Keeping promises: A case study of escalating commitment leading to organizational change collapse

Abstract

Political pressures behind promises made during large-scale organizational change often lead to a general reluctance by top leaders to modify plans, even when critical assumptions change. Despite the recognition of the need for flexibility and emergence in planned strategies, some leaders feel that an accepted plan constitutes a formal “promise” between the organization and the major stakeholders to carry out the plan as originally presented - even in the face of conflicting information. There is broad agreement that the capacity of organizations to change strategies, systems and structures, is crucial for organizational survival and success. Yet, there is little evidence that the failure rate is decreasing in response to the availability of normative models of how to implement change, or of research-based evidence on the causes of change success and failure. In the present research, we employ a theoretical lens – the one of escalation of commitment to a failing course of action (Staw, 1976; Sleesman et al., 2012) - that so far is not sufficiently reflected in the academic literature for analyzing organizational change under real-time conditions. In doing so, we highlight aspects of complex change processes that are less visible than other theoretical perspectives. Using longitudinal process data from the failed attempt at strategic reorientation of a national air traffic control organization (AVINOR), we show that some new variables emerge as determinants of change failure. These factors are partly under leadership control, however, other factors are not, and their management involves paradoxes and difficult trade-offs that must be made when they are considered in concert with previously established determinants of change success