
Develop synergistic relationships
The two prerequisites for the development of synergy within a relationship: willingness and ability. Willingness stems from the sharing of common goals and interdependence. Ability is a combination of empowerment and participative management skills.
Empowered employees are those who provide true value to the organization, influencing the outcome of management’s decisions and actions. The antithesis of empowerment is victimization. Victims believe they are faced with a negative situation offering no alternatives. In actuality, most victims face alternatives they refuse to act on because they view them as too expensive. Empowerment represents both a person’s willingness to provide input to decision makers and an environment where that input is valued.
Empowerment doesn’t mean abandonment. Setting the context for change means understanding what employees do and do not know. When it comes to change, people don’t believe in a new direction because they suspend their disbelief. They believe because they are actually seeing behavior, action and results which lead them to conclude that the program works.
Without a concrete payoff, no organization is going to spend valuable time fostering good working relationships. Achieving synergy can make change work, and the payoff is a successful business in an ever-changing world. What gets managed, in harnessing the momentum of synergistic processes, is the human capacity to work as a team. Managing the energy unleashed through synergistic teamwork is as important as managing any other valuable resource. To successfully implement it, there are four approaches you must adopt: strategize, monitor and reinforce, remain team-focused and update continuously.
1 Strategize.
People working within synergistic relationships realize the value of planning action steps that are specific, measurable, and goal oriented with specific boundaries. Without such direction, you could not manage resources, determine priorities or ensure that individual activities are compatible. Although managers usually initiate these perimeters, they need to be ultimately decided upon with the input of the participants. Setting clear guidelines for what is expected, what is possible, and what is negotiable is absolutely essential in establishing the boundaries for empowerment.
2 Monitor and reinforce.
When making their moves, synergistic implementation teams must be able to oversee progress and offer solutions to any problems that develop. Caution must be taken not fall prey to an error commonly made in human relations—the belief that once a common goal is announced, all parties will perceive that goal in the same way and feel the same urgency to achieve it. To sustain your change, you must apply positive reinforcement for appropriate behavior and progress, as well as negative consequences for inappropriate behavior or lack of sufficient progress.
3 Remain team focused.
Working with a synergistic team demands that the group remain sensitive to the needs of the individuals within the team, the team as a group and the organization itself. It is not unusual for different levels of the organization to perceive and respond differently to an impending change. It may seem natural to you that those who are more competent at a task should move ahead faster than others. But that attitude fails to acknowledge that the change project’s progression was made possible because of the project’s original synergistic approach. Success is based on the ability of the team to synchronize its moves with each other so that the team gains the maximum benefit.
4 Update.
Unstable environments produce constantly changing variables. Reacting to these shifts in a manner that assist goal achievement requires a continuous updating of action plans. Sometimes people don’t need to change; plans do. When resistance surfaces, a synergistic team applauds the open dialogue and redesigns the plan as necessary. It is the people and the process which need to be upheld. The plan serves the people and the process. Listed below are some basic skills to help encourage and support synergy in that processing.
Five basic skills that help foster synergy.
- Establish prerequisites. Build the motivation (common goals and interdependence) and abilities (empowerment and participative management) that are the foundation for synergy (within the established and agreed upon boundaries).
- Support permeability. Help people express and be open to learning new ideas, perspectives, meanings, values, feelings, behaviors, and attitudes they would not otherwise accept or exchange.
- Encourage paradoxical thinking. Help people live through the frustration and confusion that occurs when they attempt to understand apparently contradictory ideas, viewpoints, feelings, or attitudes.
- Facilitate creativity. Teach people to value the integration of opposing views, causing a shift from “either/or” opposing relationships to “both/and” supportive relationships.
- Structure discipline. Use the new, mutually supported concepts to pursue specific objectives, assign task responsibility and stick to the schedule until the change is fully accomplished.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M.A., Human Resource Development
Three Keys to Successfully Managing Change
October 28, 2012 By
Most people see change models as circular. Since change is a constant element in a successful organization, its repeated forces are always in action. Three keys are essential to successfully manage change: empathy, communication, and participation.
Empathy
Empathy, the first key to successfully managing change, is crucial in obtaining information about who will be affected by a change and how they will react to it. Knowing how people will react is an important factor in the decision to make a change as well as the speed with which the change should be implemented.
Communication
Communication, which is the second key to successfully managing change, is also vital. Both oral and written communication must be done well for people to understand an impending change and the reasons for it.
