Employee Participation in Change Programs

This chapter aims to assist those responsible for implementing change to think more about how employee participation or involvement is undertaken during the change process. The chapter starts by providing an overview of the theoretical explanations as to why employee participation in change management is important. The authors then examine the nature of employee participation in three organizations undertaking major culture change programs, each using a different change intervention. They present three case studies that show how the context surrounding the change (comprising drivers, intervention, approach to change, and change levers) influenced the characteristics of employee participation in the change process. They conclude by emphasizing the significance of examining change agents’ intervention methodology as a contextual factor to understand better the experience of culture change programs. The key message is that employees’ experiences of participation influence their perceptions on the effectiveness of this type of change.