Deck 15: Organizational Change

Question 1

Refreezing involves producing disequilibrium between the current state and the future state.

Answer 1

False
Explanation: Refreezing occurs when the organization's systems and structures are aligned with the desired behaviors. Unfreezing involves producing disequilibrium between the driving and restraining forces.

Question 2

The force field analysis model states that stability is achieved only when the driving forces for change subside and are replaced by restraining forces acting in the same direction.

Answer 2

False
Explanation: According to the force field model, stability occurs when the driving and restraining forces are roughly in equilibrium-that is, they are of approximately equal strength in opposite directions.

Question 3

According to the force field model,stability occurs when the driving forces and restraining forces are of approximately equal strength in opposite directions.

Answer 3

True
Explanation: According to the force field model, stability occurs when the driving and restraining forces are roughly in equilibrium-that is, they are of approximately equal strength in opposite directions.

Question 4

The urgency for change must always be initiated from a problem-oriented perspective in order to be effective.

Question 5

Negotiation and coercion are necessary for people who will clearly gain something from the change and in cases where the speed of change is critical.

Question 6

Fear of the unknown usually motivates employees to support organizational change.

Question 7

Unfreezing occurs when the driving forces are weaker than the restraining forces.

Question 8

Communication should be applied to reduce resistance to change where the change must occur quickly with little financial cost.

Question 9

Customer feedback provides a human element that energizes employees to change their current behavior patterns.

Question 10

An emerging view of employee resistance to change is that it is a resource rather than an impediment to change in modern organizations.

Question 11

People sometimes resist change to prove that the change agent is incompetent.

Question 12

To bring about effective change,leaders must create an urgency to change internally rather than rely on forces outside the organization to create that urgency.

Question 13

Unfreezing occurs by making the driving forces stronger,weakening the restraining forces,or a combination of both.

Question 14

Subtle forms of resistance create the greatest obstacles to change because they are not as visible.

Question 15

When people support change,they typically assume that it is others who need to change.

Question 16

One reason why employees typically resist change is that they dislike predictable role patterns.

Question 17

You realize that in order to bring about a change in your organization,employees need to break old routines and adopt new role patterns.Stress management strategy is best suited in this situation.

Question 18

Coaching and other forms of learning reduce resistance to change mainly by helping employees break previous routines and adopting new role patterns.

Question 19

Resistance worsens procedural justice.

Question 20

An emerging view of employee resistance to change is that it is a dysfunctional and irrational response to a desirable initiative which should be eliminated in modern organizations.

Question 21

A unique feature of appreciative inquiry is that it breaks away from the problem-solving mentality by reframing relationships around what is positive and possible.

Question 22

The best way to manage resistance to change among those who will clearly lose out from the change is to introduce coercion practices.

Question 23

Action research is a problem-focused process of organizational change.

Question 24

Action research maintains the view that research orientation is less significant compared to action orientation.

Question 25

Coercion should never be used to manage change in organizations.

Question 26

Action research is the process of determining whether the change process is ethical or not.

Question 27

Appreciative inquiry tries to break away from the approach to change advocated by action research.

Question 28

Positive principle advocates the view that people are motivated and guided by the vision they see and believe in for the future.

Question 29

The first step in the Four-D model of appreciative inquiry is dreaming,in which participants envision what might be possible in an ideal organization.

Question 30

One problem with negotiation is that it tends to produce compliance rather than commitment to the change process.

Question 31

Diffusion of change is more likely to succeed if some people who have worked under the new system are moved to other areas of the organization.

Question 32

Action research adopts the emerging philosophy of positive organizational behavior and directs the group's attention away from its own problems.

Question 33

Pilot projects get diffused fast when employees are devoid of role perceptions.

Question 34

Unless the change must occur quickly or employee interests are highly incompatible with the organization's needs,employee involvement is almost an essential part of the change process.

Question 35

Transformational leaders act as agents of organizational change.

Question 36

Pilot projects are usually more flexible and less risky than centralized,organization-wide programs.

Question 37

Organizational rewards are powerful systems that refreeze behaviors.

Question 38

How we perceive and understand the change process depends on the questions we ask and language we use throughout that process.This is called the constructionist principle.

Question 39

Information systems and reward systems help to refreeze the desired conditions in organizational change.

Question 40

Change experts recommend introducing quantum change when the organization wants to overhaul the system quickly and decisively.

Question 41

Which of these forces pushes organizations toward a new state of affairs?

A) Process forces
B) Driving forces
C) Parallel learning structures
D) Restraining forces
E) Vertical learning structures

Question 42

A parallel learning structure is an organizational change approach in which a social structure is constructed alongside the formal hierarchy to increase the organization's learning.

Question 43

Future search events minimize resistance to change with little or no involvement from employees.

