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Continuous learning has been referred to as an integral phenomenon of learning organization. While a range of studies have associated continuous learning with employee performance; understanding of this relationship remains underdeveloped in the context of mergers and acquisitions. The present study investigates the relationship among continuous learning, change-efficacy and contextual performance of employees working with a recently merged bank and further explores the mediating role of employees' change-efficacy in relationship between continuous learning and contextual performance of employees.

A research model with underlying hypothesis is proposed by drawing upon the theory of transformative learning, social cognitive theory and theory of change management. Cross-sectional data was collected from bank employees undergoing integration in a post-merger phase.

The findings of the study suggest that continuous learning influences employees' change-efficacy and change-efficacy significantly mediates the relationship between continuous learning and contextual performance of employees. The empirical association drawn from the variables has been recognized by extant research as a brighter manifestation of learning organizations.

The research is undertaken in a large Indian bank and the analysis is based on cross-sectional data which may not be generalized across a broader range of sectors and international environment.

The findings of the study have a potential to help HR practitioners to utilize continuous learning in change management by enhancing contextual performance of employees post-mergers and acquisitions.

The study is one of its kinds in a post-merger setup which captures the outcomes of continuous learning by either confirming or extending the existing theories.

Considers the relationship between the types of targets or benchmarks used and reward structures adopted in two contrasting performance improvement strategies – continuous improvement and radical change. Hypothesises that the process of target setting and the reward structures adopted will be different between the two strategies. The propositions are that organisations involved in continuous improvement of a process will base their performance targets on past performance and internal benchmarking, arrived at through consultation and with a mixture of financial and non‐financial rewards for achieving targets. For processes involving radical change, targets will be based on external benchmarks imposed by senior management, with financial rewards for their achievement. The findings from a semi‐structured questionnaire conducted in 40 UK service organisations reveal that most continuous improvement targets were based on past performance and that processes undergoing radical change made limited use of external benchmarks. In the majority of cases, targets were imposed by managers without consultation, with rewards linked to theachievement of those targets. Financial rewards, particularly financial bonuses, predominated in both improvement strategies. The implications are that the potential benefits of adopting process changes are being constrained. In continuous improvement the lack of participation in target setting could be undermining the team‐based empowerment philosophy of the strategy. The aim of radical change is to achieve a paradigm shift involving revolutionary rather than evolutionary change which is less likely to be fulfilled with targets based on past performance.

Much has been theorized about what change strategies to employ given particular types of organizational change. Organizational theorists have linked participative strategies with culture change, strategies based on logic and reason with new technology implementations, and power strategies with the introduction of new laws and legislation. However, to what degree are these suggested recommendations carried out in organizations? In this paper, we explored the extent to which change recipients perceive the use of theorist recommended strategies when undergoing specific types of organizational changes. Using survey research (N = 88), we investigated the perceived relationship between two components of change: change content and change strategy. The results partially follow the ideals proposed by previous theorists, but they also highlight a significant relationship between power-coercive strategies and episodic change events that is contrary to those ideals. For practitioners, our findings draw attention to the connection between change content and change strategy in the hope of offering some guidance to those change agents who must determine how to lead a particular change initiative. Additionally, since our investigation is original and exploratory, we incite future research aimed at understanding the congruency between change content and change strategy formulation.

Change receptivity is recognised as an important factor in successfully implementing organizational change strategies. The purpose of this paper is to examine the process of change in the initial stages of a change agenda within a public sector organization and analyze the communication of change. It traces the resultant receptivity to organizational change. The paper investigates whether organizational change communication is a crucial element in employees' receptivity to change.

A case study design is employed and the multiple methods employed include surveys, focus groups, archival data and participant observation.

The findings indicate that the initial change communication is problematic. The employees respond to a lack of instrumental change communication with a constructivist communication approach in order to manage the implications of continuous change.

This research provides an overview of the first 100 days of change in a public sector organization only, and so the limitations of single case studies apply. However, the close investigation of this phase provides further research directions to be addressed.

