VSR Models of Change as Normative Practical Theory

2021 ◽  
pp. 495-528
Author(s):  
Cara C. Maurer ◽  
Anne S. Miner ◽  
Mary Crossan
Keyword(s):  
Computational Models ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Organization Change ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
Change Processes ◽  
Individual Change ◽  
Retention Models ◽  
Rational Decision Making ◽  
Practical Tool ◽  
Day To Day Operations

This chapter offers a counterpoint to increasingly complex computational models of evolutionary change processes at higher levels of analysis. It explores the value of internal VSR (Variation-Selection-Retention) models as practical tools for managers. Individual change agents may actively and deliberately influence each of the three core internal processes and their balance and connect them with external VSR processes. Individuals may shape the organization’s current and potential future contexts beyond mere external adaptation to creation of novel future states. Broadening traditional assumptions of top-down rational decision-making, we include the potential of human imagination, and emotions of individuals and groups as engines of change as improvements to existing internal VSR models. A normative theory of internal VSR processes offers a practical tool for day-to-day operations of agents interested in understanding and affecting organization change. We encourage academics to bring renewed enthusiasm to teaching internal VSR models of change to practicing managers.

A Study on Employee Attitude towards Organizational Change and the impact of Change Management on Organization Commitment

2019 ◽  
Vol 118 (3) ◽  
pp. 158-169
Author(s):  
Dheera.V. R ◽  
Jayasree Krishnan
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Change ◽  
Change Management ◽  
Tamil Nadu ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Organization Change ◽  
Sustainable Growth ◽  
Positive Approach ◽  
Organizational Goals ◽  
Organization Commitment ◽  
The Impact

Organizations that are aiming to successfully implement change needs the support and acceptance of employees who are their key stakeholder. This study analyses the influence of Employees` attitude towards organization change. The research also aims at evaluating the influence of employees’ attitude towards commitment to organization and job after the introduction of change in the organization. The study was conducted among 300 employees who belonged to executive and managerial category from different star rated hotels in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India which are currently embracing organization changes. The findings indicate that employees of the study demonstrate a positive approach towards the change management in their organization. The observations also project that a positive approach by employees towards changes, is a very good indication for organizations to know that their workforce is committed towards the organizational goals. Hence with the support of change agents, adequate communications and by creating awareness about the need for change will result in sustainable growth in the organizations.

The communicative constitution of institutional change in expression games

2020 ◽  
pp. 147612702095925
Author(s):  
Marc Krautzberger ◽  
Emamdeen Fohim ◽  
François Cooren ◽  
Thomas Schumacher
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Change ◽  
Early Phase ◽  
Process Model ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Change Processes ◽  
Collective Actors ◽  
Communicative Constitution ◽  
First Moment ◽  
Over Time

Neo-institutional theory has recently advanced our understanding of the early phase of institutional change but presupposes contexts in which verbally and nonverbally expressing the intended institutional change within a group is already possible. We develop a process model that explains how change agents conceal and reveal their intentional work on institutional change over time to avoid painful sanctions and counteractions. The model describes how change agents proceed from the first moment of forming the intention to promote institutional change until change is sedimented through diffused taken-for-granted behavior. It advances the understanding of how individual and collective actors communicatively influence the macro-pathways of institutional change. The model offers new insights into the very first moments of institutional change processes, the ability to change institutions, the role of ambiguity in change processes, and how change agents slowly and fundamentally change institutions.

Importance of Integrating Sustainability Principles into Project Management Competency Standards

2015 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 9-78
Author(s):  
���������� ◽  
Tatyana Ponomareva ◽  
������� ◽  
Dmitriy Gergert ◽  
���������� ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Project Management ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
Management Competencies ◽  
Performance Reporting ◽  
Operational Activities ◽  
Day To Day Operations ◽  
Sustainability Standards ◽  
Project Management Competency ◽  
Sustainability Principles

