Exploring Change Resistance in Law Firms

Introduction

In-depth interviews were used for data collection in this study. The interview guide has five sections all aiming to collect different type of information from the study respondents. These sections were personal information, change management, nature of the law firms, use of knowledge management systems in legal profession, and implementation of information systems in the company. Have collected information in these areas, the researcher would be able to answer the researcher questions, which revolved around the need for implementing new technology in law firms, existence of change resistance in law firms, factors influencing change resistance in law firms, and approaches that can be adopted to promote change acceptance in law firms. This chapter will present and analyse that information that was collected from the study respondents. Data was collected from 55 participants.

Personal Information

Table 1 contains the personal information captured from the respondents. The respondents were asked of their age, gender, position they occupied in the organisation, and the duration for which they had worked at the organisation. From the scores filled in the table, 7 of the respondents were aged between 18 and 24 years, 22 respondents were aged between 25 and 34 years, 19 respondents were aged between 35 and 44 years, 5 respondents were aged between 45 and 54 years, while the remaining 2 respondents were aged 50 years and above. From these results, we can infer that most of the respondents (40.1%) were aged between 25 and 34 years followed by 35.4% that were aged between 35 and 44 years. Table 1 also shows that 24 of the respondents were male while the remaining 31 were female. Additionally, it is evident that of the 55 respondents, 15 held managerial positions while the remaining 40 were ordinary employees is the company. Further, the scores in the table reveal that 2 of the respondents has worked with the company for 0 to 12 months, 17 respondents has worked with the company for 1 to 3 years, 21 respondents had worked with the company for between 4 and 6 years, 12 study participants has worked with the company for between 7 and 9 years, while the remaining 3 had been in the company for 10 years and above. Therefore, we can conclude that most of the study participants were female, most of the study respondents (72.7%) were ordinary employees, and most of the study participants (38.2%) had been in the organisation for between 4 and 6 years. This shows that Foot Anstey employees are spread across different demographics defined by age, gender, and experience.

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Change Management

These section of the interview guide comprised various questions all aimed at exploring the extent to which law firms face change and the response these organisations as well as their employees give. Given the interviews were held with both employees and managers, the questions were asked on the set of respondent that appeared more knowledgeable to answer. For example, managers would be asked of their role in facilitating change but this would not be asked to the employees. This section has 10 questions and the responses obtained are presented and analysed below.

Frequency of change in law firms

This question was asked to both the employees and managers. On a scale of 1 to 4, the respondents were to indicate the extent to which they encountered change in their profession. The figure below summarises the results.

In figure 1 above, 4% indicated that the experience change very often, 38% indicated they experience change often, 56% of the respondents indicated they rarely experience change, while the remaining 2% indicated they do not experience change at all. The researcher was concerned how some of the respondents had not experienced any sort of change in the organisation. In response, the respondent indicated that the legal profession is surrounded by changes but that organisation was active in shielding the employees and therefore as an employee who had been in the organisation for less than I year, this respondent has not experienced any change. Another respondent who was also an employee indicated that changes were there but if the management resist them, then they do not affect employees and as a result, employees experience very few changes or none at all. This was consistent with a statement given by one of the managers who indicated that the organisation is faced with many changes but there are various factors the management has to consider before accepting or resisting change and in most cases, changes are resisted. Therefore, it can be concluded that even if there are many changes around the legal profession, Foot Anstey rarely experience change at the organisation or individual level.

Manager’s Role in facilitating Change

This question was only asked to respondents that held managerial positions in the organisation. After analysing the information collected from the 15 managers, the researcher identified that managers played two roles in facilitating change in the company. First, managers felt responsible for evaluating if there was need for the change and second, managers felt responsible for preparing employees for change. In their first role, one of the respondents indicated that a cost-benefit analysis must be conducted to ensure the change is profitable to the organisation. In this case, if the cost is higher than the benefits, then the managerial team must resist the change but if the benefits outweigh the risks, then the management should implement the change. Once the change is deemed beneficial to the organisation, then the manager has a role of preparing employees for the change. In preparing employees for change, the researcher identified five actions that managers have to take to ensure employees accept the change. First, the manager should clearly communicate information about the change to the employees. Here, one of the respondents indicated that the manager must convince the employees the change is beneficial to the organisation in order for the employees to see the need for implementing the change. Second, the manager should demonstrate personal support to implement the change: one of the respondents indicated that managers must act as role models for the employees to emulate. Third, managers must train employees aiming at equipping them with necessary skills while preparing employees for change. Fourth, managers must create an environment in which the change can be successfully implemented. One of the respondents indicated that in such an environment, employees must feel supported to work through the change. Fifth, managers should act as resistance managers, which implies that a manager must identify resistance and control it to ensure employees remain committed to the change.

