The stage model of transition

Abstract

The article discribes and discusses the phases that employees go through when a change is to be implemented. The phases presented in this article are schock, denial, depression, acceptance, testing, consolidation, and reflection and learning, from Kreye’s Stage Model of Transition. The model shows how an employee’s level of self-efficacy correlates in each of the stages, and argues that employees must go through each of the stages in some fashion in order to fully accept a change. There are several models that are created to map the changes in the level of employees’ self-efficacy, hereunder Manion’s The seven stages of change and Rashford and Coghlan’s The four-stage model, all of which are based on Kubler-Ross’ The five stages of grief.

The models are relevant for project managers and leaders because having a knowledge and understanding of the employee’s self-efficacy, and what is causing it, is essential in order to lead them during the transition. It is important for employees to be managed well when their self-efficacy is low, as it affects their motivation to work, and may even affect the quality of work they perform.

Introduction

A project has a set budget, timeframe, deliverables and have a unique objective as its goal. Especially in long, complex projects, many things can change, for example, deadlines can be altered, budgets can be cut, and management can change. During changes in a project, it is an important part of people management to make sure that all stakeholders are guided through changes properly. If people are mismanaged during changes, it can result in lowered productivity and feelings of resentment towards the management. Moreover, creativity and innovation can be abated, if employees do not feel involved in the changes, as the feeling of ownership and inclusion in the project is important for morale.

This article will describe and discuss The Stage Model of Transition, which is a model of the seven stages stakeholders must go through when a change is announced and undergoes, and how self-efficacy develops throughout the stages. It is claimed that the person experiencing a transition must go through all seven stages in order to eventually accept the change. It is therefore essential for the People aspect of project managent, that the project manager is aware of the stages, and allows each individual to work through them .

This article has the purpose of descibing the stages of which people, particularly employees, can go through during an organizational change, and how the stages affect their self-efficacy. The model will also be compared to alternative models, and the application and limitations will be discussed.

In this paper, the employees in a project team are considered to be stakeholders, as they have a vested interest in the success of the project. The project could potentially pave the way towards a goal in their career, or be added to their personal portfolio of consultant work, and their engagement and motivation is therefore important for the success of the project .

Also, "organisational change" is a broad term used in this paper to describe organisational changes in a project. This is due to the fact that projects can be considered a temporary organisation .

The stages

Below, a walk-through of the stages in Kreye’s ”Stage model of transition” from the reading material for the course 42543 Management of organizational change is presented, as well as how the level of self-efficacy correlates . Similarities to the other models’ stages are also presented and compared, as the different models provide nuances and different insights in the phases.

The figure shows how self-efficacy rises and falls over time after a change is announced. Written in black are the stages from Kreye’s Stage Model of Transition, and in grey are how the other models’ (presented in the section ”Related models”) stages correlate, based on how they describe self-efficacy levels throughout the stages.

Adapted from Kreye (2020) reading material for the course 42543 Management of Change. The stages of transition and the corresponding level of self-efficacy. In grey are how the other models described would fit on this model, based on the level of self-efficacy

Shock

• Employees are informed of the change that will be happening, or is perhaps already underway, and are unable to grasp the reality of it. This phase may be most predominant in more significant changes, but may also occur in a milder form when informed of a smaller change. Employees are temporarily paralysed from the information, and become unable to work. Manion descibes the initial phase of a change as ”losing focus”, since the information of a change can distract from day-to-day work. This stands to contrast to where Rashford and Cohglan begin their four-stage model, ”Denying”, which is the second phase in the other models.
• Self-efficacy falls, as the employees attempt to grasp what the change will actully mean, and their motivation in their work may be temporarily thrown off.

Denial

• Employees wish to ignore the fact that change will be happening and go about their work as though the change will not be happening, or at least not affect them as an individual.
• In Rashford and Coghlan’s four-stage process , the theme of this phase is ”This does not affect us”. Employees have the mentality that the change will not affect them, and deny that they will have to adapt to the change. The second stage in Rashford and Coghlan’s model is ”Dodging”; ”Ignore this. Don’t get involved.” This phase is similar to the denial phase in that employees still do not believe that the change will affect them directly, but differs in the sense that they begin to realise that a change will be happening. Rashford and Coghlan suggest that employees can get creative in this stage, and become active in finding ways to dodge the change. This element of it leads into the next stage, depression, where employees are no longer in denial.
• Self-efficacy rises, as employees go about their regular work, or may even work even harder in the old ways in attempt to dodge the change.

