Step by step vs.

Culture
A strategy for managing change

Elin Storm & Lotta Ek

Thesis LIU-IEI-TEK-A--08/00499—SE
Institutionen för project, innovationer och entreprenörskap

Organizational change
Abstract
Even though companies are facing a continuously changing environment, far from all
businesses manage to succeed with their organizational changes. (Olson, 2008) If
wanting to meet market demands and avoid unnecessary costs it is important to ask the
question if we can, in some way, predict, understand or influence the process of change.
(Ahrenfelt, 2001) The purpose of this thesis is to determine if life-cycle theories can be
used exclusively when planning and managing a process of change. To answer the
purpose, the thesis is based upon a qualitative case study at Consafe Logistics group. The
objective with the empirical studies, executed through nine interviews with various
managers, was to determine whether or not life-cycle models and organizational culture
can be of assistance when managing change. The studies showed that the opinions differ
between the respondents and that the topics internal communication and documentation
were frequently brought up during the interviews.

Theoretically, this thesis addresses different life-cycle change theories and an alternative
model for implementing change through organizational culture. Furthermore the theoretic
section considers the areas Project organization, Leadership in processes of change,
Knowledge, competence & education, Internal communication and Documentation. The
thesis showed that applying life-cycle theories to a change can be of limited use since
there are big difficulties in placing the different activities throughout the change in a
chronological order. The theories can be used however to highlight the relationship
between activities which can be useful for making time savings. Irrespective of the order
activities are managed in a process of change, measurable goals, feedback and support
throughout the process are central for the change’s outcome. This thesis has resulted in a
general life-cycle model for managing organizational change based upon existing theories
and empirical studies. Finally, culture and inertia are described as two factors that either
facilitate or inhibit the success of the change depending on how they are managed.

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Acknowledgements
In the process of writing this thesis we have gotten support and the benefit of an
outsider’s perspective from several people and organizations. We would like to express
our gratitude for their time and energy which has helped to produce this paper.

The thesis would not have been possible to carry out without the participation on Consafe
Logistics. Apart from supplying us with necessary tools like computers, an office and
breakfast we are very grateful for the welcoming office environment and the patience to
answer questions that everyone has shown. We would also like to say a special thanks to
all our interview respondents.

We would like to say a big thanks to Charlotte Widstrand for her initiative to offer us the
opportunity to write our thesis for Consafe Logistics. We have gotten invaluable
experiences not just only work related, but also enjoyments like a winter in Skåne.

We couldn’t have found our way through the jungle of academic rules for how to write a
thesis if it wasn’t for our tutor at Linköpings Tekniska Högskola, Eva Lovén. Many
thanks for your support and guidance.

We have clearly experienced that you can never get too much help when it comes to
writing a thesis. We would like to thank the consultancy bureau Centigo for giving us
another way of looking at working with organizational change.

Through constructive criticism throughout the work of this thesis, our opponent Therese
Scheidmann has given us valuable input. Many thanks for your opinions and your time.

Finally we would like to send an abundance to close family and friends who have
supported us through times of stress and worries. Thank you for taking us on long walks,
going out to dinners and just calling to ask about the weather.

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Table of contents
1. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................................... 6
1.1. BACKGROUND .............................................................................................................................. 6
1.2. PURPOSE ...................................................................................................................................... 6
1.3. DELIMITATIONS ........................................................................................................................... 7
1.4. DIRECTIVES .................................................................................................................................. 7
1.5. DISPOSITION ................................................................................................................................. 8
2. FRAME OF REFERENCE................................................................................................................ 9
2.1. HOW AND WHY CHANGE DEVELOPS.............................................................................................. 9
2.2. IMPLEMENTATION THEORIES ...................................................................................................... 10
2.3. PROJECT ORGANIZATION ............................................................................................................ 18
2.4. LEADERSHIP IN PROCESSES OF CHANGE...................................................................................... 22
2.5. COMPETENCE, KNOWLEDGE AND EDUCATION ............................................................................ 26
2.6. INTERNAL COMMUNICATION ...................................................................................................... 30
2.7. DOCUMENTATION ...................................................................................................................... 31
3. ANALYSIS MODEL ........................................................................................................................ 33
4. METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................................................... 35
4.1. RESEARCH PROCESS ................................................................................................................... 35
4.2. ANALYZING DATA ...................................................................................................................... 40
5. EMPIRICAL STUDY....................................................................................................................... 42
5.1. EMPIRICAL BASE ........................................................................................................................ 42
5.2. DECISION ................................................................................................................................... 45
5.3. INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................... 46
5.4. INITIALIZATION .......................................................................................................................... 49
5.5. EARLY JOB EXPERIENCES ........................................................................................................... 50
5.6. INSTITUTIONALIZATION ............................................................................................................. 54
5.7. SUPPORT .................................................................................................................................... 56
5.8. FEEDBACK.................................................................................................................................. 56
5.9. CULTURE.................................................................................................................................... 57
5.10. INERTIA ...................................................................................................................................... 57
5.11. A CONSULTANT’S POINT OF VIEW .............................................................................................. 58
5.12. BENCHMARKING ........................................................................................................................ 59
6. ANALYSIS ........................................................................................................................................ 62
6.1. THE PROCESS OF CHANGE AND THE DECISION ............................................................................ 62
6.2. INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................... 63
6.3. INITIALIZATION .......................................................................................................................... 68
6.4. EARLY JOB EXPERIENCES ........................................................................................................... 70
6.5. INSTITUTIONALIZATION ............................................................................................................. 74
6.6. SUPPORT AND FEEDBACK ........................................................................................................... 76
6.7. CULTURE.................................................................................................................................... 76
6.8. INERTIA ...................................................................................................................................... 78
7. AUDITED ANALYSIS MODEL ..................................................................................................... 80
7.1. FROM FIVE TO FOUR PHASES....................................................................................................... 80
7.2. TRANSPARENT PHASE BOUNDARIES ........................................................................................... 81
7.3. KEY FACTORS AND AREAS OF INTEREST ..................................................................................... 81

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 7.4. CONTINUOUS FEEDBACK AND SUPPORT ...................................................................................... 82
7.5. INERTIA AS A POSITIVE DRIVING FORCE ...................................................................................... 82
8. CONCLUSIONS ............................................................................................................................... 83
8.1. TRANSPARENT PHASE BOUNDARIES ........................................................................................... 83
8.2. MEASURABLE GOALS ................................................................................................................. 83
8.3. BENEFIT FROM EVERYONE’S COMPETENCES AND OPINIONS ....................................................... 83
8.4. CONTINUOUS FEEDBACK AND SUPPORT ...................................................................................... 84
8.5. NECESSARY REORGANIZATION ................................................................................................... 84
8.6. A POLICY FOR DOCUMENTATION ................................................................................................ 84
8.7. A POLICY FOR INTERNAL COMMUNICATION ............................................................................... 85
8.8. KNOWLEDGE, COMPETENCE AND EDUCATION ............................................................................ 85
8.9. GENERAL STRATEGY FOR MANAGING CHANGE........................................................................... 86
9. DISCUSSION .................................................................................................................................... 88
9.1. THE METHOD .............................................................................................................................. 88
9.2. THE RESULTS.............................................................................................................................. 88
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................................... 89

Table of figures
FIGURE 1 PROCESS THEORIES OF ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE ......................................... 9
FIGURE 2 FACTORS INFLUENCING ADJUSTMENT DURING THE IMPLEMENTATION PROCESS ........................... 11
FIGURE 4 ILLUSTRATION OF A FUNCTION BASED VERSUS A PARALLEL ORGANIZATION ................................. 21
FIGURE 5 TO LEAD DURING CHANGE IS TO SEE AN ASSIGNMENT ................................................................... 25
FIGURE 6 KOLB'S LEARNING STYLES ............................................................................................................ 28
FIGURE 7 MODES OF THE KNOWLEDGE CREATION ........................................................................................ 29
FIGURE 8 ANALYSIS MODEL .......................................................................................................................... 33
FIGURE 10 CONSAFE LOGISTICS’ COUNTRIES OF PRESENCE .......................................................................... 44
FIGURE 11 ILLUSTRATION OF CONSAFE LOGISTICS' ORGANIZATION BENELUX ............................................. 51
FIGURE 12 PROMISE PROJECT APPROACH ..................................................................................................... 52
FIGURE 13 AN ILLUSTRATION OF WHAT SITUATIONS MAY REQUIRE WHAT LEARNING STYLE ........................ 69
FIGURE 14 ORGANIZATION DIAGRAM ............................................................................................................ 72
FIGURE 15 AUDITED ANALYSIS MODEL......................................................................................................... 80

Table of table
TABLE 1 SELECTION ..................................................................................................................................... 39
TABLE 2 GENERAL STRATEGY FOR MANAGING CHANGE ............................................................................... 87

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1. Introduction
Introduction
The background, the purpose, delimitations and directives for this thesis are described
below. To help the reader familiarize with the thesis disposition a brief description of the
contents of each chapter follows.

1.1. Background
In the best of times, organizations are facing exciting opportunities as a result of new
products, new technologies and new initiatives. In challenging economies and uncertain
political environments organizations are often faced with changes of varied nature, and
these changes disrupt the status quo and causes stress to people involved. (Olson, 2008)
An urge to change is understandable from the management’s or consultant’s perspective
but organizational changes are often ineffective or counter-productive. (Sorge & van
Witteloostuijn, 2004) Thus, ensuring that the change is both victorious and persistent can
be challenging and elusive and calls for both individual and organizational competences.
(Kiefer, 2005) Roughly 70 percent of change efforts fail or are disrupted, and the
consequences are significant in both short term and long term. Lower productivity and
morale, missed objectives, wasted time, wasted money and higher employee turnover
mean big costs of failure for the organization. (Olson, 2008) Thus, it is important to
understand and contemplate the character of the process of change, its different phases
and consequences. It will be important to ask the question if we can, in some way,
predict, understand or influence the process of change. (Ahrenfelt, 2001)

Consafe Logistics offers customers logistical solutions, more specifically warehouse

management systems, from here on called WMS. A WMS can be described as computer
software designed to manage the storage and movement of items throughout the
warehouse. (Multichannel merchant, 2008) It is said that organizations remain
competitive because they are able to support and implement continuous and
transformational change. (Gilley et al., 2008) To stay competitive on the market and keep
up with market demands Consafe Logistics has begun a change process to improve their
product portfolio. Consafe Logistics is looking for a structured plan for how to implement
the process of change and avoid common pitfalls where others have failed.

1.2. Purpose
The purpose of this thesis is to determine if life-cycle theories can be used exclusively
when planning and managing a process of change.

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 1.3. Delimitations
To restrict the thesis to only concern areas relevant to the change process and to find an
answer to our purpose, necessary delimitations have been made.
.
• Even if Consafe Logistics will change their product portfolio there will still be
customers depending on the company for service and support for excluded
products. A plan for how to manage this service and support does not lie within
the boundaries of this thesis. It is a result of the process of change, but not a
necessary activity to succeed with the process of change.

• Porras and Robertson (1993) define four categories of components which describe
an organization’s inner work environment; organizing arrangements, social
factors, physical setting and technology. We will only focus on the organizing
arrangements and the social factors.

1.4. Directives
Guidelines for how Consafe Logistics wish to benefit from the results of this thesis are
written below.

• Consafe Logistics is looking for a common strategy, preferably constructed as an

easy-to-follow check-list, for how to manage the process of change.
• The strategy should be useful to all subsidiaries and partners.
• The strategy should be made from a manager’s perspective.
• We should assume that the first sale to customer has already been established
when developing the check-list.

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 1.5. Disposition
The content of each chapter are briefly described below.

Chapter 2, Frame of reference

Theories concerning areas relevant for the process of change are presented in the second
chapter.

Chapter 3, Analysis model

A synthesis of the theories from the frame of reference makes up the analysis model
which is presented in the third chapter.

Chapter 4, Method
Our research process, including how we did our literature study and data collection,
followed by how we analyzed our collected data is described in the fourth chapter.

Chapter 5, Empiric study

The results from our empiric studies are presented in the fifth chapter. The empiric study
has involved employees at Consafe Logistics group, Consafe Logistics’ customer base,
three benchmarking cases and finally thoughts from the consultancy firm Centigo.

Chapter 6, Analysis
Results from the empiric study are compared to theories from the frame of reference in
the sixth chapter. The analysis follows the structure of our analysis model.

Chapter 7, Audited analysis model

Necessary changes to the analysis model, uncovered in the analysis, are made in the
seventh chapter and the final audited analysis model is presented.

Chapter 8, Conclusions
Conclusions drawn from the analysis are isolated in the eighth chapter.

Chapter 9, Discussion
In the ninth chapter the thesis method and the final results are discussed.

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2. Frame of reference
reference
To get a deeper understanding of the areas concerning process of change, a literature
study has been carried out. On the basis of the purpose, relevant theories are presented
below to underlie the upcoming analysis.

2.1. How and why change develops

There are different reasons and backgrounds underlying an organizational change. To
understand the process of change and what theories to apply, one must begin by
understanding how change develops. We start by defining the nature of the change
according to the four process theories presented by Van de Ven & Poole (1995) (See
Figure 1).

Evolution Dialectic

Multiple Variation → Selection → Retention Thesis

Entities Conflict → Synthesis
Antithesis

Population scarcity Pluralism (Diversity)

Environmental selection Confrontation
Competition Conflict
Unit of
Change
Life Cycle Teleology
Terminate Dissatisfaction

Harvest Start-up Implement Search/

Single Goals Interact
Entity Grow Set/Envision Goals

Immanent programs Purposeful enactment

Regulation Social construction
Compliant adaptation Consensus

Prescribed Mode of Constructive

Change

Figure 1 Process theories of organizational development and change (Van de Ven & Poole, 1995)

A change can be prescribed or constructed as a single entity or as multiple entities. A

change sprung from Evolution, prescribed and multiple entities, is a recurrent, increasing
and probabilistic sequence of variation, selection and maintenance events. These changes
normally originate in population scarcity, competition and commensalism. According to
the Dialectic theory, constructive and multiple entities, change is instead a recurrent,
discontinuous sequence of confrontation, conflict and synthesis between contradictory
values or events. Opposing forces underlie the changes of dialectic nature. Life-cycle

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theory, prescribed and single entity, is the third theory and it describes the change as a
linear and irreversible sequence of unfolding potentials present at the beginning. The
generating force in life-cycle theory is a prefigured rule or program regulated by nature,
logic or institutions. The last theory explaining change is Teleology, constructive and
single entity, in which change occurs when an end state has been envisioned. The
changes are recurrent just as in evolution and dialectic, but unlike these theories
Teleology has sequence of goal setting, implementation and adaptation of means to reach
desired end state. (Van de Ven & Poole, 1995)

2.2. Implementation theories

In this thesis our focus is on a life-cycle, step by step, process of change. We are aware
that the life-cycle theories have been criticized by among others Howell & Costely
(2006) because the life-cycle theories do not consider the process of change to be
continuous. Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) explain the life-cycle theories’ assumption that
an organization can be in equilibrium since it is a matter of the ratio of stabilizing versus
changing forces. It is this equilibrium that criticizing authors don’t believe in since it
contradicts change as a continuous process. We also know that several change process
theories can work simultaneously. (Van de Ven & Pool, 1995) Even so we chose life-
cycle theories since we are interested in identifying their benefits and disadvantages and
finally to see whether they have the potential to be developed. We will present two
classical life-cycle theories for implementation of a process of change; Endsley’s (1994)
implementation model and Lewin’s (1947) three step model. The two academically rooted
theories are followed by two consultancy step by step strategies, Rydin’s (2007) twelve
step model for organizational development and Tonnquist’s (2006) change process, and
finally an alternative model for implementing change, rooted in culture, is considered.

2.2.1. Endsley’s implementation model

One of many life-cycle theories of what to go through when implementing an
organizational change is the one introduced by Endsley (1994). The model has been
formulated from a top perspective to provide information about the different stages an
organization faces in a process of change and to inform about the various activities in
each step. (Endsley, 1994) (See Figure 2)

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 Early Job
Decision Introduction Initialization Experiences Institutionalization

- Whom - Manner - Adequate - Effects - Values, Attitudes

- Why - General Training - Ability & Commitment
- Importance Acceptance - Realistic Desire to - Reinforcement Dynamic
- Detail - History Training Adjust - Pervasiveness Equilibrium
- Flexibility - Individual - New/Ideal - Retraining
- Impact - Impact - Environmental fit
- Benefits - Others
& Demands

Feedback

Figure 2 Factors influencing adjustment during the implementation process (Endsley, 1994)

Endsley (1994) suggests five major stages in her model; decision, introduction,
initialization, early job experiences and institutionalization with key factors specified in
each step accordingly to figure 2. The two first phases can be reversed or taken together
as one depending on the situation. Irrespective of the order, the first phase is intended to
make the organization leave the present equilibrium while the final step re-establishes a
new dynamic equilibrium. The model focuses on facilitating individual adjustments to
new technologies and to minimize the resistance to the change. Endsley (1994) means
that it is important to pay attention to the individuals involved in the process of change
since they have been found to be extremely important for a successful implementation.
Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) agrees that it is of great importance to involve the
individuals and French & Bell (1999) further add that involvement and participation
energize greater performance, produces better solutions to problems and enhance the
acceptance for decisions. Whether it is favourable to attempt to eliminate the resistance in
the process of change or not is discussed later in the frame of reference.

During the three phases introduction, initialization and early job experiences, feedback
devises need to be incorporated to get hold of potentially negative reactions throughout
the change. If the organization is flexible enough or not and to what extent feedback is
addressed will be an important determinant of the success of the system and the
adjustment process of the employees according to Endsley (1994). Bruzelius & Skärvad
(2004) add that one prerequisite for an individual in an organization to learn is that he or
she receives feedback on what they are currently doing.

2.2.2. Lewin’s three step model

As early as in 1947 Kurt Lewin developed the three step model stating that every process
of change goes through three stages. (Angelöw, 1999) Even if it has been criticized by
Howell & Costely (2006), they still consider the model to include relevant ideas even for
continuous change. We find Lewin’s (1947) three step model to be interesting and will
include other authors’ opinions on his model while describing it below.

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Unfreezing is the first step and this is the period of time when the need and
understanding for a change is initiated. (Lewin, 1947) The step is about reaching
acceptance for a new way of being or working, and leaving the present situation behind,
(Burnes, 1996) and corresponds to Endsley’s (1994) Introduction phase. The difficulty is
to influence individuals or groups to leave the state of equilibrium that they are
comfortable with. (Kritsonis, 2005) Kritsonis (2005) describes how the unfreezing step
can be accomplished by the use of three methods. Initially the affected people have to
experience an increase in forces pulling them away from the equilibrium they’re in, and
then feel a decrease in the forces holding them back. Finally one should find a mix
between the two. Examples of how to steer these forces are by motivating and explaining
the need of change, including people in the process and building morals and trust within
the organization. In the consultant book Project management (authors’ translation of
Projektledning) Tonnquist (2006) suggests a way to reach the desirable attitude within the
organization and at the same time test the change idea to see if it is durable. The method
Think Drop is a way to prepare an organization for change and at the same time benefit
from all the internal competence. An idea is planted in the bottom of the organization,
where the people who in the end will be affected by the change work. If it manages to
make its way to the top it is most certainly already supported by a significant part of the
employees to make an implementation go smoothly. (Tonnquist, 2006) This is similar to
Bruzelius & Skärvad’s (2004) support model (authors’ translation of förankringsmodell).
On its way through the organization it has also been altered and improved by the different
competences it passes. (Tonnquist, 2006) We are aware that caution has to be taken when
using literature written by consultants since they intend to write in an uncritical and
selling way. We have chosen to include Tonnquist (2006) since we have seen strong
similarities to our academic literature. Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) also bring up the
expert model (authors’ translation of expertmodel) which in many ways is the opposite of
the support model. In the expert model the decision is taken on a top level and the people
it will affect the most are the last ones to hear about it which decreases their involvement
in the decision.

Moving is the name of phase two, and this is when all focus should be on reaching the
new level. (Lewin, 1947) Equivalent to a combination of Endsley’s (1994) Initialization
and Early job experiences phases, forces trying to maintain the organization’s old
behaviour have to be eliminated at this stage. According to Burnes (1996) this might
require some form of confrontation from the management or just taking people away
from the old environment through a team-building session or training. Kritsonis (2005)
also states the importance of changing individuals’ perception of the old situation,
making them see that they will reach a new equilibrium through change. By working
together as a group and seeing influential leaders convinced of the need of change will
bring the right attitude. The moving phase is about changing norms and behaviours to
suite the new state. (Angelöw, 1999)

Re-freezing is the last step in Lewin’s (1947) model and corresponds to the final phase,
Institutionalization, in Endsley’s (1994) model. Keeping a new state is equally important
to making the specific changes. (Burnes, 1996) The re-freezing step searches to stabilize
and establish the new conditions as the normal ones. (Angelöw, 1999) If this third step is

12
not successful there is a risk that the change is short-lived. To get the new norms and
ways of working to become an equilibrium it can be of help to make them permanent in
writing, for example through policies. (Kritsonis, 2005)

2.2.3. Rydin’s twelve step model for organizational development

As mentioned above, caution should be taken when using literature by consultants.
Anders Rydin has more than 30 years of experiences as a consultant, mainly in processes
of changes, as a business manager and as self-employee, thus we find it interesting to
consider his model in this thesis. Rydin (2007) suggest a model in twelve steps more
focused on specific actions that need to be taken in a process of change. The initial steps,
Step 1 and 2, being Evaluating the conditions and Get the trust, both handles situations
preceding to starting the actual process of change.

Step 3 and 4 can be compared to the unfreezing step in Lewin’s (1947) model described
above. In the third and fourth step one has to decide where to start the change and whom
it will concern. Establishing this gives a starting point from where to start the process of
sowing the idea of change, and just like in the unfreezing step aiming for acceptance and
understanding. (Rydin, 2007)

Step 5, 6 and 7 fall under the moving step in Lewin’s (1947) model. Rydin (2007), in
agreement with Burnes (1996) and Kritsonis (2005), states the invaluable effect of
teamwork and involving the individual in the process of change to reach a good attitude
and see why change is necessary. The key is to make people feel included and useful, by
evaluating the ideas and suggestions gained from these team-building activities.

Step 8-12 represent the re-freezing step in Lewin’s (1947) model. Rydin (2007) suggest
evaluations as a way to make the new norms stick. By doing follow ups several times and
showing the benefits of the change it will keep people positive and make them more
hesitant to fall back into old habits. These evaluations should come frequently in the
beginning, but then more seldom until the change has become the normal state. The final
step is then to terminate the traces that a process of change has been made, for example
disband the project group working with the change.

