Tahereh Ebadi; Seyed Hosein Kazemi; Hassan Danaeefard
Abstract
1- INTRODUCTIONAlthough family organizations are usually on the sidelines of management research, they play a significant role in local and international economies. Therefore, in the last few decades, studies have focused on the differences between these organizations and conventional ones. One ...
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1- INTRODUCTIONAlthough family organizations are usually on the sidelines of management research, they play a significant role in local and international economies. Therefore, in the last few decades, studies have focused on the differences between these organizations and conventional ones. One of these areas of attention is researching survival and organizational changes in these organizations. Due to their dual identity (family on the one hand and business on the other), family organizations face different change issues and have distinct characteristics that can prevent or promote changes. 2- THEORETICAL FRAMEWORKPrevious research has addressed many issues and research questions about the different aspects of experiencing organizational change in family organizations. Specifically, the main research topics include the person-centered behaviors of the founders (such as their leadership style and entrepreneurial behaviors) alongside the specific features of these organizations (such as cultural differences). Another main focus of the literature has been explaining the distinct nature of family organizations, resulting in a middle-range theory about the dualistic nature of their identity, namely, the socioemotional wealth theory. Socioemotional wealth refers to financial aspects of the firm that meet the family's affective needs, such as identity, the ability to exercise family influence, and the perpetuation of the family dynasty. However, what is lacking in the literature is a more comprehensive look at how family organizations experience organizational changes. To answer this question, secondary data analysis, i.e., how previous studies have conceptualized organizational changes and its promoting and preventing factors in family organizations, would be a suitable path. 3- METHODOLOGYThe current study tried to answer the research question by systematically reviewing the literature from 2000 to 2020. Unlike traditional narrative review, systematic review is repeatable and transparent. It provides a structured and documented approach to the literature selection and review process to reduce review bias. We followed the procedures and recommendations of some authoritative articles to conduct this review. Accordingly, the first step was determining clear and specific questions at the beginning of the study: “What approaches and theories are used in the conceptualization of change in family organizations?” and “What are the factors that promote or prevent change in family organizations?” The next step was doing an initial search and identifying related articles in 5 online databases (Google Scholar, Sage Publications, Science Direct, Taylor & Francis, and Wiley). We used two categories of keywords and logical operators (AND, OR) to perform the search. The search was conducted in September 2020 and only among sources published in English between 2000 and 2020. For the selection of articles, we set some inclusion and exclusion criteria, such as “the study should be empirical and being published in a peer-reviewed journal,” which were applied through software-aided control, referring to related sites, and reviewing the abstracts of the articles. By the end, 81 final articles were selected for this review. To extract data, we created an Excel file with columns related to the general characteristics of the articles and our research questions. During a back-and-forth process between the researchers, we negotiated and finally agreed upon the extracted information. Since the data and methods of the reviewed articles were heterogeneous, we combined the findings in this study qualitatively. To do so, the final articles were entered into ATLAS.ti (version 8) software for content analyzing and coding and their information was combined into three main themes: the approach or theory used for conceptualizing the change and its promoting and preventing factors. 4- RESULTS & DISCUSSIONThis study was to summarize the findings of past studies and provide a more general picture of change and transformation in family organizations. Specifically, this research aimed to answer two main questions: “What approaches and theories are used in the conceptualization of change in family organizations?” and “What are the factors promoting and preventing change in family organizations?” Regarding the first question, the finding of this study is that change in family organizations is mainly conceptualized around five main perspectives: succession, entrepreneurship, sustainable business development, socio-emotional wealth, and organizational culture. As for the second question, reviewing articles shows that factors preventing and promoting change in family organizations are not far from these topics. For example, one factor that drives change in family organizations is the existence of an entrepreneurial culture and the existence of an entrepreneurial leader and founder. Also, the existence of a suitable substitute and non-family expert staff are factors that lead to change. This means that change in family organizations mainly happens either through an internal factor (i.e., entrepreneurial culture) or an external factor (i.e., the presence of non-family experts). These two observations show two main strategies to facilitate change in family organizations that can be used by managers or change consultants. The same pattern is observed among preventing factors. The existence of non-professional managers, traditional attitudes towards organization management, and nepotism have been among the preventing factors. This means that if the organizational culture of a family organization is institutionalized in the form of anti-change norms such as nepotism or authoritarian leadership, it would be one of the biggest obstacles to change. In such a case, managers or change consultants can facilitate changes in these organizations by making cultural interventions such as organizational confrontation meetings. 5- CONCLUSIONS & SUGGESTIONSBy categorizing and combining theories/approaches to the conceptualization of change and its preventing and promoting factors in family organizations, this study paves the way for developing a change management model in family organizations. For this purpose, this study has categorized all the obtained preventing and promoting factors into five capabilities: adaptability, human capital, generational transition, manager/s, and change management. This means that those factors that help to create these five capabilities are the promoting factors, and those that weaken these capabilities are the factors that prevent change in these organizations. Based on this classification, future studies can conduct research on how to measure and mature these capabilities in family organizations and provide a model for promoting and successfully managing changes in family organizations.
Mohammad Sadegh Dadmehr; Yaghoob Maharati; Alireza Khorakian; Fariborz Rahimnia
Abstract
1- INTRODUCTION
As the competitive environment has rapidly grown over the past two decades and seriously overshadowed the activities of private enterprises, unsuccessful changes, especially in terms of instability and unsustainability of the achievements, have become a fundamental challenge ...