Participation
Participation (also known as feedback), which is the third key, is critical in order for people to feel involved in the change. Involving people in planning of change usually results in acceptance more readily and a smoother path from resistance to commitment throughout the organization.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M.A., Human Resource Development
RESISTANCE TO CHANGE
October 10, 2012 By
Resistance to change is often reflective of energy devoted to closure attempts. That is people are attempting to finish what they feel to be incomplete in the historical structure of the organization. Providing some way for the organizational members to disengage from that history; to finish, at least to some extent, the past helps them to focus on the change at hand and the future of the organization. The same could be said of an individual in the process of change. The individual must be committed to the future and the new vision of the change being attempted. This involves being willing to ‘let go’ of past ways of doing things and embrace the new plan.
Honoring the past, whether it is the past of the individual in change or the past of the organization in the throes of change, can be essential in order for a new change concept or program to be installed and accepted. To move beyond the status quo often requires acknowledgement of what has gone before, even if the past was not necessarily good. For many people to move on and ‘let go’ there must a reiteration of what has been done in the past which has allowed them to get to where they are now. Once the past has been honored, seeing people’s responses on the change continuum becomes clearer.
In large measure, acceptance or resistance will depend on what people expect will happen. Optimists are apt to accept change while pessimists are apt to resent them because of the “fear of the unknown.” Not everyone in the organization will have the same view of change. Some employees will have mixed or neutral feelings about the change. Acceptance and attitude go hand-in-hand. If employees like the manager along with the way that the change is introduced, the change will be accept and even welcomed. If the manager is not respected, the change will probably be resisted. Probably the most significant reason why people will accept/welcome change or resent/resist change is related to their participation. Employees whose input is solicited about changes to be enacted are much more likely to work with management changes.
Points to Remember in anticipating resistance to change
1 Emotion cannot be countered by reason alone, but requires emotional reassurance.
2 Once trust is lost, it is very difficult to win back.
3 Criticism is not necessarily mere resistance; it may be well founded.
4 Once a program is up and running — working with communicated success— resistance will dwindle.
5 In overcoming resistance, prevention is better than cure.
Change is a process
Change proceeds along a continuum connecting the present to a future state. To get from the present to the future, an organization or an individual must go through transition. Understanding, encouraging, and guiding this transition from the present state to the future state is what change management is all about.
Present à Transition à Future state
Pain drives change. The two prerequisites for successful organizational change are pain and remedy. Pain is a critical mass of information that justifies breaking from the status quo. Remedy is desirable, accessible actions that will solve the problem or take advantage of the opportunity afforded by the current situation. Pain management provides the motivation to pull away from the present: remedy selling provides the motivation to proceed to the desired state. Every successful transition from the present state to the desired state entails these two prerequisites. For prolonged change, both elements must work together. Orchestrating pain messages throughout an institution is the first step in developing organizational commitment to change. A case for compelling urgency must be built. The pain of what people had/knew/cling to must be seen as greater than the price of transition. The key to motivating any change is liberating the target’s resolve to change.
Eight stages of resistance to change
Much like the grief process many of us experience with the loss of a loved one, there are eight distinctive stages through which people pass when they feel trapped in a change they don’t want and can’t control. These stages are: stability, immobilization, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, testing, and acceptance.
- Stability. This phase precedes the announcement of the change. It represents the present state, or status quo.
- Immobilization. The initial reaction to negatively perceived change is shock. Reaction in this phase may vary from temporary confusion to complete disorientation. Here, the impact of change is so alien to the person’s frame of reference that he or she is often unable to relate to what is happening.
- Denial. This phase is characterized by an inability to assimilate new information into the current frame of reference. At this stage, change-related information is often rejected or ignored.
- Anger. This phase is characterized by frustration and hurt, often manifested through irrational, indiscriminate lashing out. These emotions are typically directed at those in close proximity, who also are usually the ones most willing got be supportive, such as friends and family. So it is not uncommon for those closest to the target to be blamed, criticized and treated with hostility.
- Bargaining. Bargaining takes many forms. At this stage, people begin negotiating to avoid the negative impact of change. This point in the process signals that an individual can no longer avoid a confrontation with reality. All earlier phases involve different forms of denial. This phase marks the beginning of acceptance.
- Depression. Depression is a normal response to major, negatively perceived change. Likely symptoms here are resignation to failure, feeling victimized, a lack of emotional and physical energy, and disengagement from one’s work. At this point, the full weight of the negative change is finally acknowledged.
- Testing. Regaining a sense of control helps people free themselves from feeling of victimization and depression. They do this by acknowledging the new limitations while also exploring ways to redefine goals; this makes it possible to succeed within a new framework.
- Acceptance. People now respond to the change realistically. But acceptance of the change is no synonymous with liking it. It just means that the person is now more grounded and productive with in a new context.