Question 44

The chief executive of a large telecommunications company wanted to restructure the organization so product leaders would have more power than the executives in charge of each region.The regional executives tried to prevent this restructuring just because it would weaken their power and reduce their salaries in the long term.This action by the regional executives is mainly an example of resistance due to:

A) direct costs.
B) saving face.
C) fear of the unknown.
D) breaking routines.
E) incongruent organizational systems.

Question 45

Future search conferences are meetings among a small task force of senior executives who have been given the mandate to look for a change agent on a particular corporate strategy.

Question 46

Practices such as action research avoid the use of management's power to induce compliance and conformity and is less likely to create ethical issues.

Question 47

The emerging view among change management experts is that resistance to change:

A) needs to be seen as a resource.
B) refers to the fact that employees are happy with the status quo and can perform well only in the status quo.
C) is the change agents' distorted perception of employee behavior based on their own doubts about the success of the change process.
D) indicates that change is not required in the organization.
E) is an impediment to change.

Question 48

Unfreezing refers to:

A) getting one's own way in organizational politics.
B) wrong management practices that discourage newcomers from staying with the organization.
C) ensuring that the change effort is diffused to others within the organization.
D) the process of improving organizational communication.
E) producing disequilibrium between the driving and restraining forces of change.

Question 49

Which model of organization change explicitly refers to unfreezing the current situation and refreezing the desired state?

A) Parallel learning structures
B) Process consultation
C) Appreciative inquiry
D) Quantum change
E) Force field analysis

Question 50

Increasing the restraining forces and reducing or removing the driving forces would:

A) make the change process more difficult to implement.
B) remove any resistance to change.
C) have no effect on the change process.
D) give the change agent more power in the change process.
E) align the organization's systems and structures with the desired behaviors.

Question 51

Creating urgency for change is most closely associated with:

A) the delivering stage of appreciative inquiry.
B) the final stage of a search conference.
C) reducing the restraining forces.
D) the process of increasing the driving forces.
E) refreezing the desired conditions.

Question 52

An important feature of parallel learning structures is that they operate within the existing organizational hierarchy.

Question 53

In organizational change,unfreezing may occur by:

A) increasing the restraining forces.
B) increasing the driving forces.
C) reducing the urgency to change.
D) changing individuals in key positions.
E) reducing the pace of the change.

Question 54

Using the action research model instead of the other models such as parallel learning structure approach,enables an organization to eliminate the threat of violating individual privacy rights.

Question 55

The main objective of force field analysis is to help change agents to:

A) identify ways to control the external environment.
B) find ways to increase the driving forces for change.
C) diagnose the situation better by understanding the driving and restraining forces for change.
D) determine whether change is necessary in the organization or not.
E) determine and single out the force that causes organizational resistance for change.

Question 56

Increasing the driving forces and reducing the restraining forces tends to:

A) reduce the need for change.
B) unfreeze the status quo.
C) refreeze the status quo.
D) decrease environmental stability.
E) produce environmental equilibrium.

Question 57

Refreezing refers to:

A) getting one's own way in organizational politics.
B) a management practice used to discourage newcomers from engaging in organizational politics.
C) aligning the organization's systems with the desired behaviors to support and reinforce the new role patterns.
D) repeating the change process to obtain better organizational outcomes and employee performance.
E) producing disequilibrium between the driving and restraining forces of change.

Question 58

Which of the following types of resistance to change is a strategy to "prove" that the decision is wrong or that the change agent is incompetent?

A) Direct costs
B) Saving face
C) Fear of the unknown
D) Breaking routines
E) Incongruent organizational systems

Question 59

Which of these forces are commonly called resistance to change?

A) Process forces
B) Driving forces
C) Parallel learning structures
D) Restraining forces
E) Unfreezing forces

Question 60

One ethical concern with some organizational change programs is that they may threaten the employee's self-esteem.

Question 61

According to the action research model,which of the following occurs during the "diagnose the need for change" step?

A) Analysis of data
B) Establishment of client-consultant relationship
C) Determination of the change effectiveness
D) Establishment of new conditions
E) Selection of external consultant

Question 62

Change agents should introduce new rewards and information systems to:

A) unfreeze the new behavior.
B) begin the process of appreciative inquiry.
C) avoid action research.
D) refreeze the desired conditions.
E) unfreeze the organizational change.

Question 63

Senior executives at a large retail organization want employees to become more customer-friendly.Employees think they are serving customers well enough and the company is the dominant player in the market.What should the executives do to create an urgency to change in this situation?

A) Stop trying to convince employees that they should change their behavior and use other strategies to gain market share.
B) Keep pushing employees to change even though they don't see the need to change and attempt to replace the existing change agent.
C) Introduce punishments for employees who do not become more customer-friendly.
D) Inform employees about the driving forces in the external environment indicating that the company's dominant position will be threatened unless they become more customer-friendly.
E) Introduce a reward-punishment scheme to promote the change in the organization.

