Introduction
Properly performing a change initiative can be a difficult task for an organization’s executives. To implement such initiatives, the organization should be prepared to address the alterations, introducing a relevant change strategy and maintaining control over the elements that might affect it (Cameron & Green, 2019).
As such, the Microsoft enterprise has proven itself as a business that can effectively utilize the Prosci ADKAR model of change to restructure its approach to organizational activities and secure higher productivity. This paper discusses the change initiative implemented by Microsoft in 2014, analyzing and critiquing the Prosci ADKAR approach used with regard to corporate culture, as well as outlining possible alterations to enhance the change activity.
The Context for Change
The Microsoft corporation is a well-recognized tech giant that currently occupies a strong position in the technological market. Nevertheless, when smartphone operating systems began to dominate the technological market, the enterprise’s profits began to decline (Hempel, n.d.). While Apple, Android, and Bada started to occupy larger portions of the market, Microsoft was struggling with accepting the change. In 2014, the new CEO, Satya Nadella, majorly restructured the company’s previous approach.
Prosci ADKAR: The Innovative Model of Change
To properly adjust the organizational processes and ensure that the necessary practices are smoothly integrated into the organizational activities, Microsoft executives were required to choose a relevant change strategy. The Prosci ADKAR model was chosen as the most promising message that allows efficiently executing the needed type of change: a corporation-wide transformational change (Cameron & Green, 2019). The ADKAR is interpreted as Awareness, Desire, Knowledgeability, and Reinforcement, and it is deeply connected to the concept of corporate culture (Cameron & Green, 2019). As such, successful utilization of this model requires that the executives alter the workers’ understanding of the company’s goals and achievements, encouraging them to participate in the change initiative.
In addition, Prosci ADKAR requires additional input from the company’s leaders. The transformational change framework suggests that to properly execute change, the leaders must fulfill their roles, motivating the employees and adapting the environment according to their current needs (Cameron & Green, 2019). For instance, Microsoft chose to educate the executive managers on change leadership, prompting them to improve the workers’ desire to transform the enterprise (Prosci, n.d.). In addition, the corporation hired professional change agents who facilitated the adjustments and controlled the process of change (Prosci, n.d.). These methods of conducting change are highly endorsed by the creators of Prosci ADKAR, exemplifying that Microsoft executives followed the Prosci ADKAR framework as closely as possible.
Initiating Change Through ADKAR
After the appropriate strategy has been chosen, the implementation process has been separated into distinct stages. The first step was to create an awareness of the need for change, ensuring that the corporate culture supports the change initiative (Cameron & Green, 2019). A strong organizational culture not only improves the workers’ motivation to engage in the change initiative but also increases the likelihood that the alterations will be accepted by the personnel.
After that, Microsoft executives focused on the second phase of the implementation strategy, generating the employees’ desire to participate and support the change. Considering that individuals often respond to adjustments negatively, attempting to preserve the current state of the environment, it is essential that change is desired by the workers themselves (Cameron & Green, 2019). From this perspective, Microsoft was able to successfully build the employees’ interest in changing the current approach, while the organizational culture encouraged employees to establish a solution on how to enter the smartphone software market.
The next stage that is crucial to complete when utilizing the Prosci ADKAR model is the promotion of knowledge on integrating the change into the current organizational processes. Before 2014, Microsoft’s corporate culture was focused on the promotion of only successfully distributed products, negatively affecting the creation of innovative solutions (Hempel, n.d.).
By incorporating training programs and coaching instructors that informed the workers of the change methods, Microsoft was able to prevent misunderstanding and confusion, which are likely to arise without appropriate change knowledge. After that, the fourth step was to ensure that employees also possessed the skills necessary for performing the new activities (Cameron & Green, 2019). Focusing the organizational culture on practicing the skills is also vitally important for initiating the change process. As such, Microsoft executives introduced training seminars and professional consultations in order to improve the skills of the workforce and help them integrate the new behaviors into the working activities.
