1.

0 Introduction
The changing business environment has forced a majority of organizations to make
changes in order to enhance their competitive advantages. Hewlett-Packard (HP), a
leading organization in the global information technology industry, has committed to
a significant shift on the business operational paradigm under a new leadership in
2012. The purpose of this report is to analyse and reflect on the change process of
Hewlett-Packard (HP) in terms of an interview with a middle-level manager of HP,
China. It will first identify the problems facing HP, the impetus for the change, the
change process, the major issue during the change and the overcome strategies.
Additionally, it will demonstrate the individual understanding of change management
and reflect the knowledge upon in relation to the change process of HP.

2.0 Background of HP
Generally, the dramatic declines in HP’s market share and profit have been
regarded as the most significant problems facing HP in the recent years. The
underperformance has led to a dramatic decrease, equivalently 46%, on HP’s stock
price (Thibodeau, 2012). As a result, a new CEO, Meg Whitman, has taken the
leadership role in HP in 2012. Soon Meg Whitman indicated there were a number of
problems within the organization that have been the root causes for the decreases.
Thidodeau (2012) pointed out, the divergent management in the subsidiaries and the
ineffectiveness of use of the internal resources have led to a lack of internal
collaboration, and knowledge and resource sharing. Eventually, these divergence,
ineffectiveness and non-cooperation have contributed to the underperformance. As a
result, Meg Whitman has carried out a series of management strategic changes to
bring HP back to on the right track. However, despite the success, Meg Whitman has
have encountered strong internal resistances during the change process.
3.0 Impetus for the change
There have been external and internal impetuses forcing HP to conduct the
management strategic changes. First of all, the external impetus has been considered
as the increasingly intensive competition in the global information technology (IT)
industry (Sheremata, 2003). The highly intensive business environment has led to the
decrease in price of computing-related product, as well as the increase in customer
bargaining power (Sheremata, 2003). In other words, the price of computing-related
product has decreased by many of IT firms in order to enhance their competitive
edges. Also, the development of IT industry has broadened the range of product
selection for the customers. In addition, the internal impetus has been the divergence
of subsidiary management, and lack of knowledge and resource share (Thibodeau,
2012). As above mentioned, these problems have caused the operational
ineffectiveness and underperformance. On this basis, HP has been forced to make
changes in order to deal with the problem that the management divergence and
internal ineffectiveness had been no longer capable of surviving the changing
business environment.

4.0 Analysis and evaluation of the change process

4.1 The change process
Basically, the top-management of HP has applied a four-steps of change
management model described by Judge’ and Pucik’s (2009) to accomplish the
management strategic changes. Judge and Pucike (2009) further explained that a
change management can be divided into four steps: investigation, planning,
implementation and evaluation. In this case, HP firstly has sent a number of
investigators to each of their subsidiaries with the purpose of examining the current
operational status and issues. As Judge and Pucike (2009) pointed out, the
investigation process is to examine and analyse the weaknesses which can be
potentially improved. The investigators have been required to work closely with the
subsidiary managers to identify the problems. In addition, the planning process is to
design the change strategies and implementation procedure (Judge & Pucike, 2009).
To do this, HP has gathered and analysed the valuable information from the
investigators, and then create strategic planning preparing for changes to resolve the
problems. By analysing, HP has focused on the problems of non-aligned business
goals and management paradigms between the subsidiaries, and the ineffectiveness of
using and share the internal knowledge and resources. As a result, Meg Whitman has
planned to integrate the internal resources; unify the business goal; as well as redesign
the management paradigm for the subsidiaries (Thibodeau, 2012). More specifically,
HP has decided to establish a new Internet-based resource and knowledge sharing
system for all of the subsidiaries (Thibodeau, 2012). For instance, the interviewee
pointed out that HP China has installed a new reporting system. The employees have
been able to log on the reporting system to upload and find out the technical files
posted by other employees to help them work. Also, HP has adjusted their business
goal and unified the subsidiary management to emphasize on increasing the
management integration. The interviewee demonstrated that there have been several
changes occurred in relation to the workplace policy and management structure being
compatible with the headquarter policy of HP. During the implementation process,
HP has designated coordinators to the subsidiaries in order to assist the national
managers achieving the management changes (Thibodeau, 2012). The primary
responsibilities of the coordinators have been to deliver the change strategies, assist
the subsidiary managers and report to the head office of HP about the change progress
(Thibodeau, 2012). Therefore, Meg Whitman has been able to evaluate the change
process via reviewing the reports in order to adjust the original strategy.

