Change and Development Processes

Question 1: Discuss the increasing importance of flexibility to traditional organizations, and some of the internal changes that must be made in order to gain the required degree of flexibility.

Answer 1: Before the mid- 20th century, popular opinion was that healthy businesses, like strict fathers, employed consistent and inviolate rules. Neither employees’ discontent nor original ideas were respected, and every aspect of production was streamlined into a model all employees must follow. Flexibility suggested lack of backbone, uncertainty and weakness. The social revolution began a grassroots change, and the new technology sealed it. Today, a business that operates as it always has is seen as obstinate and doomed. In order to survive, organizations must quickly discover how to become flexible in order to respond to continuous changes from within and without. This flexibility means part of the decision making process must be put into the hands of employees; managers must consider individual personalities and cultural tendencies when assigning work; and organizations must look not to the past for successful models, but to the present and into the future.

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Question 2: Customer response to membership buying clubs such as B.J.’s and Costco, and to ‘big box’ style retailers like Target and Home Depot, has propelled these types of businesses to the top. Discuss why customers have responded so well to what these types of companies offer.

Answer 2: Membership warehouse companies and ‘big box’ retailers re- create the marketplace of old, where shoppers visited small shops specializing in a single type of item, grouped in a common location. Where once a shopper could buy meat from a butcher, turn to the next booth for vegetables and stop next for bakery items or clothing, today a single trip to a store offering everything from food to tools provides the same convenience. But convenience alone isn’t sufficient to draw the vast numbers of buyers these businesses need to succeed. Customers will pay a little more from time to time in exchange for convenience, but most shoppers are concerned with getting the goods they need at the lowest possible price. ‘Big box’ retailers and membership buying clubs market themselves as money saving options, because they purchase goods in enormous volumes and pass savings along to the customer.

Question 3: Consider the dangers inherent in an overabundance of flexibility, flexibility that has been inappropriately applied, or flexibility as an automatic response to a newly perceived element in a situation.

Answer 3: There is no question that organizations that refuse to adapt to become more flexible are doomed. At the same time, it can be argued that flexibility is only useful when it is required. Any true system, by definition, requires form; form without structure is liquid, and if liquid isn’t contained, it cannot be systematized. An organization that doesn’t understand the necessary relationship between flexibility and stability does itself a disservice by blindly accepting the wisdom of the day that says ‘be flexible or perish’. An organization that accepts every innovative business model that comes along is, in actuality, employing none of them. Giving employees a voice in decision making is useful only when those employees have experience and understanding of the problem. Responding to a faster market by limiting production runs and rushing product distribution without taking the time required to consider all options can destroy, rather than enhance, an organization’s bottom line.

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