Reflective Note: CMGT_A | Ramashis Biswas | PGID: 61510121

Instances of Resistance:
I came across resistance across Level 1 and Level 2 in my second organization. We had recently
taken over a sick retail business and were working to integrate all employees into a cohesive
functional unit. As a result of the acquisition, several teams were reshuffled and this led to serious
performance issues all around. In particular, we encountered strong Level 2 resistance from a
perceived favoritism towards new recruits and lack of competence on the part of the legacy
employees. As a result, a lot of employees were replaced/ fired.
The situation could have been dealt with better, as in hindsight, we ended up hiring a lot of these
legacy employees back after one or two years. They had specific skillsets which made them
valuable assets to the discount retailing business and we later realized that the cost to replace them
was extremely high.
My Take on the Levels of Resistance

Level 1 resistance is the easiest to deal with. I would not advocate sharing all information
with everyone. However, I do recommend setting up of accessibility matrices, which detail
who is allowed to access what information and why.
Level 2 resistance is trickier as it involves addressing the softer side of resistance. In
particular, my observations suggest that the best way to integrate people is by eliminating
silos created on the basis of familiarity and instead forcing people of diverse groups to
work on projects together.

The BPR Case

The BPR case appealed to me as my work responsibilities were similar in my previous
organizations. The biggest challenge with any reengineering exercise is that people feel threatened
on a competency level. The immediate response is that the new process will make the person
redundant at some point. As a result, I think the strategy adopted by the team in first fixing the
strategy and anticipating the reactions of the stakeholders was critical to the success of the project.