Five key principles in the “Resistance to change” Pattern
Resilience is enhanced if you:
- Understand the basic mechanisms of human resistance.
- View resistance as a natural and inevitable reaction to the disruption of expectations.
- Interpret resistance as a deficiency of either ability or willingness.
- Encourage and participate in overt expressions of resistance.
- Understand that resistance to positive change is just as common as resistance to negatively perceived change and that both reactions follow their own respective sequence of events, which can be anticipated and managed.
Summary
To manage change well you must use sober selling as your approach. It is essential to divulge up front the real price for change. The truthfulness in the selling process will not eliminate the disruption that the change is causing, but it will engender better trust relations with your fellow colleges in change.
Resistance is inherent to disruptive change; the only variables are how and when it is manifested and what is done with it. Ambiguity is always accompanied by a resistance invoice. You can pay early or late, you can pay for managing resistance or healing from resistance – but you will pay.
The Five Step ADKAR Behavior Model
September 24, 2012 By
Change management is a required capability for developing change competency. To build change competency, you must equip all levels of your organization with the understanding, perspectives and tools to make change seamless and effortless. The ADKAR model is great to assess where your organization is today relative to change competency and develop an action plan to move in that direction.
Managing change management as a change process is also a possible perspective to take with this model. This model can also apply to how well the organization responds to change in addition to determining how well a specific change process is going.
ADKAR model for organizations:
Awareness
The organization understands the importance of responding quickly and efficiently to internal and external pressures to change; the organization understands what change competency is and the associated business risk of not developing change competency; all groups understand the business reason and drivers for making this shift in culture, values, and skills.
Desire
All groups at all levels acknowledge that the ability to change is critical if the organization is to survive, and they are ready and willing to begin the journey toward change competency.
Knowledge
The organization has the base knowledge of what a change-able organization looks like and what skills and values are required; all facets of the organization have a basic understanding of change management theories and practices; each group understands its role in a change-competent organization.
Ability
The organization possesses and effectively utilizes the tools and processes to manage change; leaders, change practitioners and front-line employees have practice and coaching in being successful change agents and can routinely apply their knowledge and skills to realize change; barriers that prevent change implementation are readily identified and removed.
Reinforcement
The organization encourages and rewards successful change through its culture, values and initiatives; support of change competency is reinforced and resistance to change is identified and managed; change is part of ‘business as usual’.
Key ADKAR change principles:
1 Change agents must be conscious of both a sender’s meaning and a receiver’s interpretation.
2 Employee resistance is the norm, not the exception. Expect some employees to never support the change.
3 Visible and active sponsorship is not only desirable, but necessary for success.
4 Value systems and the culture of the organization have a direct impact on how employees react to change.
5 The size and type of the change determine how much and what kind of change management is needed. Just because a change is small does not mean that change management is not required.
6 The “right” answer is not enough to successfully implement change.
7 Change is a process. Employees go through the change process in stages and go through these stages as individuals.
ADKAR model for individuals:
Awareness of the need to change
Desire to participate and support the change
Knowledge about how to change
Ability to implement new skills and behaviors
Reinforcement to keep the change in place
To put these principles into practice, two change management approaches are necessary: the employee’s perspective and the managers’ perspective. Managing change from the employees’ perspective is called individual change management. Managing change from the managers’ perspective is called organizational change management.
Individual change management is often overlooked by many change management models. Individual change management includes the tools and processes that supervisors use with their employees to manage individual transitions through change. This employee-oriented component of change management is the critical ingredient that allows a project team to:
1 Help employees through the change process
2 Create a feedback loop to business leaders and identify points of resistance
3 Diagnose gaps in communications and training
4 Implement corrective action
Summary
The most powerful change management strategies combine organizational change management techniques with individual change management tools to create a robust, closed-loop process.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M.A., Human Resource Development
What Is Human Resource Development?
July 31, 2012 By
Human Resource Development (HRD) is a practice that combines training, organization development, and career development efforts to encourage improvement of individual, group, and organizational performance. Its purpose is to enhance employee performance/productivity, which leads to employee and customer satisfaction and an increase in the profitability of the organization.
The Four Basic Sections of HRD
HRD is comprised of four basic sections: personal development, professional development, performance administration or management, and organization development. Each section will differ in significance from one organization to the next. The significance of each section within an organization may depend upon the extent of the organization’s focus to improve human resources. Personal and professional development concentrate on the growth and development of the individual, while performance administration or management and organization development place their focus on a whole system approach to the effectiveness of the organization.
