OBU RAP Topic 9 – Analyse and evaluate the management of change within a specific area of the organisation resulting from a strategic decision

Overview

The management change is a process of making an organizational change mainly in the goals, processes and technology of an organization in a very structured way. The purpose of managing change is to introduce strategies affecting, controlling, and helping people to adapt to change. There are three types of management change, developmental, transitional, and transformational.

The major areas of an organization that need to be considered for writing a RAP on topic 9 are

• Human resource management/employee engagement: one of the most critical responsibilities of an HR department is defining roles and duties. Change management is needed when those employee definitions need redefining. This can occur due to situations like economic instability, the need to downsize, new technology or trends.
• Sustainability initiative: this change aims to achieve both financial and environmentally sustainable momentum in the business
• Technological developments: This refers to identifying modern technology and then implementing change for improved profitability and productivity of the business.

The change can be most effective if there is a strategic plan to implement the change. There must be a complete process for testing and implementing change, communicating change, documenting change and then finally evaluating its impact on the specific areas of the business. Documentation of change is seen as a crucial part of managing change to maintain an audit trail. It also ensures compliance with the regulations. Often, even the best-planned strategies must suffer failures for some reason. Change is always not easy to implement. Often the culture of an organization does not accept change and to overcome this problem, flexibility must be created around the workplace. Lack of senior team alignment and insufficient focus can also lead to failed change management.

Key features/requirements

The main requirements of this topic are

• Selecting a suitable company that has undertaken management change successfully in the last three years
• Analysing the extent of management change within the specified area of the organization
• Evaluating the impact of the identified change on the financial and business performance of the company
• All the identified changes must have been evident in the last three years
• Identifying the strategic need for the management change

Key success factors

In addition to the guidance of a mentor, there are some points that can be followed for a successful RAP project

• Selecting a suitable company that has undertaken management change
• Identification of the strategic decisions that led to the management change
• Identification of the areas where the change has been implemented
• Assessing the impact of the changes on the performance of specified areas of the business
• Creating a link between the changes and the performance of the specific areas of the company over three years.
• Access to the internally generated information
• Permission from the management to use the internally generated information
• In-depth knowledge of management change in an organization
• In-depth knowledge of the impact of these changes on the success of the company
• Demonstrating a clear understanding of the industry and its competitive peers
• Adequate application of the selected goals and objectives that were set at the beginning of the RAP in the proper sections of RAP
• The implementation of the correct research methodology to get good results on all the selected goals and objectives that were put in place at the beginning of the RAP
• Keeping the discussion logical by keeping all the objectives in mind
• Using reliable and appropriate sources for data gathering
• Properly referencing the information gathered according to the Harvard referencing style as told by the OBU.
• Usage of suitable business models to study different aspects of employee behaviour and its reasons
• A comparison to another organisation or the industry sector average

 Accounting and Business models for topic 9

Business process change (BPC): Business process change is the new way the business operations are performed in the company. It improves the relationships between the management and its employees and gives the company a competitive edge. This model ensures the innovation of the company recent It ensures that profitability is improved with reduced costs and more efficient performance. The 4 core steps for changed business leadership are planning, initiating, implementing, and stabilizing.

Stakeholder analysis: stakeholder analysis is a process of identifying all the interested parties that can influence your systems and potential changes. This is a very important process that management can use to win the support of other people. It ensures that your business operations succeed where others might fail. Identification of stakeholders and winning their trust and support is very crucial to the success of any project or company. This model can help companies in building relationships with stakeholders, winning resources and getting ahead of the game. Stakeholder analysis can be conducted in three steps:

• Identify your stakeholders: There might be many people or parties who are interested in the company such as the shareholders, government, alliance partners or suppliers
• Prioritize your stakeholders: classifying the stakeholders based on their power and influence over the company is the next step in stakeholder analysis.
• Understand your key stakeholders: companies need to understand how their key stakeholders feel about their business operations and projects.

Cost-benefit analysis: cost-benefit analysis is a way to ensure if a particular decision or management change will prove to be beneficial for the areas to which change is being applied. If a company does not know the outcome of a decision it is going to make, then it can calculate the cost versus profits to analyse its decision. There are many advantages of taking this test before making any major decision. By doing this analysis, a company can find out the most critical information regarding the outcomes of strategic decisions like the ROI and value chain. The first step of a cost-benefit analysis involves a framework for analysis. Then all the projected costs and their estimated benefits are laid out. Companies should then assign a dollar value to each cost and benefit.  Then tally the total value of costs and benefits and compare. If the benefits outweigh the costs, then the management change should be incorporated without a second thought.

These models can be used effectively to study the pre and post-effects of the management changes made in the company and how the company positively improved its specified areas by applying these changes.

Possible limitations faced by the students while researching topic 9

The main aim of conducting research is to set up new facts or confirm the outcomes of the previous research. It enables us to gain new knowledge regarding the subject. However, while preparing for OBU thesis research students face many problems.

Some of the key limitations are as follows:

General Limitations

• Research method: Students need to have a clear understanding of the research methods. The research methods are not relevant or reliable as students are not trained in different methodologies. Simply replicating the knowledge available online or from different sources is not wise. There is a lack of basic knowledge regarding the correct methods of research.
• Interaction between the subject company and student: There isn’t any proper interaction between the subject company and the student. This means that a substantial amount of data going into the thesis goes untapped. The key issues of the company can only be highlighted with the help of internal company management.
• Overlapping information: overlapping information is often obtained because of excessive research through various sources. Each source has its own story to tell. Students often get confused regarding the facts and statements
• Time constraints: it is without a doubt that students need to complete their RAP before the deadline hits. Sometimes, the time limit can affect the quality of RAP very negatively. Students need to acknowledge this from the very start and set a schedule to be consistent with their research.
• Data collection process: The diverse ways of collecting data presents a strong limitation. If a student conducts an interview person to person or if he does it over the phone, both can have different effects on the interview. Hence, this data limitation must be reflected upon

Specific Limitations

• Confidentiality Issues: students may not get permission from the management to conduct primary research due to confidential issues.
• No access to internal challenges: Students will not know about specific challenges due to lack of information as the company will not want to share weak points.