Further, setting out milestones in a project of change is important for the outcome. By
limiting and appointing partial results throughout the process, set points are created that
are to be followed by any means possible. (Rydin, 2007)

2.2.4. Tonnquist’s change process

Tonnquist (2006) proposes a model of six components to keep in mind when working
with the process of change. Literature written by consultants intends to often paint a
simplified picture of the reality, but after recognizing several similarities to the precedent
life-cycle theories we have chosen to include Tonnquist (2006). The important
components in a process of change that Tonnquist (2006) call success factors are
presented below followed by the consideration of the importance of time.

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1. The first factor of success Tonnquist (2006) proposes is to create a climate of change.
Much like already described in the Moving phase (Lewin, 1947) this is done by showing
the facts pointing on the need for change. (Tonnquist, 2006)

2. Dealing with the people affected by the change is one of the most important
components of reaching success in a project. In the plan of how to communicate, the
different target groups are defined and the message is formulated to fit the audience.
(Tonnquist, 2006)

3. According to Tonnquist (2006) the third factor for a successful change is to create a
vision getting everyone involved in the process all the way to the end. Remembering step
5, 6 and 7 Rydin (2007), Burnes (1996) and Kritsonis (2005) also points out the
importance of involving individuals, and so does Endsley (1994) in her implementation
model. Many researchers have identified the importance of a goal; among others
Cummings & Worley (2005), Howell & Costely (2006) and Northouse (2007).
Leadership includes attention to goals. (…) Therefore, leadership occurs and has its
effects in context where individuals are moving toward a goal. (Northouse, 2007)

4. Big effort should be put into pointing out how the work of change can be linked to the
rest of the activities in the organization. This is preferably done by relating the goal of the
project with the overall strategic goal. (Tonnquist, 2006)

5. The effect of the project of change should be measurable. Creating S.M.A.R.T goals
(Specific, Measurable, Accepted, Realistic and Time limited) makes this possible. These
are followed up at times of milestones and points of decision during the entire project.
(Tonnquist, 2006) Rydin (2007) agrees and also talks about the importance of having
measurable goals.

6. The last part in a successful change according to Tonnquist (2006) is to make it

permanent, this being the main goal in the Re-freezing phase (Lewin, 1947). The change
to be carried out hasn’t been implemented only because the project has ended. For a
change to be rooted in time is of the essence. It is of great importance that there are
contacts during the implementation of the change; these people need to support the
organization and help practically implement the change during a foreseeable period of
time. These contacts are also the ones who regularly follow up the project and make
measurements to secure that desirable effects have been reached. (Tonnquist, 2006) All
three life-cycle theories described above all agree that making the change permanent is
vital for a successful change. (Endsley, 1994; Lewin, 1947; Rydin, 2007)

The importance of time

Things take time. This goes for every process of change. (Ahrenfelt, 2001) Tonnquist
(2006) adds that it is common to make the mistake to worry about the time it takes to
implement a change. It is easy to suppose that the longer a change is preceding, the
bigger the risk of failure. (Tonnquist, 2006) It’s very difficult to estimate exact times for

14
a process of change and we must learn to express ourselves in months and years when
talking about an organizational change. A reasonably big change can vary between two to
five years. After two years the company should have passed the stages of resistance (see
chapter 2.4.2) and instead be in a stage of practicing. (Ahrenfelt, 2001)

2.2.5. An alternative model for implementing change

The criticism aimed towards the life-cycle theories by Howell & Costely (2006) is rooted
in the fact that step-by-step models do not consider the process of change to be
continuous. They say that the only thing we can know about the future is that it will be
different from today and therefore the aim should be on creating a learning organization,
able to manage necessary change projects on their own. This changes the leader’s role
into focusing on shaping the culture so that a work environment encouraging learning is
created. (Howell & Costely, 2006)

Defining culture with ABC

To discuss the subject culture it is necessary to first give a definition. Hall (1995) talks
about culture as ABCs in a specific group of individuals. The ABCs stands for cultural
components on three different levels. (See Figure 3) Similar to Hall’s (1995) definition
Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) resemble organizational culture to five layers in an onion.
The two views are presented below.

Artifacts and Etiquette are on the surface level, representing visible and concrete
phenomena that a visitor to the culture will immediately grasp. Language, clothes and
currency are examples that fall under this category. (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004; Hall,
1995)

Behaviours and Actions represent

the second level with phenomena a Artifacts & Etiquette
little more subtle. The way that
things are done and the way people
act towards each other, for
example how individuals use the
Behaviours
language to communicate is an
&
example of a B factor. (Bruzelius
Actions
& Skärvad, 2004; Hall, 1995)

Core Morals, Beliefs and Values

constitute the third and deepest
level in Hall’s (1995) definition. Core Morals, Beliefs & Values
The attitude towards certain
phenomena and what people think Figure 3 The different levels of cultures. (Authors'
is right or wrong describes the C interpretation, 2008)

15
factor. (Hall, 1995) Unlike Hall (1995) Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) divides the C factors
into three layers; norms, values and basic assumptions (authors’ translation of normer,
värderingar and grundläggande antaganden).

The specific group of individuals that has to be combined with the ABCs to describe
culture has no predetermined size or mix. The group can be everything from the family
next door to the entire German population. (Hall, 1995) The context of the ABC
definition of culture is supported by Bakic-Miric (2008) as well as Encyclopaedia
Britannica (2008) which describes culture as the customary beliefs, social forms, and
material traits of a racial, religious, or social group.

Different characteristics of culture

Another way of defining culture is through scoring a group of individuals on five
different characteristics. The five factors below are Hofstede’s (1993) characteristics of
culture.

Power distance index is a measurement of how much the individuals in a group expect
and accept that the distribution of power is unequal.
Individualism describes to what extent people are expected to look after themselves. The
opposite collectivism occurs in groups of individuals where the family bonds or ties to
society are strong.
Masculinity measures the difference between the men’s and women’s behaviours in a
culture. If the men’s role is to act very assertive and competitive in a culture where
women are expected to care for the bringing up of children and the household the
masculinity would be high.
Uncertainty avoidance index is to what extent individuals are comfortable or not in
chaotic situations. The index describes how much people strive to have order.
Long-term orientation is if people treasure knowing that their future is in their control or
if they’d rather care about fulfilling their present duties, for example traditions, social
obligations and personal reputation.

Rodrigues (1998) examines culture similar to the characteristics Hofstede (1993) states,
but adds among others shared decision-making/few in charge, high-context/low-context
and decisions based on data/emotions. Rodrigues (1998) and Hofstede (1993) are not the
only researchers which have defined cultural dimensions. We have chosen not to further
develop the dimensions, we solely want to make the reader aware of the fact that there
are several different ways of characterizing culture and we have chosen the one spoken
for by Hofstede (1993).

Is it possible to shape culture?

Culture has a big impact on how everyone acts, even if they might not even be aware of
it. Differences in culture can make or break business deals, and understanding and being
aware of the ABCs can be crucial to managing a partnership according to Hall (1995)
Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) state that for an organization to maintain long term success it

16
is important to develop, maintain, exclude and renew the organization’s values and basic
assumptions. Sanchez (2004) goes further and claims that the end result of any
organizational process can be explained and even manipulated by cultural factors.

According to Schein (1992) and Davis (1984) one of the most powerful tools for a
manager is maintaining and changing culture. Given the correct stimuli the culture can be
altered into a desired result. Sanchez (2004) agrees that culture can be changed, but that
one has to be careful not to mistake organizational climate for culture. Climate is easily
changed and very susceptible of outer forces in the work environment. An example of
climate change is when a pay raise results in improved efforts. Culture on the other hand
is very difficult to change and will not be affected short term. Pettigrew (1986) is one of
several who oppose to the idea of changeable culture. Culture is a factor that strongly
limits a company’s possibilities and which is rooted in the organization’s members. The
only chance to affect the culture is by creating a deep sense of crisis followed by strong
methods for creating change. In spite of their difference in how they approach a process
of change Pettigrew’s (1986) view is very similar to Lewin’s (1947) model. The sense of
crisis is similar to the unfreezing phase where forces keeping people to old habits are
eliminated resulting in a chaos facilitating the implementation of new ways of thinking.
Again the strong methods for creating change following the crisis described by Pettigrew
(1986) are similar to the strong change focus in Lewin’s (1947) moving phase where all
efforts are on reaching a new state of working. Hall (1995) says that for a manager to
change culture it is most important to focus on the B-factors even if they take time to
change. A language and table manors can be relatively easily changed, and the morals
and values in a company will probably not change to support a partnership. This leaves
the manager with the B-factors which can be controlled through positive or negative
reaction towards people’s behaviours. Agreeing with Hall (1995), Bakic-Miric (2008)
says that how we communicate, not the specific language, is the most important part of
acting in an intercultural society.

The key to a successful partnership is not to get the same culture, but rather to
acknowledge and accept the differences. Hall (1995) calls this bridging. If partners do not
succeed to bridge their two cultures, misunderstandings and misinterpretations of
intentions can seriously damage the relationship. Rodrigues (1998) also clarifies the
importance of the sole acknowledgement that there is a difference, and not to expect
things to be done the same way in different companies or countries. Once both parties
have come to terms with the situation, benefits can be gained from the cultural
differences. Cvetcovic (2008) adds that the intercultural tension that is created can result
in creative solutions and unconventional, positive thinking. All it takes is for the energy
to be canalized in the right direction. Unfortunately it often takes a situation of great need
or even crisis to make organizations work in a new way according to Cvetcovic (2008),
which corresponds to the crisis situation necessary to change culture described by
Pettigrew (1986).

17
 2.2.6. Similarities between life-cycle and culture based change
theories
The four life-cycle theories and the alternative method based on culture that we have
described show several similarities as well as differences. The life-cycle theories show a
very clear aspiration to reach equilibrium (Lewin, 1947; Rydin, 2007), whereas the
culture based model strive to be in a constant state of change (Howell & Costely, 2006).
The change climate desired between the start and end equilibrium in the life-cycle models
(Tonnquist, 2006), which is created to make the organization susceptible to change, is
always present in the culture based model (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004).

In both types of models the leader is an influential actor with the power to affect the
climate in the organization. In an optimal continuously changing organization managing
itself, the leader is still a big part in managing the process of change, but he or she should
take on the role as a motivator rather than giving strict guidelines of what actions that
have to be done. (Howell & Costely, 2006) The leader in a life-cycle process will only
take on the similar role during the time of instability. In step 5, 6 and 7 in Rydin’s (2007)
twelve step model people should feel included and be motivated to take part in the
process of change, which means trying to affect the climate. When a new equilibrium is
set the life-cycle theories reinstate the leader in charge of initiative (Lewin, 1947; Rydin,
2007; Tonnquist, 2006) whereas the culture based organization strives to become self
sufficient (Howell & Costely, 2006).

Howell & Costely (2006) talk about the importance of creating a learning organization,
whereas the life-cycle models mention training as a necessary activity to satisfy needs of
knowledge necessary to reach the new equilibrium (Burnes, 1996; Endsley, 1994).
According to Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) the key to a learning organization is to get
individuals to teach each others through communicating knowledge. Sanchez (2004) puts
communication as the primary element in shaping culture. The effect of reward systems,
benefits, training, development and visions all depend on how well they are
communicated. According to Sanchez (2004) analyzing a company’s communication
policy to see if the communication to external constituencies coincides with the internal
communication says a lot about the company’s culture.

Combining the two types of change theories we have identified important areas in the
process of change which are treated in the life-cycle theories as well as in the culture
based model. Hence we have chosen to address the areas project organization, leadership
in processes of change, knowledge, competence and education, internal communication
and finally documentation.

2.3. Project organization

Do changed circumstances and changed prerequisites demand special forms of
organizations or is it possible to apply one organizational form in all situations? This

18
chapter is written with the intension to investigate what professional roles and what
organizational structures are suitable for an organization facing a process of change.

2.3.1. The work organization in projects

Tonnquist (2006) states that a change in an organization does not happen by itself; it is
rather made possible through the work of the members in a project group. In a situation
where there is one specific task to solve working in project form is convenient according
to Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004).

The project roles

It’s important to have well defined roles within a project group. To avoid people doing
the same things or confusion about who is doing what strict guidelines are necessary.
Shared responsibility often leads to misunderstandings. (Tonnquist, 2006) Organization
is all about who has the responsibility and the authority to do what. (Thulin & Thulin,
2003)

The project owner is the person ordering and therefore also initiating the project. The
project owner represents the customer and has the customer’s best interests in mind. By
being the provider of financial resources he or she can steer the project towards higher
quality and smaller costs. (Tonnquist, 2006) The role as project owner becomes more
important with increasing project size, but even in small projects the role can cause
problems. The project owner has an internal role as well as an external. He or she has
authority to decide when a project should start, but not what resources should be used for
what activities. The project owner is not just the initiator of the project, the task of
appointing a project leader and a steering group is also his or hers. (Tonnquist, 2006)

The project leader has the task to deliver what the project owner asks for. It’s his or her
responsibility to know the strengths and weaknesses within the project group and by
using this ability assigning suitable tasks for the right project members. The project
leader has to take on four different characters in a natural way; coach, mentor, expert and
boss. To be able to shift between the different characters the project leader has to know
him- or herself very well. One might say that it’s more important and also more realistic
to know your own weaknesses than not to have any. The project leader also needs good
social and person skills to know when which character is required. (Tonnquist, 2006) A
successful project leader contributes to a healthy project group, and benefiting
information sharing and constant communication is an example of good project
management often resulting in innovative and efficient outcomes. (Gelbard & Carmeli,
2008) It is also up to the project leader to provide the project group with whatever
resources they require within the time and cost frames of the project. (Bruzelius &
Skärvad, 2004)

The project group is responsible for solving tasks leading to the finishing of the project.
Every single member should have the competence to solve his or her problem, but getting
the big picture and seeing his or her role in the project is the project leader’s

19
responsibility. A project group should only include the exact number of people needed to
manage the project assignment. (Tonnquist, 2006)

The recruiting process should according to Tonnquist (2006) be based on the two factors
competence and ability to work in a group. Whilst the ability to cooperate depends on all
the different members in the group, the level of competence a person possesses requires
time. Competence is achieved through practical application, meaning experience. The
second factor, ability to work together, has a strong connection to the project result.
Gelbard & Carmeli (2008) defines team dynamics as the quantity and quality of
interactions between team members and say that the team dynamics often determine the
outcome of a project and the overall success of the project team. A common problem
when recruiting new people is that they are expected to work the same way everyone else
does. They are treated like an extra set of hands instead of new competence and ideas,
which is exactly what a company in change should be looking for. (de Klerk, 1996)

The steering group consists of representatives from the project owner as well as the
organization that employs the project group. Each member of the steering group should
have the necessary competence to judge and give opinions about the progress made in the
project as well as the problems encountered. It’s important to find a good group
composition so that competent decisions can be made quickly and that no side is favoured
even though the project owner often has the role as chairman or chairwoman. (Tonnquist,
2006)

Tonnquist (2006) also describes Resource owners, Partial project leader, Quality
manager, Reference group and Project coordinator as roles in a project organization. We
have chosen to exclude these roles since they seem to be more relevant to for example
projects in product development which requires tangible assets and where the final result
is unknown in the beginning of the project.

2.3.2. Organization for a process of change

An organization divided into roles as described above is called a function based
organization according to Thulin & Thulin (2003) while a project based organization is
an organization where people are allotted short term or long term project roles, depending
on the size of the project, to solve a specific assignment (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004).
Thulin & Thulin (2003) claim that an organization based on function as well as on
processes or projects, trying to follow through with a process of change faces the risk of
having areas where no one is responsible. Implementing a change and at the same time
managing the everyday work is made much easier through having a parallel organization.
In a parallel organization all the members are part of two groups working side by side
with different goals. One group is working with the everyday assignments and the other
group is working with a process of change. Since everyone is taking part in both of the
two groups, the gaps present in a strictly functional, process or project based organization
can be filled. (Thulin & Thulin, 2003) This way of making the different roles less strict is
also a way of increasing the internal flexibility which is something de Klerk (1996)
agrees is important in a healthy organization. The parallel organization is criticized by

20
Tonnquist (2006) because it demands a lot more from the management and increases the
risks of bad employee morals. Following through with a process of change at the same
time as the ordinary assignments forces meetings and appointments to be scheduled more
in advance. Opposite to the effect a parallel organization has on the different roles, the
internal flexibility concerning when to do what is decreased. (de Klerk, 1996) If
employees are working in several projects at the same time, they are forced to prioritize
in situations where time is scarce. If co-workers prioritize different projects it will create
disagreements and lower the moral at the work place. To avoid this the management has
to take action and explain the purpose of the new project and bring up the subject for
discussion. (Tonnquist, 2006) For an illustration of the differences between a function
based organization and a parallel organization see figure 4.

Management Project Leader Project Member

Every Day Activities

Process of Change
Function based

Parallell Every Day Activities

M P P
P
a r r
r Management n o o
o a j j
c
e
g e e
s e c c
s m t t
Project
e
o Leader
f n L M
t e e
C
h
a m
a Project d b
n Member e e
g
e
r r

Figure 4 Illustration of a function based versus a parallel organization (Thulin & Thulin, 2003)

21
 2.4. Leadership in processes of change
To remain competitive, an organization is required to support and implement continuous
and transformational change. One to two thirds of major changes have been deemed
failures or have made the situation worse for the business. The leadership within the
organization is the critical factor in enabling and driving change efforts according to
Gilley et al. (2008) Hence, to map out the desirable characteristics and the foremost
tasks of a leader facing change can facilitate a successful implementation of change.

2.4.1. What characteristics does the role as a leader of change

involve?
Organizations don’t change. People do – or they don’t. If staff don’t trust leadership,
don’t share the organizations vision, don’t buy into the reason for change, and aren’t
included in the planning – there will be no successful change – regardless of how
brilliant the strategy. (Kinsey Goman, 2000)

Since it is unusual that the CEO and the management themselves are interested in running
the processes of change it is necessary to appoint a so called leader of change. The leader
of change has an overall role to be a project leader with the assignment to keep all parts
of the change together to reach the comprehensive goal. (Tonnquist, 2006) American
Productivity & Quality Center (1997) instead states that the CEOs plan and manage
organizational change, thus serving as the change agents. (American Productivity &
Quality Center, 1997)

No matter what position the leader is in, Tonnquist (2006) affirms the importance of the
leader to create a common vision for a group of individuals working towards a concrete
goal in accordance to Kinsey Goman (2000). All individuals in a group have their own
personal goals to be realized. If there is consensus between the individual goals within
the group and the common goal of the project, the project will become stronger and is
more likely to succeed. The more the leader knows about his or her project group, the
likelier he or she is to create tasks that satisfy the individual needs. It is all about creating
a win-win situation for the group as a whole and its individuals. (Tonnquist, 2006)
Leaders in all levels of an organization will face opportunities to create change readiness
at the same time as they face the challenges of change. Gilley et al. (2008) have identified
six leadership skill sets that supposedly influence the organizational success rate
positively during change. The skill sets are presented below and are desirable
characteristics in a leader of change. (Gilley et al., 2008)

Ability to coach
By coaching the individuals in an organization facing change, the leader improves the
renewal capacity and the flexibility which have a positive impact on organizational
change. (Gilley et al., 2008) Awareness is the first key element of coaching and
awareness can be raised or heightened significantly through focused attention and
practice. (Whitmore, 1997) The Encyclopaedia Britannica (2008) defines awareness as

22
having or showing realization, perception, or knowledge (…) alertness in drawing
inferences from what one experiences.

Ability to reward
An effective reward philosophy makes allowances for every step of the process of
change. Celebrating milestones and being rewarded for incremental change meet
favourably response from employees. Reward programs should be planned to help the
organization to achieve specific desired change outcomes according to Gilley et al.
(2008).

Ability to communicate
Communication is a valuable tool for motivating employees involved in change. It is vital
in overcoming resistance to change initiatives, to prepare employees and to give them a
personal stake in the change process. (Gilley et al., 2008) Specify the nature of the
change, explain why, repeat the purpose and actions planned, make it a two-way process,
support change with new learning, institutionalize the information flow about the change
and model the changes yourself are some communication recommendations to make
change work. (Saunders, 1999) Also Kotter (1995) stresses the importance of
communication and he means that the leader should communicate the new vision and
strategies by using every communication vehicle possible. (Kotter, 1995)

Ability to motivate
Leadership is a process used by an individual to influence group members toward the
achievement of group goals in which the group members view the influence as legitimate.
(Howell & Costely, 2006) The leader’s ability to convince and influence others to work
in a common direction is of the essence in an organizational context. Motivating others
call for skilled leaders who can organize and promote a motivating environment,
communicate effectively, address questions, generate and prioritize ideas, commit
employees to action, and provide follow-up to overcome motivational problems. (Gilley
et al., 2008) The leader needs to articulate the organizations vision in a manner that
stresses the value of the addressed audience. (Kotter, 2001) It is not enough to create a
common visualization of the goal, but the goal has to be broken down to divisional and
individual level and in that level concretizes. (Tonnquist, 2006) Kaplan & Norton (1996)
add that despite the best intentions from the management, empty statements like
becoming best in class, the number one supplier or an empowered organization don't
translate easily into operational terms. For the employees to act towards the envisioned
strategy statements, these have to be expressed in concrete and measurable actions and
goals, this agreeing with Tonnquist’s (2006) the fifth factor of success.

Ability to Involve and support others

Proving confidence in the employee’s ability to be successful on the job and valuing
contributions demonstrates support. Support and employee involvement prove critical to

23
successfully implementing change, thus being supportive and make employees participate
in the process is an important managerial task. (Gilley et al., 2008)

Ability to promote teamwork and collaboration

To achieve organizational goals a leader benefits from effectively managing teams and
structuring workgroups so as to support collaboration. Interpersonal ability combined
with collective process and structure can promote teamwork and collaboration, which
eventually have an impact on ability to reach the vision. (Gilley et al., 2008)

2.4.2. How to explain the difference between intension and

result
The scarcity of an optimistic relationship between planned change and its realization has
caused a quest for a deeper understanding in the subject. The concepts resistance to
change, inertia and supporting and restraining forces have been used to explain this gap.
(Lovén, 1999)

According to Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) organizational change does almost always face
resistance irrespective of the extent of the change. The level of resistance and its strength
is dependant on what the change concerns, how radical it is and how the process of
change is managed. Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) Several authors clarify the different
stages of resistance a person goes through when facing change. The SARA model is an
attempt to explain what and at what stage of the process reactions occur between the
employees. According to this model the employee faces the four faces shock or surprise,
anger, rejection and acceptance. According to this model, leaders and staff at different
levels in the company reaches the stages at different times, probably due to the fact that
the leader gets aware of the change earlier in the process and therefore has time to react
earlier. (Hughes et al., 2006) Also Tonnquist (2006) recognizes that the individual in
organizational change goes through a phase of resistance.

