The Change Management

Résumé du document

Charles Darwin said: “It is not the strongest species that survives nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change”. Among many examples, my favorite is the case of the primitive tribe of Colombian Indians, the Kogis. The main particularity of this tribal organization is to function without any leader. Its members always undertake decisions following huge negotiation. For instance, a definitive decision is always taken after long meetings in the dark! Each one is free to express his opinion, and easily accepts contradictions.

This kind of meetings avoids instances of usual aggressiveness or unusual emotions. The Kogis provide an example for management with active participation. This “collective intelligence” is a scarce ability looked for by managers who want to share their vision to people.

As Reuter says (2000), management is an art that we have to rethink constantly to face the constant economic and social evolution. Since the 1980s, many management models have followed each other in bringing more or less appealing new rules and new theories. From benchmarking to “best practices”, from “think global, act local” to corporate governance, from competitive advantage to creation of values, from “participation management” to re-engineering, management methods are numerous.

They all offer a standard process to follow in a precise perspective. However, the slowing down of the world economy, the start-up crisis, the global competition, the disappearance of the traditional hierarchy model and revolution in both technology and communication leave us no other alternative but the obligation to manage change. We need to be firmly rooted in change. “The future is coming so fast, we can't possibly predict it; we can only learn to respond quickly” (Steven Kerr).

The Chambers 21st Century Dictionary defines change as “to make or become different”. Thus, change refers to a process which goes with the company life, side of instability and environment development. Managing change is:
-Solving the problem statement (using adapted methods and models)
-Managing the project of change (improvement, reorganization, restructuring).
-Taking into account human dimensions (values, culture, change resistance with participation, communication, training and coaching).

Working in a family business, named Desertours™, we are going to build a changed management model for this company in the tourism industry. With twenty years experience, Desertours™ is the 4WD and motorcycle adventure travel leader in the French market. Our company offers trips around the world, including Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, Okavango, Namibia, Madagascar, Venezuela and the United States. Over the past ten years, Desertours™ has diversified its range of skills and is now organizing sports events such as 4L Trophy™, a 4L orientation race in the Moroccan desert, reserved for students, as well as the Roses des Sables Trophy™, a 4WD, quads and motorcycle women-only race.

Before studying the change we can implement to retain our leadership, it is judicious to understand the causes of change and the current reality of the change management.

Extraits

[...] Collins, J Good to Great. New York : HarperCollins. Harpham, A Tools to manage continuing change. Development and learning in organizations : pp. 15-16. Jacobs, D.F Session 2 Contemporary Management & Leadership : MMB 747. University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa, 21st August 2007. Kotelnikov, V The change management [online]. Available from : http://www.1000ventures.com/business_guide/crosscuttings/change_managem ent.html. LaLonde, T Tips for making successful change happen. [...]

[...] However, because the two main events (4L Trophy™ and The Roses des Sables Trophy™) are famous and popular (more than participants for both), numerous others companies want to copy our competitive advantage. We must be careful in producing these products and developing others. We have understood why it is necessary to introduce a change process: performance, environment, competition Before to show how manage change and give key success factors in DESERTOURS™, it is judicious to study the current truth of the change management in our business. The reality of the change management Most of the managers think that change management exceeds organisation, competition or productivity concepts. [...]

[...] Because our human resources manager, Mr Julien Lethullier is skilful and appreciated by the whole staff, his department can lead changes To show the personal commitment of the manager and the top management: Because Jean-Jacques Rey is mostly not available, he has to show his participation for communication actions, through his permanent accessibility to the project and last through his interaction of decisions and the day-to-day team work To rely on leaders in the company It is important to bear in mind that changes automatically cause active and passive resistances, because of power stakes or achieved situation questioning. Usually, active resistances are due to acting minority, whereas most of people are content with a passive resistance, because of a natural immobilise situation faced to change. Thus, the main aim is to motivate the majority and overall, the most interested people of DESERTOURS™. This kind of leader is respected by his colleagues and can impulse change effects. We can give for example our financing manager, Mrs Pierrette Ciurleo. [...]

[...] The Change Management Table of Contents Introduction Why do we need change? The improvement of our company performance Three main constraints The political environment: The technological environment: The competition environment: The reality of the change management A management which is aware of people Managing change has to follow a precise theoretical process Resistance and fear How to manage change? A complex exercise Some success keys factors to successfully implement our change strategy 6 Conclusion Bibliography C harles Darwin said: is not the strongest species that survives nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change”. [...]

[...] Thus, our teams would be motivated to change, in inviting and encouraging staff to participate in discussing and implementing change. According to Mousset, CEO of Mousset Transit Group the fact that we want to imply the lowest social ladder employee in the company decision-making “refers to the Kogis approach”! 10. To involve the middle management to motivate others Involvement of the middle management is required to reassure people and to help them to be familiar with change. We can implicate all our department managers. The target is to modify behaviours in avoiding coming back to acquired habits. [...]