Planned Organizational Change: Toward Grounded Theory

Abstract

Distinctions between "logico-deductive" and "grounded" theory capture a range of critical problems facing students and practitioners of planned organizational change. The development and application of grounded theories is likely to improve the quality of findings obtained from given change efforts. Among available research strategies retrospective case analysis-together with procedures for the continuous coding and comparison of case materials -appears to have considerable potential as a method for generating grounded theories of planned change. In this paper retrospective case analysis is applied to a sample of 67 successful and unsuccessful change efforts. Results of bivariate analysis suggest that only three out of eleven leading hypotheses about the conditions of successful change efforts (viz., those involving collaborative modes of intervention, participative change-agent orientations, and strategies emphasizing high levels of participation) are weakly to moderately supported by available evidence. While findings must be approached cautiously, the further development and application of retrospective case analysis is likely to contribute to grounded theory and, thus, to the alleviation of present gaps between theory and practice.