Organization Capacity For Change (2024)

Change is an inevitable part of individuals' life and organizations. Change is the only constant in life; we see it in nature inform of transition from season to season. The ability of a person to respond to changes, and adapt to it, determine how he will live his life. The same thing applies to organizations. Being able to adapt to change, is a trait that any organization with high aspirations for success must-have. Should they not, they face the risk of becoming irrelevant in the marketplace. Organizational capacity for change (OCC) is the overall capability of an organization, to prepare for, or to respond to, an increasingly volatile and changeable environment.

Every person has a capacity for change; it does not matter if the change is positive or negative, personal, or professional. Let imagine that our change capacity is a cup, and every single change we go through is like pouring water into that cup. We start a new project, moving to a new apartment, our kids change school, we change our gym membership, etc.…. our cup will overflow if we do not empty it. The same thing applies to our change capacity if we do not manage our change capacity our cup becomes full, and we become change fatigue and experience change saturation.

Organizations need to assess their change capacity before undertaking many change initiatives. Organizational capacity for change (OCC) is overlooked in change management.OCC is a dynamic, multidimensional capability that enables organizations to create or revise competencies in order to survive and prosper. This overall capability comprises of three ingredients: (a) human skill sets and resources, (b) formal systems and procedures, and (c) organizational culture, values, and norms. The concept of organizational capacity to change contains eight different dimensions—four of the dimensions focus on critical human capital and four focus on social infrastructure. These dimensions are:

1.Trustworthy leaders.

2.Trusting followers.

3.Capable champions.

4.Involved middle management.

5.Systems thinking

6.Communication systems.

7.Accountable culture.

8.Innovative culture.

Mutual trust between leaders and organizations is an essential ingredient in building organizational capacity for change (OCC). If leaders want the organization to trust them, then they must learn to trust the organization. Trusting others is necessary if you want to be trusted. Some people, alas forget this too quickly recent research has found that employee openness to change, was even more influenced by how justly the policy was implemented, than by how fair the policy was perceived to be.

Trusting followers is fundamental to becoming a change-capable organization. Furthermore, trust is becoming more valuable over time. The organizational trust provides an anchor and some stability when everything else is changing. Having some predictability and psychological safety, when everything is in flux and changing, is a valuable resource. Most change initiatives fail because they do not consider the emotional impacts associated with change.

References.

Judge, W. Q. (2011).Building organizational capacity for change: The leader's new mandate. Business Expert Press.