Organizational Change-Less is better

There are many meta-level issues that organizations need to focus on in creating change. One major characteristic for sustaining change is simplicity, the less changes the better. Before a major change is created within an organization leaders first should try to fix the problem that problem that the organization is having without a radical new reengineering project. Change is good is many ways, but a major change too quickly can promote insecurity among the members of the organization.

One of my faculty members told me a story about a major mistake that his former principal made. When the principal first arrived at the school he wanted to make major changes. He did not get the staff to buy into his vision. One of the changes he made was to have staff meetings twice a week and all lesson plans had to be turned in Thursday for the following week. The principal never explained his reasons behind the changes he just wanted everyone to hop on board. During the course of the year the principal made many more sporadic radical changes. The teachers were outraged at the new changes. The morale of the faculty and staff dramatically declined and about one half of the teaching staff requested transfers to other schools. The principal was only assigned to that particular school for one year. The principal wanted to change things too quickly; he should have presented his ideas to the department heads first. When the principal received approval and buy in from the department heads he could have then presented his ideas to the rest of the staff. If would not have tried to fix everything overnight and by himself the whole attitude of the staff would have been different.