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1- INTRODUCTION
As the competitive environment has rapidly grown over the past two decades and seriously overshadowed the activities of private enterprises, unsuccessful changes, especially in terms of instability and unsustainability of the achievements, have become a fundamental challenge for such organizations as private banks. The research conducted in this field indicates that planning, directing, and sustaining the organizational change results is very difficult, and pervasive changes affecting the main elements of the organization do not meet the expected goals. Some researchers suggested that organizations have difficulty sustaining continuous improvement in the long term, especially after an initial period of two or three years. As in most cases, employees do not internalize the new changes and behaviors as their norms and mental beliefs and do not use them as a basis for their subsequent behaviors. The results and achievements of changes may become unstable and fade after a short time, and a return to prior behaviors may occur in some cases. Thus, the organization incurs significant financial and opportunity costs that weaken its competitive position. This is true for Iranian private banks as they do not depend financially on the government and are in a fiercely competitive environment. Therefore, the main questions are as follows: what are the strategies to achieve sustainable change, and what are their consequences in Iranian private banks?
2- THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Different theories exist for organizational change, which can be used to support and guide research to find the roots and consequences of sustainable organizational change. Research on organizational change can be categorized into three types: 1) content models emphasizing the content and essence of change, 2) contingency models considering the context and environmental conditions, and 3) process models focusing on the stages of change. A review of different change models indicates that they focus only on the content, process, or implementation of change while not addressing the period after the implementation, including institutionalization and stabilization of change. Therefore, this research was conducted to bridge the existing gap and provide change managers and agents in Iranian private banks with a vision to understand deeply the strategies for sustaining organizational changes and their consequences.
3- METHODOLOGY
The philosophical foundation of the present research performed in private banks was interpretivism with the qualitative approach, and the grounded theory strategy was used. In this research, the systematic approach of Strauss and Corbin was used. The samples were purposefully selected by conducting snowball sampling on managers and experts of the private banks of Iran who have experience working in at least one change program in the past ten years, provided that one year lasted since achieving the results. The organizational change experts and researchers who had significant experiences were interviewed with a semi-structured method. The sampling continued to reach data and theoretical saturation. The collected data were analyzed by open, axial, and selective coding processes using the MAXQDA 20 software. Lincoln and Guba's criteria (credibility, dependability, confirmability, and transferability) were used to validate the results.
4- RESULTS & DISCUSSION
The research findings demonstrated that sustainable change is characterized by two features: stackability of change, including internalization of the change and its adaptation and alignment with the organizational components, and spreadability of change, including the ability to transfer experiences to other employees and apply the organizational change. According to the research findings, the strategies needed to implement sustainable changes in Iranian private banks include 1) empowering employees through training and utilizing work teams, 2) empowering the organization by establishing a knowledge management system and motivational mechanisms, the mobilization of financial resources, the scrutiny, and explanation of the organization's strategic plan, leadership style, effective processes, and agile structure. The consequences of sustainable changes include 1) employees' growth and excellence due to their increased psychological and behavioral maturity, 2) improved efficiency to increase financial resources and reduce organizational costs, and 3) improved effectiveness to satisfy the strategic stakeholders and gain a competitive advantage. The research findings are noteworthy in that sustainable organizational change is considered a way to increase the productivity and prosperity of human resources in the organization.
5- CONCLUSIONS & SUGGESTIONS
This research demonstrated that a change is sustainable and is institutionalized when it is internalized in employees' beliefs and becomes a basis for their subsequent behaviors. This is realized by applying employee and organization empowerment strategies. Therefore, it is suggested that change managers and agents in the country's private banks consider the empowerment of employees seriously by applying influential and continuous training and expanding teamwork by using the strategies identified in this research, and the empowerment of the organization by using a knowledge management system, motivational mechanisms, providing financial resources, checking and explaining the organization's strategic plan, applying an appropriate leadership style, effective processes, and structural agility.
Marzieh Morovati; Zohayr Hayati
Abstract
Abstract
This study was carried out to evaluate scientific production in the area of change management with the aims of reflecting knowledge growth, highlight the weaknesses and strengths of the databases, and to assist researchers to manage and plan their future work in their fields of interest. This ...
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Abstract
This study was carried out to evaluate scientific production in the area of change management with the aims of reflecting knowledge growth, highlight the weaknesses and strengths of the databases, and to assist researchers to manage and plan their future work in their fields of interest. This is a survey study and its subjects of study were all titles indexed in Thomson Reuter’s databases in this area from 1990 to 2009. Findings showed that 2530 documents have been indexed during this period. Most documents have been published between 2006 and 2010. The annual growth rate for publications is 78.80 percent. Findings also show that 6,105 authors have been involved in the production of this number of titles among them S. Lee is at the top and Penamora, Hicks, Towill were at the second and third places. These documents have been produced by 80 countries among them U.S. and England were at the first and second places. 1173 journals published this amount of documents among them “Journal of Organizational Change Management” occupied the first rank. These documents have been published in 11 different languages of which English was the prominent language. They have been published in 12 different formats, of which article was the prominent one. This number of documents has received 20,778 citations, totally. The article titled "Tightening the iron cage – concertive control in self-managing Teams” received 401 citations, placing it at the top of the list.