The Importance of Correct Diagnosis in Organizational Change Programs

1. Why is diagnosis so vital in organizational change programs?

In order to implement a successful change program you must have reliable information outlining what you are attempting to fix. Failure to diagnose the problem can lead to even more problems. If you do not take the appropriate time to understand the problem you could be reacting and treating something that doesn’t need to be treated. For example, if you went to the doctor with a symptom and he doesn’t properly diagnose what has caused that symptom, the medicine he gives you for something that is not actually the problem, could create more complications.

Failure to accurately diagnose will create further poor decisions down the road. It is likely you will only be trying to fix some symptom of the actual problem so the problem will continue to persist until you get to the root cause. In order to identify the causes of the symptoms, performance measures are necessary. (Kaydos, W.1991) An example could be that you have a clogged sink. If you pour Drano down the sink pipes or try to plunge it out you will most likely be successful for a period of time. The clog will go away but then it can resurface. If the clog is actually due to tree roots growing through the plumbing, until you fix that, your sink will continue to periodically back up because you are only treating the symptom with your temporary solutions. In this scenario, even though the outcome has been identified, to clear the sink, the diagnosis was not accurate and the problem will persist.

Without proper diagnosis, you are not aware of what needs to change in order to resolve the problem. The diagnosis is at the beginning of a chain of events, if you fail to understand the root cause, your entire p...

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...llowed sufficient time to adjust to the idea of the new process, refreezing will be more successful. If management of resistance to change has been incorporated in the plan, with evaluation and feedback of the change, the new process will be congealed and the change plan effectiveness can be measured.

References

Amer, Dr. Naila H. Leadership Role in Management of Change. Retrieved from: www.kma.org.kw/Leadership.ppt

Brown, D.R. & Harvey, D. (2006). An experiential approach to Organizational development, (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Gibson, Ivancevich, Donnelly, Konopaske. (2009). Organizations Behavior, Structure, Processes. (pg 458) New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Kaydos, W. (1991). Measuring, Managing, and Maximizing Performance. (Pg. 38) Cambridge, MA. Productivity Press, Inc.