Organisational change that is initiated by middle management rather

than top management is more likely to gain employee support. This

is the conclusion of a recent study co-authored by Bas Koene, assistant

professor in RSM’s Department of Organisation and Personnel

Management

Koene, B.A.S. (Bas)

Koene, Bas

EUR Research Repository

ROTTERDAM SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT, ERASMUS UNIVERSITY Effective ads: new  technology answers  old questionsBy Linda Couwenberg Improving the supply chain in humanitarian  logisticsBy Erwin van der Laan and Jan van Dalen Rethinking  managerial roles in change initiativesChris Murray talks with Bas Koene   How can auditors  avoid the perils of  aggressive accounting?By Marcel van Rinsum  Why can’t China clean up its act?By Pursey Heugens   The use and misuse of power and  unethical behaviourBy Laura M. Giurge 2nd Quarter 2017Management Knowledge         RSM DISCOVERYwww.rsm.nl/discovery RSM - a force for positive changewww.rsm.nl/discovery 2nd Quarter 2017   |   11operationalises the change objectives to fit the local situation.Koene and colleagues’ quantita-tive study, published in the Journal of Management Studies, was based on 1,795 questionnaires received from respondents in 468 organi-sations. Conducted in collabora-tion with colleagues from Australia’s Monash Business School, Canada’s Wilfrid Laurier University and the UK’s Cambridge Judge Business School, the study focused on employee support of change in relation to four different con-figurations:• Top management initiated  and executed. • Top management initiated but  middle management executed.• Middle management initiated  but top management executed.• Middle management initiated  and executed.Change initiation, according to the study, includes identifying the op-portunity, making the business case, and securing the resources commit-ments for the change. Change execu-tion involves implementing the change, from defining the day-to-day activities to translating general goals into peri-odic milestones to giving some sense and direction to those involved in the change process.Top management initiated change did not consistently engender em-ployee support for change. Nearly 48 per cent of change initiatives in the study were initiated and executed by top managers, making this configu-The study on managerial roles in launching and executing organisa-tional change shows that this positive effect of change initiation by middle management is further strengthened when top management engages in change execution. ‘The findings of the study are valuable, because quantita-tive research usually fragments the sit-uation, either investigating the impact of top management or that of middle management in change situations. Actually, both middle management and top management have a dynamic, on-going role to play,’ Koene says, noting that they each bring specific strengths and weaknesses to the process. The top management research em-phasises the importance of setting di-rection for the organisation and legit-imation in the external environment, Koene says. The middle management research emphasises how experience in the work process leads to grounded and practical change initiatives. Both, however, also face challeng-es, he says. Top management needs to motivate people in the organisation to go along with their ideas that may not always obviously benefit them, while middle management operates in a complex organisational environ-ment where their change initiatives may make sense locally, but might be perceived as less relevant in the wider organisation. People are quick to conclude that top management mostly has a role in change initiation, he says, setting goals and legitimating the change externally and explaining it internally, while mid-dle management then translates and “If middle management initiates the change, it's often closer to what people experience and it's more acceptable to people in the organisation.”Organisational change that is initiated by middle management rather than top management is more likely to gain employee support. This is the conclusion of a recent study co-authored by Bas Koene, assis-tant professor in RSM’s Department of Organisation and Personnel Management. Rethinking managerial roles  in change initiativesChris Murray talks with Bas Koene12  |   2nd Quarter 2017Management KnowledgeRSM DISCOVERYration the most common in the data. Nevertheless, he says, ‘As a way of managing change, this is not an ap-proach that has a very clear positive or negative impact.’ Nor did the study show significant positive employee support for change that was initiated by top management and executed by middle management — which account-ed for 28 per cent of the change initia-tives in the study.Middle manager advantageIn contrast, change that was middle management initiated and executed showed statistically significantly great-er levels of employee support. ‘If mid-dle management initiates the change, it's often closer to what people experi-ence and it's more acceptable to peo-ple in the organisation,’ he says.‘Top management often frames change in strategic terms. When peo-ple in the organisation think about change,’ Koene explains, ‘they think about actual changes in their work processes, what it does to their direct client connections, what it does to their jobs. They experience change and talk about change in a very different way. Middle management, in that sense, is closer to people in the organisation than top management in the way they frame and talk about change.’ However, one of the challenges of change that is initiated and/or execut-ed by middle management is the po-tential for a unit-focused framework, as opposed to an organisation-wide perspective. ‘The risk is that middle managers might have a localised view of what needs to happen, that they don't see the big picture,’ Koene says. ‘They might have local interests rather than organisational interests at heart.’ As a result, some fear that middle man-agement-initiated change can lead to political conflicts, and less employ-ee support for the change. However, Koene notes, ‘This is not what we find.’ The research shows more rather than less support for change driven by mid-dle managers. A surprising resultAlthough the research showed positive employee response to change initiated and executed by middle management, the most effective configuration was the third on the list: change launched by middle management but executed by top management. ‘People will think top management initiates, middle management executes. The value of these findings is that they highlight that, actually, it can be the opposite. Middle management initiation and top management of change shows a con-sistently positive effect on employee support for change.’ As Koene explains, this counter- intuitive allocation of roles best lever-ages the strengths of both middle man-agement and top management while counterbalancing their weaknesses.Staying involvedTop managers, Koene says, have an im-portant role to play in linking change to organisational objectives and the over-all direction of the company — which is why the continued involvement of top management. ‘Top management needs to be involved and stay involved to maintain the clarity of the organi-sational vision and direction,’ he says. ‘Middle management can initiate the change, but top management has to support it and legitimise it, and clarify how it's also relevant in the broader context of the organisation and the or-ganisation's goals.’As Koene explains, top manage-ment can help employees understand the overarching why of the change. To garner employee support, he says, ‘there needs to be constant attention to what does it mean? What are we do-ing?’ Top management best answers those questions, according to Koene. ‘During the process of change, eve-rything becomes more complicated than it was before,’ he says, ‘People will be doing and experiencing unfa-miliar things. It's very important that top management keeps helping them to make sense of what's going on. Top management needs to provide clarity and direction whilst balanc-ing it with healthy doses of realism and reflection,’Direction and sense-making is just one aspect of top management in-volvement. ‘Good leaders keep the change idea alive. What is very impor-tant for top management to consider is that when there is a change project in the organisation they have to frame it so that it remains open to updating and that there is possibility for crea-tive evolution and reframing, taking into account new things,’ he says. In sum, he says, top management ensures that change initiatives remain consistent with the organisation’s over-all goals and strategies, while at the Rethinking managerial roles in change initiatives (continued)Chris Murray talks with Bas Koene2nd Quarter 2017   |   13www.rsm.nl/discovery tle of static dichotomies, Koene says, is obsolete. ‘This research points to the impor-tance of understanding organisations not just as clear hierarchies, but as so-cial entities where multiple realities come together and are constantly ne-gotiated,’ he says. Change, Koene explains, is an evolv-ing process, in which the involvement of both middle managers and top managers remains important.  ‘Middle management acts and experiments and initiates in the process of change,’ he says. ‘Top management engages in constantly reconciling the multiple re-alities and the process of sense mak-ing and reorganisation – and constant-ly deals with emergent experiences in the process of change.’When it comes to organisational change, this continuous partnership of middle and top managers is, his re-search shows, what works best. The paper, Rethinking ‘Top-Down’ and ‘Bottom-Up’ Roles of Top and Middle Managers in Organizational Change: Implications for Employee Support, writ-ten by Mariano L.M. Heyden, Sebastian P.L. Fourné, Bastiaan A.S. Koene, Renate Werkman and Shahzad (Shaz) Ansari, is published online in the Journal of Management Studies, January 2017. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1111/joms.12258Bas Koene is Assistant Professor, Department of Organisational Change and Personnel Management, and Director, RSM Case Development Centre, Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University.  EMAIL  bkoene@rsm.nlTraditionally, research into roles played by managers in organisational change focuses either on a “top-down” approach, with top managers initiat-ing the change that middle manag-ers executing, or a “bottom-up” ap-proach, in which middle managers initiate change that is sometimes resisted by top managers wary of change from below. This either-or bat-same time allowing them to be open to ‘complexity and evolving understand-ings.’ As Koene explains, ‘The perfect plan doesn't exist. It's important to re-evaluate situations as they develop. Top management can thus be inspired by initiatives of middle management in the organisation but also take into account developments that happen along the way.’“This research points to the importance of understanding organisations not just as clear hierarchies, but as social entities where multiple realities come together and are constantly negotiated.”

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