Discussion
• A Survival Guide for Leaders
• The Real Reason People Won't Change
Introduction to the Lesson with the authors' summaries:
1. A Survival Guide for Leaders
Let's face it, to lead is to live dangerously. While leadership is often viewed as an exciting and glamorous endeavor, one in which you inspire others to follow you through good times and bad, such a portrayal ignores leadership's dark side: the inevitable attempts to take you out of the game. This is particularly true when a leader must steer an organization through difficult change. When the status quo is upset, people feel a sense of profound loss and dashed expectations. They may need to undergo a period of feeling incompetent or disloyal. It's no wonder they resist the change and often try to eliminate its visible agent. This "survival guide" offers a number of techniques--relatively straightforward in concept but difficult to execute--for protecting yourself as you lead such a change initiative. Adapted from the book Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive Through the Dangers of Leading (Harvard Business School Press, 2002), the article has two main parts. The first looks outward, offering tactical advice about relating to your organization and the people in it. It is designed to protect you from those who would push you aside before you complete your initiatives. The second looks inward, focusing on your own needs and vulnerabilities. It is designed to keep you from bringing yourself down. The hard truth is that it is not possible to experience the rewards and joys of leadership without experiencing the pain as well. But staying in the game and bearing that pain is worth it, not only for the positive changes you can make in the lives of others but also for the meaning it gives your own.
2. The Real Reason People Won't Change
Every manager is familiar with employees who won't change. Sometimes it's easy to see why, but other times it can be very puzzling when the individual has the skill, capability and commitment to change but does nothing. So what's going on?
Often resistance to change does not reflect opposition or inertia, but rather a hidden 'competing commitment', which is often poorly articulated or even unconscious. Many of these "competing commitments" are based on long-held beliefs that are an integral part of their make-up so they can be difficult to change.
Some examples of 'competing commitments' are:
• dragging one's feet on an assignment because one wants to avoid a next tougher assignment or
• future lack of work.
• avoiding teamwork or meetings because one wants to avoid the conflict that is associated with it
• using sarcastic disruptive humor to keep oneself at a distance from a work group you may not
• want to be associated with
• not progressing a contact because of a fear of being accountable for the results of one's work.
Discussion Questions:
1. What are some critical skills that leaders need to manage change in organizations? As leaders, please discuss some of the critical actions that an organization should take with the realization that change is necessary?
2. In your opinion and experience, why do employees resist change in the workplace? What can leaders do to lower or diminish employees' resistance to change?
The response should include a reference list. Double-space, using Times New Roman 12 pnt font, one-inch margins, and APA style of writing and citations.