Suitable organization for Topic 9

The most suitable organization is the one that undertook management change in any of its areas. Selecting a company which is established enough so that its performance and financial position to be studied over some time is necessary. To make a high-quality RAP, it is essential that students choose a company whose operations are easily understood by the student, and h/she can make connections between various topics.

The following factors should be kept in mind while choosing a company for RAP:

• The general interest of the student in the company
• The amount of information available for the company
• Access to reliable secondary sources of information
• Familiarity with the industry sector associated with the company

Suggested approach for Topic 9

Before starting your research, you should understand the assignment. The guidelines mentioned in the information pack should be read. The word count and length should be looked upon. What kind of sources are required by the topic, primary or secondary? The style of citation ‘Harvard referencing’ should be understood by the students. All the other requirements and directions made by the OBU must be complied with. After choosing this topic, a proper mind map must be made from the start, so the student conducts all the required tasks in a proper and timely manner. All the major requirements and aspects of the topic should be considered thoroughly so that a strategy can be devised to meet those requirements. A research methodology and all reliable websites and authentic sources should be noted down. The style of referencing must be kept in mind while researching this topic in order to pass the OBU RAP.

In Part 1- (research objectives and overall research approach), Students need to make a table of contents and a title page mentioning the ACCA reg number and the selected topic. Part 1 mostly contains the introduction and the objectives of the RAP. The objectives of the RAP must be written clearly, and they should be relevant to the requirements. The objective of topic 9 is to analyse the management of change and areas where change can be applied. Students should take an approach that is consistent with the research questions and topic 9. there are 3 or 4 research questions usually. This part comprises 1000 words.

Part 2- (Information gathering/accounting and business techniques) is a section in which all your understanding of the business and accountancy models is analysed here. A quality explanation of the used models or any other frameworks and analysis of all their possible limitations must be performed. The most structured way of representing section 2 is by first mentioning the sources of information that were used to acquire the data for research on topic 9. Topic 9 is about managing change in specific areas such as HR and IT so it will require internally generated information. The impact of changes can only be evaluated through primary data collection. A discussion of the limitations of your information gathering must be included. Students should find references to mention limitations instead of writing from their own opinion. Any ethical issues that arose during information gathering and your solutions regarding the issues. Every part should be backed up by good references. Next, you would list down all the business and accountancy models and their possible limitations. Changes are studied under the models ‘Business process change’ and stakeholder analysis. To find out more about the selection of respective models for topic 9, kindly refer to section ‘Accounting and business models for topic 9’ above.  Word count is to be prioritized which is 1800-2000 words.

In part 3, there is a further evaluation, analysis and conclusion. It should contain a description of the results obtained and all the limitations. Further research with examples and comparisons between the two companies is done. It is the most critical section, and most students fail in it if they are not in the hands of an experienced mentor. Only a qualified mentor can guide the students critically to secure a passing grade. Evaluation and analysis of topic 9 mean you need to explain the financial performance with the help of a Cost-benefit analysis. This will compare the costs with benefits and profits. Analysis regarding the effects of the management change must be studied. whether it has proved to be more beneficial or not? Has it helped in the strategic goals of the company? Evaluation means that you will be extracting results from the data researched. Hence this part of RAP provides actual value and meaning to your research and RAP. All findings should be presented in a good form with the help of graphs, pie charts, tables etc. Conclusions must be made based on your research work. Recommendations to the selected company may be made but it is not very necessary. It is of utmost importance that word count must be kept in mind. If you exceed it in any way, then the examiner will not mark the conclusions resulting in failure.  4500 words must be written to ensure a detailed analysis.

Every student takes his approach regarding the given topic, and this is only a very broad version of what can be done. Whatever approach is taken, the guidance of the project mentor is needed every step of the way to pass RAP with good grades.

Suggested Approach for SLS

The meetings with the mentor must be planned at the start of the RAP and a track of those meetings must be kept in a diary as it will help later on to write the SLS. The time required to conduct effective research needs to be calculated at the start and a timetable should be kept in place. The meeting notes can be used as evidence to demonstrate all of your learning while writing the RAP on topic 9. Self-reflection is important and must be documented. consulting the mentor on every step of the way can resolve all the potential and real problems of the students.

Sources of information

There are mainly two types of sources that can be used, primary and secondary.

Primary sources are the data that you collect on your own and it is considered first-hand. This can be done by conducting interviews, surveys or having participants fill in questionnaires. In this topic, students are required to gather information directly from the management which will qualify as a primary source of information. Internally generated information will give you a better insight. You may be able to better evaluate the impact by having internal information.

Secondary information on the other hand refers to already available and published information. Using it to your own advantage by checking the authenticity of these sources can be very beneficial for the RAP.  All other sources of information such as online websites, journals, and articles are considered secondary sources of information. For using a secondary source, the reliability must be checked, and then the information should be put in the RAP. Information in the RAP must be through a relevant source and its content should also be relevant to the topic. The sources of information play a crucial role in producing a good RAP that is based on facts and figures. If reliable sources are not found, then a student must consider choosing a different topic for which information is more easily available.