Reducing change management complexity: aligning change recipient sensemaking to change agent sensegiving

Kumar, Payal; Singhal, Manish

doi:10.1504/ijlc.2012.050855

Cited by 6 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…Musolff (2021) contends that certain proverbs play an important role in fueling emotionally charged discussions in conjunction with metaphorical narratives of liberation in public debate. Koschut (2020) discusses how emotional discourse establishes, asserts, challenges, or reinforces established power and status in politics, while Zappettini (2021) explores how emotionally charged representations of particular ethnic communities influence public debate.…”

Section: Dominant Discourse and Emotionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While sensegiving has power over the sensemaking of others, who are often the recipients of the message, employees' responses to top management's message are crucial because they can influence its outcome. Kumar and Singhal (2012) discuss the need to align sensegiving and sensemaking, and Smollan and Sayers (2009) argue that employees will only respond positively to organizational change if their values are congruent with organizational values. However, it has long been argued that policy is not always reflected in practice due to an unbalanced power structure (Hong et al, 2006).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The politics of smiling: the interplay of emotion, power and discourse in sensegiving and sensemaking

Zhu

2024

JOE

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PurposeThis research investigates the politics of smiling as a central driver for employees to navigate power dynamics within the prevailing discourse at a Japanese retailer in Hong Kong. Existing critical management studies emphasize power in organizational language, often neglecting the role of employees’ emotions in sustaining discourse. This paper examines employees’ smiles as tools for legitimizing (sensegiving) and interpreting (sensemaking) discourse. It explores how the use of their emotional display influenced the outcome of the company’s attempt to legitimize discourse. This research divides the discourse process into five phases: formation, codification, implementation, monitoring and adaptation.Design/methodology/approachUsing the critical sensegiving and sensemaking approach, this paper discusses how employees’ interpretations of corporate policies shape the perpetuation of dominant discourse and outcomes. Data were collected through the author’s long-term participant observation in the Hong Kong branches of Japanese retailers.FindingsThe formation phase discusses the emergence of a dominant discourse favoring Japanese practices in the company’s Hong Kong operations. Codification involves the conceptualization of standard smiles in customer service policies. In practice (implementation, monitoring and adjustment), employee smiles serve as tools for negotiating power—shaping careers, earnings and shift preferences. This paper argues that this discourse shapes organizational norms while employees’ sensemaking influences the discourse implementation. Furthermore, this paper highlights the transnational impact of Japanese culture in Hong Kong, which has shaped the way Japanese top management and local employees interpret the dominant discourse.Originality/valueThis study demonstrates the importance of discussing the display of emotions and employees’ intentions to understand their impact on the outcome of discourse implementation. This study also reiterates the significance of discussing the influence of one culture on another to understand the broader social context that affects the perpetuation of discourse.

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Section: Dominant Discourse and Emotionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The politics of smiling: the interplay of emotion, power and discourse in sensegiving and sensemaking

Zhu

2024

JOE

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“…Section 2 provides an overview of sensemaking research (Kumar and Singhal, 2012; Maitlis, 2005; Weick, 1988; Weick, 1993; Weick, 2011; Weick et al , 2005), which tries to explain the success or failure of change management projects by identifying different factors influencing whether employees perceive organizational change positively or negatively. The central finding is that employees’ resistance to change is often triggered by negative emotional responses.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensemaking and sensegiving

Will

Pies

2018

JAOC

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Purpose Change management projects typically fail because they meet employee resistance created by emotional sensemaking processes. This paper aims to present an in-depth explanation for these failures and how change managers could avoid them. Design/methodology/approach This study presents an argument in the following three steps: it begins with an empirically well-established fact that attempts at change management often trigger negative emotional responses; the moral foundations theory is then used to identify the typical categories of emotional responses that may result in resistance to organizational change; and the ordonomic approach to business ethics is built upon to substantiate the diagnosis that, in many cases, emotional responses cause employees to behave in a way that is collectively self-damaging. Findings The core idea of the current study’s contribution is that emotionally driven processes of sensemaking can easily become dysfunctional, especially in situations that require extensive change. Consequently, it should be top priority for managers to engage in sensegiving, which comprises: narratives that explain what is going on against the background of relevant alternatives and appropriate discourses that guide how employees form their expectations. In a nutshell, sensegiving attempts to reframe sensemaking processes. Practical implications Even if a win–win potential already exists, it can still be misperceived. If employees are used to thinking within a trade-off framework, this might trigger trade-off intuitions and negative emotions, in effect leading to a situation that makes everyone worse off. Such mental models might become a self-fulfilling prophecy. To counter such a tendency, sensegiving aims at a professional management of sensemaking processes. The task of successful change management, properly understood, is to create and communicate win–win potentials, ensuring that all parties involved understand that they are not asked to sacrifice their self-interest, instead they are invited to participate in a process of mutual betterment. Originality/value The literature on sensemaking draws attention to the empirical fact that resistance to change is typically driven by emotions. The moral foundations theory helps in exactly identifying which emotional dimensions are relevant in times of organizational change. The ordonomic approach to business ethics points out that – owing to their emotional nature – processes of sensemaking might fail, that they may mislead employees into behavioral patterns that are collectively self-damaging. Therefore, a top priority for management is to engage in sensegiving, that is, in (re-)framing sensemaking processes.

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An Updated Model for Agility and Its Implications

Chatwani¹

2019

Organisational Agility

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Reducing change management complexity: aligning change recipient sensemaking to change agent sensegiving

Cited by 6 publications

References 56 publications

The politics of smiling: the interplay of emotion, power and discourse in sensegiving and sensemaking

The politics of smiling: the interplay of emotion, power and discourse in sensegiving and sensemaking

Sensemaking and sensegiving

An Updated Model for Agility and Its Implications

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