Question

In the final project, you will be developing a change plan for the "Alaska Airlines: Navigating Change" case study. In The Heart of Change Field Guide: Tools and Tactics for Leading Change in Your Organization, Cohen explains what is required from the leader and other parts of the organization to incorporate Kotter's steps successfully as a change intervention. Review the case study "Alaska Airlines: Navigating Change" and then complete the following:

(a) State what actually occurred in the case regarding Kotter's first two steps of establishing a sense of urgency and creating the guiding team in a change effort and

(b) address each of the critical elements for Section II parts A and B in your change effort analysis. Make sure to include your recommendations for implementing Kotter's steps 1 and 2.

A. Create Urgency Describe a plan to create urgency within the organization and convince stakeholders that this change needs to take place.

What processes currently exist for implementing change?

How will these processes need to be updated for the proposed change?

Describe the strategy you will use to get support from your employees.

How will this strategy be effective?

B. Build a Guiding Coalition Identify who should be involved in this guiding coalition.

Provide rationale for each choice. Kotter likes 50% leaders and 50% managers with experience, while others prefer the composition to be 33% leaders, 33% managers, and 33% informal leaders, but you can assemble the guiding coalition as you see fit.

Determine steps you can take to ensure commitment from those involved. Describe those steps.

Answer 1

a change plan for the "Alaska Airlines: Navigating Change" case study. In The Heart of Change Field Guide: Tools and Tactics for Leading Change in Your Organization, Cohen explains what is required from the leader and other parts of the organization to incorporate Kotter's steps successfully as a change intervention. Review the case study "Alaska Airlines: Navigating Change" and then complete the following:

(a) State what actually occurred in the case regarding Kotter's first two steps of establishing a sense of urgency and creating the guiding team in a change effort and

(b) address each of the critical elements for Section II parts A and B in your change effort analysis. Make sure to include your recommendations for implementing Kotter's steps 1 and 2.

A. Create Urgency Describe a plan to create urgency within the organization and convince stakeholders that this change needs to take place.

What processes currently exist for implementing change?

How will these processes need to be updated for the proposed change?

Describe the strategy you will use to get support from your employees.

How will this strategy be effective?

B. Build a Guiding Coalition Identify who should be involved in this guiding coalition.

Provide rationale for each choice. Kotter likes 50% leaders and 50% manage

Answer:

Organizational change management is not a one-time process; It is gradual and takes place in steps. One of the models to use in organizational change management is the Kotter’s (1996) 8 step change process. The eight steps are:(1) Create a sense of urgency,(2)Form a powerful coalition,(3)Create a vision,(4)Communicating the vision,(5)Empowering others to act on their vision,(6)Creating short term wins,(7)Consolidating change and (8)Institutionalizing new approaches

The purpose of this assignment is to examine and discuss Kotters’s first two steps of change process in reference to Alaska Airlines.

Creating a sense of Urgency

The airline is operating at all-time low with only 70-75% of flights being on time and four mishandled bags per 1,000 passengers.Morever, the ground crew is handling baggage and also performing ground service between flights.

If the above situation persists, there is going to be significant drop in operating income which will affect net revenues for the airlines. This will in turn cause the airline to lay off staff, reduce salaries and remuneration in a bid to reduce costs. The airlines needs change to turn the situation around .To be able to achieve this, the management has proposed the appointment of a high-level person to fix the Seattle hub

The current process for implementing change at Alaska airlines involves the top management meeting somewhere and deciding to implement change. For the proposed change to occur, all employees need to be given a forum where they can be able to participate and give their views. This will enable the company to identify and determine which personnel are an obstacle to change and how best to convince them that change is necessary.

To get support from employees I will conduct an intense lobbying primarily through the flight attendants and pilots unions. I will use flies to communicate the importance of change in the current situation

Forming A powerful coalition

Forming a powerful coalition is the most important step in implementing change in an organization. This is because leadership is a factor for the success and growth of any organization. The coalition which is chosen should include leaders who inspire trust and loyalty from their followers.

The powerful coalition will include Bill Ayer, president and Chief executive officer, Brad Tilden, executive Vice-president of Finance, Glen Johnson, executive Vice President of airport service,maintaenance and engineering and Ben Minicucci,Vice President of Operations

The coaling will include 50% leaders and 50% managers to infuse strong leadership skills and good management styles.

The following steps will be used to get commitment from members of the coalition;

• Communication
• Establish expectations
• Signing performance contracts

Recommendations

To implement the two steps in Kotter’s step process of change management, the airline should come up with a steering committee to oversee the whole process. The steering committee should select some of its members to conduct monitoring and evaluation of the entire process

References

1. Alaska airlines(2011).Company facts.
2. Allison, Melissa (May 14, 2005). "Alaska Airlines outsources 472 baggage-handling jobs". The Seattle Times. Archived from
3. Anderson, Jeff (2013). The Lean Change Method: Managing Agile Organizational Transformation Using Kanban, Kotter, and Lean Startup Thinking. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.
4. Editorial Team, Mind Tools (18 February 2016). "Kotter's 8-Step Change Model". Mind Tools. Retrieved 18 February 2016.
5. Kotter, John P. (1996). Leading Change. Harvard Business School Press