Is it easy for you to accept change?

This question was asked to both the managers and employees. The figure below scores the responses.

From figure two, it is evident that 85% of the respondents indicated it is not easy for them to accept change while only 15% indicated it is easy for them to accept change. Given these are the same employees and managers expected to manage change in the organisation; we can conclude that change resistance at Foo Anstey is high. This led to the following question that explored the factors that influenced the respondents to resist change the table below captures the reasons for change resistance.

The Perceived Cost of Switching

The researcher established that the switching cost was the most common reason the organisation and its employees resisted change. The analysis show that Foot Anstey experiences high switching cost in the company context as well as at the individual level. At the organisational level, one of the managers indicated that the company not only has to purchase the new equipment but also pay for the installation cost, train employees on how to handle the new equipment, and in some instances hire new employees with advanced skills. Another manager indicated that the company has to spend in ensuring employees remain committed to implementing the change rest the implementation fails. At the employee level, several costs were outlined including more time and energy required, employees have to acquire new skills, fear of work overload before fully switching, increased stress, reduction in job satisfaction, loss of power and control, and increased job insecurity among others. Therefore, the study results reveal Foot Anstey experiences high switching cost, which hinders change acceptance.

Other factors influencing change resistance

Among the questions the researcher asked was whether the respondents have experienced fear of being excluded from the group for voicing different opinions. Most of the respondents indicated that fear of voicing different opinions is common in that one always want to be like those airing similar opinions. One of the respondents indicated, “I don’t want to be the different one and forever be blamed by colleagues for disrupting their work routine.” Therefore, the respondents indicated that they air their opinions based on the views of the majority. Hence, we can decipher than in-groups are a factor promoting change resistance in Foot Anstey. The researcher also explored the extent to which employees at Foot Anstey were willing to share their ideas. The respondents indicated that in most instances, employees are hesitant to share ideas especially when they do not want a certain change implemented. One of the respondents indicated, “you just have to conform to the wishes of many and keep personal ideas to self. All the same, it makes no difference sharing your idea when all the others are of contrary opinion. No one listens.” The researcher also established that the company does not have defined metrics of measuring the effectiveness of change, which makes it hard for the management to communicate the need for change to employees. Additionally, the respondents indicated that the company does not have a way of differentiating between those people willing to implement change from those resisting change and in some instances changes are implemented when a good number of the employees struggle with the change. The result is failure in implementing the change.

Nature of Change management in Law Firms

In this section, the participants (both managers and employees) were supposed to respond to the following statements:

Law firms are profitable business, so the sense of change urgency is limited.

Yes – 51

No – 4

Successful change depends on dominant personalities/ individuals working in your company. (can you describe those individuals)

Yes – 46

No – 9

The respondents that believed that change implementation was dependent on dominant personalities in the organisation were expected to list some of these persons. Among the identified persons were leaders, supervisors, head of departments, managers, and all senior staff. The respondents indicated that these individuals have power and authority and therefore if they believed in the change, they had the power to ensure it was successfully implemented in the organisation. From this perspective, we can conclude that leaders have a significant role in facilitating successful change implementation.

Change is imposed to particular departments without receiving compliance from employees.

Yes – 29

No – 26

There is a little diversity within law sector, so it is difficult to facilitate change.

Yes – 46

No – 9

There is no mutual trust between the lawyers as the sector demands high competitiveness (billable hours targets, promotions / partnering based on delivered profit)

Yes – 51

No – 4

From the scores in this section, it is evident that professionals in legal firms do not see the need for change as they already perceive legal firms to be profitable. Second, it is evident that leadership is essential in successful change management in legal firms. Third, it is evident that imposing change on employees in the legal sector could help promote change acceptance, which underscores the need for bureaucratic leadership in legal firms. The study results also show that there is little diversity in legal firms, which makes change management very difficult. When employees share similar ideas, it is difficult for others to voice different opinions, which implies there is no one to challenge lawyers on the need for change. Finally, the study results reveal that there is no mutual trust between lawyers as each seeks to build his/her personal profile in an attempt of remaining competitive. This implies that lawyers would see no need for IT systems that would bring the need for knowledge sharing.

Knowledge Management Systems

In this section, the researcher was interested in exploring the need for knowledge management systems in legal firms as well as their acceptance. The findings are scored below.

Do you see need of nurturing a culture of knowledge sharing?

