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Integrative Paper Kotter Meets Ivancevich Change is usually one of the most difficult phenomenons to accept. Although we are living in an ever-changing world, people are likely to resist change if what they are currently doing is seemingly working. Kotter’s eight-step model provides a design for successfully implementing change within an organization. According to The Heart of Change, the main problem that people faced when leading change was changing the behavior of people and in order to successfully lead a change movement one must be able to speak to people’s feelings. According to Ivancevich, there are several forces for change. Organizations are not likely to even think about making changes if there is not a shocking event to lead to the need for change. For example, plummeting sales would lead a company to evaluate where they are going wrong. Technology, which in itself is forever evolving, is another change stimulant. With the evolution of technology jobs roles are changing and some are no longer needed. As such, people are forced to adapt to technology in an effort to stay viable. In addition to necessity and technology, social and political change also contributes to change. This outside factor is something outside of the control of the organization, but will ultimately affect the company’s future. An example of this may be a recession. The first step according to Kotter’s model was to increase urgency. The presence of urgency leads to being able to sustain change. Before one can adequately proceed to create a change movement, they must show why the change needs to take place. Human nature leads you to believe that if something is not broken do not fix it. So many will be resistant to change unless they understand why things must change. The biggest adversary of this step is the feeling of complacency and it is very difficult to bring people out of their comfort zone. Complacency occurs within an organization when employees become comfortable with the way things are going and find it unnecessary to change. According to the reading, most companies fail to make the needed change as they skip this step or rush through this step in their urgency to jump to the action phase. An effective leader is able to successfully locate the problem and also get others onboard. It is necessary to motivate other to participate. This step is crucial as failure to get others on board for the change leads to most companies failing to successfully implementing change. It appears that it is also important to follow these steps in order. If one is not able to establish a great enough sense of urgency, the risks seemingly outweighs the benefits of change, then others are not likely to be convinced of a need for change. Kotter suggests using brutal facts to show that change is necessary. Rather than using analytical data, an example of this would be using a customer’s survey of the product/service. This makes the problem more real than a graph with numbers. Once the sense of urgency is created, the first step is successfully completed. The second step of the eight-step model involves building a guiding team. The guiding team serves as the pioneers in essence of the movement to change. The guiding team should be composed of outspoken members who are not afraid to speak up. One essential factor in successfully leading a change movement is establishing a sense of trust within the guiding group. After all, they are set to become the face of the change movement and if there is uncertainty amongst the group, others are not likely to trust them. Also, the group must all be working towards the common objective and fully committed to leading change. According to Ivancevich, interpersonal influence and group behavior are powerful forces when affecting a group’s performance. This means they are also instrumental in effecting a group’s motivation and dedication to change. Once the guiding team is selected, the team must then decide what the vision for the future is. This entails specifying exactly was change is needed and how will they achieve that change. This vision needs to be one that is able to capture the attention of the target audience quickly and move them to action. It needs to be clear, concise and relatable. Again rather than filled with research it should be structured around real-life relatable examples. The guiding team again is the face of the change and needs to lead by example. The vision should be against the status quo, providing a new look at things. The vision should be used as a guide, with goals set. Without the presence of goals, a vision is just a bunch of words with no call for actions. Without the call for action, this again eliminates the need for change to take place. The vision should in essence be realistic, attainable, yet challenging. Presenting too easy of a task leads to one not being motivated to attempt to attain the goal. No one wants to be labeled a failure. Now that the vision has been created it must then be communicated to others. If step 3 was done correctly, the vision that was created should be very simple to understand and therefore simple to communicate to others. One needs to remember that as a member of the guiding team, plenty of research was done. With that being said, during the communication of the vision, the message needs to be worded so that any and every one can understand and so that interest doesn’t get lost. Ivancevich believed that there were certain factors that hindered effective communication. First, he believed that one’s ability to interpret information based on their own previous experiences hindered their ability to effectively understand the message. Next, he mentions selective hearing. This is the ability to tune out what is being said to you and in essence hear only what you want to hear. One of the most important hinderers to effective communication mentioned in the text is filtering. This is when information is manipulated to seem positive. According to Kotter, this would be a big hindrance to his process and the success of his eight step model relies on the group’s ability to maintain open and honest dialogue. Once one has effectively communicated for buy-in, they must then empower action. This step entails removing any barriers that may prevent the change movement. According to Kotter, the biggest barrier to effectively putting a change into motion is upper management. Once the buy in for change is put into place one of the walls that may deter others is being shut down by upper management. This coupled with the fact that these people may not have ever successfully been apart of a movement to change may lead to the concept of change being feared. Thus one may need to be empowered to act. Kotter suggests using credible sources available to in essence boost confidence. Nothing empowers people more than seeing others who have successfully done what they are attempting to do. This can be a great motivator. Ivancevich builds onto this concept by stating that rewards serve to motivate employees to perform at their highest level of performance. The next step involves creating short-term wins with rewards. Human nature leads people to become discouraged if goals are only long term. In order to prevent that, one must create smaller goals that can be attained in the short-term future. The goal needs to be attainable. It should also be able to be completed cheaply and easily. This will serve several purposes. First and foremost, it will turn the nonbelievers into believers. Those who held off on the need for a change will now begin to second-guess themselves. Most importantly, those who did buy in will begin to see the fruits of their labor. Rewards, according to Ivancevich, motivate employees to achieve success. To further build on the concept of short-term wins, Kotter lists four purposes. Besides rewards the hard work of the team, they provide valuable feedback to the leaders of the change movement as to whether or not the process is working. Why is this valuable? If change leaders are able to realize that certain processes are not working before completing the project and then realizing it is a failure, they are able to revamp procedures and still save the change efforts. At this point in the model, it may seem tiring, and overwhelming. As such, this step calls for keeping the movement going. Step six should have given the group the momentum needed to get the change going. Kotter suggests a reinforcement of step 1, keeping the sense of urgency up. Change leaders tend to think they are almost at the end of the road and have reached the success needed and tend to start slacking. Again, complacency is the most detrimental to the change process. Even worse, at this stage because it cancels all the progress that has been made thus far. In order to combat this, one must build on the change. During this step, the change leaders need to continue to develop projects that provide more short-term wins. This displays more success for onlookers to view and more motivation for participants to continue to finish towards to finish line. The final step according to Kotter is getting the implemented change to stick. In order to do so one must ensure the change has been deeply grounded into the company’s culture. First and foremost, others must be made aware of the reason the change is necessary. With upcoming employee orientation, the changes should be incorporated into training. New employees, who are ignorant to the old way of doing things, will receive the change better than the existing employees. As the change is implemented, rewards should be used to enforce the movement but not the only enforcer. Ivancevich shares many similar concepts and ideas regarding change within an organization. He believed as Kotter did that the first step towards change is the recognition of a need to change. Ivancevich believed that employees from all levels should be involved in the incorporation of change. Third, communication should be open and ongoing to that the attempt to make changes is successful. Ivancevich further believed that successful change was to be led by influential people who would be able to facilitate change. This resonates what Kotter referred to as the guiding team. Both Kotter and Ivancevich, speak on effective changes within an organization. They both recognize that successful change takes first and foremost the recognition of a need for change.

Works Cited
Kotter, John P., and Dan S. Cohen. The heart of change: real-life stories of how people change their organizations. Boston, Mass.: Harvard Business School Press, 2002. Print.
Ivancevich, John M., and Robert Konopaske. Organizational behavior and management. 10. ed. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Irwin, 2014. Print.