PHL 736 Week 7 Organizational Transformation Example

Changing How a Plant Speaks Up: Leading an Ethical and Safety Transformation

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

PHL/736: Political Acumen and Ethics

Week 7 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

The learner, the company, its plants, the incidents and all people named by role are composites written for a model paper.

Weeks 4 to 6 found gaps between Platte Valley Foods' stated values and its practices. In the spring, two events made those gaps concrete. A line worker on the fastest deboning line lost part of a finger when a machine guard, removed to clear a jam, was not replaced. Two weeks later, the ethics hotline received a report that a supervisor had cut the hours of a worker who had complained about the same missing guard. The CEO asked the composite vice president of corporate affairs to lead a transformation of how the company handles safety and speaking up.

Diagnosis

The vice president gathered evidence over six weeks. Injury records showed that near-miss reports had fallen by half over three years even as injuries rose, a pattern suggesting people had stopped reporting minor problems. Exit interviews from hourly workers mentioned fear of supervisors. A short anonymous survey, offered in four languages, found that 58 percent of line workers agreed that "people who raise problems get treated worse." Supervisors' bonuses depended mainly on pounds per labor hour.

The diagnosis: production pressure, reinforced by supervisor incentives and a few supervisors' behavior, had created a culture in which workers saw speaking up as risky. Policies against retaliation existed but were not trusted.

A Model for Leading Change

Kotter (1995) drew on observations of many corporate transformations to identify eight steps and the errors that derail them: convince people that change cannot wait, gather a leadership group strong enough to drive it, form a vision, spread it widely, remove obstacles so people can act, produce quick and visible wins, consolidate them into further change and anchor the changes in everyday culture. Kotter warned especially against declaring victory too soon and against neglecting to anchor changes in the culture.

The model fits the situation, with adaptations. Urgency already exists after the injury. The guiding coalition must include people trusted on the floor, not only executives. And anchoring change will take years, beyond the expansion's start-up.

Change Agents and Networks

Battilana and Casciaro (2012) studied change initiatives in a national health system and found that change agents' positions in informal networks shaped their success: agents with networks bridging otherwise unconnected people were more effective at changes that departed sharply from existing institutions, while those in cohesive networks did better with changes that departed less. They also found that agents connected to colleagues who felt mixed about a change tended to do better.

For the transformation, which departs sharply from the plant's norms, the coalition needs members who bridge groups: line leads respected across shifts and language groups, a maintenance supervisor who works with every department and union stewards where present. The vice president mapped the informal network through conversations with workers and identified eleven such bridges, several of them ambivalent about management's sincerity, which Battilana and Casciaro's findings suggest is useful.

The most important members of the coalition were not on the organization chart: they were the line leads everyone calls when something breaks.

Why Codes Are Not Enough

Treviño et al. (2006) reviewed research on behavioral ethics in organizations and concluded that ethical and unethical behavior is shaped strongly by organizational context, including leadership, reward systems, ethical climate and culture and peer behavior, not only by individual character or formal codes. Applied here, the anti-retaliation policy failed because supervisors were rewarded for output, because leaders had not visibly enforced the policy and because workers watched what happened to those who complained.

The Transformation Plan

Urgency and vision. The CEO will speak at every shift meeting, in person with interpreters, acknowledging the injury and the retaliation report and stating a vision: every worker can stop the line for safety without penalty.

Guiding coalition. A safety and speak-up council of twelve: the plant manager, the safety director, four line leads, two maintenance staff, two supervisors and two hourly workers chosen by peers.

Systems. Supervisor bonuses will weight safety measures, including near-miss reporting, equally with productivity. A stop-the-line rule will be written and trained. Retaliation claims will be investigated by corporate staff outside the plant, with results reported to the council.

Accountability. The supervisor in the hotline case, after investigation, was removed from supervision. The investigation also found that the production schedule made guard replacement impractical during jams, and maintenance procedures were changed.

Short-term wins. Within three months: guards redesigned on the deboning line, a visible tally of near-miss reports and fixes posted on each line and recognition for workers whose reports prevented injuries.

Politics of the Change

Some supervisors will resist, seeing the change as undermining their authority and threatening output. The plant manager supports the goal but worries about the expansion schedule. The vice president will meet supervisors in small groups, explain the incentive change and involve two respected supervisors in the coalition. She will ask the CEO to state publicly that the expansion timeline will adjust if needed, removing the fear that safety will be sacrificed for start-up.

What Could Go Wrong

Three risks could undo the plan. If near-miss reports rise and leaders treat the rise as bad news, workers will stop reporting again; the council will explain in advance that rising reports are a sign of trust. If a supervisor retaliates and is not held accountable, the whole effort will lose credibility; corporate investigations protect against local cover-ups. And if production problems during the expansion lead managers to quietly restore old pressures, workers will notice; the board's quarterly review of speak-up measures alongside output is meant to keep both in view.

Fairness

The change must be fair to supervisors as well as workers. Supervisors will receive training in coaching and handling concerns, and the bonus change will be phased in over two quarters so no one is penalized for results under the old rules.

Communication in Every Language

About a third of hourly workers are more at ease in a language other than English. Every message about the change, including the stop-the-line rule and how to report retaliation, will be delivered in person by supervisors and line leads in the main languages spoken on the floor, with written versions posted. The hotline will accept reports in those languages.

Measures and Milestones

Over two years: near-miss reports per thousand hours (expected to rise at first), recordable injury rate, survey agreement that people who raise problems are treated worse (target below 20 percent), retaliation claims and their outcomes and turnover among hourly workers. The council will review data monthly and report to the board quarterly.

Sustaining the Change

Kotter's warning about declaring victory too soon applies. The vice president will keep the council in place after targets are met, build speak-up measures into supervisor selection and promotion and repeat the survey annually.

Conclusion

A serious injury and a retaliation report revealed a culture that silenced concerns. A plan drawing on Kotter's steps, research on change agents' networks and behavioral ethics changes incentives, accountability and daily practice alongside messages and builds a coalition of informal leaders. Week 8 combines the course's work into an ethics and influence strategy.

References

Battilana, J., & Casciaro, T. (2012). Change agents, networks, and institutions: A contingency theory of organizational change. Academy of Management Journal, 55(2), 381-398. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2009.0891

Kotter, J. P. (1995). Leading change: Why transformation efforts fail. Harvard Business Review, 73(2), 59-67.

Treviño, L. K., Weaver, G. R., & Reynolds, S. J. (2006). Behavioral ethics in organizations: A review. Journal of Management, 32(6), 951-990. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206306294258