Ahrenfelt (2001) further presents a model describing the different stages employees go
through when facing change. He focuses on the complementarities between the process
of the leader and the process of the organization. Even though this thesis addresses the
leader’s role in an organization facing change, the leader needs to be aware of the stages
the organization goes through to identify his or her proper action in each step. Ahrenfelt
(2001) identifies three phases of resistance in the process of change. (see Figure 5)

24
Figure 5 To lead during change is To see an assignment (Ahrenfelt, 2001)

Scientists within the field of economics prefer the perception of inertia to the idea of
resistance meaning that it is less judgmental. Inertia is a force holding organizations back,
preventing them from over-reacting in temporary environmental changes. When
organizations react with delays even to important environmental changes, due to market
situation changes, inertia has its drawbacks. In the literature, two types of inertia can be
distinguished; manoeuvre inertia and insight inertia. The first type comes from
investments in future technology, production and markets. Insight inertia on the other
hand is the inability of an organization to spot troubles following a normally trouble free
history. (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004; Lovén, 1999) Österlund & Lovén (2005) further
defines inertia as the company’s inability to change the competence resources fast
enough to meet new market changes. There is a need to over communicating during

25
change. The key message might have to be communicated numerous times through
various media. (Österlund & Lovén, 2005)

It is not unusual but rather natural that the organization is to resist the change since
established patterns are not only questioned but also changed in the every day work. The
resistance shouldn’t always be considered bad for the change though. (Ahrenfelt, 2001;
Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004) Resistance gives the individual a chance to go through the
questions and to be part of the change. The different phases of resistance also give a great
deal of important and some times decisive information for the one who really requires it,
often the leader of change. Resistance and the work of resistance are first of all
informative in the work of change and it is an expression for true engagement and true
involvement. An indifferent and uncritical person is unengaged in the process and usually
tries to stay outside the work of change. Authoritarian managers normally ignore this
matter of course. The leader should keep in mind that the co-workers, through
experience, are the organization’s foremost teachers when it comes to pitfalls and
possibilities for the business, thus resistance should be acknowledged and used during the
change. (Ahrenfelt, 2001)

2.5. Competence, knowledge and education

Competence augmentation and widening of the co-workers responsibilities are crucial
factors for success since the organization is its employees. Learning is a here-and-now
process of great need for the individual, the work group and the organization. A variable
world creates a need for continuously competence development. (Ahrenfelt, 2001)
Because of the significance of learning and increased competence in organizations, we
will below discuss theories concerning the importance of education.

2.5.1. Managing knowledge

Competence development can be divided into two parts, the possessed knowledge and the
knowledge that one lack and need to develop. At this stage, a difference between
knowledge and competence should be drawn. Knowledge is something that can be taught
while competence comes from knowledge put into practice. Needed knowledge is
managed in an early stage of a project, while in a later stage of the process, the
competences developed are handled. Competence development is the responsibility of the
management but it is always executed on an individual level. To make the right
organizational demands is a competence management challenge. Education is normally
the fastest way to acquire knowledge. Every educational effort should be preceded by an
analysis to find the gap between the individual competence and the competence
demanded from the organization. Whether the competence development is accomplished
through education or through recruitment; it is of great importance to document needs
and to bring out a plan showing how the gap of knowledge is to be filled. (Tonnquist,
2006)

26
 2.5.2. What kind of education and to whom?
In this context, education should provide two wide purposes. First of all it should enhance
the understanding of the organization’s business for the employees to understand both
where and why the change is necessary. Second, the education should serve the purpose
of providing workers with the necessary skills to implement change. Giving the
workforce increased responsibility and authority does little good if the tools to handle the
change haven’t been given to them. Tools can range from leadership skills for rising
managers to technical skills that qualify workers for the new jobs change might create.
(American Productivity & Quality Center, 1997)

2.5.3. Learning styles

One basic fact to appreciate is that not everyone learns in the same way. Some people
prefer to talk out loud by discussing the subject; others like to learn alone, reading or
watching videos. Some people want learning to be fun and entertaining while others want
nothing but the facts. These differences can often be accommodated through a mixture of
activities; newsletters, e-mails, one-on-one sessions, group discussions, posters or lecture
series. In the process of planning the educational design, one should keep in mind that
lessons that don’t apply to one’s job tend to be forgotten quickly at the same time as
tedious information to fit each individual’s task can be equally discouraging. (Kolb &
Kolb, 2005)

As a result of our heritage, our particular past life experience, and the demands of our
present environment most people develop learning styles that emphasize some learning
abilities over others. (Kolb, 1976) According to Kolb & Kolb’s (2005) experiential
learning theory learning is defined as the process whereby knowledge is created through
the transformation of experience. Knowledge results from the combination of grasping
and transforming experience. Learning can be conceived of as a four-stage cycle. (Kolb,
1976) The model describes two dialectically related modes of grasping experience;
Concrete Experience (CE) and Abstract Conceptualization (AC) as well as two related
modes of transforming experience; Reflective Observation (RO) and Active
Experimentation (AE). (Kolb & Kolb, 2005) A typical presentation of Kolb's two
continuums is that the east-west axis is called the Processing, how we approach a task,
and the north-south axis is called the Perception, our emotional response, or how we
think or feel about it. (Business balls, 2008) Alan Chapman at Business balls (2008) has
illustrated Kolb’s thoughts in a very descriptive way, and therefore we chose to include
Chapman’s illustration instead of Kolb’s. (See Figure 6)

27
 Concrete
Experience
Feeling

Accomodating Diverging
(Feel & Do) (Feel & Watch)
CE/AE CE/RO

Active Reflective
Experimentation Observation
Doing Watching

Converging Assimilating
(Think & Do) (Think & Watch)
AC/AE AC/RO

Abstract
Conceptualization
Thinking

Figure 6 Kolb's learning styles (adaptation and design Alan Chapman, Business balls (2008)
(Authors presentation))

The individual must be able to involve him- or herself fully, openly and without bias in
new experiences (CE). He or she must be able to observe and reflect upon these
experiences from different perspectives (RO). Further, he or she must be able to create
concepts that incorporate his or her observations into logically sound theories (AC) and
finally these theories must be used to make decisions and solve problems (AE). Different
individuals learn according to different styles. Thus, to know and identify which style an
employee should apply to and learn best and most through can be of great importance for
the company’s future. (Kolb, 1976) Thulin & Thulin (2003) adds that the choice of
method for competence development doesn’t only depend on the person about to learn
but also on what kind of knowledge is to be taught. The employee can attend a course, or
undergo an education, learn from co-workers, learn from others within the organization
or in other organizations. The choice of method also depends on the means available.
(Thulin & Thulin, 2003)

Explicit or tacit knowledge?

Knowledge is a multifaceted concept with multilayered meanings. In short, knowledge is
created and organized by the very flow of information, anchored on the commitment and

28
beliefs of its holder. One dimension of the knowledge creation process can be the
distinction between tacit and explicit knowledge. (Nonaka, 1994) Tacit knowledge is
defined as knowledge we all unconsciously possess. We can not gain it by reading; it is
created through a combination of theories and experiences. The every day knowledge of
non linguistic character that a professional person possesses is incredibly important for
the development of the organization. (Ahrenfelt, 2001) Tacit knowledge is highly
personal and hard to formalize which results in making it difficult to communicate to
others. Explicit or codified knowledge on the other hand refers to knowledge that can be
transmitted in formal systematic language. (Nonaka, 1994)

Nonaka (1991) has identified four basic patterns for creating knowledge in any
organizations. The four patterns are socialization, externalization, internalization and
combination and are represented in figure 7. (Nonaka, 1991)

Tacit Explicit
knowledge To knowledge

Tacit
knowledge Socialization Externalization

From
Explicit
knowledge Internalization Combination

Figure 7 Modes of the Knowledge Creation (Nonaka, 1994)

Socialization, from tacit to tacit. Sometimes the individual shares tacit knowledge
directly with another. (Nonaka, 1991) One effective method to transfer tacit knowledge is
through mentorship. The overall task a mentor commits to is to share his or her
knowledge and making other people grow and develop. (Tonnquist, 2006) Thulin &
Thulin (2003) agrees that mentorship is a mutual learning where the more experienced,
the mentor, is an adviser and guide for the less experienced, the adept. Nonaka (1991)
argues that although this knowledge transfer between mentor and adept can be effective
for the personal tacit knowledge base, on its own, socialization is a rather limited form of
knowledge creation. Neither the apprentice nor the master gain any systematic insight
into their craft knowledge. Because this knowledge never becomes explicit, it cannot
easily be leveraged by the organization as a whole. (Nonaka, 1991)

Combination, from explicit to explicit. Discrete pieces of explicit knowledge can be

combined into a new whole. For example, when a controller of a company collects
information throughout the company for a financial report, that report is new knowledge
in the sense that it combines information from different sources. This combination does
not really extend the company’s existing knowledgebase though. (Nonaka, 1991)

Externalization, from tacit to explicit. When the foundations of an employee’s tacit

knowledge can be articulated, he or she converts it into explicit knowledge, thus allowing

29
it to be shared with the team. Another example might be if the controller develops an
inventive new approach to budgetary control based on his own tacit knowledge
developed over years of experience rather than merely compiling a conventional financial
plan for his company. (Nonaka, 1991)

Internalization, from explicit to tacit. As new explicit knowledge is shared throughout an

organization, the information begins to become internalized by other employees. That is,
they use it to increase and reshape their own tacit knowledge. (Nonaka, 1991)

While each of the four modes can create new knowledge independently, the central theme
of Nonaka’s (1991) model of organizational knowledge creation hinges on a dynamic
interaction between the four different modes. Hence, knowledge creation is constructed
of both tacit and explicit knowledge and, more importantly, on the interchange between
these two dimensions through internalization and externalization. A failure to build a
dialogue between tacit and explicit knowledge can cause problems for the organization.

2.6. Internal Communication

To spread and share the vital knowledge with others within an organization, one of the
most central parts of all project work, the business needs a working internal
communication. (Tonnquist, 2001) Thus, this sixth part of the frame of reference is
concentrated upon the implementation of a well-functioning internal communication.

2.6.1. How to inform

Information is a one way process and a monologue, while communication is a two or
more way process. (Ahrenfelt, 2001) This one way process, information, is a contributing
stress factor since distributing information has become very easy. Many workplaces
could decrease the daily stress they are facing today by analyzing what kind of
information is supposed to go to whom and in what quantity. The absolutely most
efficient way to distribute information is to keep it electronically. This demands a well
functioning technique support, available to all co-workers though. It is also of great
importance that the employees feel responsible for finding the information needed.
(Thulin & Thulin, 2003) Archibald (1992) presents an idea of how to create a
communication plan to secure that necessary information reaches concerned employees.
The plan is to answer the questions what and when is to be communicated and to whom
and how is it to be executed?

2.6.2. Problems with internal communication

Geddie (1994) gather in his article Leap Over the Barriers of Internal Communication
primary obstacles to effective internal communication. He means that internal
communication is too often taken for granted even though the audience is vital for the
real and lasting success of the organization. He identifies the obstacles as a failure to
recognize that communication must be essential to strategic planning, a failure to trust

30
employees and to communicate precarious issues openly. He also promotes failure to kill
the belief that power comes from hoarding information, lack of training in or low comfort
level for efficient communication, the fear of making mistakes and poor focus by too
many communicators as obstacles for successful communication.

2.6.3. What not to forget when informing

To build well functioning channels of information is a strategic question that demands
time initially but gives a better result and working environment in the long run. The
internal information can be written or oral, formal and informal. The better the formal
information works, the more trustworthy the information as a whole becomes. Thulin &
Thulin (2003) give a guideline for the information to be accessible, sufficient and
reliable.

Even though a firm can use several formal communication ways to reach out to the
audience as described above, the informal grapevine should not be forgotten as an
important source of information and spreading of knowledge. (Wood, 1999) Wood
(1999) has gathered some agreed key communication principles from the literature
presented below.

1. The first communication should come from the senior management person in
charge.
2. Face-to-face communication is most effective; it allows interaction.
3. Senior managers are seen as the key to communication.
4. The newsletter is not a major source of organizational communication but
employees think it should be.
5. There is a clear distinction between information (generally too much) and
communication (not enough).
6. There is an emphasis on the concept of managing by walking around.
7. The process needs to be constantly assessed and revamped.
8. Written communication followed by an open meeting is effective.

2.7. Documentation
Documentation is never a glamorous job. This could be one of the explaining reasons
why many organizations still keep minimal or no documentation. Many workplaces
neglect updating their documents due to a stable workforce. Though, when different
employees enact different approaches in their responsibilities, this lack of accurate
documentation can become a problem. A formally documented work instruction or
specification can work as a key to maintain a consistent performance. (Cheng, 2008) This
section presented below discusses the importance of documentation and how much and
what should be documented in an organization.

31
 2.7.1. Why put energy into documentation?
Cheng (2008) states that when paying visits to the shop floor he often asks one single
question to the operators: Assuming I was just hired for this job, can you show me the
right way to do it? The employees are often enthusiastically helping him with what
should be done but once they are faced with the question how he can make sure he does it
right in their absence, they become dead silent. Documentation is a way to make
individuals less indispensable.

2.7.2. How to document

Whatever the name for the documents, may it be a setup sheet, parameter table or a work
instruction for example, an important question is how it is created. Since the Industrial
Revolution, machines and products have become more complex. This means that self-
made instructions can cause infinite, useless risks every time a company faces a change.
(Cheng, 2008) Something to reflect upon is if the documents need to be printed or if it is
enough to save them electronically. Today’s digital multifunction devices can output to a
number of electronic document types. These documents can then be stored on a computer
or be emailed to recipients directly. Keeping the documents electronically saves space
and facilitates the process of finding stored documents. (SolutionTech, 2008)
To document the process is the first step in formalizing a quality system. To create
documents needed, the process needs to be thought through, this exposes wholes in the
process that need to be managed and it forces a consistency in how the process is run.
(Dalgleish, 2005)

An analysis of your company’s documentation might help you reduce costs if finding that
it exceeds the level of needed documentation. A way of creating an effective document
management plan is to analyze the current documentation process, including workflow,
types of documentation and communication methods. This analysis is preferably
followed by a review resulting in finding opportunities for cost savings and increased
efficiency, which are further carried out according to a plan of action. (SolutionTech,
2008)

32
3. Analysis Model
A synthesis of the theories discussed in the previous chapter resulted in an analysis model
presented below. The thought behind our analysis model and the different parts in it are
described below.

The analysis model developed as a synthesis of the theories presented in our frame of
reference is presented in figure 8.

Unfreeze Move Re-freeze

Early Job
Decision Introduction Initialization Experiences Institutionalization

- Whom - Manner - Adequate - Effects - Values, Attitudes

- Why - General Training - Ability & Commitment
- Importance Acceptance - Realistic Desire to - Reinforcement Dynamic
- Detail - History Training Adjust - Pervasiveness Equilibrium
- Flexibility - Individual - New/Ideal - Retraining
- Impact Proj Org - Impact - Environmental fit
Proj Org - Benefits Leadership - Others
Leadership & Demands KCE Proj Org
KCE Int Comm Proj Org Leadership
Int Comm Proj Org Document Leadership KCE
Document Leadership KCE Int Comm
KCE
+/- Int Comm Document
+/- Int Comm Document
Document +/-
+/-
+/-

Feedback & Support

C U L T U R E

I N E R T I A

Figure 8 Analysis model1 (Authors, 2008)

We initially chose to base our analysis model on Endsley’s (1994) implementation

model, but after our literature study we identified a lack of consideration of certain areas
in the process of change. Therefore we combined Endsley’s (1994) implementation
model with Lewin’s (1947) three step model. We chose to not include Rydin’s (2007)
model since it is so strongly related to Lewin’s (1947) model and therefore we consider it
to be indirectly represented. After recognizing advantages with the culture based model
for a process of change we added culture in an attempt to combine Howell & Costely’s
(2006) alternative model with the life-cycle models. The common areas of interest

1
The areas of interest for a process of change are in figure 8 written Proj Org, Leadership, KCE, Int Comm
and Document.

33
concerning the process of change we identified, project organization, leadership in
processes of change, knowledge, competence and education, internal communication and
documentation, have been added to all phases to complement Endsley’s (1994) key
factors. +/- symbolizes opportunities and risks that the leader should be aware of in each
of the change process’ phases. We chose to keep feedback because it accordingly to
Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) is a requirement to create a learning organization. We further
added support since also support has proven to be important throughout the change.
(Tonnquist, 2006). We also added inertia as a counterweight to Endsley’s (1994) opinion
that all resistance should be decreased since we have seen that resistance has advantages
according to Ahrenfelt (2001) and Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004). We have chosen to write
inertia in the model to avoid the negative association to the word resistance (Lovén,
1999).

34
4. Methodology
To be able to estimate the reliability of a survey or a report, the methods which it is
based upon have to be considered. (Lekvall & Wahlbin, 2001) Hence, this fourth chapter,
methodology, will give the reader an insight into our research process, selection and
data collection.

4.1. Research process

Our work began with a literature study, followed by preparation for our data collection.
Our data collection included interviews and benchmarking, which we analyzed by
comparing it with the theories from the literature study by using the analysis model. We
drew conclusions from the analysis which gave us an answer to our purpose. The
different steps are separately presented below first illustrated in figure 9 and then under
corresponding headlines.

Project Preparation Data Conclusions

start of data collection
collection
Analysis
Literature
study

Figure 9 Research process (Authors, 2008)

4.1.1. Literature study

The first part of the work with our thesis was to carry out a literature study. We began
with a preliminary treatment of the literature before the frame of reference was written
and throughout the study we have tried to stay critical to the theories.

How to find the right literature

To be able to see which direction we wanted our empiric study to take we began by
considering the subject of the process of change from a theoretical point of view. To get
the essential information for the frame of reference we carried out a literature study,
concentrating on relevant books and articles. The literature was of scientific character and
mainly concerned the topics organizational change, change management, leadership,
project management and culture. In addition to the books, we used articles from various
well known journals, a selection of these being International Journal of Project
Management, Academy of Management Learning & Education and California

35
Management Review. To find these journals, we used the database Business Source
Premier. The articles of interest were found after searches with the keywords;
organization, change, leadership, change management, education, documentation,
culture and strategy combined in different ways to get the optimal outcome for this
thesis.

A preliminary literature treatment

After acquiring literature needed, it can be beneficial to prioritize them and make
organized notes of the content before starting the work of the frame of references. (Patel
& Davidson, 1994) We used Patel & Davidson’s (1994) ideas of organizing the literature
before carrying out the actual text. Prioritizing the literature was followed by a thorough
review of the highly prioritized books. We made this by making a document each for all
the literature with the highest rating. In the documents we specified the main context,
their angle of approach and for which areas in our frame of reference it could be of
interest. By doing this, we facilitated the organization and production of the frame of
reference.

When writing, one often realizes what information is lacking, what possibilities the
results actually give and what thoughts can be connected to them. Therefore, Johansson
& Svedner (1998) suggest that a draft should be made as soon as possible since it
stimulates the work and thinking of the researcher. We followed their recommendations
and saw to it that summaries were made shortly after interviews and literature studies.

Keep a critical mind

We have tried to keep a critical approach to the theories and to get different angels on all
areas of interest in the process of change while reviewing the literature. Knowledge
critique is a way of adapting logical thoughts according to Eriksson & Wiedersheim-Paul
(1999). We are aware that caution should be taken when using consultant literature since
it intends to be uncritical and written in a selling way. Even so the materials from
consultant literature we have used have shown strong similarities to many of our
academic theories, and we have therefore decided that they can be of value to our thesis.
To remember is that being critical is not the same as being negative but rather
questioning. (Eriksson & Wiedersheim-Paul, 1999) We are aware that there are two sides
to the same coin and therefore we have considered different, sometimes even
contradictive, opinions about the areas concerning the process of change. What we
uncovered in the frame of reference resulted in an analysis model. Being critical helped
us to see weaknesses in the separate models we studied, which made us develop an
analysis model consisting of parts from several models.

4.1.2. Data collection

The main data collection was preformed at Consafe Logistics and was constituted of
interviews. We further studied secondary material, observed the behaviour at the office

36
and we finally included a consultancy bureau and three benchmarking cases in our
empirical study.

Our role
We, the authors, have not entered Consafe Logistics as change agents but more in the role
as observant and interviewers. In the role as observant you can only study behaviour of
today and not knowledge, opinions and values (Lekvall & Wahlbin, 2001) making the
interviews our source of primary information. We have also acquainted ourselves with
secondary material available through internal documentation and communication.

Qualitative study
When trying to understand cultural phenomena and human communication it’s a question
of circumstances that cannot be mapped out through objective measurements. (Wallén,
1993) To get deeper knowledge than the fragmented information that quantitative
methods give the researcher a qualitative approach is favourable. (Patel & Davidson,
1994) The goal of the qualitative method is to expose a number of qualities that relatively
well captures the central objectives in a certain phenomenon, in other words, getting a
conception of the occurrence of issue. (Eneroth, 1994) Due to the nature of our purpose;
importance of experiences and points of views instead of measurable information, we
have chosen to do a qualitative study.

Case study
A research strategy can be chosen between surveys, experiments, desk investigations, and
case studies depending on the nature of the starting point of the research. (Lekvall &
Wahlbin, 2001) Encyclopaedia Britannica (2008) states that a case study is an intensive
analysis of an individual unit (as a person or community) stressing developmental factors
in relation to environment. A research design is the logic linking between the data to be
collected and the initial questions of study. One of the most challenging of all social
science attempts is using case studies for research purposes. If the main part of the
questions posed in the research is of “how” and “why” character, a case study is
favourably used. (Yin, 2003) Instead of doing a broad study we are interested in going
deeper into one company getting to know opinions, the work environment, how and why
decisions are made and implemented. Hence we have done a case study.

The structure of our interviews

Using open interviews where the questions are decided as the interview proceeds or
extended observations is a better approach than using questionnaires with predetermined
questions if getting the whole picture of the respondent is desirable. (Johansson &
Svedner, 1998) In a qualitative survey, data that is not meaningfully quantified is
gathered, analyzed and interpreted. (Lekvall & Wahlbin, 2001) The qualities described by
Yin (2003), Johansson & Svedner (1998) and Lekvall & Wahlbin (2001) inspire us to
chose open, unstructured interviews where only the main topics are predetermined. Using

37
only predetermined topics as a guide for the interviews gave us the opportunity to control
the direction of the interviews. During our interviews we have had the following topics
based on our analysis model:

• What is the situation like in the subsidiaries and partners today?

• Why was the decision made to focus on Astro?
• How has the decision been received in the different subsidiaries and partners?
• How has the process of change been carried out?
• How will Consafe Logistics make the change permanent?
• How is support and feedback between the different parts of the organization
approached?

We are aware that it is difficult to ask direct questions about culture, therefore
conclusions on this subject were made after observations during the interviews and while
working in the office environment. Since we were provided with our own office at
Consafe Logistics, we were able to communicate informally with the respondents as a
complement to the interviews.

