Case 10: Managing Change and Employee Well-Being in an Italian School: Psychosocial Training Intervention as a Possible Solution

Abstract

Over the last 20 years the Italian education system has lived an intense and tormented epoch of reforms and radical changes culminated in the introduction of school autonomy and decentralisation. Such institutional pressures have created, in the Italian school system, contradictory effects at an individual and organisational levels leading to employee resistance or indifference on one hand and investment in training for developing coping strategies on the other. The Italian school system comprises of teachers – the largest professional group of workers within public schools, who are also viewed as individual participants of change. Managing professionals and their professions is increasingly gaining momentum as organisations realise the importance of attracting and retaining key talent and human capital. Managing change in a professional setting such as in the case of school teachers can be difficult as the nature of their profession affords them high autonomy; paradoxically, at the same time, there is a low level of observed cohesiveness amongst the teachers.