Depression

• Employees begin to realize that a change will be happening, and that it cannot be stopped. At this point, individuals have very different reactions, but in general the morale is low. Rashford and Coghlan’s four-stage model does not include a stage similar to the depression stage that is present in most other models of change .
• Self-efficacy falls, as moving into the unknown in some fashion means that their skillset may or may not apply directly. They may have difficulty seeing themselves in the new way of working, or worry that they cannot make a significant impact anymore. Also, in this stage the individuals may not have a deep understanding of exacly what the vision of the change is, and how they fit into it. This contributes to the lack of motivation felt in this stage, as there seemingly is not an obvious benefit to the occuring changes.

Acceptance

• Acceptance is the full realisation that changes/transition will be happening, and perhaps what it entails. In Manion’s seven stages of change, this phase is referred to as ”Letting go fo the past”. It is the acceptance that a way of working will be left behind, and that there is a necessity for altering both big and small things in order to reach the final vision. This phase also includes gaining a better understanding of what the vision actually is, and thereby why the changes are necessary and eventually beneficial.
• Acceptance is accompanied by an all-time low self-efficacy. This is because the benefits of the change are not yet realized, yet things are changing, and it can feel to some as though everyone else is adapting and moving forward ahead of them. Different employees may move through the stages at a different pace, leaving some feeling left behind, and others held back and frustrated . In Jo Mansion’s study of nurses’ reactions to change, she observed a team where some members were in ”The pit” (the depression phase), and others had moved onto ”Letting go of the past”. The members of the team grew impatient with their colleagues, as they had different paces of moving forward, and perhaps had a lack of understanding of the stages, and the importance of moving through them.

Testing

• Finding a way of working with the change is necessary, which may bring with it some creativity and experimentation of how to perform even better. This stage is similar to the ”testing the limits” stage of the seven stages of change model, where energy is rising again, and employees feel more creative and resourceful . Rashford and Coghlan refer to this stage as ”Doing”, where there is a general consensus that the big change will be accompanied by many small changes, which must be taken action on . They also refer to energy levels generally rising, and tangible action being taken.
• Self-efficacy generally increases, but may go up and down, as testing can bring small failures as well as successes with it.

Consolidation

• People are feeling more confident of their capabilities of dealing with the change and a new way of working, increasing self-efficacy.
• Sustaining the change requires continuing to look forward, although small failures may at times cause a set-back.
• When people are feeling more distanced from the turbulent first stages of the change, they can more rationally reflect on the change, their own performance and feelings, and how it was managed. Self-efficacy returns to a ‘normal’ level, or ideally higher, as changes are generally implemented in order to improve performance in the organisation.

Reflection & learning

• Also called internalisation, this stage is where people have moved sufficiently past the change, and can now see with more objectivity how the change was. They can better see the benefits of the change, and why it was necessary to change from the old ways.
• Self-efficacy ideally continues to rise.

Application to project management

Project managers must be aware of the stages, so that they can keep track of which stages their team have gone through and manage them as they go. It is also important for project managers to be aware of the stages, so they do not try to force the team to skip any of the stages, for example the “awareness/shock” stage. When a team receives the news of a significant change being made to their project, they may have a difficult time continuing work right away, and it is important that each individual is allowed time to process the information without feeling pressured to move on as though nothing has happened. Manion describes the difficulties and conflicts that can arise as a result of some employees moving through the phases at a different pace from others. It is therefore important as a people and project manager to be able to spot these occurances, and to be aware of the root cause.

The examples and description of the stages above are exaggerated to promote understanding, and may not be so prominent in smaller changes. This model in particular is created in the context of organizational change, but it can be argued that it can also be applied in project management, due to the fact that projects are a temporary organization , and changes are bound to occur in any project. Therefore, stakeholders (employees) must be managed through the changes to ensure their participation and continued interest.

Self-efficacy

”…a person's estimate of his or her capacity to orchestrate performance on a specific task” .

Self-efficacy, the belief in one's capability to perform at work, is essential for the output of work that is done. An individual's likeliness to succeed in a task is directly correlated to their self-efficacy, so it is important to the success of tasks, and hence of an entire project, that members of the project team are taken care of. Self-efficacy and self-confidence are related, and building up an employee's confidence in their skillset and competencies is greatly beneficial to their ability to make decisions, creativity, and overall motivation and well-being in the workplace.

