Management of strategic change at the food and agriculture Organisation of the United Nations Somalia office

Abstract

Strategic change management today has become an important aspect in every organization universally and is considered one of the best practices as there is no constant organization. Managing strategic change differs from one organization to another because of differences in context and the people involved in the change. While the process of developing a competitive strategy is an analytical one requiring carefully appraisal of the environment vis-à-vis the internal capabilities of the organization, the process of managing the expected strategic change is somewhat different. Managing strategic change is dependent largely on how the leadership of an organization communicates, motivates and gets buy in from staff to carry out the required change. The study undertook to establish the management of strategic change practices undertaken at FAO Somalia in Nairobi Kenya. The objective of the study was to establish the approaches to managing change as adopted by FAO Somalia Office and also to determine the challenges of managing change at FAO Somalia Office. The study was carried out through a case study design where the unit of study was sought to find out the management of strategic change practices at FAO Somalia. The study made use of the primary data which was qualitative in nature. Primary data collection was done through interviewing members of top management at FAO Somalia. The respondents of the study were sixteen (16) managers drawn from various departments. They included the head of sectors from: Livestock, Fisheries, FSNAU, SWALIM and Head of Administration. Middle level managers interviewed included; Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E), Cash Based Interventions (CBI) and Human Resources. The researcher managed to interview four (4) of the selected five (5) employees. The study established that FAO Somalia has an elaborate change management process and has ensured that its leaders and staff accept change as business as usual. The study showed management of strategic change practices in FAO Somalia by reviewing the approaches to managing change adopted by FAO and to determine the challenges of managing change at FAO. Managers and employees’ involvement, training, workshops, seminars are some of the change management practices that have been instrumental in steering change. The top down communication approach proved very important to ensuring strategic change is properly communicated to all levels of employees and management and it proved to be quite effective providing quick and speedy implementation. FAO Somalia is capable of managing change even with the ever volatile operating environment inside Somalia where cases of sporadic instability hampers delivery of services to the beneficiaries. Finally the study draws conclusion that FAO Somalia is capable of managing change even with the ever volatile operating environment inside Somalia where cases of sporadic instability hampers delivery of services to the beneficiaries but FAO is able to adapt to the ever changing environment and recommendation that would contribute to high success in change management. In addition the paper highlights areas for further research related to change management.