4.2 Issue
The major issue during the change process has been identified as the internal
resistance from the subsidiary employees and managers. As Daniela and Nadina
(2013) pointed out, employee resistance to change is a common phenomenon when an
organization commits to a change because that the uncertainty of a change may be
threatening their interests, such as the security of job or salary. Daniela and Nadina
(2013) also argued that disagreement is another common reason for the employee
resistance to a change. In this case, HP has definitely faced strong resistance from the
subsidiary employees and managers. As the interviewee pointed out, there have been
many dissatisfying voices from the employees against with the changes once the
changes have been undertaken. Most of them have been lack of tolerance and terrified
because they have concerned with the possibility of layoff, the changes on their
working patterns and salaries. Some of managers have considered that HP China has
outperformed in comparison with other subsidiaries so that the changes might lead to
negative effects. Additionally, the interviewee argued that other managers have felt
anxiety about their management autonomy would be decreased after the management
integration. Furthermore, a significant number of workers have claimed that the
subsidiaries should distinguish their management approach adapting to the diverse
business environment in different countries. Thus, many excuses have been used
attempting to resist the changes.

4.3 Overcome strategies

In fact, HP has developed two strategies – empowerment and force-field – to
overcome the employee resistance. As above mentioned, HP has designated
coordinators to report the change progress and issues. From the reports, HP has found
out that the changes about the improvement of internal knowledge and resource share
have faced less intense resistance in comparison with the changes related to
management integration. In other words, the primary resistance have been embodied
in the management changes. In addition, the interviewee indicated that the
coordinators have also been required to investigate the degree of employee resistance
in each of the subsidiaries. As a result, HP has decided to apply the empowerment
strategy to deal with the low level of employee resistance; on the other hand, to apply
the force-field strategy to cope with the high level of employee resistance. According
to Castaneda and Farah (2013), generally the intensity of employee resistance to an
organizational change can be either low level or high level depending on the degree of
employee’s acceptance and tolerance of the change. The common reactions at a low
level of resistance are lack of motivation and procrastination (Castaneda & Farah,
2013). In other words, employees will accept and adapt to an organizational change
slowly. However, the common reactions at a high level of resistance include being
ridiculing and feigning ignorance (Castaneda & Farah, 2013). This is to say;
employees will completely neglect and take actions to against the change.

To deal with the low level of resistance, HP has used empowerment strategy to
involve the subsidiary employees and managers into the decision-making process.
Therefore, subsidiary employees and managers with the low level of resistance have
felt more comfortable and powerful in the change process. This is because; employees
are able to provide suggestions to the change process as well as receive the respect
from the management (Furst & Cable, 2008). As a result, they will achieve a high
level of satisfaction during the change process (Furst & Cable, 2008). To deal with the
high level of resistance, HP has applied force-field strategy to force the subsidiary
employees and managers to change. Furst and Cable (2008) argued that normally
there are two contrary forces toward to an organizational – resisting and supporting
force. In force-field strategy, management should increase the supporting force and
decrease the resisting force to a change (Furst & Cable, 2008). In fact, the pressure
created by the supporting force will be reinforced to influence on the resisting force.
As a result, the resisting force will yield to the increasing pressure from the
supporting force (Furst & Cable, 2008). In this case, the head office of HP has
undertaken the subsidiary management re-construction if a subsidiary management
has been as the major resisting force in order to foster the supporting force. For
example, the interviewee indicated that some of the HP China managers have been
replaced and some of the departments have been merged to reduce the resisting force.
As a result, the resisting force in HP China has been eliminated eventually. By
applying these two strategies, HP has enabled to achieve the success of their
management integration change.