Selection
To get the information desired, interviews with employees at Consafe Logistics, both
employees at the Mother Company and employees at the subsidiaries, have been carried
out. In total we have carried out nine open, unstructured interviews with employees in the
Consafe Logistics group. In table 1 the interview respondents’ position, total time at
Consafe Logistics, year of birth and gender are presented.

Name Position Total Time Year Gender

at Consafe of
Logistics in birth
2008/10
Artemiev, Country Manager, Consafe 10 months 1965 Male
Dmitry Logistics LLC
Bowes, Paul Manager / Technical 14 years, 5 1969 Male
Leader, Consafe Logistics months
UK Ltd
Hellström, Dan Director, Consafe Logistics 17 years 1956 Male
A/S
Koot, Jord Managing Director, 1 year, 10 1964 Male
Consafe Logistics B.V., months
Olenmark, Bengt Product Manager (Second), 23 years 1953 Male
Consafe Logistics AB
Ollier, Neale Sales Manager, Consafe 2 years, 5 1971 Male
Logistics Ltd. months
Persson, Lars Chairman of the Board & 19 years 1963 Male
Responsible for Products &
Markets, Consafe Logistics

38
 SP. zo.o
Widstrand, Project Leader for Astro 3 years, 7 1973 Female
Charlotte Roll-out months
Öwall, Mikael Astro Chief Technical 21 years 1961 Male
Officer, Consafe Logistics
AB

Table 1 Selection (Authors, 2008)

Our group of respondents contains nine people working in different countries for Consafe
Logistics. Only one of the respondents is a woman, namely our tutor at Consafe
Logistics, Charlotte Widstrand. The ages range from mid thirties to mid fifties. There is
also a range from just under a year to over 20 years in experience with working with
WMS and the specific company culture in Consafe Logistics.

Our intention has been to interview representatives from all the different subsidiaries and
partners. The only subsidiary incapable to participate was Consafe Logistics Norway. We
are aware that some useful points might have gone missing, but evaluating the overall
result we are satisfied with only having one decline.

We are aware of the fact that we have only interviewed a small share of the employees at
Consafe Logistics. Thus, the reliability diminishes since we haven’t been able to include
all opinions available. We are also aware that all of the respondents represent the
manager level in the company, and that as a result it is difficult to notice inertia since it is
often more present further down in the organization. We have followed the
recommendations of who to contact given by Charlotte Widstrand, and since our strategy
check-list is to be created from a top perspective we believe that the right people have
been approached. If we were to do an exhaustive study of the strategy implementation, its
affect on the entire organization and its markets, interviews with people working on all
levels should have been necessary. We also visited one of Consafe Logistics’ customers
in Sweden, Runsvengruppen AB. We had an interview with Tobias Fors, logistics
engineer, which helped us to get a preliminary understanding of Consafe Logistics’
relationship to customers.

We have executed the communication mainly through face-to-face contact, through

telephone and email. The information from the employees at Consafe Logistics has
mainly been through interviews in person, but due to geographic distance some
interviews and additional questions have been communicated over telephone or via email.
All interviews with the employees at the Lund office have been conducted face-to-face as
well as the interviews with the country managers from the Benelux and Poland. The
interview with the country manager at Denmark was over the telephone. All
communication with the subsidiary in the U.K. and the partners in Russia has been
handled via emails. All respondents have been contacted via email after the interview
giving them an opportunity to comment on the preliminary empiric text to give us the
best accuracy according to the Delphi model which says that showing the summarized
material to the respondents is a way to increase the validity. (Lekvall & Wahlbin, 2001)
We are aware that letting the respondents read the empiric text can mean risking that

39
statements and opinions are changed, but in our case we were fortunate to have no
significant alteration.

The main contact with our tutor, Eva Lovén, at Linköping’s University and the
management consultancy bureau, Centigo, was carried out via email, though we did have
three meetings face-to-face with Eva Lovén and one meeting face-to-face with the
consultancy bureau Centigo during the process.

Benchmarking
The method benchmarking is used to learn from those best at a certain process. This
method is about a mutual exchange at the same time as it is a method to make
improvements in a systematic way. After identifying that something needs to be
improved, a search for an organization to learn from is carried out, preferably from the
leading business in the area or from companies which have faced similar situations. The
model business can with advantage be active in a different field. (Thulin & Thulin, 2003)

We have used the Renault Volvo merger and Lawson Software’s acquisition of Intentia
for our benchmarking study according to Centigo’s recommendations. Consafe Logistics’
subsidiaries are obtained through international acquisitions, thus we find these two cases
of business mergers of interest for this thesis. In addition, we used Nynas attempt to enter
Russia because we believe that it can be helpful when it comes to the relationship to
Consafe Logistics’ Russian partners. In the first case, we used a case study made by
Bruner & Spekman (1998) to find the pitfalls Volvo and Renault didn’t give enough
attention to during their failed fusion. In the second and third case, the Lawson Software
Intentia acquisition and Nynas attempt to enter Russia, we have used reports made by
students taking the course International Business, TEIM09, at Linköping’s University.
We are aware that these reports didn’t undergo the same quality review as articles in
international journals do. We did however attend the course ourselves and have
concluded that the content in the reports is qualitative enough to be used for
benchmarking in this thesis.

4.2. Analyzing data

A case study means that a few objects are examined in several different manners.
(Eriksson & Wiedersheim-Paul, 1999) In a case study, data is not coded into measurable
numbers, instead the researcher normally works relatively close to the often verbally
based data available and the examiner tries to get the overall picture from an individual
case. One way to compare the different sources, being different thoughts of the
employees at Consafe Logistics, is to compare them with each others and group them
together depending on similarities. The comparison is then followed by an analysis of the
differences between the groups. There are no fixed standards to follow when analyzing
case studies. (Lekvall & Wahlbin, 2001) Interpretation is therefore, exactly like
measurements, a basic method to find the meaning in observations. (Eriksson &
Wiedersheim-Paul, 1999)

40
We have, when analyzing our data, tried to map out the unanimous thoughts from the
employees of how to solve the problem and of the current situation, as well as pointing
out the areas where the opinions go apart. We have structured the analysis according to
our analysis model. Hence the first level of headlines follow our analysis model;
decision, introduction, initialization, early job experiences and institutionalization which
correspond to our topic questions. The analysis led to an audited analysis model since
flaws in our initial analysis model were uncovered.

41
5. Empirical
Empirical study
We have met with employees at the mother company and with representatives from the
different subsidiaries to gather empiric data. Below we present the result from the
interviews at Consafe Logistics. The chapter ends with the results from a benchmarking
study and the outcome from a meeting with the consultancy bureau Centigo.

5.1. Empirical base

To get a basic understanding for the company Consafe Logistics and the underlying
reason for their change process, the reader will below be introduced to Consafe Logistics
and the relationship to its customer. We further explain the present situation at the
different subsidiaries to give a picture of how far in the process of change the different
units have come.

5.1.1. The beginning of Consafe Logistics

The company Consafe Logistics was founded under its current name, after a fusion of
two companies, in 2004. Consafe Logistics offers customers logistical solutions, more
specifically warehouse management systems, from here on called WMS. Initially
Consafe Logistics offered two different WMSs; SattStore and Astro. At the time of the
company fusion, resulting in Consafe Logistics, three subsidiaries were already running,
selling SattStore. These subsidiaries in Denmark, the Benelux and the U.K. all became a
part of Consafe Logistics in 2004. A few years later, in 2006 and 2007, the company
expanded with new acquisitions and this time new companies in Poland and Norway
were bought and made into subsidiaries. The latest expansion went further east and
resulted in setting up two external Russian partners and a small Russian subsidiary. The
external partners will get support from the mother company to sell Consafe Logistics’
products, but they will not be included in the group. The subsidiaries and partners all
have different amount of experience of WMS and Astro depending on their background.

Strategic decision to change

Three years ago, in 2005, Consafe Logistics’ management made the strategic decision to
only let one WMS be their flagship, namely Astro, to be able to stay competitive on the
market and meet customer demands. Today many of the customers use the other WMS
SattStore and therefore service and support of this system still have to be available for at
least ten more years. This need to still be able to help customers with problems related to
SattStore means that the most urgent measure to be taken is to stop delivering the system.
As of now the decision has been taken on a management level but the change has still not
been implemented in some of the subsidiaries. The process of change necessary in the
subsidiaries to switch to selling Astro alone is affected by many factors including not
only knowledge about the new software, but also differences in project management,

42
project organization, leadership, language and culture. With an augmented number of
employees working with Astro, a need for sufficient documentation and improved
internal communication has also increased.

5.1.2. Consafe Logistics’ customers

Depending on Consafe Logistics’ position on the market customer contact is initiated in
different ways. In Sweden, where the company is the market leader, customers often
come with inquiries themselves. In some countries Consafe Logistics does telemarketing
to locate potential customers and in especially Benelux the customers hire consultants
who work exclusively with WMS purchases. The market in the Benelux looks different
than the one in Sweden. In Sweden Consafe Logistics has a big market share and little
competition while in the Benelux there are about 70 competitors on the market. This
competitive market makes it important for Consafe Logistics Benelux to be careful when
talking to the customers. Trying to make an existing customer change from SattStore to
Astro can make them turn to a competitor when they need a new WMS solution.

Customer Relationship
Consafe Logistics’ customer relationships has been described as strong and built on
personal contacts, and Consafe Logistics is not expected to loose any customers as a
result of the change. Several employees are convinced that whether the customers choose
to stay with Consafe Logistics and change to Astro or leave all depends on how the new
situation is presented to them. If the people in contact with the customers can explain the
benefits and reassure them that they can only gain from the change, the risk that they seek
other WMS suppliers is minimal. One employee at Consafe Logistics expressed that the
customers he has talked to understand and accept their decision, but this employee still
see a potential risk of loosing some customers.

A satisfied customer
The big warehouse Runsvengruppen AB is one of Consafe Logistics’ Swedish customers.
They came across Consafe Logistics and Astro during a project to find a new business
system. They got the offer to change both their business software system and WMS in
one go, the WMS being Astro, and since the name Astro was recognize from other big
companies it was chosen as the new WMS. During the implementation of Astro
employees from Consafe Logistics were present during about two weeks. The employee
we met at Runsvengruppen AB was the first one to get training in Astro, and afterwards it
was up to him to spread the knowledge further within his organization. He says that this
way of teaching worked out perfectly since getting the responsibility to teach others
forces you to fully understand the material. It took almost the entire summer to get Astro
running and the Runsvengruppen AB employees to get familiar with the new system, but
the employee we met with says that there has been no bigger complications and that they
are very happy about the new WMS. Overall Runsvengruppen AB is very satisfied with
their cooperation with Consafe Logistics and there has never been any problem to get the
necessary support either from their personal contact or from the support department.

43
 5.1.3. The situation in Consafe Logistics group today
Consafe Logistics is present in the countries pointed out in figure 10. Looking at the
maturity of the market, levels of experience with Astro and the progress made towards
refocusing sales, the situation in each country differ substantially.

Figure 10 Consafe Logistics’ countries of presence (Consafe Logistics, 2008)

Consafe Logistics Sweden is no longer selling any new SattStore systems to new
customers, though there are still some bigger customers who will keep getting their
SattStore systems updated as well as old SattStore customers who wish to get the same
WMS in new warehouses. Even if it is the final goal, no attempts to convert a customer’s
WMS from SattStore to Astro have been made. Consafe Logistics Sweden has created a
critical mass of Astro competence, big enough to meet customer demands.

Consafe Logistics Denmark sold their first Astro system in 2006. By the summer of
2008 the goal to only sell Astro to new customers was reached. Some old customers still
demand SattStore, but today practically all WMS systems that are sold in Denmark are
Astro systems. There is a need to increase the Astro competence in Denmark to be able to
implement all the ordered Astro systems. Since Consafe Logistics Denmark has already
changed into focusing sales primarily on Astro systems, creating enough workload for the
employees is not a problem at the moment. At this subsidiary the next step is to create
enough Astro competence to handle the planned deliveries. Today, four to six employees
possess sufficient knowledge about Astro and these persons are now ready to teach the
rest of the staff through learning-by-doing.

The subsidiary has today sold three Astro systems in the Benelux, one of which is
implemented and running and the following two are still in the implementation phase.
There is a belief that by the end of year 2009 Astro will represent half of the sold systems
at Consafe Logistics Benelux, as of today about one out of six systems sold are Astro.

44
Since the market for SattStore is big in the Benelux compared to the Nordic markets the
office there has kept selling it to stay profitable whilst they learn Astro. The Benelux
market is one of the biggest markets for WMS in the world with all of Consafe Logistics’
biggest competitors present.

The Polish subsidiary, Consafe Logistics Poland, has not yet sold their first Astro system
but the subsidiary has three potential customers and they are preparing to be ready when
the first system is sold. Unlike the Danish, the Benelux and the British subsidiaries,
Consafe Logistics Poland is not changing from selling SattStore to Astro but from selling
one of their own WMS systems to Astro.

There are four people working at Consafe Logistics U.K. today, managing sales and
SattStore implementation on the British market. They are managed by the Danish office,
no efforts towards selling Astro have been made yet but in the near future they will
launch a marketing campaign to attract customers. The employees at Consafe Logistics
U.K. have gotten some Astro training but not enough to manage an implementation on
their own according to themselves. The British market includes many big actors and the
British office has already contact with several potential customers. The British employees
realize that they have to start working towards the product change, but due to the lack of
knowledge in Astro, they are afraid to loose too much business. A change will not happen
until the knowledge and competence is built up according to the employees at the British
subsidiary.

The subsidiary in Norway has not yet begun to sell Astro systems. Since the subsidiary
has not been included in Consafe Logistics group for very long the process has not come
far.

The two newly set up partners in Russia are represented by one Consafe Logistics
employee. This representative’s main task is to manage partner motivation, including
marketing and presale support to the eager partners. Yet there has been no sale of Astro,
but there are several potential customers. The Russian market has a lot of potential,
growing quickly from almost nothing. The big American companies are already present,
but the price level is stable. Right now the main focus is on getting the first Russian
project. The target is set to running three projects during the year of 2009, and to reach a
level of eight to ten projects within the following five years.

5.2. Decision
When the two WMSs, Astro and SattStore, were included in the same company the two
products' functions overlapped significantly. Therefore many employees were prepared
that a change had to be made in the near future. Two overlapping products were the
reason why the decision to change was taken. The management at Consafe Logistics had
the choice to either make a completely new product including all of both Astro's and
SattStore's strongest features or to choose to lay off the weaker one. It was not financially
defendable to have two equivalent products and keep up with the market demanded

45
developments at the same time which made the change important to the company. The
possibility for customers currently using one system to change to the other was also an
important factor. It was clear that a change from Astro to SattStore would be very
difficult if not impossible. Consafe Logistics also considered the products' technical
aspects, their position on the market and their image and made the decision to focus on
Astro. Both products were already very detailed and developed, but the main reason for
why Astro was chosen as the stronger product was because of the way that Astro is built.
To a big extent the technical aspect was a contributing factor mainly because Astro
allows continuous updates to be made as opposed to SattStore which is not easily
updated. Because Astro allows frequent updates, the customers benefit from all the new
features and functions, and at the same time it gives them an incentive to stay as
customers with Consafe Logistics. All the subsidiaries which were included in Consafe
Logistics at the time participated in making the choice to focus on Astro.

Whom the change concerns doesn’t only include the employees at Consafe Logistics
group but also the company’s customers. Consafe Logistics is hoping that the focus on
Astro will give them more time to develop the product further and that additional time
can be used to extend the range of complementary products. There is also a possibility to
enter, for Astro, new markets now that it has been updated to fill the gaps to SattStore.
For example warehouses dealing with food make up a new market where SattStore was
very strong in the past, but where Astro now can grow. There should be no significant
difficulties for the customers using SattStore to change WMS to Astro. They have to get
used to a new interface, but considering that any update in SattStore usually means
considerable changes because it only happens very rarely due to the complexity of the
system's architecture customers’ decision to change to Astro is made easier. To make an
update in SattStore is usually comparable with starting a new implementation project, and
there is a belief that many SattStore customers will be motivated to change to Astro. Even
if it would be beneficial for Consafe Logistics if all the customers could convert from
SattStore to Astro it will not be possible. Some bigger customers’ warehouses include
significant amounts of mechanics integrated with their current WMS, and a change would
mean extensive financial costs, which results in restrained flexibility of the change.

5.3. Introduction
The manner in which the decision to change was informed to the organization was by
putting the responsibility on the country managers. It was up to them how they wanted to
present the news in their subsidiary. At Consafe Logistics Sweden the news was mostly
spread by word of mouth, and no special posts were made on the Intranet. To many
employees the decision came as no surprise, hence a general acceptance was reached
quickly. The change will affect the different subsidiaries differently since their history
includes different amounts of experience with the Astro system and WMS over all. The
managers we talked to had not received any negative opinions about the change from the
individual level, but similar to the organization the change will affect the specific
individuals differently. The change will affect, apart from the organization at Consafe
Logistics, also its customers. Warehouses using SattStore will still keep the same level of

46
service and support, but the wish for a new SattStore implementation will be harder to get
fulfilled. The opinions, concerning what affect this will have on the customer base, go
apart; while some believe that the impact will not lead to any customer losses others say
that it is a necessary risk that has to be taken.

5.3.1. Leadership
The change has been introduced at the top of the organization at Consafe Logistics. Each
of the representatives from the different subsidiaries who were included in the decision
brought the information of the change back to his subsidiary. The country leader was
responsible for informing about, introducing and managing the change process at his
subsidiary, but he gets support from information that is spread via the different
communication channels. When it came to announcing the news of the change, it was
done very differently; face-to-face, email and word of mouth. No internal communication
channel was used to approach the entire organization at the same time.

There are no plans or precautions of how to handle a bad reception of the news of change.
The country leader has no reward system to help him motivate employees to become
involved in and contribute to the change process, but according to several managers there
is no need for it since everyone has had positive attitudes towards the decision. There
have been no personal or individual goals set for each employee either. Everyone works
in a group and the goal is always completing the next WMS implementation.

5.3.2. Knowledge, competence and education

It is the country manager’s responsibility to explain the need for change and to answer
any objections made from the employees. How he does it is up to him to decide since
there are no information guidelines. If he approaches the employees face-to-face the
employees have the possibility to question the decision directly to him, but today there is
no information session where the objections can be presented to the Consafe Logistic top
management. Since the news of the change was spread by word of mouth to a big extent
it did not allow for any communication about the decision were the knowledge could
have built up in the organization. In addition the little information about the change that
was posted on the Intranet as well as on the different data bases was insufficient and not
updated.

5.3.3. Internal Communication

The Astro system is too complex for one person to know everything about it, thus there
can not be only one person answering all the questions from the subsidiaries. The
increased number of Astro projects sold creates a need to contact each other directly
within the company, to use informal channels, and to create transparency where
skills/knowledge/experience resides. As of today, when the employee at the subsidiary
doesn’t know who possesses the knowledge needed the question goes through Charlotte
Widstrand, project leader for the Roll-out team, and she passes the question on to the

47
competent person available at the moment. Direct questions concerning sales often go
through Lars Persson or Bengt Olenmark.

Competence Matrix
With a growing company the task of answering questions from the subsidiaries will be
too big for just a few employees. One solution to this was the making of the competence
matrix. The matrix shows what employee or employees are competent in what area, and
was developed as a help for the employees to know who to turn to with problems to
solve. The matrix is poorly used today though, one turns to the people within ones
network prior to using the list. In Denmark, this is probably due to the close geographical
distance to the Lund office. Many trips over the sound have made it possible for the
Danish employees to build a thorough network in Sweden. There are individuals that
insist that it is a good idea though and that it needs to be brought to the employees’
attention that the competence matrix exists. The competence matrix was evaluated in the
summer of 2008. Out of the eleven employees evaluating the competence matrix
everyone answered that they do not use the matrix today. The majority states that they
think it is a good idea but that they did not know about it until the inquiry. It could be
useful for new employees and it has to be promoted more to root it in was one of the
opinions that was expressed in the evaluation. Information about the competence matrix
has been spread via mass e-mails but without much success. The best tool for internal
communication today is the Intranet according to some respondents and news are posted
on the Intranet and a big part of the company’s documentation is available here.

5.3.4. Documentation
Despite the benefits with Astro, such as easily made upgrades, the system has its
drawbacks. One disadvantage is that the system is very complex. Before the Consafe
Logistics fusion the centralized organization in Lund, MA-systems, allowed the
employees to keep the knowledge tacit and it was been enough to know who knows what.
As the company is growing with a complex product, with offices in multiple
countries/markets, this knowledge/experience needs to be more easily spread and a need
for increased documentation has risen. The challenge today for the employees that are
just getting to know Astro is to know what it can do, how it works, how it solves the
problem and what they can offer the customers. This could be put together in one
important document which is lacking today, suggestively called function description. The
function description could be made from the today existing activity model (authors’
translation of verksamhetsmodell). There are opinions that a function description could
bring benefits to the work in the subsidiaries and that a list of strengths and weaknesses in
Astro’s functionality would be a big help. One drawback with the function description is
the uncertainty whether or not it would be possible to upgrade it simultaneously with the
upgrades of the Astro system. To have a functioning function description demanded it
requires that this document is consistently upgraded parallel with the updates in the Astro
system. There are opinions that Consafe Logistics has made big improvement when it
comes to documentation, and even if there is a lot to be done an effort would get it up to a
sufficient level.

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 5.4. Initialization
All the employees at the different subsidiaries have not received adequate and realistic
training to manage Astro implementations. The training has varied due to prerequisites
and resources available resulting in the present situation where Denmark and Sweden
only sell Astro to all new customers whilst the U.K. has not made any changes in their
way of working.

5.4.1. Knowledge, competence and education

The first project in the Benelux resulted in a big loss of 200% while the second project
presented a loss of 90 %. The subsidiary hopes to reach break even at the third project.
This slow and expensive implementation is a big loss for the company and the change to
go from one WMS to Astro must be made more efficient to reach a higher profitability.
This could be done by better and more documentation, education for the employees,
leveraging cross company expertise/experience, enhancing the product functionality, and
improving/shortening the implementation methodology/process. Training courses for
application consultants, developers and salesmen plus an introduction course and a
continuation course to Astro for new employees has been carried out to some employees
at the subsidiaries. The education has taken place in Lund and held by employees from
the Swedish office. Consafe Logistics’ representative in Russia has had application
consultancy training. The employees at the British office had a three day training course
last year in 2007. Unfortunately due to the mixed level of ability in the group and method
in which the course was run some of the participants were not satisfied with the insight
they got into the functionality of Astro. One respondent pointed out the drawback in
offering the employees educations too early in the process. Acquiring the knowledge
without following up with practical experience immediately creates a risk that the new
knowledge is lost, thus requiring the educations to be carried out again. Since the lead
time for an Astro system is about one and a half to six months from sales to the first step
of the implementation the employees have enough time to acquire the knowledge once
the first system is sold.

