Senin, 27 Agustus 2012

The Pivot Point: Success In Organizational Change by Victoria Grady & James Grady - Book review



The Pivot Point

Success in Organizational Change


By: Victoria M. Grady, James D. Grady

Published: August 1, 2012
Format: Paperback, 140 pages
ISBN-10: 1614483000
ISBN-13: 978-1614483007
Publisher: Morgan James Publishing






"But despite all these advances in the field, the vast majority of organizational change initiatives still fail", write Assistant Professorial Lecturer in the Department of Organizational Science within the Columbian School of Arts and Sciences at the George Washington University, Victoria M. Grady; and consultant and researcher into the human element in organizational behavior, James D. Grady, in their insightful and research based book The Pivot Point: Success in Organizational Change. The authors describe how the usual reason given for the failure of change management initiatives, one of employee resistance, is insufficient to explain those ineffective attempts, and instead demonstrate through research how discovering how and why employee attachments affect their behavior.



Victoria M. Grady (photo left) and James D. Grady understand that blaming employee resistance to change, for the failure of change management initiatives, is superficial and even misses the mark entirely. The authors propose the alternative explanation, based on their extensive research, that successful change depends upon finding the pivot point where change becomes a reality.

The pivot point is the time and place where people within the workplace leave their old ideas and attachments behind, and embrace the new. The insight that people become attached to objects, in the form of other people, familiar technology, a particular system or process, or an abstract idea, provides the key to understanding why change fails to take place.



James D. Grady (photo left) and Victoria M. Grady recognize that change leaders must focus on the individuals, and their special pivot points, for change to made effectively. The author point out that for many change leaders, the course of action is more wishful thinking than it is real understanding of the employees themselves. The authors provide the tools for improving change initiatives through measuring and tracking the employees and their response behavior to each specific element of the change process.

When the attachment factor is understood, and treated with tact, clarity, and dignity, people will respond more positively, and develop confidence in accepting and embracing the change. When it is recognized that the resistance to change belief is not about resistance at all, the change manager is able to look beyond resistance. The response is really a human behavioral one, and it can be understood as a reaction. With that insight in place, recognizing the pivot point of the attachment can be understood and replaced with a fresh approach and behavior.

For me, the power of the book is how Victoria Grady and James Grady combine their theory and research with practical advice for understanding the underlying, human behavior that can be addressed successfully to achieve real change. The authors move beyond the usual reason given, one of employee resistance to change, to discover the deeper reason that change efforts fail,through their groundbreaking research findings. The authors provide an important method of measuring each step along the change implementation journey, through a tactful and dignity oriented approach.

The book itself is a combination of a narrative business fable and a guide book. The story and characters provide engaging illustration of the the principles of identifying the attachments, pivot point, and measuring the reactions for easier understanding. The authors also provide additional insights in the form of the book appendixes, and they add enrichment and depth to the principles shared in the main book itself.

I highly recommend the essential and must read book The Pivot Point: Success in Organizational Change by Victoria M. Grady and James D. Grady, to any business leaders, executives, managers, or entrepreneurs in any size of business or type of industry, who are seeking an effective and insightful approach to achieving successful and lasting change management. This thought provoking book will change forever the way you look at change management, and the misunderstanding of the deeper reasons for employee resistance, to that change.

Tags: , , ,



Tidak ada komentar:

Posting Komentar