An Innovation Perspective 1

This chapter argues discrepancy between anticipated and actual effects can be understood if the implementation of reform within organizations. It also discusses identifying three contributions of integrating the change management literature and public sector reform literature as complementary fields of study. The chapter presents the emergent approach to change is regarded as a more devolved and bottom-up approach to implementing change. In this sense, the use of the term emergent change is thus comparable to what other authors refer to as organizational development. A theoretical model involving these variables was constructed and fitted to the data using the statistical technique of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). Both planned change and emergent change processes are positively related to commitment to change among employees. The relationship between both change approaches and commitment to change is indirect. The analysis indicates that high degrees of both change communication and employee participation are positively related to commitment to change.