Is remembered change useful?

Abstract

Measures of change are used for two main purposes in OD: (a) estimating the amount of change that occurred from an OD intervention (e.g. mean differences); and/or (b) assessing relationships between two or more variables as part of hypothesis testing (e.g. correlations). In this study we primarily focus on the hypothesis testing purpose for measuring change, although we will discuss the implications for estimating the amount of change.

We focus on two alternative measures of the change in job satisfaction over time: (a) Longitudinal Change; and (b) Remembered Change. These two measures of change are used as predictors of organizational commitment and the number of labor grievances filed by individuals. Our results show that combining both measures of job satisfaction change together explains more variance than either measure alone. We conclude by discussing the meaning of change and the implications of these results for both OD practice and research.

Citation

Wanous, J.P. and Reichers, A.E. (2003), "Is remembered change useful?", Research in Organizational Change and Development (Research in Organizational Change and Development, Vol. 14), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 283-309. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0897-3016(03)14086-4