Like much of the world, this author watched the news over the past three weeks regarding the staggering chaotic dismantling of America’s once heralded institutions by a corporate marauder with his own exaggerated corporate success and his ragtag team of questionably qualified associates.
While the stated purpose of rooting out fraud, waste, and inefficiency might sound noble, the implementation and change management approach seems highly questionable.
Whether breaking signed treaties, ignoring agreements, making false claims, untruths about continuity, millions across the world learned that they can no longer trust, to the same degree, a once reliable partner to follow through with their promises and even contractual commitments.
Global order since the end of World War II has been built on perceptions of honouring commitments and respect for allies. But here in Kenya as commensurately tens of thousands lost their jobs overnight and hundreds of thousands of beneficiaries learned of abrupt stoppages, observers can naturally ponder whether the new American change management initiative will prove successful.
To measure a change initiative, one typically looks to see if it built internal and external trust amongst stakeholders, whether the organisation functions more efficiently, and the degree to which targets get met. To ensure success, researchers recommend a variety of approaches that adhere to the famous Lewin’s Model of Change with its unfreezing, movement, and refreezing techniques.
First, unfreezing warms up the entity to the idea of change. Steps involved in unfreezing include the Kotter framework of establishing a sense of urgency, creating a guiding coalition, developing a vision and strategy, and communicating the change vision.
Sadly, what is happening in the United States seems to have skipped unfreezing altogether except for emphasising a sense of urgency, albeit it perhaps a false urgency.
Second, the movement phase involves taking the action.
The Mento framework includes development of a change plan, identifying internal change champions and an internal change sponsor, preparation of the internal organisational recipients of change, creation of cultural fits and smalls wins for motivation, and constantly and strategically communicate the change all while measuring progress of the change effort.
Unfortunately, what is happening across the ocean brings external forced movement with no internal departmental change plans, no change champions or internal change sponsors, no crucial preparation time at all for employees or beneficiary stakeholders, zero culture fit and compete disregard for any employee motivation.
In fact, it appears that the less staff motivation the better so that the best employees leave and the least competent get stuck and are forced to continue if they are fortunate enough to keep their jobs amidst the mayhem.
Internal and external communication has been so dismal that the implementers should receive the award of the century for miserable transparency, while all with no measures of effective progress.
Finally, change management in the final refreezing phase involves what we in Kenya would call concretising the new organisational reality.
The Cummings and Worley framework highlights that in this stage, that sustaining momentum becomes key as the entity must anchor its new approaches into its organisational culture and lessons learned. None of the virtues of refreezing seem to be happening with the new American administration.
So, what could be the effects on internal and external trust? As the Business Daily readers know, the well-researched foundations of trust involve whether stakeholders believe in the ability of the organisation, perceive the entity to hold benevolent good intentions towards employees and beneficiaries, and finally whether people believe in the integrity of leadership.
The big three aspects of trust by prolific researchers Roger Mayer, James Davis, and David Schoorman hold over 99 percent of the antecedents of trust. Sadly, the crashing, dismantling, and court cases of departments and agencies makes it appear that building trust and efficiency was never the plan of the change architects.
In analysing the likely impact on the trust components, stakeholders will feel that the authorities possess no ability to implement change management or even exercise standard leadership appropriately or effectively.
The external change agents that entered the departments and agencies appeared to hold complete disregard for the wellbeing of employees or even beneficiaries, so no post-change benevolence perceptions are expected to exist.
Finally, stakeholders will probably not see any integrity in their leaders given the secrecy, lack of transparency in their approach, virtually no communications, and unclear promises.
In essence, what is happening in America may go down in history as the worst examples of change management in modern times. A shockingly unscientific approach.
But sadly, instead of just hurting a particular company’s profits, the bad leadership are harming millions of lives in the process. Textbooks, case studies, and history videos will likely lament such bad planning and poor execution. Unfortunately, terrible consequences will occur for the departments, agencies, and possibly that country as a whole.
So, what next? Hopefully the new world order centered on questionable truths and abrupt deceits will shift our continent into its own inward direction with our Pan-African brothers and sisters standing together in the spirit of umoja, resilience, and self-reliance.
Have a management or leadership issue, question, or challenge? Reach out to Dr. Scott through @ScottProfessor on X or on email [email protected]