Training in another country

In addition to the courses carried out to the employees, Consafe Logistics Benelux has
chosen to send a new employee to the office in Sweden for six months. The objectives
are that this employee can gain sufficient knowledge/experience to return after several
months and work with Astro in the Benelux office. The Polish office has followed the
Benelux strategy by sending three employees to Lund to learn about Astro and get
practical experience during over a year, before they go back to Poland ready to start
working with Astro implementation. Consafe Logistics Denmark has instead employed a
person from the Swedish office with about eight years of experience from the Swedish
office. This way the Danish subsidiary acquired an expert and at the same time they are
able to take advantage of this employee’s network in Sweden. One expressed opinion is
that it’s more sufficient to have people coming to Sweden to learn about Astro than to

49
send single Swedish employees to each subsidiary. Not only will one Swedish employee
in a subsidiary be forced to take on the heavy load of being the employee with most Astro
competence, but sending people to Sweden will automatically create better
communication channels. The company language in Consafe Logistics is English, but
communication towards customers is often made in the local language. The only country
where English causes a bit of a problem is in Poland, and therefore all the Polish
employees are obliged to enter an English language course.

Synergy
There is a present project running within the company, the Synergy project, with the
objective to share knowledge within the company the best possible way. An introduction
to the project on Consafe Logistics’ Intranet states that With an increasing number of
employees, working in multiple countries, in multiple offices, in multiple Business Areas,
we definitely need to more and more work-as-one to successfully answer the ever rising
expectations of our increasing base of customers. (…) The key in achieving this is
excellence in information/knowledge sharing and cross-company collaboration.
Learning, and translating that learning into action rapidly, is just impossible without
sharing information throughout the various domains of our organization. And this is just
what The Synergy Program is about. The roll-out of the synergy project is to start in
December 2008. The realization of the Synergy project will improve the flow of
information within Consafe Logistics, and much hope relies on it to succeed.

5.5. Early job experiences

The training courses at the mother company and the recruitments of new competences to
the subsidiaries are followed by the actual change. The biggest effects on the subsidiaries
as a result of the change have been reorganizations and recruitments to meet up to the
demands that selling and implementing Astro brings. The training described above has
given the employees the ability to adjust and hopefully also initiated a desire to adjust
among the employees; they have all embraced the change well according to the
managers. To be able to work with the Astro at the subsidiaries and to make the
implementation processes consistent, different documents have been created and these
are used in the early job experiences. Due to the benefits with the new product, Astro,
many of the old ideals at the subsidiaries have become inferior resulting in little
resistance towards the change. The change has been drastic at some subsidiaries while it
has been a slight adjustment in others. Consafe Logistics Poland didn’t have the same
experience of WMS, of using English as the company language and of Consafe Logistics’
way of working. Consafe Logistics Denmark and Benelux on the other hand were used to
working close to Consafe Logistics Sweden due to SattStore and they had profound
WMS experience. Thus the impact on the individuals differs between the different
subsidiaries and the mother company. Since the change concerns all the employees at
Consafe Logistics group, there are no others within the company to be affected by the
change.

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 5.5.1. Project organization
There are three main roles involved in the implementation process; project leader,
application consultant and developer. Depending on the project size, roles like technical
project leader or different experts can also be included. The project leader manages the
organization, the planning and much of the initial customer contact. The application
consultant works close to the customer to agree on which functions should be added and
to help the customer to get the most out of Astro. The developer manages the program
code, for example adding new functions. Depending on the size of the project the number
of application consultants and developers can vary.

An example of the effect on the organization

The organization at Consafe Logistics Benelux today can be described as below. (See
Figure 11) Since 2007, a project group, consisting of a project leader, two application
consultants and one developer, has been employed with the sole purpose of working with
Astro. They will be the first in Consafe Logistics to implement Astro in customers’
warehouses in Benelux.

Project leader Project Leader Project Leader

2 1 2

System leader Appl Consultant System Leader

3 2 3

Developer Developer Developer

7 1 7

SattStore Project group Astro Project group SattStore Project group

Until 2007 After 2007 when the

Astro project group was
employed
Figure 11 Illustration of Consafe Logistics' organization Benelux (Authors’ interpretation after
interview with Koot (2008))

51
The system leaders for SattStore and the application consultants for Astro can be
considered system architects for the two WMSs. One problem in the process of focusing
on one product is that the system leaders for SattStore need to possess deep technical
knowledge while the application consultant for Astro must have a solid background in
logistics. This means that the system leader can not easily change into an application
consultant. Since Consafe Logistics must offer support to the SattStore customers for at
least seven years after the last system being sold, the knowledge of SattStore will still be
necessary for the company.

How to work with Astro

Consafe Logistics has developed a project model for the implementation process with the
purpose of managing customers in a unified way in every country. The project model is
called Promise and is available to everyone in the company. Promise includes six phases
each one stating necessary activities and milestones that have to be reached. (See Figure
12) Each phase is accompanied by a large number of documents and check-lists
providing the project members with material helpful to organize and complete the
project.

Sales phase

Living up to the PROMISE

handover R
Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3 Phase 4 Phase 5 Phase 6
E
S
U
L
N

G
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R
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VE
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IO

IN

IN

T
TI

TI

N
AT

O
IA

O
AI

D
IC

SI
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TR

AN
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IF

IS
IN

S
G
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&

H
FI

M
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N

&
SP

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Figure 12 Promise Project Approach (Promise, 2008)

Phase 1, initiation
This is the first step after the sale has been made. Basic activities like setting up project
documents, making a project plan, resource scheduling and organizing a kick-off with the
customer are included. The final goal with the initiation phase is to get the project
document signed.

Phase 2, specification

52
The customer’s special needs are listed and a preliminary study of what specific activities
which have to be done is set up during the second phase. Milestones to be reached are
agreeing on the pre-study document and on the customization list.

Phase 3, configuration
In the third phase the program is customized by the developer to follow all the precedent
agreements, and a lot of configuration performed by the application consultants.
Milestones are for example completed module tests and a system configuration
document.

Phase 4, testing & training

During the fourth phase more people are included as a result of the key-user and end-user
training taking place at this time. Extensive tests are also done to verify that the
configurations in phase 3 are correct. Certified operators and successful tests constitute
milestones in the fourth phase.

Phase 5, commissioning
Once the fifth phase has been reached Astro has been programmed to fit the customer’s
needs and the staff has been trained. It is time to hand over and let the warehouse manage
itself. The last preparations before leaving the customer are made, and during a period of
a couple of weeks the warehouse is left to manage itself, but with extensive support from
Consafe Logistics. It is also now that the Go/No Go meeting takes place hopefully
leading to the start of a beneficial supplier customer relationship. The milestones are a
signed service contract and a signed Go decision.

Phase 6, go live & hand over

Consafe Logistics leaves the customer with the running product, a process called go live,
and hands over the contact to customer support. In this the sixth and last phase the
customer should be completely prepared to manage the warehouse on their own. The
team does a project review and if everything is pleasing, signs a project closure.

The implementation of an Astro system in a customer’s warehouse is a process that can

vary immensely in both time and effort. Considering all the different problems that can
arise during configuration and tests it is not surprising that this process can take anything
from weeks to years. Today Promise is used in the Benelux and Sweden and opinions
differ when it comes to whether or not the employees in Denmark use Promise for their
projects. If personal models are used instead of Promise some people are made
indispensable since they possess that can be accessed by everyone.

Working across country boarders

There is an ambition in the company to work closer together between the different
countries to benefit from each other's progress. Unfortunately it is not financially possible
to gather everyone for meetings, but for very special occasions, like releases of new
products, that is the goal. With increased communication between the subsidiaries
employees with special competence can get the opportunity to work in a different country

53
to exchange experiences and create quick communication channels. Especially when it
concerns increasing the Astro competence in a subsidiary an exchange can be done. The
next step for Consafe Logistics Benelux has already been taken and means to start
focusing sales more on Astro. This is needed to create enough workload for the Astro
project team to work with in a near future. Another step to take is to work across
subsidiaries and not only use local resources. Some employees mean that Consafe
Logistics must change organizationally on a global level by working with projects
together between the different subsidiaries and the mother company. This means that the
employees should become more moveable making the organization more dynamic.
Working more across the national boundaries is not too easy though. In general,
employees at one office are not likely to be excited to work abroad for a long period of
time. In addition, working across national boundaries creates an additional dimension
into the staff planning. In it lies the difficulty that there is a wish to manage all projects,
including documentation and discussions, in the local language as well as the difficulty of
transferring the employees’ mentality from a SattStore focus to an Astro focus.

5.5.2. Leadership
The change was initialized at the top of the organization and spread downwards to in
different amounts of time reach all employees. As a result opinions from different levels
of the organization have not been taken into account. Depending on the number of
employees at the specific subsidiary the country manager might not work closely to the
others in the organization on a daily basis. Therefore the way of leading differs from each
country and it is sometimes hard for employees to get their voices heard.

5.5.3. Documentation
One problem to spread knowledge through documents, except for the lack of documents
available, is that not everyone knows where to find the documents. Most documents are
available from a common server, possible for all subsidiaries except for the Polish office
to access today, or at the Astro Forum on the Intranet. The Consafe Logistics
representative has only access to documents on request, but has been given Astro related
material. The documents at Astro Forum are primarily used by the developers. The
information has been spread through the country managers but there is a belief that the
information hasn’t always reached the final user. One respondent said that he only has
good knowledge of how to find documents posted on the Consafe Logistics Intranet, not
common servers. Another problem to solve that has been pointed out is how to make the
documents easier to locate. Taking on the problem by developing a search engine or a
function imitating an encyclopaedia has been suggested.

5.6. Institutionalization
The attitudes towards the change have been very different, but the common opinion has
been that the process has taken too much time which has affected the overall
commitment. Insufficient knowledge due to delayed training courses has resulted in

54
unnecessarily low profitability in the first Astro implementation projects in Consafe
Logistics Benelux. The subsidiary in Denmark has started the process of reinforcing the
new ways of working by further building up the competence base with retraining. The
managers we talked to feel that the pervasiveness towards the change has been minor
throughout the entire process, and in the organizations in Denmark and Sweden everyone
has adjusted to the Astro focus.

5.6.1. Leadership
Several subsidiaries see increasing the knowledge base for Astro as one of the main tasks
to complete the process of change. Though there are few traces of a plan for how or when
the new final state will be reached, which some explain with the fact that they have still a
long way to go. The goal for all the subsidiaries undergoes the superior strategic plan to
change into exclusively selling Astro and to develop a critical mass of Astro competence.
All the country managers are aware of the background to the decision of focusing on
Astro. Consafe Logistics Denmark has set a goal in terms of time in their local strategy.
In the beginning of 2007 a goal to only sell Astro to new customers within one and a half
year was set. Similar to Consafe Logistics Denmark, Consafe Logistics England has set
the goal to have implemented the first Astro system during the year of 2009. The partners
in Russia have set a short term as well as a long term goal, and in addition they are both
measurable, namely a number of customers in a certain period of time. Consafe Logistics
in Benelux, England and in Poland do not have a set plan of when they are supposed to
exclusively sell Astro but the change in the Benelux has been said to be made as soon as
possible.

The Consafe Logistics management never set up any measurable goals for the group
when it came to changing the existing customers WMSs into Astro systems. A reason for
this was that the Astro competence in some subsidiaries was, at that time, non-existing
whilst the experience and customer base for SattStore was well established making it
difficult to do any estimates. Some of the subsidiaries did however set up measurable
time based goals for when they where supposed to start selling Astro and when all new
sales should consist of solely Astro systems. None of the subsidiaries have a strategic
goal of when to transfer the SattStore customers’ systems into Astro systems. In addition,
no concrete financially, quantity or time based mile stones have been set except for the
one in terms of time set in Denmark. Even if there is a wish to stop selling SattStore
altogether there are still big customers who demand the system. The subsidiaries have to
earn money and as long as their knowledge is predominantly about SattStore they will not
stop selling it.

5.6.2. Documentation
An effort to improve the available Astro documentation posted on the Intranet and in the
different databases has been made. Promise is a step towards having sufficient
documentation covering all areas of interest, but it is used to a different extent in the
different subsidiaries.

55
 5.7. Support
An organized attempt to support the subsidiaries throughout the change process towards
selling exclusively Astro was made in Lund. A team of three Swedish employees was put
together called the Roll-out team. The purpose was to come up with a strategy of how to
manage the change, develop necessary documents and training and to support the
subsidiaries with knowledge and resources during the process. Due to staff re-
organization the Roll-out team was short-lived and barley lasted past the turn of the year
2008. Several people think that it is necessary to put together the Roll-out team again to
meet the demands from the subsidiaries. Requests to the Swedish office are made about
extra resources and support, but today there is not enough capacity meet their
requirements.

5.7.1. Customer Support

One of the questions that have not found its solution yet is whether the support should be
centralized or local. Offering customers local support guarantees them help in their own
language, but centralized support can make 24 hour access possible. Today the customer
support is divided into three different levels; first, second and third line. All questions go
through first line, also called help desk. Questions that need a deeper technical
background are directed to second line and, if they can't be solved there, finally to third
line. Today the different levels of competence in the subsidiaries cause that not even first
line can be local in all the different countries. Some people believe that customer support
in the local language is necessary, and that the local support team should contact Sweden
themselves with second and third line questions.

5.8. Feedback
The managers at the subsidiaries we spoke to feel like most of the employees in the Lund
office are focused on their own projects and have little time to spare to help the
subsidiaries. One employee means that since the employees have a busy schedule at the
Swedish office and the results are measured in Swedish measurements, it is hard to get
the mentality to focus on other offices and on making other employees’ projects work.
The priorities need to be considered; this being a question of both structure and culture.
Some say that the office in Lund isn’t prepared to provide necessary support to the
subsidiaries in the change process towards selling Astro as of today. This suspicion is
confirmed by an employee that claims that Consafe Logistics England has not gotten any
support from the Swedish office, much due to the fact that they are managed by the
Danish office. The same employee also adds that having the possibility to get access to
personal with expertise knowledge about Astro is crucial to succeeding with
implementing Astro in England.

Apart from the opinions we received on support and feedback there is no model for how
to evaluate the reorganizations in the different subsidiaries. The amounts of
communication and review have differed from country to country.

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 5.9. Culture
As a company present in more than one country Consafe Logistics is exposed to
problems or benefits due to cultural differences. Through aiming towards having a mix of
nationalities by personnel exchanges the company hopes to cover the cultural gaps and to
create beneficial communication channels. Because of the geographical closeness to the
Danish office Swedish and Danish employees can work closely together. Working
together doesn’t pose any problems, but when it comes to contact with Danish customers
he feels that there has to be Danish employee in the front. Concerning the cooperation
between Consafe Logistics Sweden and Benelux it goes very smoothly, and it is a big
advantage that both nationalities have good knowledge in the English language. We learn
about some Polish customs, but apart from the complex bureaucracy there are no
difficulties working together. As of yet Consafe Logistic has not experienced any
problems with working with Russians says there is a conviction that Consafe Logistics
made a good decision to enter a partnership in Russia instead of starting up a subsidiary
on their own since one can suspect there to be many hidden customs and ways of
working.

5.10. Inertia
Since all the subsidiaries have different amounts of experience of Astro and the sales
process is based on close customer relationships, one could have suspected some
resistance towards the decision from for example the sales team. The common opinion is
that the decision has been received very well and one employee says that he is convinced
that the British salesman will have the same motivation to sell Astro as he does for
SattStore, but that the lack of training and knowledge in Astro needs to be addressed so
that Consafe Logistics U.K. is competent to sell the product. In Russia there is no
problem to motivate the salesmen for the Consafe Logistics representative since all sales
are managed by the partner internally. Contrary to many of the managers one considers it
a challenge to make the salesmen sell Astro, not due to resistance towards the product,
but because there is a need for more knowledge and experience about Astro in the
company to promote Astro over SattStore to the customers. Another manager doesn’t
think that the salesmen will be hesitant to sell Astro since it is a stronger product and
therefore easier to sell. Once again a manager says that there have been no difficulties in
making the salesmen chose to sell Astro instead of their former product because it is a
matter of selling knowledge in logistics more than selling a single product. There has
been a bigger problem to promote Astro to the project group since the different project
roles in SattStore and Astro do not agree with each other. The difference between the
required project roles for Astro and SattStore has forced Consafe Logistics Benelux to
make the decision to employ new people to the Astro project group, whilst in Denmark
both new employees and relocated resources make up the Astro project group.

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 5.11. A Consultant’s point of view
Centigo is a management consultancy bureau helping companies and organizations to
work towards business wellness by guiding them through critical change projects.
(Centigo, 2008) Centigo has during the work on our thesis been an extra external source
for ideas and has given us constructive criticism throughout our work.

5.11.1. Supporting incentives to create product

identification
Since the salesmen are to make the customers buy the product, it is of great importance
that they know and identify themselves with the product. Salesmen that have been
working with one product base for a long period of time are unlikely to willingly change
into selling another product, especially if the old products are still in the company’s
product portfolio. Therefore, it is important to make the salesmen feel for the new
product. Additionally if a new product is brought into the market it is usually in its
growing phase while an old product is mature or may even be declining. To make the
salesmen change from selling a profitable product that they know and recognize to start
selling a new product that is much less profitable in the beginning is not an easy task. To
make the salesmen take this step from selling a mature, profitable product to a growing,
not yet as profitable one, demands incentives and a supporting outer system. These
supportive incentives are not necessarily of monetary art; one has to identify what drives
people to choose to sell one product over another in order to influence them to sell the
new product. It can also be an advantage to externally control the change while it is
carried out by internal people. This way it is possible to get impartial input to the change.
(Aurell et al., 2008)

5.11.2. Recognize all parties’ interests

Aurell et al. (2008) suggests that a balance score card is made to help ensuring that the
change strategy fulfils the interests of all parties. To all parties the goal, results, critical
success factors and activities should be mapped out. It is important to understand what
drives people and what the business logics are to give recommendations that will be
accepted and that are in line with the company’s vision. Therefore, one should ask the
question what’s in it for me?, and at the same time keep all parties involved in mind to
point out future benefits making sure that everyone will be on the right terms with the
management’s decision. The next step in creating the checklist is to map out restraining
outer forces prohibiting the project realization. It is important not to ignore the risks and
the obstacles the change brings. (Aurell et al., 2008)

To make customers, who use the product that is to be excluded from the portfolio, change
to the new product requires that the customers understand what they can get out of the
change. To make the customers interested in changing products, the benefits of the new
product need to be pointed out legibly also in a customer’s point of view. (Aurell et al.,
2008)

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 5.11.3. The implementation
It is conclusive that everyone understands why a change is made and what advantages the
change will bring. In a process like the one of interest in this thesis, clear visions and an
explanation of the benefits it brings is often forgotten. Concrete goals are immensely
important to a successful process. (Ehrhardt, 2008)

Documentation
Documentation is always a challenge. One option is to deal with it properly by putting all
documents on the intranet and to begin documenting thoroughly. Sometimes it is enough
to gather all existing documents in a SharePoint (Microsoft Corporation, 2008)
equivalence making it easy to find the documents. The reason for lacking documentation
is that everyone knows how we use to do it. This is rarely true and it often results in
people working in their own way and that information is not willingly released with a
mentality that I will no longer be needed if I share my knowledge. (Ehrhardt, 2008)

Feedback
To control that the parent company’s request to change into selling the new product is
followed by the subsidiaries follow ups are necessary. The consultants at Centigo are
using tools to check up on what people think about the new way of working. These tools
do not show that the employees actually work according to the new way or how they
work with for example the business software solution. The activities can always be
measured through a scorecard with an activity list that is followed up. (Ehrhardt, 2008)

5.12. Benchmarking
Benchmarking is defined as “a systematic search for business excellence through
continuous improvement, both from a strategic and an operation perspective”. (Klein &
Margherita, 2007) To benefit from the mistakes and success of companies in similar
situations, may they be in the same branch or not, can be of great help for a successful
business. We will here examine the Renault Volvo merger, Lawson Software’s acquisition
of Intentia, and Nynas’ attempt to enter Russia.

5.12.1. The Renault-Volvo merger

Bruner & Spekman (1998) has made an in-depth case study of the failed strategic alliance
between Volvo AB and Renault SA. The authors highlight six key points of vulnerability
for alliances after studying the Renault Volvo merger. (Bruner & Spekman, 1998) Out of
the six factors, leadership style and cultural differences are particularly interesting for our
thesis.

As for the leader, Bruner & Spekman (1998) claims that it is not sufficient for a leader of
corporate transformation to be able to create a vision alone. Other necessary attributes

59
identified are the ability to build buy-in, involvement and participation. Trust, credibility
and honesty are other desirable key alliance management skills. At the Renault Volvo
alliance, mistakes were made through not fully acknowledging the risks and through not
fully explaining the expected gains. (Bruner & Spekman, 1998)

One must also attend the differences in culture (language, values, customs and national
traditions) on both a corporate and a country level. Alliances consist of people working
together, finding a common ground on which to build the value that first brought the
firms together. Cultural differences do matter; denial of the importance of cultural
differences will only accelerate problems.

In alliances that cross national boundaries longer, rather than shorter, periods of time
might be needed to establish a web of interpersonal ties among key managers, to build a
more accepting environment for cultural differences and to nurture the trust and
commitment. Though, one should keep in mind that waiting too long allows resistance to
build. (Bruner & Spekman, 1998)

5.12.2. Lawson Software’s acquisition of Intentia

Lawson Software and Intentia merged in 2006, being the beginning of the company
Lawson. Intentia was the one party facing most organizational changes and cultural
barriers as the new unison company was created. As for leadership and organization,
Intentia went from being an entrepreneurial business to becoming a part of a more
hierarchic structure. The new atmosphere made several employees leave the company,
though some of which did come back to the company after the situation was stabilized.
Since Intentia was in a bad financial situation at the time of the merger, the employees
needed little assurance of the importance of the change and thus the leader’s role as a
motivator and visionary lost some of its significance. (Althin et al., 2008)

The cultural clashes in the newly formed company were uttered through the American
more formal, hierarchic manners of working with more prescribed decision pathways.
Since this merge considers an American and a Swedish company, the tangible cultural
differences are not likely to be found in Consafe Logistics’ case. What one should pay
attention to though is the importance of cultural differences also in this case. (Althin et
al., 2008)

5.12.3. Nynas attempt to enter Russia

By the end of 1991, the oil company Nynas AB began to plan an expansion into Estonia.
By having a contact person in the country the implementation was facilitated and after a
successful expansion to the east side of the Baltic Sea an effort to enter Russia started.
When trying to get a permission to build their own harbour Nynas AB encountered
difficulties. (Bengtsson et al., 2008)

The situation that the one paying the most gets first in line was a usual way of negotiating
in Russia at this time and since paying bribes was against the policy of Nynas AB this

60
became a problem. After several rejections, Nynas AB finally got their agreement but on
the condition that their construction would fulfil demands that made it twice as expensive
to build. Since this was not financially possible for the company, they protested and were
offered to pay their way to a better deal. Five years after the expansion was first brought
up to discussion; Nynas AB gave up the attempt to enter Russia. Nynas AB’s CEO at the
time meant that they had felt invisible forces counteracting their efforts and as far as he
experiences there are no new plans to enter Russia. (Bengtsson et al., 2008)

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6. Analysis
Using the theories concerning the process of change described in the frame of reference,
we will, in this chapter, analyze the empirical data we collected. The analysis is based on
the analysis model.