5.0 Conclusion and recommendations

HP has accomplished an organizational change to integrate management between
the subsidiaries, and enhance the internal knowledge and resource sharing in 2012. in
fact, the increasingly intensive competition within IT industry, and internal
ineffectiveness and divergence have forced HP to carry out the change because HP’s
revenue and market share had decreased dramatically. Although the organizational
change in HP has been successfully completed by accordingly applying the
empowerment and force-field strategies, HP has faced different level of internal
resistance, such as procrastination and ignorance. HP would design a training session
in order to assist the employees adapting to the changes. Geller (2003) indicated that a
training program can offer a number of benefits to carry out an organizational change,
such as minimizing the anxiety of employees, and making clear and explain the
business goals to the employees. Therefore, a training program would be able to guide
the HP employees to adjust themselves successfully adapting to the change.

6.0 Reflection
A change management is regarded as a process to make an organizational transition to
a desired state (Smith & Worsowicz, 2012). In my opinion, the change management is
to plan, strategize and implement an organizational change in terms of the analysis of
both internal and external environment with the purpose of maintaining and
increasing the competitive advantages. Also, the change can be carried out by forcing
or being proactively. Based on the HP’s case, HP has to undertake an organizational
change because of the increasing competition and internal ineffectiveness. However,
in some other cases, an organization may proactively seek to a change in order to
prepare itself for the potential challenges. In fact, I think that every organization has
to commit to a change because the industrial, political, economic and social
environment is changing. Otherwise, an organization may not be survived, for
instance the bankrupt of Nokia.

In addition, while the change approaches may be different, they normally contain
several steps, including problem assessing, developing or planning, implementing and
evaluating (Lee & Ahn, 2008). These phases of a change process were exactly as
same as HP did in its change process. However, some approaches highly value the
step of employee training. In fact, I also believe that employee training can effectively
decrease the degree of employee resistance to a change.

Normally, I think that the internal resistance to a change is unavoidable because the
change will more or less impact someone’s interests. As Popescu and Enescu (2012)
pointed out, designing strategies to overcome the resistance is an important part of
change management. In HP’s case, the company has also faced different levels of
internal resistance to the change, such as procrastination and ignorance. I also agree
with that different levels of resistance should be dealt differently as HP has
established two strategies to handle the high and low level of internal resistance.
Generally, I think that it is important to achieve a mutual agreement on how to
conduct a change between the management and employees because it will reduce the
intensity of the resistance. Popescu and Enescu (2012) demonstrated that employees
can be involved in decision-making process to ease their resistance. I believe the
involvement of employees in decision-making is an approach to help an organization
and the employees achieve the mutual agreement on the change.

I also found out an interesting fact that employee resistance sometimes will be
beneficial for a change process from Popescu’ and Enescu’s (2012) paper. They
argued that the resistance is able to facilitate the organizational creativity and
innovation. As above mentioned, HP has brought the employees into the decision-
making process in the region with the low level of resistance. Thus, some ideas from
the employees have been considered when implemented the change. In addition, HP
has committed to a hard approach to pressure the high level of resistance, for instance
the management replacement and department merger. In other words, HP has made a
strong demonstration for other people with the high level of resistance if they
continually refused to cooperate.

Given the evidence, I think that organizational change is necessary for a business’s
success in the changing environment. The change process should include problem
investigation, planning, implementation, employee training and evaluation. An
organization should apply different approaches to deal with the unavoidable internal
resistance. More importantly, an organization should attempt to utilize the resistance
overcoming strategies to facilitate and smooth the change process.
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