The final phase of the change initiative was to ensure that the change implementation was performed successfully. As such, the executives were required to enhance the workforce’s competencies in the implementation of desired behaviors. As such, corporate culture often sets specific expectations for performance, enabling employees to improve particular skills and behave according to the desired norms (Cameron & Green, 2019). Nevertheless, to change the practices commonly utilized to complete the working tasks, it is imperative to reinforce the change initiative, prompting the employees to use the skills and behaviors learned during change training (Cameron & Green, 2019). The Microsoft corporation launched several incentive programs specifically to support the implementation of new knowledge and encourage workers.
Implementation Outcomes
After the chosen strategy had been utilized, Microsoft executives reported several positive outcomes. In 2017, as a result of the change initiative, the company’s revenues surged, text and its position on the smartphone operating system market increased (Weinberger, 2016). In comparison with 2014, Microsoft incredibly improved its financial standing and regained the interest of all various customer populations (Weinberger, 2016). However, the most significant consequences of the initiative were the improvements in employee engagement and morale, suggesting that the workers were inspired to work for the corporation and motivated to contribute to its development (Delaini, 2021). Higher team cohesion and communication between members were also noted, with positive changes to the corporate culture observed.
Regardless of the beneficial outcomes, it is crucial to consider that the overall organizational environment includes factors that can promote and impede change. As such, although Microsoft was indeed experiencing a decline before 2014, it still held a strong position in the computer software market (Weinberger, 2016). Good financial standing is advantageous when implementing a change initiative, as the workforce is more likely to trust the executives’ choices due to the corporation’s current achievements (Cameron & Green, 2019). Furthermore, the necessity to advance into the smartphone operating systems market has already been addressed by the executives and recognized among the employees, meaning that the workforce might have already possessed the awareness for change.
Nevertheless, such elements as the change in leadership and lack of previous change experience could have hindered the implementation of the chosen initiative. When a company’s higher executives are replaced, it is common for the workforce to experience complications when adapting to the new leadership, meaning that the process of change can be less efficient (Cameron & Green, 2019). Moreover, as Microsoft had not previously utilized the Prosci ADKAR model, the lack of relevant knowledge might have decreased the strategy’s success.
Recommendations for Future Implementations
Microsoft’s example demonstrates that the Prosci ADKAR model can be highly efficient when implementing a change initiative. However, if another corporation were to utilize a similar strategy, alterations to this process could be suggested. Firstly, due to the potential differences in the corporate culture, it is possible that, contrary to Microsoft, awareness about change would be substantially lower. Thus, the firm should be prepared that additional efforts to improve awareness may be needed (Cameron & Green, 2019). After that, Microsoft employees have not reported resistance to change, possibly given the enterprise’s success in the computer software sector (Weinberger, 2016). Nonetheless, in a less successful organization, objection to adjustments might be significantly higher, and it is recommended to utilize extra measures to assess and overcome resistance (Cameron & Green, 2019). In this regard, the executives must ensure that the corporation’s internal environment and various factors affecting it are thoroughly analyzed before strategy execution.
Conclusion
To conclude, organizational change that occurred in Microsoft corporation after 2014 has been discussed in detail in this paper, outlining the implemented strategy and analyzing the change process. It is evident that the Microsoft executives, led by Satya Nadella, have successfully used the Prosci ADKAR method to incorporate the desired changes, not only improving the company’s outputs but also enhancing the workers’ engagement. Moreover, the employees successfully adapted to the new environment, with the enterprise overcoming potential obstacles. Nevertheless, it is advised that change awareness levels and resistance two adjustments are addressed when implementing a similar change initiative in a different organization.
References
Cameron, E., & Green, M. (2019). Making sense of change management: A complete guide to the models, tools and techniques of organizational change. Kogan Page Publishers.
Delaini, S. (2021). How Microsoft used change management best practices to launch a new business intelligence platform. Inside Track Blog. Web.
Hempel, J. (n.d.). Satya Nadella’s got a plan to make you care about Microsoft. The first step? Holograms. Wired. Web.
Prosci. (n.d.). Success Spotlight: Leader of change management at Microsoft. Web.
Weinberger, M. (2016). How Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella did what Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates couldn’t. Business Insider. Web.