6.1. The process of change and the decision

After studying Van de Ven & Poole’s (1995) theories of change in organizations we have
identified the upcoming change at Consafe Logistics’ subsidiaries to be a combination of
life-cycle and teleology. Since the decision to change was set by the management as a
strategic goal, the change can be considered teleological. The plan is to only sell Astro to
new customers to give place for extra development of Astro and of complementary
products. This together with the vision that the change can be implemented by following
a step-by-step check-list is in line with the life-cycle theory of change. (Van de Ven &
Poole, 1995)

In line with Rydin’s (2005) step 3 and 4 in the model for organizational development and
Endsley’s (1994) decision phase, a decision of where and when to start the process has
been taken on a global level in the company group. This decision was made by the
management at Consafe Logistics Sweden, but also country managers representing their
subsidiaries participated; hence a joint decision to change could be made. Pettigrew
(1986) writes that changing company culture and employee attitudes is only possible
when a crisis situation is followed by strong forces promoting change. Consafe Logistics’
decision to focus on Astro was taken as a precaution to promote future development,
which according to Pettigrew (1986) could result in difficulties to motivate employees to
change. How easily an organization accepts change can also be seen as flexibility which
is described as a key factor in Endsley’s (1994) implementation model. De Klerk (1996)
says that internal flexibility is important for a healthy organization, and can according to
Gilley et al. (2008) be affected through having the leader coach the employees. Consafe
Logistics seems to have little difficulty in initiating a process of change since the
information about the decision was spread quickly, even if unorganized, which points to
internal flexibility, but the fact that the actual change takes a long time in some
subsidiaries shows that the organization changes slowly.

6.1.1. Opportunities and risks

+ When taking a decision it is an advantage to benefit from experiences in all levels of
the organization according to Bruzelius & Skärvad’s (2004) support model and
Tonnquist’s (2006) Think Drop model. This is an opportunity which is not taken by
Consafe Logistics in the decision to focus on Astro.

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− Even if the decision to change has been communicated to all the subsidiaries they
have not made the same amount of progress. If there is too much time between the
decision and the actual change there is a risk of loosing motivation within the
organization. Kritsonis (2005) forces pulling from the old state and forces pushing
towards a new state are missing, and if there is a strong motivation initially but
nothing happens the employees can become frustrated and resistant to change.

6.2. Introduction
The process of change has not been able to start at the same time in all the different
subsidiaries because of the different market situations and levels of Astro knowledge, but
the decision has gone out to everyone. According to the management all employees
understand the importance of the change but in some cases it is difficult to leave the
present situation behind because of financial demands and lack of knowledge. Thus,
according to Lewin’s (1947) model the different units have entered the unfreezing phase,
but at different points in time. The managers say that the employees at the Swedish,
Danish and Benelux offices have all reached an understanding for why the change is
necessary and they have all accepted the new ways of working which is a key factor in
Endsley’s (1994) introduction phase. According to Lewin’s (1947) model this implies
that all these three subsidiaries have not just entered but also passed the unfreezing phase.
Consafe Logistics in Poland and the U.K. have understood the importance and need for
the change, but they have not yet made any changes in their ways of working leaving
them still in Lewin’s (1947) unfreezing phase. At the same time they have gone through
some training to manage an Astro implementation which would mean entering Endsley’s
(1994) initialization phase as well as Lewin’s (1947) moving phase.

In the case with the Russian partner, Consafe Logistics are facing a start-up rather than a
change. This office does however have to face similar stages as the subsidiaries. The
Russian representative and foremost the partners are enthusiastic about starting to sell
Astro but are in the same situation as the subsidiaries in Poland and the U.K. in the sense
that they have not yet started to work in the new way. Again similar to Poland and U.K.
the Russian representative has gotten some Astro training and access to documentation
which means having entered Endsley’s (1994) initialization phase and Lewin’s (1947)
moving phase without completing Endsley’s (1994) introduction phase or Lewin’s (1947)
unfreezing phase.

6.2.1. Leadership
In Consafe Logistics’ process of changing towards an Astro focus, the country manager
could be considered the leader of change Tonnquist (2006), giving them the
responsibility for creating a vision, to coach and to reward according to Gilley et al
(2008). To make the change accepted throughout the organization Tonnquist (2006)
suggests a method called Think Drop. By beginning with getting acceptance from the top
management and then implementing the change throughout the organization, which is the
reversed way to think drop, Consafe Logistics is instead using what Bruzelius & Skärvad

63
(2004) call the expert model. This decreases the company’s chances to benefit from the
internal competence. To introduce the mere idea of change at the bottom of the
organization and letting the employees react to the plan and comment on its
insufficiencies the change process can be improved by all the different competences it
passes according to Tonnquist (2006). According to Hughes et al. (2006), by introducing
the idea of change early the employees enter the stages in the SARA model not much
later than the leaders. This would help the country managers to get a better understanding
of what the employees are going through. The think drop method could be a way of using
the informative work of resistance, that Ahrenfelt (2001) mentions, to benefit from
different opinions about the change. In Consafe Logistics’ case, all interviewed have said
that the negative opinions and resistance towards the change has been minor, which can
be an expected result when talking to managers. Despite the lack of knowledge about
resistance, it can be profitable for the company to notice the different opinions about the
change prior to its implementation since having employees working against the change
can cause bigger problems than spending energy on getting them positive to it. Since the
change has been introduced to all the employees today, it is too late to use the think drop
method or a similar process to capture the different opinions and experiences about the
current change, but it might be something to keep in mind when facing future changes.

Changing the focus

The management has not used the three methods spoken for by Kritsonis (2005); pulling
the employees from the equilibrium they are in, increasing the forces pulling them
towards a new state and finally finding a balance between the two. The subsidiaries have
begun the change but none of them has been pulled away from a SattStore focus to
Astro’s advantage, and only one of our respondents mentions that a new focus needs to
be implemented in the subsidiaries. To create a new focus the leader has to be able to
communicate the vision to the employees and coach them according to Gilley et al.
(2008). Aurell et al. (2008) stress the importance of incentives, not necessary of monetary
art, to change the focus upon a new product that in the beginning is less profitable then
the old one is. Some of the respondents believe that the employees are willing to change
into selling Astro, mainly because they understand that it is a better product thus making
the technical aspect the incentive for the employees. Hence, the profits of Astro should be
clearly explained to the employees since it is what makes the focus change, and as a
result creating the pulling force suggested by Kritsonis (2005) necessary to move the
employees from their present equilibrium. Gilley et al. (2008) mention ability to reward
as one key factor that a leader should posses. In Consafe Logistics’ case there are no
monetary rewards to successful employees, but just the benefit of selling a better product
can be seen as a reward, which makes it very important for the leader to communicate the
message.

The importance of measurable goals in leadership

Some of the leader’s required qualities are his or her ability to reward, communicate and
motivate according to Gilley et al. (2008). Kotter (1995) also states the importance for a
leader to communicate a clear vision. There have been no measurable goals set for

64
Consafe Logistics group saying when in time or what criteria that has to be fulfilled when
the process of change can be seen as finished. Gilley et al. (2008) and Kotter (1995) both
stress that a vision should be communicated as well as actions planned which points to
the importance of clear goals. Unfortunately Consafe Logistics Denmark, the U.K. and
Russia are the only units that have set time based goals. It would be easier for all parts of
the Consafe Logistics organization if the main goal with the process of change was
measurable. To only sell Astro to new customers will never be reached since it is
impossible to know if Consafe Logistics will sell a SattStore system to a new customer a
year later. For a leader to fulfil the qualities written above, his or her job is made easier if
he or she can point to milestones and goals which should be followed by any means
possible according to Rydin (2007). Gilley et al.’s (2008) ability to reward includes
celebrating milestones which is made very difficult if there are none. Milestones can
further help to give the employees a clear vision of what is going to occur in the future,
reassuring the employees uncomfortable with uncertainty.

Individual goals
Kritsonis (2005) states the importance of looking to each individual in the process of
changing the entire organization, and Tonnquist (2006) says that the goals should be
made individual by using the leader’s knowledge about his project members. When an
employee knows that in the future things which lie outside of his or her field of
competence will be expected of him or her, the stress on this person can increase and
make him or her more change resistant. Setting clear goals which show when this person
will attain the necessary knowledge through training will make him or her feel more
secure. Since the process of change has not been strictly organized and commonly done
in the different subsidiaries the country managers do not have the possibility to inform
employees about planned activities and required training.

6.2.2. Knowledge, competence and education

According to the American Productivity and Quality Center (1997) education should
provide two wide purposes, one of which being enhancing the understanding of the
organization’s business and why and where a change is necessary. Today, no education to
create an understanding of why the change is needed is carried out to the employees at
Consafe Logistics. This task is put on the country managers alone. After getting the
information about the change from the country manager, the employees come in contact
with Astro either from a custom-made training course built to fit the employee’s specific
position or through colleagues who have already started working with Astro. Learning
from colleagues means face-to-face communicating which according to Wood (1999) is
the most effective way of communicating since it allows immediate interaction. If
accompanied by a manager this could be a good opportunity for him or her to get a hold
of opinions about the change and also to counteract resistance at an early stage. Wood
(1999) suggests that an effective way of communicating is written communication
followed by an open meeting. Thus, initial training should preferably be preceded by a
shorter written version for the employees to familiarize with the idea of the change before
the first meeting. Today there is available documentation and information about Astro on

65
the Intranet and databases, but the knowledge about how to locate it is lacking. Wood
(1999) also points out the importance of the first communication coming from the senior
management, since getting any news that will effectively change one’s every day work is
easier to accept if it comes from an influential leader. Getting information about the
decision out to everyone in the organization has not been a problem, showing that letting
the country managers do this is a working concept, but the way each country leader
chooses to spread the information can not be controlled. Apparently it is important not
only from whom the message comes, but also how it is communicated.

6.2.3. Internal Communication

According to the country managers we have spoken to, getting the message about the
change out to the employees have been successful. There is however doubt that all
information given to the country managers reaches the final users. Both Gilley et al.
(2008) and Kotter (1995) point to the importance of the leader to communicate, and in
Consafe Logistics’ case the leaders’ ability to communicate might have to be questioned
if the messages do not always reach all the employees. Consafe Logistics’ Intranet has
been considered to be the best communication channel, but Geddie’s (1994) thoughts that
internal communication is too often taken for granted should be remembered. Kotter
(1995) stresses the importance of using every communication vehicle possible to reach
out to the audience since the key message might have to be repeated according to
Österlund & Lovén (2005). Thus, information should probably be spread in more ways
than through the Intranet. Mass emails have been tried in an attempt to reach the
employees with information about the competence matrix. The evaluation of the matrix
did however show that the information had not reached the employees. The company
could benefit from making a communication plan recommended by Archibald (1992)
where answers to the questions what, when, to whom and how the communication should
be carried out is presented. One option might be to evaluate what communication
vehicles actually work by getting feedback from the employees. Thulin & Thulin (2003)
meant that it is of great importance to make the employees feel responsible for finding
the information they need. One question for Consafe Logistics is how to make the
employees accept responsibility for finding information. One stress factor for the
employees according to Thulin & Thulin (2003) is that it is very easy to spread the
information, making it overwhelming for the employees to seek out what information is
important to whom. Thus, if the responsibility should lie on the individual to seek
information, it is important that not too much is communicated on the Intranet or via
other communication channels. In addition, Thulin & Thulin (2003) say that the most
efficient way to keep information is electronically, but it is of great importance that there
is a functioning technical support controlling admitted material, which is not the case at
Consafe Logistics today where everyone can post new information.

6.2.4. Documentation
Information should be made accessible, sufficient and reliable according to Thulin &
Thulin (2003). Most employees can access all documents today but not everyone knows
where they can be found. The most effective way to distribute information is to keep it

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electronic according to Thulin & Thulin (2003) but it might be a problem for Consafe
Logistics to control that the right information is the one available due to continuous
product updates resulting in new document versions. Taking on the problem by
developing a search engine or a function imitating an encyclopaedia could be one
solution. Regardless if the documents are searchable or well structured on the common
server they need to be made more accessible according to Thulin & Thulin (2003) and the
employees need to know where and how to find the documents. Despite individual
opinions that much has been done to improve the documentation it is still considered to
be insufficient today among all our respondents. For the employees to be able to work
with the Astro implementation process without constant support the documentation need
to be made sufficient. A group could preferably be assigned to think through the
documentation process, to create the necessary documents and to discover weaknesses in
the process according to Dalgleish (2005). Controlling the documentation process was
one of the tasks the Astro Roll-out team was assigned to do when they were active. A
review of the documentation can in the best cases result in cost savings for the company.
(SolutionTech, 2008) To further make the documents reliable they need to be updated
simultaneously with updates on the product which is one of the issues our respondents
have mentioned.

6.2.5. Opportunities and risks

+ The fourth factor for a successful change produced by Tonnquist (2006) is to link the
vision to other activities. There is an opportunity to motivate the focus on Astro by
pointing out benefits affecting different parts of the organization. Some of the
respondents explain that the change will allow more resources to be put on
development of Astro which is a big benefit for the R&D department. As a result of
increased development Astro will become a stronger product which makes it easier
for the salesmen to promote it to customers and also get the sale despite of tough
competition.

− Tonnquist’s (2006) third success factor is the importance of goals and a clear vision
and the fifth factor is having measurable goals. Consafe Logistics Denmark is the
only subsidiary with a S.M.A.R.T. goal according to Tonnquist (2006). The Polish
and the Benelux subsidiaries all lack measurable goals. The Russian partner has set
both a short term and a long term S.M.A.R.T goal with the number of customers as
the measurement of success. Many authors stress the risk of not getting employees
involved if a clear vision is missing.

− When it comes to internal communication there is a risk that employees are expected
to take responsibility to find useful information without making theme fully aware
that it is required by them. This is a process of change in itself and will need to be
approached with care. Today all the managers we talked to had identified the lack of
necessary documentation. If employees start looking for information without finding
the documents relevant to them, they will quickly fall back into not looking for it.

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 6.3. Initialization
After an understanding for the change was reached all the subsidiaries’ employees
concerned by the change received training from employees at the mother company. The
training has varied due to prerequisites and resources available.

6.3.1. Knowledge, competence and education

The second wide purpose of education, according to the American Productivity &
Quality Center (1997) is providing employees with the necessary skills. This is fulfilled
through the different training courses provided by Consafe Logistics Sweden. Employees
from the Benelux, Denmark, Poland and the U.K. have all been given tools to handle the
change through offered Astro courses suited for their specific positions. By having
separated courses for the different project roles the included exercises and the provided
documentation will be adapted to the participants, relieving them from the complication
of sorting out what is relevant to them. Employees from the Benelux have had sufficient
training to sell and implement three Astro systems for customers. So far none of the
projects have been profitable, much due to lack of training initially. Necessary training
should be handled at an early stage (Endsley, 1994; Tonnquist, 2006) and our
respondents believe that Consafe Logistics could have been more prepared to get
profitability in their Astro projects. The importance of getting the right training close to
when the knowledge is needed came up during our empiric research. Training done too
long before it's needed for a real Astro implementation is often superfluous since it is
quickly forgotten. When a sale of an Astro system has been done the project group
assigned to work with the implementation should get training immediately. Since the lead
time between a sale and the beginning of the implementation is about one and a half to
six months the first project group need to be fast learners to get sufficient knowledge
during that time. The knowledge obtained through training at the mother company further
needs to be transformed into competences according to Tonnquist (2006) which in
Consafe Logistics’ case means using his or her knowledge in an Astro implementation
project.

By watching and attending courses at Consafe Logistics the employees begin with
Diverging and Assimilating according to Kolb’s (1976) learning styles. Employees from
Poland and one employee from the Benelux continue with the Converging and
Accommodating styles (Kolb’s, 1976) in Sweden by working with Astro together with the
Swedish employees in Lund. The employees from Denmark, the Benelux and the U.K.
who have attended courses in Sweden get the Active Experimentation and the Concrete
Experience once they have returned to their subsidiary and begin to work in an Astro
project. The early job experiences in a process of change can be viewed at as the active
experimentation of the actual change. (Kolb’s, 1976) When the first projects were
implemented in Denmark their project group got its active experimentation and the rest of
the Danish employees will go through the different learning styles when they begin with
learning-by-doing at the subsidiary. It is important to keep in mind that different people
learn in different ways and some people need an emphasis on feeling and some on
thinking when learning and some learn best when watching while others need to

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practically do the task to learn. (Kolb & Kolb, 2005) An illustration of what situation in
Consafe Logistics may require a certain learning style is presented in figure 14 below.

The employee is
openly involved in
new experiences Concrete
by working with Experience
Astro

An employee goes
Accomodating Diverging through training at
(Feel & Do) (Feel & Watch) Consafe Logistics
CE/AE CE/RO Sweden and makes
observations
Active Reflective
Experiment. Observation

The theories are

used to work
with Astro Converging Assimilating
projects with (Think & Do) (Think & Watch)
support at the AC/AE AC/RO
subsidiary or in
Sweden
The observations
Abstract are incorporated
Conceptual. into logically sound
theories

Figure 13 An illustration of what situations may require what learning style (Authors interpretation)

Consafe Logistics offers different ways of teaching depending on the nature of the
information and the resources available. By offering courses, practical experience at the
Swedish office or documentation, Consafe Logistics meets Thulin & Thulin’s (2003)
ideas that the teaching methods doesn’t only depend on the person about to learn but also
on the material to be taught.

Transforming knowledge and competence

By sending people to Sweden to work there for some time, like in the case of the three
Polish employees and the employee from Benelux, the subsidiaries can benefit from the
tacit knowledge at the mother company. When the employee acquires the tacit knowledge
from other employees and then keeps it tacit, socialization has occurred according to
Nonaka (1991). In this case, the employee does not only obtain tacit knowledge but he or
she also gets an understanding for whom to contact when dealing with different Astro
issues. A reorganization of the documents on the common server or the creation of a
search engine for the common documents suggested is a way of transferring explicit
knowledge to new explicit knowledge, i.e. combination. Consafe Logistics’

69
knowledgebase isn’t extended this way but the creation of the newly gathered and
structured information is new knowledge in the sense that it combines information from
different sources. (Nonaka, 1991) There is a common opinion that there is a need for new
documents to be created. Externalization occurs when the new documents are created
since the employees need to use their tacit knowledge and put it into words, thus making
it explicit and available for the other employees. When these new documents are spread
through the organization some employees increase and reshape their tacit knowledge
making the information internalized. If the organization can not build a dialogue between
tacit and explicit knowledge it can cause problems. (Nonaka, 1991) The Synergy project
is an attempt to increase communication between the different company units, and if
successful it will transfer knowledge from employee to employee.

6.4. Early job experiences

According to all the theories about organizational change we have brought up in the
frame of reference, once an organization has reached acceptance to transform into a new
state of being it continues towards a phase where the actual change takes place.
(Angelöw, 1999; Burnes, 1996; Kritsonis, 2005; Lewin, 1947) As stated above, Consafe
Logistics in Sweden, in the Benelux and in Denmark have all gone through Lewin’s
(1947) unfreezing phase. In addition, employees at both the Danish subsidiary and the
Swedish office have gone through sufficient training to solely focus new sales upon Astro
and forces that maintain the old habits have been eliminated or at least diminished
following Kritsonis’ (2005) suggested methods. In Benelux there is still a problem of
profitability with the Astro projects and customers who still demand SattStore can be
considered a force keeping the Benelux office from passing through Lewin’s (1947) first
phase completely. Burnes (1996) states that getting the employees to keep on working
with Astro despite the poor profitability can be facilitated through some form of
confrontation from the management, team-buildings or training. The importance of
getting the employee to feel included and useful as an effect of teamwork can be
achieved through team-building activities also according to Rydin (2007). The Polish and
the British subsidiaries have gotten some training in Astro, thus they have begun to enter
Lewin’s (1947) moving phase although they are not yet able to implement Astro at
customers’ warehouses. Hence, the Polish and the British offices are currently in the
beginning of Endsley’s (1994) initialization phase since they do not yet posses adequate
training. At the same time Consafe Logistics Poland has located potential customers and
in the near future the Polish employees who have been working in Sweden to gain Astro
competence will be returning. This puts the Polish office ready to gain early job
experiences which is the fourth phase in Endsley’s (1994) implementation model.

6.4.1. Project organization

According to Thulin & Thulin (2003) it is important to have well defined project roles to
avoid people doing the same thing or for areas to lack a person in charge. After looking at
the organizational change that took place in the Benelux office where adjustments had to

70
be made to fulfil Astro demands we can see that some changes have to be made in each
subsidiary, but is there also a need for a re-organization on a higher level? To follow
through with a strategy towards refocusing on Astro Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) suggest
a project group with well defined project roles which cover all necessary responsibilities.

Project roles
The decision to implement the change has been made by the Consafe Logistics
management, and together with the fact that they have authority to distribute financial
resources it makes them the project owner according to Tonnquist (2006). They also say
that the project owner can decide when the project should begin and who should be
allotted the positions as project leader or steering group, but not how the financial
resources should be spent. The power of distributing resources could instead be appointed
to the project leader along with the assignment to deliver what the project owner has
asked for. (Tonnquist, 2006) The position as country manager in each country of
presence resembles the position as project leader where the project is Consafe Logistics’
focus on Astro. As support, the country leaders had the Roll-out team as long as it was
active, and afterwards Charlotte Widstrand alone. Because of the Roll-out team’s
profound knowledge in the issue they acted similar to a steering group, who gives support
as well as constructive criticism and opinions according to Tonnquist (2008). They also
had good leadership qualities since they, in their external position, had ability to involve
necessary competence in their task to support. As a result teamwork and collaborations
between different parts of the Consafe Logistics Group is promoted, which according to
Gilley et al. (2008) is critical to successfully implementing change. Aurell et al. (2008)
state the benefits of steering externally but acting internally. If the Roll-out group was
reinstated to act as a steering group the subsidiary could be seen as the internal
organization. The task of actually managing the Astro implementation projects is done by
a base group including a project manager, an application consultant and a developer.
Naturally depending on the project size more than one person can have the same position
and more roles can be required. It is up to this group to deliver the change required of the
project leader (Tonnquist, 2008), in Consafe Logistics’ case being the country manager.
The responsibility to provide the project group with necessary resources, in this situation
to a large extent meaning training, so that the project can be managed within the specified
time and cost frames is on the project leader. (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004) In figure 13
below the organization for implementing the change and for implementing Astro is
illustrated.

