Lewin’s Three-Phase Model of Change and Force Field Analysis
Kurt Lewin (1951) offered a three-phase model of organizational change in which he described change as a process of (1) unfreezing, (2) moving, and (3) refreezing. Current organizational practices need to be released (or unfrozen) to be changed. Once they are changed, they need to be refrozen as newly adopted regular practices. Lewin pointed out that two forces worked together to maintain equilibrium in an organization: forces promoting a change and forces promoting the status quo. Change can occur only when forces of change are greater than forces maintaining the status quo. This can happen in two ways: if forces promoting change are increased or forces maintaining the status quo are decreased.
For example, imagine that a company is going to introduce a new financial software system. Forces supporting the change might be that (1) the new system will permit a more sophisticated analysis of the company’s financial results, (2) the new system will be more accurate than the current system, and (3) the system can be integrated into the current contracts and manufacturing systems. Forces resisting the change might be (1) the need for extensive employee training, (2) the cost of implementing the system, and (3) the reluctance on the part of employees who have had a bad experience with similar implementations. Lewin’s model points out that change will not occur if the training, cost, and resistance are greater than the benefits that the system offers (see Figure 4.2).
Lewin’s is an easily grasped description of change that has been widely adopted by managers and practitioners. It explains that to embrace something new, something else must be left behind. The organization must be freed from prior practices and must work to sustain the change when it is implemented. The model also reminds us that organizational members must be prepared for a change, and that levels of resistance can mean that the organization remains in a frozen state until we work to unfreeze it. Members must be practically or symbolically released from previous practices in order to change them, and following a change, conscious attention must be paid to reinforcing the change in order to help it stick. A popular adaptation of Lewin’s model refers to an organization’s current state, a transition state, and a desired state (Beckhard & Harris, 1977). Despite its popularity among practitioners, many scholars have noted that an “organization-as-ice-cube” model is, however, an oversimplification of a much more complex process, particularly since organizational practices are never exactly frozen (Kanter, Stein, & Jick, 1992).
Figure 4.2 Kurt Lewin’s Force Field Analysis
Lewin’s concept of force field analysis has become a useful tool for OD practitioners to use with clients. The tool can help organizational members understand what factors would support a given change effort and what resistance might prevent the change from being adopted. Some practitioners use the model as a formal assessment, asking team members (separately or in groups) to rate the strength of the forces for and against change on a scale from 1 to 5 to prioritize actions where energy should be directed (see Schwering, 2003, for a variation on this approach).
The Nadler-Tushman Congruence Model
Noting that systems theory is “too abstract to be used for day-to-day organizational behavior-problem analysis” (Nadler & Tushman, 1983, p. 114), Nadler and Tushman have offered an expanded version of systems theory that contains additional concepts intended to be more useful to practitioners (see Figure 4.3). Nadler (1981) also explains that this model is particularly useful for organizational change. The premise behind the model is this:
The model puts its greatest emphasis on the transformation process and in particular reflects the critical system property of interdependence. It views organizations as made up of components or parts which interact with each other. These components exist in states of relative balance, consistency, or “fit” with each other. The different parts of an organization can fit well together and thus function effectively, or fit poorly, thus leading to problems, dysfunctions, or performance below potential. Given the central nature of these “fits” among components in the model, we will talk about it as a congruence model of organizational behavior, since effectiveness is a function of the congruence among the various components. (Nadler & Tushman, 1983, p. 114)
Like the traditional model of systems theory described earlier, notice that inputs, transformation processes, outputs, and feedback are also included as part of the congruence model. Each of these has been expanded in this model. Inputs include environment, resources, and history, and are merged with organizational strategy to influence transformation processes. Market demands, human resources, technology, capital, information, and prior patterns all comprise the organization’s inputs. Strategy is included in the congruence model as it determines what the organization will work on and how the organization must work to achieve its outputs. Outputs are now more specifically defined not only as the “tangible” product of the organization’s processes, but outputs also consist of organizational, group, and individual performance. Nadler and Tushman include job satisfaction, stress, and other individual outputs as products of the work environment as well. Transformation processes have been expanded in the congruence model to include four important elements that relate to one another: task, individual, formal organizational arrangements, and informal organization. The task component encompasses the work to be done, but also the skills and knowledge required to do it and the degree of independence or judgment required. The individual component includes employees’ knowledge and skills, engagement and motivation, preferences and attitudes, and other influences on individual behavior. Formal organizational arrangements include explicitly defined processes and organizational structures, job definition, metrics, the physical layout and environment, and other officially specified aspects of the work. Informal organization is defined as the less explicitly defined or tacit understandings, processes, methods, and norms that comprise how work is actually done.
Figure 4.3 The Nadler-Tushman Congruence Model
Source: Nadler, D. A., & Tushman, M. L. (1997). Competing by Design. Oxford, p. 38.
Together, these four elements are defined as the primary components of the organization. They interact together in more or less consistent ways as the organization produces its outputs. Nadler (1981) writes about a fundamental notion of the congruence model:
At the core of this systems-based perspective is the assumption that the interaction among the organizational components is perhaps more critical than the characteristics of the components themselves, and that as systems, organizations fundamentally work better when the pieces fit together. (p. 194)
Nadler and Tushman (1983) refer to this as the “congruence hypothesis,” or the idea that the better the congruence between components, the more effective the organization. When an organization has a market demand to produce a new product (new input and new output), that demand requires a specific task to produce the output. If the task’s demands require skills and knowledge that individuals do not possess, then there will be a congruence gap (or low “fit”) between task and individuals. Organizational effectiveness can be achieved only if the fit is increased.
The model points to areas that affect one another so that changes in other parts of the system can be noted and controlled. Nadler (1981) explains that when parts of a system are changed, they may increase or decrease the “fit” or congruence with other parts of the system. When change happens, other components of the organization may resist the change and encourage regression to