Coping with organizational change: a multidimensional perspective

Abstract

This paper introduces a unified model for organizational change that is designed to help change analysts think through the decision-making process. Most organizational leaders do not manage change effectively because they fail to acquire the minimum amount of information necessary to make a sound decision. In large part, this deficiency is a result of considering only a small part of the organization’s total change reality, which can be expressed in terms of the following four categories: 1) Environment creates change, 2) Organization responds to environmental change, 3) Organization initiates new changes, and 4) Organization changes environment. Through the principle of diagnostic communication, leaders can adjust to the incoming changes [categories 1 and 2]. Through the principle of rhetorical communication, they can create effective outgoing changes [categories 3 and 4]. Through the principle of dialogical communication, they can achieve a strategic balance between too much conformity, which results from diagnostic communication in isolation, and too much non-conformity, which results from communication in isolation. By understanding and communicating about change from this multi-dimensional perspective, organizational leaders, both designated and non-designated, can learn to appreciate the extent to which they influence and are influenced by the larger cultural environment of which they are a part.