The individual as a target of change

Because organizational change cannot occur without individual change, organizational change research typically focuses on individuals' role in organizational change (Jex, 2002). Woodman and Dewett (2004, p. 33) argue that considering the inverse of the individual à change à organization perspective is an ignored but vital part of understanding how to drive organizational change. Despite stability in personality and differences across time, people change in predictable ways throughout their lives. Work experiences are among the factors that shape individual characteristics and outcomes. The complex interaction between the individual and the environment implies that the individual not only changes the environment but also that the environment also changes the individual. This interactionist perspective focuses on reciprocal influences that influence change and “behavioral potentialities” (p. 33), meaning the developmental journeys of individuals and organizations.

Woodman and Dewett (2004) proposed a change model that shows organizational influences on individual change (see Figure 1 in the appendix). Individual change means the changes in employee behaviors and characteristics related to organizational functioning and effectiveness. Behavior includes on-the-job behavior. Characteristics include the individual’s job-related knowledge, attitudes, and motivation. Three interrelated dimensions of change modify how specific organizational phenomena influence individual change: changeability, depth, and time. Changeability means the degree to which a characteristic may change. Depth means the degree to which a new behavior differs from the original behavior. Time means how long it takes the change to occur. Change in individual behavior influences organizational outcomes like performance, creativity, intentions to leave, commitment, and resistance to change.

The model identifies four important influences for individual behavior and characteristics: socialization, training, managerial behavior, and organizational change programs. The congruency among these sources of change influences how individuals respond to them. Congruency can strengthen antecedent influence on individual behavior, while incongruent forces can create a conflict that can diminish change potential or cause unintended change, like dissatisfaction and stress.

The organizational influences on the individual change model (Woodman & Dewett, 2004) offer important implications for change management practice, especially in relation to understanding systemic change, commitment to change, and ethics of change.

Regarding systemic change, the model emphasizes the dynamic interaction between individuals and organizations, supporting research that effective and lasting change must be systemic and congruent with subsystems [See section titled “Assumptions of whole system intervention”].

Regarding resistance, the dimensions of individual change—changeability, depth, and time—provide change managers with additional vocabulary for understanding and dealing with resistance. According to Woodman and Dewett’s model, the least changeable characteristics will likely cause the strongest resistance and take the longest time to change. Understanding organizational influence on individual change can provide a richer understanding for dealing with resistance and facilitate positive change throughout the system. Commitment reflects the strength of individual attachment to the organization, which influences the individual’s willingness to pursue organizational goals.

Commitment is an important change force; regardless of the change strategy, change efforts will likely fail if the employees lack a  commitment to the organization and the change process. Woodman and Dewett’s (2004)  model can enhance understanding of employee commitment, which can guide change decisions and processes. Regarding ethical issues, the model can help employees understand organizational influences on their behavior so they can make informed decisions about their participation in change interventions. The model can also help change agents to consider the psychological health, job satisfaction, stress, and other detrimental influences change efforts can have on employees.

Individual interventions

Leaders generally conduct individual-level interventions as training programs to influence performance (Jex, 2002). Examples of individual-level interventions include job redesign (Hackman, 1980), teaching intervention (Huy, 2001), and T-Groups (Bradford, Liebowitz, & Benne, 1964).

Job redesign.

Job redesign is an intervention that alters jobs to improve the productivity and quality of work for individual employees (Hackman, 1980; Latack & Foster, 1985). The job redesign process typically involves changing job specifications to give an employee additional autonomy in planning, implementing, and monitoring work, making decisions, and dealing directly with clients.

Job redesign can also involve combining simple jobs into one job to enhance efficiency and productivity while creating a more meaningful position. A job design can also create a more enriching position to enhance employee motivation and satisfaction. Hackman (1980) argues that correctly implemented job redesign can increase employee satisfaction and motivation, can improve the quality of product and service, and sometimes increases the quantity of work (p. 449). However, focusing on individual positions may treat symptoms while ignoring mezzo and macro-level problems. Jex (2002) asserts that job redesign can also have unpredictable and adverse consequences throughout the organization. This could result from equity issues that can emerge when other employees perceive special treatment (Adams, 1963), and from the organization treating symptoms without addressing larger problems.

T-Group.

T-Group training is an individual intervention conducted in a group context with the goals to increase interpersonal skills, to enhance awareness of how individual behavior affects others, and to increase understanding of group dynamics (Bradford, Liebowitz, & Benne, 1964). T-Group training aligns with Lewin’s (1951; 1947) force-field theory [described in Cultural Interventions / Force Field Analysis] by creating a social environment designed to unfreeze an individual’s habitual behavior, move behaviors by encouraging the individual to experiment with alternative behaviors, and then refreeze new behaviors through reinforcement and encouragement. The T-Group lost favor as an organizational change intervention because it lacked empirical support, proved mostly ineffective in real-world applications, and introduced ethical questions about forcing employees to participate (Jex, 2002).

This does not mean that the T-Group is dead; it has been repackaged and integrated into other intervention techniques. For example, NTL Research (NTL Institute, 2008), a research organization that was founded by Kurt Lewin and that pioneered the intervention method, markets T-Group-based services and workshops in appreciative inquiry, coaching, leadership development, and diversity training. Intervention consultants like Learning for Living (2010) package similar services to American secondary education systems in the form of leadership training and compulsory diversity training programs for children.

Teaching intervention and change in beliefs.

The teaching intervention guides people to collaborate in changing their own beliefs and behaviors. Huy (2001) offers the psychic prison as a metaphor for the teaching intervention, meaning that it assumes that members mean well but are cognitively deficient.

The analytical framework for the teaching intervention is cognitive-focused OD action research that puts outside change agents in the role of uncovering and changing beliefs. The change agent fills the role of a missionary who imparts truth that liberates change targets to learn, innovate, and adapt. The goal is to create a community of responsible and mindful people collaborating to learn and adapt in an uncertain environment. The intervention theory proposes that exposing assumptions serves as a prelude to changing behaviors.

The change agent is an outside consultant and action researcher who acts as a teacher and a psychologist to uncover assumptions and teach targets correct practices using empirical rational change tactics. The teaching intervention approach is best for changing beliefs and is used to develop organizational capabilities in the moderately long term. A limitation of the teaching intervention is that it does not always lead to long-term behavioral change; changing individual cognition rarely extrapolates to organizational levels.