Moreover, recognition for one’s work is an essential driver for self-efficacy, and thereby one’s incentive to work. As Capaldo et al. state; ”Unless people believe they can produce desired effect by their actions, they have little incentive to act” . It is therefore important for motivation for work that the individual feels seen and that their work is recognized, which is an important task for a project manager to perform. In times where an employee is feeling low, for example in the depression stage, it is important that the project manager realizes the reason behind the low self-efficacy of the employee. In this way, the project manager can actively let the employee know that it is normal to be feeling less productive, and be confident that it will get better again.

The self-efficacy of the project manager is also important for project success, as well as for other stakeholder’s self-efficacy. ”[…] leadership skills and self-efficacy are shown to be crucial: Leadership weaknesses are listed among the main problems in research project implementation and prevent projects from achieving success.” . It is therefore also important for project managers to be aware of their own self-efficacy, and if they are perhaps experiencing one of the stages in the model of transition.

Stakeholder management

Managing change is an important skill in project management, as ”A structured approach to change helps individuals, groups, and the organization transition from the current state to a future desired state” . The importance in this model for stakeholder management is that managers must realize that employees must go through these stages to some extent, and accept that it may take some time and effort, rather than attempting to rush through to the acceptance phase. Kreye argues that ”the person experiencing the transition will have to work through all the stages if the transition is to be successfully completed.” For this reason, it is essential that a manager is aware of the stages, so that they themselves do not lose hope that the change will at some point be accepted.

Related models

Many other similar models have been created, and generally have the same flow of self-efficacy rising and falling as the figure above. Below is a description of the models and their phases.

The five stages of grief

This model is the origin of many of the other models. The hypothesis is that these five stages (or similar), are the phases of emotion that a person goes through when grieving, but that they can also be applied when changes or transitions happen in a workplace or organisation. The five stages of grief are:

• Denial
• Anger
• Bargaining
• Depression
• Acceptance

The four-stage model

There are many variations and adaptations of the phases in people management of organisaitonal change. Rashford and Coghlan have presented a four-stage model, which is also based on the Kübler-Ross stages of grief.. The four stages are;

• Denying; ”This does not affect us.”
• Dodging; ”Ignore this. Don’t get involved.”
• Doing; ”This is very important. We have got to do it now.”
• Sustaining; ”We have a new way of proceeding.”

The seven stages of change

This model is created based on the study of a nursing department during various individual changes, such as new hires, firing, and more. The stages are adapted from Spencer and Adams’ ”Life Changes: Growing Through Personal Transitions”. The stages are:

• Losing focus
• Minimizing the impact
• The pit
• Letting go of the past
• Testing the limits
• Search for meaning
• Integration; working towards the vision

The stages of the models described here are also shown in the figure (in grey), and are placed relatively to how the self-efficacy correlates. Although the models have different number of stages, they all in general cover some kind of denial phase, where it is not believed by employees that the change will affect them, a slump, where self-efficacy drops as employees realise that the change will be affecting their worklife, a stage of acceptance, where it is realised that the change can be worked with, and finally a stage of higher self-efficacy, reflection and working towards a vision. These overall ups and downs are the most important for a project manager or leader to be able to identify in their employees and teams. To summarise, there is not one model that can precisely describe the stages people go through during changes, but there are different elements in the presented models that may be useful for managers and project managers to help them understand rises and falls in self-efficacy in their team.

Implementation in project management

As mentioned, it is important for project managers and leaders to be aware of the reason for varying levels of self-efficacy in a team, as the underlying causes may be able to help them to know how to act. The model is not one that can be used with a how-to guide, but rather something to be aware of. The "treatment" for low self-efficacy in a team or in an employee may vary and can be handled in many different ways with different management styles and methods. The methods for change management may for example be "coercive", "adaptive", "crisis", or "managed resistance", depending on the urgency and magnitude of the change .

Limitations

This model has many different names ("Stage model of transition" , adapted from Adams et al. (1976), "The seven stages of change" , ”The mood curve” by Spencer and Adams, and many more), and there are many different terms used for the stages. There is therefore not one clear-cut model that is tried and tested to be the best. Moreover, people are different, as are their reactions to changes and management styles, so perhaps it is not possible to create a one-size-fits-all model. O’Connor and Fiol compare the emotional phases employees go through during a change to the seven stages of grief, describing how human reactions to change follow similar pattern, even under very, very different circumstances.