Question 64

_____ leaders are agents of change because they develop an appealing vision of the desired future state,communicate that vision in ways that are meaningful to others,make decisions and act in ways that are consistent with that vision,and build commitment to that vision.

A) Operational
B) Transformational
C) Charismatic
D) Collaborative
E) Transactional

Question 65

According to the action research model,the _____ before diagnosing the need for change.

A) client-consultant relationship needs to be formed
B) effectiveness of the change effort needs to be evaluated
C) disengagement of the consultant's services needs to be addressed
D) change effort needs to stabilize
E) intervention needs to be introduced

Question 66

The highest priority and first strategy required for any organizational change is to:

A) alter the responsibilities of senior executives in the organization.
B) introduce stress management counseling to the employees.
C) train employees who do not possess the skills required under the new conditions.
D) communicate the need for change and keep employees informed about what they can expect from the change effort.
E) negotiate a new set of relations among those who will clearly lose out from the change.

Question 67

Which of the following change management strategies should be given a priority when employees need to break old routines and adopt new role patterns?

A) Coercion
B) Employee involvement
C) Learning
D) Stress management
E) Negotiation

Question 68

One problem that coaching and other forms of learning have in minimizing resistance to change is that they:

A) tend to change people too quickly.
B) lead to long-term antagonism with the change agent.
C) create compliance but not commitment to the change process.
D) they are time-consuming processes.
E) attempt to change the drives instead of reducing the restraining forces.

Question 69

Which of the following is true about organizational change?

A) Change agents work best when they lead the initiative alone.
B) Groups of people with different degrees of commitment to the change contribute most to the success of public sector organizational change.
C) Guiding coalitions that lead organizational change are limited to the executive team.
D) Change occurs more informally through social networks.
E) Viral change should be avoided in organizations.

Question 70

_____ tries to break out of the problem-solving mentality of traditional change management practices by reframing relationships around the positive and the possible.

A) Parallel learning structure
B) Large group intervention
C) Force field analysis
D) Action research
E) Appreciative inquiry

Question 71

The positive principle,the constructionist principle,and the simultaneity principle are principles of:

A) parallel learning structures.
B) appreciative inquiry.
C) action research.
D) process consultation.
E) large group interventions.

Question 72

BusCorp wants to introduce a new procedure for processing customer requests.If this change will require employees to break old routines and adopt new role patterns,the preferred strategy for dealing with resistance to this change such as this is:

A) communication.
B) learning.
C) stress management.
D) negotiation.
E) coercion.

Question 73

Bezel Systems is introducing a few organization-wide changes.A coalition of employees will clearly lose out from the proposed changes and they have enough power to cause the change effort to fail.Assuming that the change effort can proceed slowly and cost is not an issue,the preferred strategy for dealing with this resistance to change is:

A) communication.
B) employee involvement.
C) stress management.
D) negotiation.
E) coercion.

Question 74

Which of the following strategies to reduce the restraining forces should be used only if all other strategies fail?

A) Coercion
B) Negotiation
C) Stress management
D) Communication
E) Training

Question 75

Action research is:

A) the theoretical foundation for appreciative inquiry.
B) a form of team-building activity.
C) a highly participative process of planned change.
D) a social structure created alongside the formal organization for the purpose of refreezing the desired conditions.
E) a process with very high level of people orientation.

Question 76

When managing change,learning interventions should be used:

A) to break routines that cause resistance to change.
B) when the organization wants to reduce the cost of implementing change.
C) when employees resist change due to direct costs.
D) in all change management activities.
E) only when all other strategies have failed.

Question 77

One way that communication minimizes resistance to change is by:

A) generating an urgency to change.
B) encouraging negotiation.
C) eliminating organizational politics.
D) promoting speedy refreezing.
E) encouraging stress management.

Question 78

In the organizational change process,strategic visions:

A) could increase or decrease the resistance to change.
B) should be suppressed as the change process might require an alternate strategy.
C) could minimize fear of the unknown.
D) form the second stage of action research.
E) lead to negotiations between management and employees.

Question 79

Employee involvement is almost an essential part of the change process unless the:

A) benefits of change are unknown to the employee.
B) organization is looking for a gradual change.
C) change must occur quickly in the organization.
D) employee strength of the organization is huge.
E) organization is planning to introduce continuous changes.

Question 80

One problem that communication,learning,and employee involvement have in minimizing resistance to change is that they:

A) can lead to more subtle forms of resistance.
B) lead to long-term antagonism with the change agent.
C) create compliance but not commitment to the change process.
D) are time-consuming.
E) are not effective when the change effort needs more employee commitment.