Organizational Learning As a By-product of Justifications for Change

Abstract

In this article, we develop and test a model that relates change management's justifications for organizational change to organizational learning. The main argument is as follows: by justifying change in specific ways, change managers instigate thought processes that generate new insights for change recipients (cognitive learning). Also, provision of justifications affects motivation, which in turn is hypothesized to foster learning. The hypotheses are tested using a multi-organization, multichange dataset from a sample of Norwegian work organizations. Empirically, a distinction is made between three types of learning outcomes: generative learning, distributive learning and process learning, i.e. the generation and dissemination of change relevant knowledge. Findings show that four types of justifications are positively related to learning. Some support was found for the hypothesis that the effect of justification is mediated by attitudes towards change and the change process (motivational path).

Keywords:

• Naturalistic learning
• organizational change
• justifications for change

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank two anonymous reviewers of this journal for their constructive comments to an earlier version of this article. We also thank participants at the ECKM08 for their comments to a preliminary version of the article.