Change can come from and spawn from
anywhere. No matter how large or small, any number of peoples may get affected
within an organization. One of the most common responses I hear about change is
that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” For example early on in my deployment
it was determined that while my shift had worked well together and there were
high amounts of cohesion, the other shift was having a lot of issues and
problems with its people (each shift covered 12 hours per day). Our leadership
proposed the idea that each shift should have a handful people swap shifts in
order to try and solve this dilemma. So what was the most common response from
my shift? “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
I can
understand the huge amounts of resistance from my shift because of the
disruption of norms the suggested change would bring. Norms can be defined as
“shared ideas about what members of an organization should do and feel. . . .
Norms cannot easily be changed because of their strong group support.” (Brown, 2011)
A certain set of norms have already been solidified on my shift and to
completely change the majority of the peoples would disrupt the strong group
support.
Generally
in order for change to occur, it must first be bred within a tribe and slowly
grown outward and beyond, at least according to Seth Godin. Seth Godin talks
about how mass marketing’s are not the way to go because it requires very
average idea that appeals to the masses. Average ideas aren’t what change the
world, ideas strong enough to start a movement do. What I gather from this is
that if I want to start a change within my work environment, I first need to
find those that also believe in the idea. Let them take ownership of the idea
and spread their stories to others. When people hear an idea from one person,
it doesn’t have nearly the same effect as hearing the idea from many people.
When enough people fight for what they believe, that’s when the potential for
revolution is at its strongest.
Bibliography
Brown, D.
(2011). An Experiential Approach to Organizational Development. New
Jersey: Pearson.
Godin, S. (2009). The tribes we lead. Retrieved from
TED: http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_the_tribes_we_lead#t-457256
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