Perceiving individual and organizational change: the role of attitudes, values, power and organizational capacity

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the individual and organizational changes perceived by the employees of a public sector organization that suffered interventions for four years. The study had three stages: measurement of organizational characteristics prior to the interventions using questionnaires; investigation of the objectives of a specific intervention and the demand for change mentioned by the organization's employees in order to construct a tool to evaluate the perceived change; and the investigation of the factors that influenced the perception of individual and organizational change. The factors that foretold the perception of organizational changes were organizational characteristics, taken as cultural variables - organizational values and power configurations (measured before and after the intervention); organizational characteristics that were change facilitators; and individual variables, such as attitudes in the face of organizational change (measured after the intervention). The criterion or dependent variable for the study was the perception of organizational and individual change. Hierarchical regressions were used to analyze the relations postulated in the study. The results indicated that the organizational values of autonomy and egalitarianism and the attitudes of acceptance and fear were the most frequent predictors of the perceived changes.