Effective Implementation of Lean Strategies †MyAssignmenthelp.com

Question: Discuss about the Effective Implementation of Lean Strategies. Answer: Introduction: Change in an organization is defined as the adoption of new ways, methods or policies within the system of the organization. Change is a very important phenomenon and needs to be adopted as per the requirement of the organization. The change in the organization can take place in many ways. Any organization can implement any new policy for any department, at times, the organization introduces certain technology, machineries, or it entirely changes the methodology for its operations (Vom Brocke et al., 2014). Anything new that has been introduced in the organization as a strategy. Change is an essential phenomenon, all organization requires change, it is for growth and for some special requirements in an organization. A planned change brought within an organization with an aim of growth is always beneficial for the organization. Organizational change requires proper planning so that the desired results can be achieved (Langley et al., 2013). It is the nature of human beings to hate change, they generally try to resist change at all costs. Human beings want things to be the same and hence they are reluctant to change because they find it very difficult to adapt to the changes. That is the reason why employees of any organization resist change. It is not liked by most of the people. Employees generally try to resist the process of change as much as possible. Resistance to change from the employees is one of the biggest issues that are faced by the organizations and management have to take a number or steps to make sure that they successfully implement their strategies for the welfare of the organization. It is very natural for the employees to resist change, what the management do is motivate the employees (Mitchell, 2013). Panda Retail Company is one of the top retail companies in Saudi Arabia. It is basically a grocery retail company. It is a very old company which has been operating since 39 years. The parent company of Panda Retail is Savola group. The organization is very old and hence it is planning to bring about certain changes within the organization, the changes are related to operations of the staff members of the company. They are planning to digitalize most of its operations. They are planning to change the software they earlier used for database management and billing purposes. The organization received a lot of resistance from the staffs who were comfortable working with the previous software (Investments, Retail Company, 2017). They are also planning to bring certain changes regarding the promotion and appraisal of the employees. Some of the employees have even left the company because they think that the new promotion method and the changes brought in the organization are not in their favor. Though the management is yet to disclose the changes it is about to bring but the information has been communicated to the employees (Cawsey et al., 2016). In order to manage the situation the company can take a number of steps that will help its employees to accept the change and the employee turnover is reduced. Firstly, it is very important for the management to plan the entire change process, they need to make a blueprint so that it can be easily explained to the employees. Planning is the most important thing that the management of the Retail. For efficiency for their planning they should consult and take advice of some experts (Xu et al., 2016). It is very important that the employees are made a part of the planning process so that there is very less resistance from the employees. Their suggestions are to be taken and given importance. This is a two way process so the employees should also participate and give their suggestions so that later there are no grievances (Investments, Retail Company, 2017). The process is needed to the employees, communication is very important, the management is required to communicate the entire process to employees unless they do not understand the process they will not be ready to accept the change. For this the management needs to answer some of the most important questions related to the change in the organization What are the changes to be brought- firstly they will have to explain to their employees what are the changes that are to be brought in the operations and the human resource department of the organization. Why is the change taking place- The management of Panda Retail needs to explain to its employees the reason for the change, they are to be explained why it is important to take a particular step (Petrou, Demerouti Schaufeli, 2016). What are the affected departments- They should explain to their staff members the departments that would be affected by the change process. All the departments that come under the change should be communicated, in this case they need to tell them that the organization is bringing certain changes in the operations department and the human resource department (Karim Arif-Uz-Zaman, 2013). What are the benefits of the change- They should communicate the benefits of change to their employees, how would it be beneficial for them. If the employees are not communicated about the benefits they will always be reluctant about the entire process and will not participate or show interest. What can be the demerits of the change- It is equally important that the demerits of the change to be brought be communicated to the employees so that they do not have any confusion, and transparency is maintained. Communicating only the positives of the change might not always be helpful because in later stages of execution problems might arise (Burnes, 2015). Motivating the employees should be done so that they are mentally ready for accepting the changes. They should be told about the benefits of the change and why it is necessary for any organization to bring changes within its operations and policies. The Panda Retail should not implement any changes that are against the interest of the employees because those changes are bound to be resisted by the employees (Dawson Andriopoulos, 2014). After the communication of the change process, it is very important to provide training to the employees to prepare them for the change that is going to take place. The Panda Retail is planning to change the software of its operations so they need to arrange a training program for their staff members to make them acquainted to the new changes that are to be implemented within the organization. It can be concluded that, resistance to change is a very natural phenomena and hence it is often seen in the big organizations that the employees resist the new changes that are brought in the organization. Panda Retail is one of the oldest and biggest companies in Saudi Arabia. For such a big organization, it is very important that they bring changes in their operations and policies. Following the same methods might keep them unaware about the benefits of other methods that can bring more profit to the organization. Combating change requires proper planning, because proper planning it would be impossible to execute any changes in the organization. They should consider the employee suggestions and involve them in the planning process so that a better plan can be made. Communication here is very important, they need to maintain transparency in the process and hence it is very important that they communicate about the changes that are about to take place. Panda Retail then needs to pro vide training to its employees so that they can be prepared for the new changes so that they can work with maximum efficiency. They are to be motivated by communicating the benefits the new change can bring, the benefit should be correlated to their career and growth in the organization then only they will be ready to accept the change. References Burnes, B. (2015). Understanding resistance to changebuilding on Coch and French.Journal of Change Management,15(2), 92-116. Cawsey, T., Deszca, G., Ingols, C., Finkelstein, S., Hambrick, C. D., Cannella Jr, A. A., ... Huber, G. P. (2016). Organizational change.Assessment,45, 49. Dawson, P., Andriopoulos, C. (2014).Managing change, creativity and innovation. Sage. Investments, R., Retail, S., Company, P. (2017).Panda Retail Company.Savola.com. Retrieved 28 September 2017, from https://www.savola.com/en/investments/retail-investments/savola-retail/panda-retail-company Karim, A., Arif-Uz-Zaman, K. (2013). 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