My opinion about the rationale behind change reluctance goal setting. Reflection on Ownership and Leading Change course

For the “Ownership and Leading Change” class we had to read 6 articles regarding change.
Riley and Clarkson’s article “The Impact of change on Performance” talks about the negative effects of change on organizations. It says that performance is indirectly proportional with change. This affects mostly employees, which start to become confused and do not have enough time to accommodate. They start questioning the effectiveness of the process itself and whether the path taken by the organization is for the better.
I believe that the change the author is talking about here is more of the “dramatic” type, as Nguyen & Mintzberg talk in their article “The Rhythm of Change” since it is felt and reacted upon. Usual, unintended change is occurring all the time within the organization, even if it is internal (like organic or systematic change) or external, in outside environment through the advances made in the industry or market (technological, customer preferences, economic conditions, etc). But this change is not perceived by us in most cases, since we take it as given. We accept to go with the wave, but refuse to go faster without performance drop.
I was thinking that this reaction is due to insecurity and subconscious analogy of this phenomenon with risk. I believe that most employees are risk adverse and are reluctant to change. They prefer a stable job in which they do a stable task and thus receive a stable income. I see few people starting to change jobs just because they are bored of it. I see even fewer starting in a completely new direction, a new job in a new industry just because they became bored of what they did that far. Reason: unwillingness to change, to learn new things, to reshape their mentality and logic, to memorize and process new information, especially after a certain period of tine exposed that specific environment.

So most of the employees are scared of changes and associate it as a transition towards the worse. The more they work in a sector, the harder they get accustomed to new things. I believe that the interest to discover new things, the desire to stay up to date with all what is happening is decreasing as age passes. Reasons may be that we absorb information slower than we previously did in our childhood, plus we realize that the amount of information is way too vast for us to comprehend. So we tend to stay with the things we knew when we were younger.
For example, the amount of people over the age of 60 that know how to operate the computer is a bit more than a handful (at least back home, where they did not receive any IT lessons). But these people prefer reading instead, a “hobby” many had when they were young. Our generation spends more time on the PC, playing games, reading e-news and watching youtube than reading physical books. I am trying to say that we assimilate the environment and try to fit in until a certain age, when we found our equilibrium. From that point onward, it will be harder for us to accept changes (i.e. old people learning PC skills and us abandoning the PC and starting to read books instead).
Ok.. now let’s get back to Rieley and Clarkson. Their solution to this fast change is developing reality based measures, clear objectives and benchmarks. They say that being vague is not recommended.
I believe that the rationale behind this is to help people reach change by hiding the process itself. If I were a worker and had a lot of imagination, I would envision change as a swim in the sea. I don’t know where the current will take me (thus I am reluctant to go into the water in the first place), but people (the change makers) push me in the water. By setting a goal, a clear objective, for example somebody telling me that there is a island 2000 feet in front of me (even if the island – goal- is not there, but it will appear, the closer we get), will give me enough power to propel through water and materialize that “island”, instead of having my thoughts caught in concerns such as the deepness of the water or the fear of drowning.
People are usually reluctant to change, unless it is a mass phenomenon. After a certain period of time we prefer more our old friends, car and apartment. But when a change is made, it is better to have a clear objective. This will help you best to pass through the transition period and keep your eyes on the price.

Reference:
Rieley, J.B. & Clarkson, I. (2001) “The Impact of Change on Performance”.
Nguyen Huy, Q. & Mintzberg, H. (2003) “The Rhytm of Change”.