Coch and French (1948)
ASSIGNMENT
Management classic: Resistance to change.
Management consultants and researchers, Coch and French conducted a now classic study of how people react to change.
1. Why were the consultants engaged by the company? * Lester Coch and John R. P. French Jr. were both employees of Hardwood. They were personnel manager (Coch) and personnel director (French) at the time of the experiment. Hardwood company was facing one of the most serious production problem that was the resistance of production workers to the necessary changes in methods and jobs. The resistance expressed itself as high turnover, very low efficiency, restriction of output, and marked aggression against management. Therefore, finding solution for those issues by further researches were strictly needed.
2. How did they conduct their study?
They set one control group and three experimental groups with different amounts of participation. * 1st group (18 workers): Individually, they were merely informed of intended changes along with the explanation of them. * 2nd group (13 workers): Only a few representatives of this group were elected to be trained in new methods. Then the new job methods were presented to all the workers * 3rd group (7-8 workers): All its members were made to discuss with the management about the change in job methods. They discussed about the current production methods and how they might be improved.
3. What were the results of the study? * 1st group: Resistance developed immediately, 17% of the members quit after 40 days. There were an increase of grievances and decrease of productivity. * 2nd group: There were no quits in 40 days * 3rd group: The best result with no quits in 40 days, no signs of resistance and productivity increased about 15%
4. Are these principals still valid today? * The main point of these principals is get employees participated in management process. Besides many different principles of
Management classic: Resistance to change.
Management consultants and researchers, Coch and French conducted a now classic study of how people react to change.
1. Why were the consultants engaged by the company? * Lester Coch and John R. P. French Jr. were both employees of Hardwood. They were personnel manager (Coch) and personnel director (French) at the time of the experiment. Hardwood company was facing one of the most serious production problem that was the resistance of production workers to the necessary changes in methods and jobs. The resistance expressed itself as high turnover, very low efficiency, restriction of output, and marked aggression against management. Therefore, finding solution for those issues by further researches were strictly needed.
2. How did they conduct their study?
They set one control group and three experimental groups with different amounts of participation. * 1st group (18 workers): Individually, they were merely informed of intended changes along with the explanation of them. * 2nd group (13 workers): Only a few representatives of this group were elected to be trained in new methods. Then the new job methods were presented to all the workers * 3rd group (7-8 workers): All its members were made to discuss with the management about the change in job methods. They discussed about the current production methods and how they might be improved.
3. What were the results of the study? * 1st group: Resistance developed immediately, 17% of the members quit after 40 days. There were an increase of grievances and decrease of productivity. * 2nd group: There were no quits in 40 days * 3rd group: The best result with no quits in 40 days, no signs of resistance and productivity increased about 15%
4. Are these principals still valid today? * The main point of these principals is get employees participated in management process. Besides many different principles of