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 Astro
process of
Consafe change
Logistics project
managemen
t

Roll-out
team Country
Manager

Proj Lead

Astro
App Con Develop implementation
project group

Figure 14 Organization diagram (Authors, 2008)

Project or parallel organization

The organizations within the subsidiaries are project based according to Bruzelius &
Skärvad’s (2004) description. Referring to the example where the Benelux office was
forced to hire new people to meet the demands for Astro, one could see that
reorganization is required. Since the newly hired were alone to possess Astro competence
they could not be forced into a cemented way of working, and was instead a fresh
addition to the organization. In that way the risk of not benefiting from the new minds
and just seeing them as an extra set of hands were avoided. (de Klerk, 1996) During the
transition period when SattStore is still very much a part of the assignments the office
needed two project groups; one for each WMS. Hence some people are working in the
old way and some people are working in a new way, which can be compared to a parallel
organization where there are every day activities and change activities going on at the
same time, but where the same people are involved in both. (Thulin & Thulin 2006) This
way Consafe Logistics avoids the risk of having areas without anyone responsible
according to Thulin & Thulin (2003) and also encourage an increased internal flexibility
according to (de Klerk, 1996) Not everyone can continue working with the same things
because of the fact that much less SattStore competence will be necessary in the future,
but many can take on a corresponding role in the Astro organization. After the goal to
focus on Astro has been reached and a new equilibrium has been reached the organization
will go back to working in a project based organization where every Astro
implementation at a customer’s warehouse constitutes a new project.

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 Working across country boarders
Working across national boarders and cooperating between the subsidiaries demands an
increased flexibility in the organization. Endsley (1994) brings up the flexibility in an
organization to be an important prerequisite for organizational changes. With increased
mobility within the organization it is difficult to work in a function based organization
(Thulin & Thulin, 2003) since the roles are frequently changed and moved throughout the
organization.

6.4.2. Leadership
Since the moving phase is about changing norms and behaviours to suite the new state
according to Angelöw (1999) the five leadership characteristics advocated by Gilley et al.
(2008) should be especially addressed in this phase of a change. The importance of the
individuals’ involvement throughout the process of change has been recommended by a
number of authors recited in this thesis. (Burnes, 1996; Endsley, 2005; Kritsonis, 2005;
Rydin, 2007; Tonnquist, 2006) The change at Consafe Logistics wasn’t implemented
with Bruzelius & Skärvad’s (2004) support method, but rather with the expert method
since the individuals didn’t get a chance to be involved in and accept the change prior to
the decision. Therefore the leader should use his or her ability to motivate, reward and
involve the employees to prevent them from falling back into old habits and to get them
involved in the process. (Gilley et al., 2008) If the leader is successful and the employees
start to change and accept the change it is important that the leader is trustworthy and that
he or she points out the goal over and over again. Even though more of an expert method
has been used in Consafe Logistics the employees have accepted the change which points
to good leadership skills within the organization. In addition, the leader should show a
will and an intention and always support the decision according to Ahrenfelt (2001) and
Kritsonis (2005). Our respondents showed a unanimous positivity and conviction that the
decision to change focus towards Astro is correct. It is not his or her role to convince, but
to motivate sceptic employees to try the new conditions and hopefully be convinced by
there own actions. The leader should also use his or her ability to promote teamwork and
collaboration. (Gilley et al., 2008) With a good teamwork in the organization the
subsidiaries can use the concept the Danish office is planning on using, which is letting
the employees with the newly acquired Astro competence teach the remaining employees
about Astro. The teamwork is a part of how employees learn from each other and the
leader has to promote group collaborations. (Gilley et al., 2008)

6.4.3. Documentation
Promise is one of the most organized document files, but it is not consequently used by
all subsidiaries. If everyone used the same methods it would make Consafe Logistics
group more consistent in its communication towards customers, and having a better
document conformity would make fewer people irreplaceable. A formally documented
work instruction or specification can work as a key to maintain a consistent performance
(Cheng, 2008), which is asked for by some of the managers we talked to. Tonnquist
(2006) says that communication must be fitted to suite the specific audience it is meant
for, and what has to be remembered is that there is the factor of different countries and

73
therefore also different cultures. One way of working might not be applicable in all
subsidiaries. It is important to consider how graphic presentations are made and how the
interpretation of a text can differ depending on the language it is written in. Not just the
project leaders, but all the employees, working in an international company should be
aware of the A factors in Hall’s (1995) model. The commonly used materials in Consafe
Logistics are the same irrespectively of countries apart from the language translation
which is often done.

6.4.4. Opportunities and risks

− It is a risk if the leader is not completely convinced of the decision to change
according to Kritsonis (2005). If he or she fails to motivate others in the organization
the forces pulling people back towards the initial equilibrium will increase.

− As well as in the decision phase, it is important to start the change while people still
have the attitude that a change will happen soon and while they are mentally prepared
for it. If they are prepared but the change never happens there is a risk that they are
forced to fall back into old habits and will not be as easily motivated later on.

6.5. Institutionalization
The process of change is not finished at the same time as the project of change has
reached its goal. (Tonnquist, 2006) It takes time, often longer than expected, to change
peoples Behaviours and Actions, and those can still be unaffected after the end of a
project. (Hall, 1995) The last step in Lewin’s (1947) model, re-freezing, includes making
the new conditions stable and established as the normal ones (Angelöw, 1999) which is
equivalent to Endsley’s (1994) institutionalization phase where the key factors values,
attitudes and commitment are included. The Swedish and the Danish offices are the only
two who have entered the last phase. They have both reached the goal to only sell Astro
to new customers, but even so SattStore is still a big part of the every day work for many
employees and no old SattStore customers have yet been converted into Astro customers.
Sufficient competence to implement Astro has been built up, but especially Denmark is
still working to increase the Astro knowledge and competence base.

6.5.1. Leadership
Rydin (2005) writes about how evaluations and follow-ups can help to keep people from
falling back into old habits. There has not been any structured model for how to evaluate
the progress that has been made in Consafe Logistics Sweden and Denmark. Both offices
have stopped selling SattStore to new customers, but so far there has been little
evaluations which could be helpful to other subsidiaries. Under the leadership quality
ability to motivate Gilley et al. (2008) mentions providing follow-ups as one of the key
tools to overcome motivational problems. To show sceptical employees the positive
outcomes due to the change will help to motivate to reach further improvements. Hence

74
for Consafe Logistics to do regular evaluations as a part of the change process would help
to keep employees’ attitudes positive as well as avoid the risk of loosing the newly
achieved equilibrium. To benefit from the subsidiaries’, that complete the process of
change first, documenting experiences will be a big help in the future for other
subsidiaries and also for the employees to remember the new ways of working according
to Kritsonis (2005). Also Endsley (1994) has set reinforcements as a necessity to make
the change permanent which is equally important to making the specific change
according to Burnes (1996).

The importance of time

Ahrenfelt (2001) says that making a time plan for a process of change is very difficult.
People are often tempted to claim that the quicker the better, even though he says that a
reasonably big change can take from 2 to 5 years to complete. Consafe Logistics
Denmark is the only subsidiary that has set a time based goal, namely to only sell Astro
to new customers by the summer of 2008. Judging from the fact that they succeeded
within the timeframe, they had managed to estimate the time required. Could their
estimation be of help to other subsidiaries to form measurable goals? Even though
Ahrenfelt (2001) and Tonnquist (2006) both warn about the effect time based goals can
have on project members we believe, after considering the amount of theories stating the
importance of measurable goals (Kaplan & Norton, 1996; Tonnquist, 2006), that a
timeframe is preferable to not having any goals. In addition since Denmark succeeded
they have both knowledge and competence of how to set time based goals for the specific
change at hand.

6.5.2. Documentation
A good way of preventing an organization to fall back into old habits is to document any
new ways of working and make it accessible to all personnel. (Kritsonis, 2005) Since
many of the subsidiaries will most likely be exposed to temptations to keep working with
SattStore as long as it is profitable, keeping documentation can help as a reminder of the
new situation. While the Roll-out team was active they developed necessary
documentation for the outlines of a change strategy, but due to the short time they were
working much is still missing. If the Roll-out team is to work as support to the
subsidiaries the amount of support would decrease immensely if the documentation
available covered all of the main required activities and was well known to all
employees. If a satisfying database, which would initially demand a big time and energy
effort, could be initiated then the subsidiaries could manage much of their basic training
themselves. If the documentation was made sufficient, in line with Thulin & Thulin’s
(2003) concept of documentation, the subsidiaries would be in a better starting position to
make the result of the change permanent. For the employees to be able to work with
Astro in absence of direct support and to be able to introduce new project members to the
work enough documentation is needed according to Cheng (2008).

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 6.5.3. Opportunities and risks
− If there are no clear goals to define when the new equilibrium has been reached there
is a risk that employees have a hard time settling down after the change. Employees
who are naturally unsecure in new situations and easily stressed during a process of
change are easier to calm for the leader if he or she can’t point to clear goals. By
using milestones and personal plans the single employee can see his of her place in
the big picture which is one of the leader’s tasks according to Gilley et al. (2008).

6.6. Support and feedback

Rydin (2007) and Tonnquist (2006) agree that making the change permanent is crucial to
succeeding with the change process. Tonnquist (2006) also mentions the importance of a
support group active during the implementation and responsible for doing regular follow-
ups and making sure that the project is heading in the right direction. The task to manage
support was put on the Roll-out team until it was discontinued. There is a wish within
Consafe Logistics to put the Roll-out team together again, and the need for support,
documentation, Astro training and an overall steering organ points to that the aspiration is
justified. As the situation is today some of the country leaders say that the Swedish office
is not ready to provide necessary support to the subsidiaries initiating the change process.

6.6.1. Opportunities and risks

+ There is an advantage if organizations can get information from others who have
gone through the same process. Especially in Consafe Logistics’ case where the
subsidiaries are in different stages in the process there is an opportunity to learn from
each others.

6.7. Culture
The impact of culture at Consafe Logistics’ case can be divided into using culture as a
tool for change according to Howell & Costely’s (2006) alternative model for
implementing change and into the cultural and linguistic differences between the mother
company and the subsidiaries.

6.7.1. Culture as a tool for change

As an alternative to Endsley’s (1994), Lewin’s (1947) and Rydin’s (2007) life-cycle
models we have learnt about Howell & Costely’s (2006) concept of creating a learning
organization through culture. Consafe Logistics have managed to create a climate for
change without creating a feeling of crisis. No big efforts have been made to create a
feeling of need for the change and an understanding for the importance to work in the
new way. The company is a result of a newly done merger however and the current

76
change of products is a result of this fusion. The merger naturally brought big changes to
the company and most employees understood that something needed to change due to the
new situation. Thus, there might not have been a need for creating a crisis situation
described by Pettigrew (1986) in Consafe Logistics case.

6.7.2. Culture and linguistic differences

Our respondents haven’t experienced any problems in making the employees change
from working with SattStore to Astro. What should be remembered though is that all the
benchmarking cases we have brought up in this thesis were more affected by cultural
differences than anyone anticipated and experienced in the beginning. It might be of help
to question whether there actually is no cultural differences or if there are differences that
solely haven’t been identified or acknowledged. Bruner & Speakman (1998) agree on the
importance of culture in mergers and they state that denial of cultural differences will
only accelerate problems. This is in line with Hall (1995) and Rodrigues (1998) who
mean that a successful partnership calls for acknowledgement and acceptance of the
cultural differences. When getting an understanding for another nation’s culture it could
be useful to keep Hofstede’s (1993) cultural dimensions in mind. Knowing if the
employees you are to work with comes from a masculine, individualistic culture with
high uncertainty avoidance index or if it is a feminine, long-term orientated culture with a
low power distance index (Hofstede, 1993) can be of great help when bridging (Hall,
1995) in a partnership.

Even though there haven’t been any considerable problems when working between the
subsidiaries according to the employees we’ve talked to there have been some minor
differences in the cultures. The bureaucracy in Poland and the need for a Danish
employee to keep the dialogue with the Danish customers are examples of cultural
differences on an A or B level (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004; Hall, 1995) which don’t go as
deep as to concern morals, beliefs and values. The language has not been a major
problem either. The English language courses for the Polish employees have been the
only concern when it comes to language and all the remaining subsidiaries are situated in
countries where English doesn’t cause a problem.

Consafe Logistics has chosen to enter the Russian market through external partners.
Seeing as Nynas managed to enter the eastern market through a contact in Estonia but
failed when they tried to become actors on the Russian market without a local contact
(Bengtsson et al., 2008), using partners might be the best strategic choice for Consafe
Logistics. Hall (1995) says that acknowledging the cultural differences are crucial for
managing a partnership. In a culture unfamiliar for the employees at Consafe Logistics,
local actors might prevent the company from encountering outer forces that are holding
them back.

6.7.3. Opportunities and risks

+ A multinational company can benefit from cultural differences if they are embraced
according to Rodrigues (1998) and creative solutions and unconventional, positive

77
 thinking can be the result from acknowledged differences. (Cvetcovic, 2008) Since
Consafe Logistics is planning to increase the work between the subsidiaries and the
mother company, cultural differences will become even more important to the
company.

− If, on the other hand, the existing cultural differences aren’t recognized they can
cause problems for the company. In all the three benchmarking cases we studied in
this thesis, culture was not reckoned as a risk and even ignored even though it was
one big contributing factor for the result. Hall (1995) says that culture has a big
impact but often people are not aware of it.

6.8. Inertia
We have identified that the inertia in Consafe Logistics come from both external and
internal forces. In Consafe Logistics’ case the external inertia is created by the customers
who still demand the SattStore system as well as support and service for the SattStore
that they already have. The internal inertia, which according Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004)
is always present even if our respondents had not noticed it, could be created through the
employees’ resistance to change.

6.8.1. External Inertia

All the subsidiaries are aware of the change to come, but only Benelux, Denmark and
Sweden have made sales and implementations of Astro. An organization that at first
embraces a new decision but then doesn’t change within the near future faces the risk of
re-stagnating in the old habits (Kritsonis, 2005), and when it is finally time to change the
organization it is probable to believe that it will be more difficult to convince a second
time. Resistance can be built up because of the opinions that the last time the decision
wasn’t followed by a change and no catastrophes happened, so why not keep the old
ways of working? This is what is happening especially in Poland and in the U.K. The two
subsidiaries have accepted the decision to refocus sales towards Astro, but as of yet they
haven’t been able to change. They are still obliged to sell and implement SattStore to
have business, and the small amount on training they have gotten will be lost if it is not
used. We wonder if it is really possible to change the attitude in an organization without
making any concrete changes. In line with Tonnquist’s (2006) first success factor
Consafe Logistics have managed to create a climate of change, but then no actions are
taken to follow through with the actual change.

This need to be able to still support SattStore customers and provide customers who
demand SattStore systems with a solution can be considered outer forces preventing the
organization from changing quickly enough. Aurell et al. (2008) brought up the idea of
restraining outer forces prohibiting the project realization and the importance not to
ignore the risks and obstacles the change brings. Endsley (1994) and Lewin (1947) both
say that all forces trying to maintain the old habits have to be eliminated. The change
need to be made top priority in subsidiaries where a more profitable product is to be

78
excluded from the product portfolio to Astro’s advantage. To make this occur, a strategic
plan of how to make existing customers change need to be realized, a way of diminishing
manoeuvre inertia. (Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004; Lovén, 1999) The company’s inability to
change the competence resources fast enough to meet new market changes is for Consafe
Logistics dependant on how to make the existing customers change into Astro. Getting
the customers to change WMS will result in employees with deep SattStore competence
having to begin to work with Astro. Their competences will be changed but with
continuous new SattStore sales this competence change is not defendable as of now.

6.8.2. Internal Inertia

According to our empiric study our respondents have noticed no resistance towards the
decision to change apart from the opinion that employees lack knowledge due to a lack of
training. We do know though, from among others Bruzeliuz & Skärvad (2004), that
organizational change almost always involve resistance irrespective of the extent of the
change. We do want to mention the fact that all resistance doesn’t have to be negative
accordingly to Bruzelius & Skärvad (2004) as well as Ahrenfelt (2001) and that even if
not spoken out load managers should be attentive to it. The different opinions and
opposing forces should be used and seen as an advantage for the organization since it
often results in creative and alternative solutions to problems.

6.8.3. Opportunities and risks

+ All the managers are convinced about the need of change. Accordingly to Gilley et al.
(2008) an influential leader has the ability to affect the all over attitude in a group.
We believe that this is an opportunity that Consafe Logistics take advantage of since
we have experienced the same certainty about the change no matter from what
subsidiary the respondent has represented.

− There might be a risk that the resistance exists at Consafe Logistics and that is
ignored form the top management. If there is resistance to change among the
employees this should be acknowledged and used by the leaders. The leader should
keep in mind that the co-workers are the organization’s foremost teachers when it
comes to pitfalls and possibilities, and that resistance is a way of expressing true
engagement. Thus resistance shouldn’t only be considered bad for the change. On the
other hand employees acting indifferent are not contributing to the process of change,
and should be approached by the leader. (Ahrenfelt, 2001)

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7. Audited Analysis
Analysis Model
The result from the frame of references, the analysis model, has been modified since the
analysis of the empiric data resulted in discovered flaws in the initial model. The thought
behind our audited analysis model and the changes from the initial analysis model are
described below.

The audited analysis model, developed as a result of a reflection of the preliminary

analysis model, is presented in figure 15.

Decision Introduction Moving Institutionalization

- Whom - Manner - Effects - Values, Attitudes

- Why - General - Ability & Commitment
- Importance Acceptance Desire to - Reinforcement
- Detail - History Adjust - Pervasiveness
- Flexibility - Individual - New/Ideal - Retraining
- Impact - Impact - Environmental fit
- Benefits - Others
+/- & Demands - Training Leadership
-Training Documentation
Proj Org
Leadership Leadership +/-
KCE KCE
Int Comm Documentation
Documentation
+/-
+/-

Support & Feedback

C U L T U R E

I N E R T I A

Figure 15 Audited Analysis model (Authors, 2008)

7.1. From five to four phases

We discovered a need for training already in the introduction phase and further training
in the beginning of the moving phase after analyzing our empiric material. Thus, we have
chosen to divide the initialization phase in our initial analysis model and added it to the
two adjacent phases. In the model, this meant that we kept knowledge, competence and
education in both the preceding and the following phases but also added the key factor

80
training. Eliminating the initialization phase from our model left us with three phases that
corresponded well to Lewin’s (1947) phases. Hence, we have chosen to fuse the two into
one. We prefer Endsley’s (1994) labelling of the introduction and the institutionalization
phases over Lewin’s (1947) unfreezing and re-freezing. We are however of the opinion
that Endsley’s (1994) classification of the phase in which the change actually occur, early
job experiences, doesn’t give a clear picture of what the phase actually is about, that is
taking actions to move to a new state, thus we kept Lewin’s (1947) label, the moving
phase, for this one.

7.2. Transparent phase boundaries

It also became apparent when analyzing the empiric data that Howell & Costely’s (2006)
critique of the life-cycle models against the lack of consideration of the fact that most
changes are continuous is justified. It was not often clear to what phase in our analysis
model that the different activities at Consafe Logistics belonged. Hence, we have chosen
to make the outlines for all the phases in our audited analysis model dashed and in
addition, we made the phases overlap each other to illustrate that it isn’t possible to draw
a distinct line between the different stages in a process of change. Even though there is a
difficulty in separating the different phases apart, we consider the life-cycle models
interesting in their approach of showing that some activities should be preceded by
others. Thus, we do not want to completely reject the life-cycle models despite their
drawbacks.

7.3. Key factors and areas of interest

After analyzing the empirical data we discovered that not all areas of interest were
actually of interest for all phases. Thus we have, in our audited analysis model, removed
areas from all the phases accordingly with the analysis and empirical data. In the first
phase of the analysis model, the decision, we have chosen to keep only Endsley’s (1994)
key factors since they answer well to the contents of this phase, hence the added areas of
interest were superfluous. We removed project organization from the introduction phase
and we’ve chosen to exclude internal communication form the following, moving, phase.
In the final phase, institutionalization, we only kept leadership and documentation from
the original five areas of interest since these were the only two of interest in our empirical
data. We find Endsley’s (1994) key factors of interest in all phases; hence we’ve kept all
factors in our audited analysis model.

One additional result of our analysis is that we have noticed that culture was
appropriately placed with both a positive and a negative direction since it can inhibit as
well as prohibit a successful change. Since we have identified opportunities and risks in
all the phases, we have chosen also to keep the +/-, symbolizing opportunities and risks,
in the audited model.

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 7.4. Continuous feedback and support
We have gotten the importance of feedback and support, advocated by several authors
(Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004; Endsley, 1994; Rydin, 2007; Tonnquist, 2006), confirmed
by our empirical data, thus we chose to keep it in the audited analysis model. We have
further added feedback and support also from the last phase since we are of the belief that
they serve a purpose throughout the entire process of change.

7.5. Inertia as a positive driving force

As our last change to the initial analysis model we have added a positive direction to
inertia due to the positive impact resistance can have on a change. (Ahrenfelt, 2001;
Bruzelius & Skärvad, 2004) Since none of the respondents had encountered resistance,
we believe that it can be of value to show that the resistance does not only bring negative
input to the change to make the leaders pay extra attention to this phenomenon.

82
8. Conclusions
Using the analysis as a base we have drawn conclusions about how to manage a process
of change. The conclusions are presented below followed by a general strategy for
implementation of an organizational change.

8.1. Transparent phase boundaries

It is difficult and sometimes impossible to divide different activities throughout a process
of change into diverse phases. What can be determined though is if some activities need
to be preceded by other activities. Hence, mapping out the relationship between activities
can be a valuable tool for time savings since it prevents activities from being initiated
before it is possible to follow them through. It is rarely possible to give general guidelines
for what activity should be handled at what stage of the process. However, following up
the decision to change by actions to benefit from initially motivated employees should be
done soon after communicating the decision.

8.2. Measurable goals

For any organizational change process, group and individual goals should be set up to
facilitate motivation for the leader and equally important is that these goals are coherent
with each other for everyone to pull in the right direction. In addition, action plans for the
employees can help the individual feel less worried in times of uncertainty and more
included in the change process. To change the internal focus towards the new ways of
working it is crucial that the leader communicates a clear vision and clear goals with the
change. A reward plan or at least a policy should be set up to reward success. The reward
can be monetary or just a small celebration, more important is that the goal need to be
measurable for the employee to know what is demanded from him or her and for the
organization to recognize when a goal has been reached. However, one should be aware
of the risk of measurable goals; if the organization only focuses upon fulfilling the goals,
all that has not been broken down into measurable goals may be ignored.