From the figure above, 93% of the participants indicated they saw no need of creating a culture of knowledge sharing while only 7% saw the need of nurturing a knowledge sharing culture. Therefore, we can conclude that employees at Foot Anstey law firm do not see the need of creating and nurturing a culture of knowledge sharing.

Benefits of using knowledge management systems

In this question, 50 respondents indicated they did not see the benefits of using knowledge management systems in the firm while 5 respondents indicated that use of knowledge management systems could be beneficial to the firm. One of the managers who spoke in favour of knowledge management systems indicated that if employees in legal firms could embrace use of knowledge management systems, skills could be easily transferred from one person to the other, which would help hone the skills of each employee in the firm. As a result, every lawyer in the firm could be productive, which would increase organisational performance of the firm helping it realise a competitive advantage. On the other hand, an employee speaking against use of knowledge management systems in legal firms said they would require one to have new skills, use more time feeding data, and disrupt the normal work routine. Additionally, the employee indicated that his hard-earned skills would just be accessed by colleagues, which would increase the level of competition in the firm and as a result he could end up losing his clients. From his perspective, the respondent indicated use of knowledge management system could lower his income thus not beneficial to him in any way. With over 90% of the respondents speaking against the use of knowledge management systems in law firm, we can conclude that employees at Foot Anstey do not perceive knowledge management systems beneficial to their firm.

Frequency of coaching

Here, the researcher asked respondents how often they coached others and how long every session lasted. The researcher was also interested in establishing whether the study participants enjoyed coaching their colleagues. Most of the respondents (more than 80%) indicated they do not coach their colleagues unless very close friends who they give advice in cases they could be struggling with. Most of the respondents (over 90%) indicated that even if they were to coach their colleagues, they have tight schedules that limit the time spent in coaching: most of their time is spent with clients. Further, the study participants indicated they do not enjoy coaching as they have to share their skills, which markets them: to the lawyers, sharing your skills is lowering your demand in the job market. Another respondent indicated that she does not enjoy coaching as she is paid based on the number of hours spent with clients: coaching robs this time thus lowering income levels. From this information, we can conclude that coaching is not frequently in Foot Anstey and employees do not enjoy coaching each other.

Are knowledge sharing activities awarded?

All the respondents indicated that knowledge sharing activities are not awarded in Foot Anstey, which implies that the organisation does not reward its employees for sharing knowledge. One of the respondents indicated that the only reward she ever received was from her friend whom she had been offering private lessons but the organisation did nothing to reward her. This respondent indicated that failure of rewarding employee for sharing their skills with colleagues discourages knowledge sharing in the firm and limits knowledge sharing among employees with close relations only influenced by friendship bonds. Therefore, we can infer that failure of Foot Anstey to reward its employees for sharing knowledge is a major factor that discourages knowledge sharing in the firm.

Information Systems User Resistance

This section explored the reasons the study participants resisted implementation of information systems. The researcher categorised the reasons into three: system factors, organisation factors, and individual factors. The study results are presented below.

Types of user resistance

From the above table, the reasons employees ate Foot Anstey resist implementation of information systems can be categorised into system factors, organisational factors, and individual factors. System factors are comprised of the features of a system that make employees and the organisation willing to use it or not; for example, the easiness of operating the system, compatibility with existing systems, and the physical appearance of the system. Organisational factors are related to the organisation’s perception of the system and its credibility. The individual factors are based on the perception of the employees on how the system will disrupt their work routine and whether the system will make their work easier or harder. Even if system, organisation, and individual factors influenced IS user resistance at Foot Anstey, the respondents indicated that individual factors are the most significant in hindering IS implementation.

User Resistance Behaviour

Having established that employees are Foot Anstey resist implementation of information systems, the researcher was interested in exploring the behaviours that employees posit to show they are not interested in the change. The table below summarises the responses.

The study participants indicated that the management team and organisational leaders are at the core of ensuring successful IT systems implementation. The table below summarises the leadership styles and strategies the respondent felt could be effective at promoting IT systems implementation at Foot Anstey.

Foot Anstey uses the participative management style and some of the respondents indicated it could be among the factors promoting change resistance in that employees feel they have the same authority as their leaders. Such respondents indicated that a shift to directive or coercive leadership would promote change acceptance, in that such a leadership approach would give the leader more authority to oversee change implementation. However, other respondents indicated that participative leadership would also be effective in that it would involve employees in development of the system, which implies the needs of employees would be considered. From such respondents, such a system would have desirable features and be user-friendly, which would promote employee commitment to change. Therefore, we can conclude that mixing leadership and managerial styles would help in promoting change acceptance in Foot Anstey.