Organizational Change Content, Process, and Context: A Simultaneous Analysis of Employee Reactions

Abstract This study examines the relationship between three attributes of organizational change (that is, content, process, and context) in a Fortune 500 telecommunications firm. While researchers acknowledge the importance of the three attributions of organizational change, there is sparse empirical evidence of the systematic and simultaneous assessment of these attributes in organizational change efforts. The investigation undertaken in this study follows a design encompassing content, process, context and outcome variables. Results, utilizing quantitative and qualitative data, reveal that organizational change (an employee outcome variable) is strongly related to the impact of the change on employees (a content variable) and organizational communication media (a process variable). Furthermore, the results of this study indicate that the extent to which employees perceive an organizational change as justified is influenced by their perceived organizational support (an organizational context variable). Implications for practitioners and future research are offered. Keywords: Organizational changechange justificationimpact of changeorganizational communicationperceived organizational supportchange contentchange processchange context