Leading Change

Organization Behavior

Book Title: Leading Change

Author: John P. Kotter

Publisher: Harvard Business School Press

Introduction of author

John P. Kotter, a worldwide famous expert on leadership at Harvard Business School, was a graduate of MIT and Harvard. He joined the Harvard Business School faculty in 1972 and who was voted tenure and a full professorship at the age of thirty-three in 1980. Kotter's honors include an Exxon Award for Innovation in Graduate Business School Curriculum Design and a Johnson, Smith and Knisely Award for New Perspectives in Business Leadership. He again gained the title as the #1 Ў§Leadership GuruЎЁ from a survey for 504 enterprises that was conducted by Business Week magazine. Outline of this book

Leading Change was named the top management book of the year by Management General. There are three major sections in this book. The first section is Ў§the change of problem and its solutionЎЁ ; which discusses why firms fail. The second one is Ў§the eight-stage processЎЁ that deals with methods of performing changes. Lastly, Ў§implications for the twenty-first centuryЎЁ is discussed as the conclusion. The eight stages of process are as followed: (1) Establishing a sense of urgency. (2) Creating the guiding coalition. (3) Developing a vision and a strategy. (4) Communicating the change of vision. (5) Empowering employees for broad-based action. (6) Generating short-term wins. (7) Consolidating gains and producing more changes. (8) Anchoring new approaches in the culture.

Perspective on this book

This book carries great discussions and uplifts our perspectives regarding business management in various ways. Frequent and common mistakes that were encountered by the managers was a key element for the Ў§eight mistakes of managing changes.Ў§ Many follow othersЎ¦ common mistakes and fail from changing while reforming their organization. The possibility of failure is that they perceive the methods from those whom were successful, but they never understood the reasons why some people fail to change. Mr. Kotter lists eight mistakes that people usually make and presents some stories to us. These examples help us to focus on the problems when reforming organizations. In the twenty-first century, competition among organizations grew enormously. The old structure of organizations is not suitable for this dynamic environment. Some firms which do not consider about changing could be eliminated from industries. Moreover, some firms which decide to change could fail to change. The failure to change organization results from insufficient plan and implement. Most leaders whom fail to change did not implement well due to the undertaking of some specific steps or execute next step without finishing the current step. Lack of employeesЎ¦ involvement in any steps is a critical reason of failure from changing. Therefore, Professor Kotter offers eight stage to achieve this goal. First of all, leaders should inform the reasons of change for the organization to the employees; the difficulties and obstacles that the organization needs to conquer; and how organization will change and the necessity of the change. Next, in order to succeed in changing, selecting a suitable group from diverse people is the critical point. Leaders should gather those people whom are respectful, expertly, and proven key players. These key players could have good skills in leadership or management. This is important because organizations