The balance between economic growth and social wellbeing has been around as a political and managerial challenge for many years, and the concept of sustainability has grown in recognition and importance. The pressure on companies to broaden its economic and sustainability performance reporting and accountability to shareholders has increased. The integration of the concepts of sustainability in projects and project management became very significant. Today modern companies have to implement the principles of sustainability in their operational activities, and this process requires changers including: finance, marketing, manufacturing, communications. Project managers are regarded in organizations as �change agents� who have a strong influence on the sustainability of organizations. Translating the principles of sustainability into strategic and operational reality project managers need to obtain some competencies that provide them with the necessary tools and abilities to manage such important changes and to integrate sustainability standards and ideas into company�s day-to-day operations. However, the standards of project management fail to address the role that project managers play in realizing sustainable development, and project managers are lacking competencies to consider the sustainability aspects of their projects. This �competency gap� of the project manager has appeared in the standards of project management competencies. Many scientific scholars and practitioners are aware of strong importance of engaging sustainability into the modern models of project managers� competencies, to prepare project managers for their pivotal role in realizing sustainability of organizations. The central question of this paper is: Which new competencies should be added to the standards of project management competencies? This paper also reports a literature-based analysis of the coverage of the competencies required for considering sustainability aspects, in the standards of project management competencies. In this article the authors present a review of different scientific approaches to the sustainability competencies of project managers and make an attempt to establish the significance of closing the gap between the set of project managers� competences and the required competencies from the point of sustainability.

scholarly journals Us and Them – First-line Management and Change Resistance

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Rønningstad
Keyword(s):  
Resistance To Change ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Public Welfare ◽  
Change Resistance ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Change Processes ◽  
Individual Resistance ◽  
First Line ◽  
Line Managers ◽  
Written Responses

Change agents are vital in enacting organizational change, yet we know little about the specific challenges first-line managers face in this role.This study draws on written responses from man- agers in Norwegian public welfare organizations to describe the trials of being a change agent. The responses reveal that issues arise from resistance among recipients of the change and from the nature of the manager’s role in the organization. Within these categories, four challenges are delineated: (1) fall-out from ‘change fatigue’, (2) individual resistance to change, (3) managers being caught between two worlds, and (4) a lack of managerial discretion.These challenges could potentially limit the change agent’s efficiency. The study suggests areas for future research and ways for public welfare organizations to improve their change processes  

Learning

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clark Glymour
Keyword(s):  
Computational Models ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Causal Structure ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
Neural Net ◽  
Stimulus Response ◽  
The World ◽  
Computational Procedures ◽  
Computational Systems ◽  
Learning Language

Learning is the acquisition of some true belief or skill through experience. Rationalist/idealist philosophers held that the very constitution of thought guarantees that fundamental laws hold of the world we experience, and that our understanding of these laws was therefore innate, not learned. The empiricist tradition, doubtful of these Rationalist claims, denied that much was innate, and held that learning occurred through associations of mental representations. This view was lent support by the nineteenth-century development of physiological psychology, which led to a view of learning as a system of adjustments in a network without any intervening representations, a perspective that led in turn, in the twentieth century, to behaviourist studies of stimulus–response associations, and eventually to contemporary neural net computational models. Empiricism, however, had also invited, especially with Hume, doubts that the correspondence between mental representations and the world could be known. Hume believed people learn, or at least form new habits, but he did not think there could be any normative theory of learning – any way of making it ‘rational’. His scepticism led to the development by Bayes and other statisticians of formal theories of how learning from evidence ought to be done. However, the standards that developed in the form of the theory of subjective probability proved impossible to apply until very fast digital computers became available. The digital computer in turn prompted both novel normative theories of learning not considered by the statistical tradition, and also attempts to describe human learning by computational procedures. At the same time, a revolution in linguistics held that humans have an innate, specialized algorithm for learning language. Applications of computation theory to learning led to an understanding of what computational systems – possibly including people – can and cannot reliably learn. Major issues remain concerning how people acquire the system of distinctions they use to describe the world, and how – and how well – they learn the causal structure of the everyday world.

Leading Digital Change and the Management of Hybridity in Social Work Organizations

2021 ◽  
pp. 55-73
Author(s):  
Maik Arnold
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Digital Literacy ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Leadership Competencies ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Individual Change ◽  
Work Organizations ◽  
Work Management

Constant organizational changes and simultaneous confrontation with different ‘rationalities' of their stakeholders have become a new 'normality' in social work management organizations. This chapter addresses the design, implementation, and sustainable development of an innovative transformation framework of leading digital change consisting of four interrelated phases: (1) identification of the demand for change, (2) development of a digital change strategy, (3) implementation of digital transformation, and (4) monitoring and optimization. This framework can be applied at the level of individual change agents, change programs and initiatives, and to the organization itself. Future research needs to discuss benefits and drawbacks to related challenges in its implementation that require organizational learning, the replacement of old management practices, the development of new digital literacy skills and leadership competencies, and the facilitation of personnel development to mobilize the staff to enact changes in their behavior, values, and attitudes in volatile environments and uncertain times.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document