Personal Development
Personal development can be defined as the development of new knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSAs) that enhance one’s current job performance. The attainment of these new KSAs may be the result of formal and informal learning events, but most often informal, on-the-job, embedded learning is responsible. Personal development is a short-term path to enhancing performance, which results in a lower level of organizational enhancement.
Professional Development
Professional development places its focus on the identification of individual interests, values, and abilities needed to develop KSAs for future employment. Professional development can include both personal and organizational endeavors. Professional Development is more long-term than personal development. It can have more of an impact on organizational efficiency because employees can take advantage of ongoing development opportunities. Professional development is more long-term than personal development. It can have a greater influence on organizational efficiency because employees are presented with ongoing developmental opportunities that increase levels of competency.
Performance Administration or Management
Performance administration or performance management is an approach used to improve organizational performance. Its goal is to assure that the right individuals have the KSAs that support their jobs both effectively and efficiently. Performance administration or management is used to analyze gaps in performance within the organization as a whole and identify interventions effective in bringing about the desired performance. Performance administration or management is often used to bring about short-term return on investment (ROI) needed by organizational leaders to demonstrate their personal leadership success.
Organization Development
Organization Development can be defined as recognizing, creating and implementing a solution to an organization’s weaknesses in performance through team effort. The desired result is a shared enthusiastic attitude toward accomplishing new and existing circumstances or events. The organization’s weakness in performance may be contributed to a procedure that is ineffective. The recognition of this weakness may become apparent through constructive criticism received from clientele or through the inability to maintain competitiveness. The weakness, once identified, should be subjected to a company meeting to solicit ideas for its elimination/improvement. Organization development provides the highest level of organizational efficiency. It requires a more comprehensive performance analysis to identify difficulties and other factors affecting results.
Summary
HRD is the integrated use of training, organization development and career development efforts to improve individual, groups and organization effectiveness. HRD helps to develop key competitiveness that enables individuals in organizations to perform current and future jobs through planned learning activities. HRD also helps to manage various work groups within organization, motivation issues and manage changes in the organization. HRD ensures an alignment between an individual and the organization’s needs.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M.A., Human Resource Develoment
The Transformative Change Model
July 25, 2012 By
The Transformative Change Model
Change management is a required capability for developing change competency. To build change competency, you must equip all levels of your organization with the understanding, perspectives and tools to make change seamless and effortless.
Managing change means managing the conversation between the people leading the change and those who are expected to implement the new strategies. It also means managing the organizational context in which change can occur.
Let’s take a look at change by examining the Transformative Change Model.
Transformative change occurs on three levels:
- Structure: the patterns of the organization (reporting lines, job definitions)
- Behavior: the way the system acts (communication patterns and relationships)
- Consciousness: the way things are viewed (attitudes, beliefs and myths)
The Seven Stages of The Transformative Change Model
1 Unconscious stage
Organizational transition begins gradually with a period of organizational unconsciousness that builds a readiness for change. (random information, sporadic symptoms and tentative new ideas)
2 Awakening Stage
Developing awareness and surfacing symptoms form a message to all involved of needed change (instability introduced, status quo harmony is disrupted)
3 Reordering stage
Probing process integrated the new catalyst with the existing situation (deeper level, new vision)
4 Translation Stage
Process of integrating information, images and visions create new vision for the future of the organization.
5 Commitment stage
Organization takes responsibility for implementation of the new vision. (pivotal, old/new clashes, resistance resurfaces) Organization makes the decision to precede or rework previous steps.
6 Embodiment stage
Leadership and employees work together to bring the transformed vision into day-to-day operations. Integration of three elements: consciousness shifts (attitudes, beliefs and assumptions), structural changes (patterns of organization) and behavioral changes (actions, relationship, communications)
7 Integration Stage
As the desired change becomes widespread, the organization reaches a stage of integration. Trust, cooperation and openness develop. Community is solidified and disorientation and chaos transformation are healed.
Change is a Constant Element
Since change is a constant element in a successful organization, the model’s cyclical forces are always in action. The timing and rhythm of the transformation is based on the entire system’s readiness to shift on each of these levels. To move from the chaos of transformative change to peak performance, it is necessary to understand the complex process of transformation as it relates to organizational and individual needs.
Although a fully integrated transformative change requires movement though all seven stages, often a micro-cycle of the seven stages is encompassed in each stage. Rhythm and timing are determined by the rate the change can be managed. As organizations undergo major transformations necessary for survival and growth, individual employee lives are also transformed. The success of an organizational change largely depends on the employees’ ability to integrate the changes. The individual experiencing transformation in an organizational context will discover that a cycle of transformation begins in the Unconsciousness Stage.
By Shirley J. Caruso, M. A., Human Resource Development