8.3. Benefit from everyone’s competences and

opinions
By planting the change idea in the bottom of the organization before the decision has
been taken, the management can receive opinions from all levels in the company. These
opinions should be taken into account for the decision to be the most favourable possible.
It is important to keep in mind that the employees often know what works and what
doesn’t work for the particular organization. This way the signs of resistance against the
change can be picked up throughout the organization and these can be taken advantage of

83
or counteracted at an early stage. It might not always be possible to let the idea make its
way through the organization if there is a time limit until implementation of the change.
Nonetheless, the employees’ opinions should be considered.

8.4. Continuous feedback and support

There should be a continuous exchange of information about progress, problems, ideas
and solutions so that a support team can quickly provide necessary resources and also
alert other changing units in the organization about problems they should be attentive to.
The support team will further quickly gain experience through getting primary
information from many sources about the progression of the change. Evaluations should
be a natural element in the project work, and it should be managed by the leader to give
him or her the possibility to support others.

8.5. Necessary reorganization

Early after that the decision to change has been communicated to everyone in the
organization the employees should be made aware that a reorganization might be
necessary. During the moving phase working in a parallel organization is preferable since
it involves everyone and assures that no areas are left without anyone in charge. Having a
parallel organization also promotes internal flexibility which makes the organization cope
with change better in the future.

8.6. A policy for documentation

By mapping out the need for further documentation and areas where superfluous
documents are created the organization can increase the efficiency at the same time as
cost savings are made. A written documentation policy with someone in charge of
thinking through the documentation process at an early stage is valuable for the change
process. This employee should create missing documents necessary for the change
process, discover weaknesses in the documentation process and decide what should be
taken away and how to and who can add material. Sufficient documentation can decrease
the work load on a support unit and make the changing units more self-sustaining.
However, sufficient and reliable documentation demands that documents are updated
simultaneously with updates on products, work processes and other updates and changes
throughout the organization. When making a documentation plan it is of great importance
to consider culture if the plan concerns employees with different nationalities.

Later on in the process of change, when the organization actually is changing, the
existing documents and work processes should be used for consistent results to customers
and to diminish the risk that some employees become irreplaceable due to the fact that no
one else knows what has been done or how it’s been done so far in a project.

84
 8.7. A policy for internal communication
The organization should write a policy for internal communication at an early stage in the
change process. When mapping out how the internal communication should be executed
it is of interest to examine what communication channel(s) is (are) the best one(s), what
communication is to go through what employee and how to be assured that everyone
knows how and where to find necessary information. To make people involved in the
change process, to make them interested in being responsible for acquiring required
information by themselves and to inform the employees of where the information can be
accessed a teambuilding or training courses can be valuable. This way the risk of
expecting employees to take responsibility to find useful information without making
theme fully aware that it is required by them is diminished. If these teambuilding session
or training courses don’t succeed to make the employees acknowledge their responsibility
in the communication process some kind of confrontation from the management might be
necessary.

8.8. Knowledge, competence and education

We have come to the conclusion that there are three important points to consider
concerning training and knowledge when managing a process of change.

8.8.1. Early training to manage resistance

The first information about any big change should come from the most influential leader,
and to be able to affect the attitudes in the organization good and motivating leaders
should be totally convinced of the decision to change. To be able to spot instant
resistance and to benefit from the opinions concerning the change or counteract resistance
an initial training can be of great use. This training should be executed at an early stage in
the process of change to inform the employees about the decision behind the change and
the importance of the change for employees, and as a result they will be motivated at an
early stage. To benefit from the opinions among the employees this training should to be
a two or more ways communication rather than a pure information session. This early
training is also a perfect opportunity for the management to present the communication
and documentation policies.

8.8.2. Training close to real experience

The training the employee must undergo to take on his or her role in the new organization
should be done close to when the knowledge is needed. If the training is held to long
before the knowledge is turned into competences through practical experiences the
knowledge is quickly forgotten. One good way of learning is through teamwork which
also makes the individuals feel involved. The management should also remember that
everyone learns differently and that this might demand specially adapted training courses
for certain individuals.

85
 8.8.3. Policy to access tacit knowledge
To transfer the knowledge from the experienced employees to those who are facing new
tasks and challenges through the change it is important to include different methods. To
transfer tacit knowledge to tacit knowledge or explicit to explicit is a limited form of
knowledge creation for the organization. Tacit knowledge can be transformed into
explicit, through new documentation from experienced and competent employees. When
other employees use these documents to increase and reshape their tacit knowledge
explicit knowledge is turned into tacit. Knowledge creation in the organization occurs
foremost when the two types of knowledge interact; an organization facing change should
put extra effort into these two methods to create a learning organization.

8.9. General strategy for managing change

As a result of our analysis we have developed a check-list presented in table 2 that can be
of use to facilitate a process of change. The easy to follow table contains the columns
phase, goal, precedent activities, necessary resources, measurable result and available
support. The only column filled in is the first one, leaving the others for the leader of
change to fill in to suite his or her specific change process. Each column is described
below and followed by table 2. A specifically filled in strategy table for our case
company, Consafe Logistics, is presented in appendix 1.

The phase column lists questions that should be answered and actions that need to be
taken. The rows are not numbered to show that they are not necessarily in the order that
they have to be done, since it is difficult to place activities in the “correct” phase.

To point to the importance of clear goals the leader of change should for each row fill in
what the goal is with each of the questions and actions as a help when motivating others.

Even if different organizations can follow through with a change process in different
orders some activities have to be preceded by certain activities. In the third column
precedent activities are filled in.

An initial estimation of what financial resources, competence and written material

necessary to complete each row’s activity is filled in under the necessary resources
column.

The fifth column is called measurable results. If it is possible to state a measurable goal
to define when the activity has been executed it should be filled in here.

Available support like contact information to people with expert competence or helpful
documentation is filled in the sixth column.

86
 Precedent Necessary Measurable Available
Phase Goal activities resources result support
Decision
Why change?
Who is affected?
When to start?
Where to start?

Introduction
First message of the
change
Internal communication
policy
Documentation policy
Reward policy
Initial training course
Set measurable goals
Feedback

Moving
Reorganization
Teambuilding
Training course
Documentation
Feedback

Institutionalization
Documentation
Feedback
Evaluation
Celebration
Table 2 General strategy for managing change (Authors, 2008)

87
9. Discussion
Below follows a discussion of the method the thesis is based upon as well as the
recovered results.

9.1. The method

One could probably claim that we might have gotten another picture if we had talked to
employees further down in the organization. We do believe though that it would have
been unlikely for us to get people to tell us about any resistance due to several reasons.
Not having the possibility to visit subsidiaries took away the benefit of interviewing face-
to-face necessary to build up a level of confidence between the interviewer and the
respondent. We are convinced that the results in this thesis are of interest even though we
didn’t have the possibility to include opinions from all levels of the company. To get a
more detailed strategy and an even more accurate picture of the reality it would be
interesting to do the study once more but with a bottom-up perspective.

9.2. The results

The results of this thesis demonstrate that numerous factors, interacting in a complex
way, affect a process of change in an organization. Getting the message out to the
audience, setting clear goals for the organization to know what to aim against and keep
documents of the process were some trouble areas in our case company. The fact that
even the seemingly basic activities cause problems for an organization facing a change
confirms to us how complex a process of change actually is. The difficulty to divide the
different activities into the accurate phases make us question to what extent the life-cycle
models can be of use. We also question the conception of equilibrium when the world
around us is in a constant state of change. This disbelief promotes the concept of a
learning organization, but to reach a change friendly company culture, which requires
changing the inner cultural factors, it takes time. Time is not always in abundance which
makes it easier to use the life-cycle methods. We do believe though that any new
company should aim towards creating a learning organization from the start. We do
believe however that it can be helpful to know that some activities need to precede each
others and that a generally developed strategy can be a good support in a process of
change. For our developed strategy to be useful we do believe that it needs to be audited
after it has been applied to different organizations and different situations. We do
nonetheless consider the checklist and guidelines presented in the conclusions to be a
good guiding principle for organizations. The need for support and feedback wasn’t fully
acknowledged in our case company. To manage a process of change, especially in units
located geographically far away from the support unit we are of the belief that a thorough
supporting system must function to check that set goals are reached and to spot problems
at an early stage, this was also confirmed by the theories presented in this thesis.

88
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 Appendix I

A Change Strategy
For Consafe Logistics

96
A strategy for Consafe Logistics
Using the conclusions as a base we have adjusted the developed general strategy for
organizational change to be able to apply it on Consafe Logistics’ change towards
focusing sales on Astro. We begin by presenting general guidelines for the change, a risk
analysis for the change and we further continue with a check-list that can be used to
facilitate the change.

Transparent phase boundaries

It is important, when planning the change for the different subsidiaries, to be aware of the
fact that it is difficult and sometimes impossible to divide the different activities into a
logic order. Thus, to have a check-list to follow strictly form the beginning to the end is
rarely useful. Circumstances may differ between the different subsidiaries with the result
of a need for changed order among the activities. It can however be useful to use a
checklist throughout the change as a guide for what steps to go through and as a help for
knowing what activities need to be preceded by other activities.

Measurable goals
For any organizational change process, group and individual goals should be set up to
facilitate motivation for the leader and equally important is that these goals are coherent
with each other for everyone to pull in the right direction. For the employees at the
different subsidiaries to know what is demanded of them it is important that short term as
well as long term goals for the change is set. Since Denmark successfully set time based
goals their experience of estimated time needed to follow through with the change should
be taken advantage of. It is better to set time based goals at the subsidiaries than no goals
at all. Even though it is difficult to give an accurate approximation of when to get the first
customer and how many new customers the subsidiary can have per year, a goal to work
towards for the employees is helpful. It can be of help to overlook the reward system to
see if there is a need for increased rewards when it comes to Astro sales and
implementations to support the employees when changing into an Astro focus. The
reward can be monetary or just a small celebration, more important is that the goal need
to be measurable for the employee to know what is demanded of him or her and for the
organization to recognize when a goal has been reached.

Benefit from everyone’s competences and opinions

By planting the change idea in the bottom of the organization before the decision has
been taken, the management can receive opinions from all levels in the company. This is

97
unfortunately too late for Consafe Logistics at the current subsidiaries since the decision
has been communicated on all levels. It is however important to keep in mind that the
employees are the organization’s foremost teachers and they often know what works and
what don’t work for the particular organization. Thus, continuous feedback from the
employees that are currently changing into an Astro focus can be especially useful when
improving the change strategy.

Continuous feedback and support

There should be a continuous exchange of information about progress, problems, ideas
and solutions so that a support team, tentatively the Roll-out team, can quickly provide
the subsidiaries with necessary resources. This continuous information also helps the
support unit to alert other changing units in the organization facing similar situations
about problems they should be attentive to. Consafe Logistics in Lund needs to be better
prepared to meet the demands in support and resources from the subsidiaries. To meet
these demands we propose the Astro Roll-out team or an equivalence to be established
again. If there is a continuous exchange of information about progress, problems, ideas
and solutions the Roll-out team can quickly provide necessary resources and also prepare
other subsidiaries facing similar situations about problems they should pay extra attention
to.

The support team will further quickly gain experience through getting primary
information from many sources about the progression of the change. Evaluations should
be a natural element in the project work, and it should be managed by the country
manager to give him or her the possibility to support others.

Necessary reorganization
Early after that the decision to change has been communicated to everyone in the
organization the employees should be made aware that a reorganization might be
necessary. The subsidiary might have to be reorganized with the purpose of being able to
implement Astro at customers’ warehouses. At least one project group need to be
employed constituted of a project leader, an application consultant and a developer.
These employees can be assigned internally within the subsidiary, within Consafe
Logistics group or through a new recruitment depending on the resources available. The
required reorganization is specific for the subsidiary concerned, thus we cannot give
general guidelines for how to reorganize to be best prepared for the change.

A policy for documentation

By mapping out the need for further documentation and areas where superfluous
documents are created the organization can increase the efficiency at the same time as

98
cost savings are possible. Making a policy for documentation and overlooking the
process should be one of the primary tasks for the Roll-out group to handle if they are to
be re-assigned. This group should make sure that missing documents necessary for the
change process are created, discover weaknesses in the documentation process and decide
what should be taken away and how to and who can add material. For everyone to be
aware of the documentation process this should be written and explained to all employees
in the organization. It can be favourable for all the subsidiaries to make their own
documentation policy as a complement to the general policy.

One document that needs to be created is a function description describing the pros and
cons with Astro, what Astro can do, how it works, how it solves the problem and what
can be offered the customers. This document can be made with the today existing activity
model (authors’ translation of verksamhetsmodell) as a base. One further document to
develop is the competence matrix, this document needs to be complemented with the
proper competences and spread to the employees. This is a document that should be taken
advantage of in the beginning of the change process since it helps those who haven’t
developed a personal network of Astro competences. One thing to keep in mind though
with these kinds of documents is that they need to be updated simultaneously with
updates on products, work processes and other updates and changes throughout the
organization. The process of these updates should be expressed in the documentation
policy.

With sufficient documentation in the beginning of the process of change the subsidiaries
could introduce themselves to the information before the first encounter with employees
already possessing Astro experience and thus be better prepared for the change process.
Sufficient documentation can decrease the work load on a support unit and make the
subsidiaries more self-sustaining. It is further important to acknowledge the cultural
aspect when documenting, all documents, without exceptions, should be made in English
so that all subsidiaries can benefit form them.

Later on in the process of change, when the organization actually is changing, the
existing documents and work processes, such as Promise, should be used for consistent
results to customers. Following these process documents diminishes the risk that some
employees become irreplaceable due to the fact that no one else knows what has been
done or how it’s been done so far in a project.

A policy for internal communication

The organization should also write a policy for internal communication at an early stage
in the change process. This is preferably another task for the Astro Roll-out group to
manage. When mapping out how the internal communication should be executed it is of
interest to examine what communication channel(s) is (are) the best one(s), what
communication is to go through what employee and how to be assured that everyone
knows how and where to find necessary information. Mass emails have been expressed as
a poor choice in communicating a message to a big crowd. If possible, face-to-face

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information is preferable but if this is impossible the Intranet can be of great use. Also a
specific internal communication policy for the subsidiaries can be a favourable
complement to the general policy.

To make people involved in the change process, to make them interested in being
responsible for acquiring required information by themselves and to inform the
employees of where the information can be accessed a teambuilding or training courses
can be valuable. This way the risk of expecting employees to take responsibility to find
useful information without making theme fully aware that it is required by them is
diminished. If these teambuilding session or training courses don’t succeed to make the
employees acknowledge their responsibility in the communication process some kind of
confrontation from the management might be necessary. To make it possible for the
employees to find the required information it is important that documents and
information is easily found. Today it is not always obvious where to find what
documents, thus a clean up of the common server or a search engine for the internal
documents can facilitate an employee’s search for documents.

Knowledge, competence and education

We have come to the conclusion that there are three important points to consider when it
comes to training and knowledge when managing a process of change.

Early training to manage resistance

The first information about any big change should come from the most influential leader,
and to be able to affect the attitudes in the organization good and motivating leaders
should be totally convinced of the decision to change. To be able to spot instant
resistance and to benefit from the opinions concerning the change or counteract resistance
an initial training can be of great use. Having an initial training session at the subsidiary,
held by the Roll-out team or another representative from the Swedish office, to explain
the profits with Astro and why the change is important for the company could create an
early understanding among the employees. At this first training or forum the Roll-out
team can provide the employees at the subsidiaries with the communication and
documentation policies. This way Consafe Logistics will reduce the problem of not
everyone knowing where to find what information. To benefit from the opinions among
the employees this training should to be a two or more ways communication rather than a
pure information session.

Training close to real experience

The training the employee must undergo to take on his or her role in the new organization
should be done close to when the knowledge is needed. If the training is held to long
before the knowledge is turned into competences through practical experiences the
knowledge is quickly forgotten. One good way of learning is through teamwork which
also makes the individuals feel involved. The management should also remember that
everyone learns differently and that this might demand specially adapted training courses

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for certain individuals. An initial Astro project group should get the first training to be
able to implement the first Astro systems to customers’ warehouses. Depending on the
WMS experience among the employees transfer of competence can be preformed in three
different ways. The employee can attend an intensive course held in Lund or at a
subsidiary with sufficient experience and time, it could be made through employees
working in Lund or at another subsidiary as in Consafe Logistics Poland’s case or finally
it can be through employing a resource with Astro competence as in Denmark’s case.
These employees with the first Astro experience and competence at each subsidiary
should further transfer their knowledge to the remaining employees at their respective
subsidiary.

Policy to access tacit knowledge

To transfer the knowledge from the experienced employees to those who are facing new
tasks and challenges through the change it is important to include different methods. To
transfer tacit knowledge to tacit knowledge or explicit to explicit is a limited form of
knowledge creation for the organization. Tacit knowledge can be transformed into
explicit, through new documentation from experienced and competent employees and
when other employees use these documents to increase and reshape their tacit knowledge
explicit knowledge is turned into tacit. Knowledge creation in the organization occurs
foremost when the two types of knowledge interact; an organization facing change should
put extra effort into these two methods to create a learning organization. Thus it is
important for Consafe Logistics to make use of the written documents for the employees
newly acquainted with Astro to take in the written information and make it their own tacit
knowledge. It is further important that the tacit knowledge within the company is
expressed explicitly, one of the tasks for the Roll-out group through the documentation
policy.

Risk analysis
A risk analysis has been carried out to point out the areas to which extra precaution
should be taken and it is presented in table 3 below. In the table, the probability and
consequences for the risks are estimated. The most critical risk to be aware of is the risk
of the employees not knowing where to find documents. To avoid this, the documents
need to be made easy to find and the employees must be informed of where to find the
information necessary. Two further crucial risks for the change are that the office in Lund
isn’t prepared for the change and that all information doesn’tt reach it’s final destination.

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 Prob. Cons. Risk value
Risk 1-5 1-5 PxC Countermeasure

Make sure that everyone knows Astro's

benefits and are able to explain the
benefits to customers. Good internal
The process of communication and a clear vision need to
change Loosing customers 1 2 •2 be expressed by the leaders.

Cultural differences Be aware of the differences and embrace

are ignored 2 4 •8 them

The office in Lund

Project isn't prepared for the
Organization change 3 4 • 12 Re-assign the Roll-out group

The employees don't know The leader expresses the vision clearly
what is expected of them and makes
Leadership throughout the change 1 3 •3 individual plans.
Inform several times and through
different communication vehicles. Control
that the information has reached
Internal Information doesn't reach everyone concerned. (Internal
Communication all employees concerned 3 4 • 12 Communication policy)
Employees don't know Make documents easy to find and inform
where or how to find the
documents and employees of where to find the required
Documentation information 4 4 • 16 documents
Establish routines for the documents to
be updated
Documents aren't updated concurrent with updates on the product
simultaneously as updates or in the
on the product 3 2 •6 organization (Documentation policy)
Risk analysis (Authors, 2008)

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A check-list to facilitate the change
For the Roll-out group to handle the support to the subsidiaries, the trainings and initially
the communication and documentation policies the group members should preferably be
assigned to the Roll-out assignment fulltime at the beginning. Once the communication
and documentation policies are finished and running the Roll-out group could be working
with support and training of the subsidiaries part-time next to other assignments. We have
below, in table 4, presented the main activities for the subsidiaries to go through when
changing into an Astro focus. It is the country managers’ mission to fill out the blanks
since these are dependant on the subsidiaries situation.

The easy to follow table contains the columns phase, goal, precedent activities, necessary
resources, measurable result and available support. The only column filled in is the first
one, leaving the others for the leader of change to fill in to suite his or her specific change
process. Each column is described below and followed by table 4.

The phase column lists questions that should be answered and actions that need to be
taken. The rows are not numbered to show that they are not necessarily in the order that
they have to be done, since it is difficult to place activities in the “correct” phase. Since
the decision already has been taken, this has been shadowed in the check-list but the
questions posed in this phase should be answered for the measurable goals to be made the
best ones.

To point to the importance of clear goals the leader of change should for each row fill in
what the goal is with each of the questions and actions as a help when motivating others.

Even if different organizations can follow through with a change process in different
orders some activities have to be preceded by certain activities. In the third column
precedent activities are filled in.

An initial estimation of what financial resources, competence and written material

necessary to complete each row’s activity is filled in under the necessary resources
column.

The fifth column is called measurable results. If it is possible to state a measurable goal
to define when the activity has been executed it should be filled in here.

Available support like contact information to people with expert competence or helpful
documentation is filled in the sixth column.

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 Precedent Necessary Measurable Available
Phase Goal activities resources result support
Decision
Why change?
Who is affected?
When to start?
Where to start?

Introduction
Set measurable To decrease uncertainty,
goals to increase motivation
and for evaluations of the
project's progress.

First message of To make employees Introduction material

the change combined aware of the change
with a first traing and get opinions and pick
course up resistance.

Internal To have control ˚ An Internal A common Internal

communication over that the right Communication Communication policy
policy information reaches the policy has been made created by the Roll-out
right person. team, a cleaned up
common server and the
Roll-out team available
for questions.
Documentation To increase the ˚ A Documentation A documentation policy
policy required documentation, policy created by the Roll-out
avoid out of date ˚ Missing documents are team who also are
documents to be created available to help create
published and make the documents the
them easier to locate. subsidiary is lacking

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 Precedent Necessary Measurable Available
Phase Goal activities resources result support
Reward policy To motivate to ˚ A Reward policy
success and to celebrate
met goals.

Feedback Reconnect to the ˚ The Roll-out team has The Roll-out team
support team to get recieved feedback from
inputs and help others. the country manager.

Moving
Reorganization Get an organziaton
suited to manage Astro
implementations.

Teambuilding To refocus on Astro, get

ideas, benefit from or
counteract resistance
and motivate the
organization.
Training course Reach a required Course materials The Roll-out team
level of knowledge
necessary to manage an
Astro implementation.

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 Precedent Necessary Measurable Available
Phase Goal activities resources result support
Documentation To cover areas of interest
in the change process as
well as the Astro
implementation

Feedback Reconnect to the ˚ The Roll-out team has The Roll-out team
support team to get The first Astro recieved feedback from
inputs and help others. implementation has been the country manager.
made at the subsidiary.

Institutionalization
Documentation To finalize the change ˚ The process of new
and prevent from loosing ways of working are
the Astro focus. written down.

Feedback Reconnect to the ˚ The Roll-out team has The Roll-out team
support team to get recieved final feedback
inputs and help others. from the country
manager.

Evaluation Evaluate the change for The subsidiary can ˚ An evaluation from all
the subsidiaries to learn implement all demanded employees at the
from each others. Astro systems without subsidiary has been
support handed in to the Roll-out
team
Celebration Acknowledge the
finilization of the change
by celebrating together

A change strategy for Consafe Logistics (Authors, 2008)

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