Conceptualizing a Framework: A Critical Review of the Development of Change Management Theories

Abstract

Although approaches to manage change dated back to as early as human history, managing effective change is still the topic of today’s debates. One of the undeniable facts about this is that change per se keeps changing, and so does its management methodology. While this fact comes, on the one hand, to validate the reason why none of the early theories stands relevant across time, it, on the other hand, proofs that change methodology is certainly fluid, giving no room for an approach to really last. An effective change is achievable [not] by a prescription, but by a thorough consolidation of the various aspects relevant to change. This paper aims therefore at identifying those [managerial] aspects of change, in hope that they could be used to construct a common base to deal with change. To that end, relevant change management hypotheses, approaches, theories dated back to the 50s are taken for thorough reviews. Results from this digest confirm that to manage change, one must factor in change type, change process, and change elements, and yet, to manage it effectively, one must go further to ensure that all the above factors work well together as they are all symbiotically related.