The findings suggest managers need to align employees' expectations of the change communication with understanding of the change goal.

The primary value of the paper is in using a communicative lens to study the change process.

Facilitation activities support implementation of evidence-based interventions within healthcare organizations. Few studies have attempted to understand how facilitation activities are performed to promote the uptake of evidence-based interventions in hospitals from resource-poor countries during crises such as pandemics. This paper aims to explore facilitation activities by infection prevention and control (IPC) professionals in 16 hospitals from 9 states in Brazil during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Primary and secondary data were collected between March and December 2020. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 IPC professionals in Brazilian hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. Public and internal documents were used for data triangulation. The data were analyzed through thematic analysis technique.

Building on the change response theory, this study explores the facilitation activities from the cognitive, behavioral and affective aspects. The facilitation activities are grouped in three overarching dimensions: (1) creating and sustaining legitimacy to continuous and rapid changes, (2) fostering capabilities for continuous changes and (3) accelerating individual commitment.

During crises such as pandemics, facilitation activities by IPC professionals need to embrace all the cognitive, behavioral and affective aspects to stimulate positive attitudes of frontline workers toward continuous and urgent changes.

This study provides unique and timely empirical evidence on the facilitation activities that support the implementation of evidence-based interventions by IPC professionals during crises in hospitals in a resource-poor country.

In this chapter, the authors consider the role of time for research in occupational stress and well-being. First, temporal issues in studying occupational health longitudinally, focusing in particular on the role of time lags and their implications for observed results (e.g., effect detectability), analyses (e.g., handling unequal durations between measurement occasions), and interpretation (e.g., result generalizability, theoretical revision) were discussed. Then, time-based assumptions when modeling lagged effects in occupational health research, providing a focused review of how research has handled (or ignored) these assumptions in the past, and the relative benefits and drawbacks of these approaches were discussed. Finally, recommendations for readers, an accessible tutorial (including example data and code), and discussion of a new structural equation modeling technique, continuous time structural equation modeling, that can “handle” time in longitudinal studies of occupational health were provided.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the developmental needs of managers operating in continuous change contexts. Special attention is drawn to communicative competences through the use of Kent and Taylor's five principles of dialogic communication. A case study is used to illustrate the communicative challenges in creating a learning organization.

The research uses longitudinal case study methodology and provides details on the multiple methods used, specifically: participant observation, focus groups, and document analysis.

Findings suggest that existing management development literature needs to reconceptualise change communication as communication during change, rather than to communicate the change. In so doing attention is drawn to the power of communicative expectations and communicative competence. Successful transformation to a learning organization is hampered by a misalignment of the employee's communicative expectations and management delivery of change communication.

Whilst single case studies can be criticized for a lack of generalisability, the use of multiple methods and a longitudinal study bolsters the rigor and validity of this study. Management development needs were not formally addressed in this case study, and thus it is difficult to offer prescriptive statements to improving communicative competences.

The field study provided ample opportunity to identify change management development needs, and reflect on how to bolster an often difficult area of change management, communication during change.

This research provides in‐depth empirical data from an organization attempting to transform to a learning organization. In prior studies the communicative theoretical framework is rarely tested, and this paper provides evidence of the communicative theoretical applicability. This contribution is extended to management development needs.

The literature on change is characterized by an opposite, dichotomist view on the subject. Many authors describe only one or some of these characteristics and attribute a normative value to it. When discussing one of these attributes they will make a deviating classification in the way in which change arises. Although types and attributes of change are largely studied in the change literature, there is no general agreement on the attributes that can best describe the different types of change. The purpose of this chapter is to try to consolidate the vast literature on the types and attributes of change in order to find a more homogeneous set of attributes.

From an extensive literature research on change articles and books from 1970 onward, eight dimensions of change attributes were found that are able to describe the characteristics of a change in a dynamic way.

In order to overcome the dichotomist view, organizational change is approached not as a process changing a system but as a system by itself. Although the borders between the change system and the system to be changed are not always easy to perceive, this view seems to create a richer picture on change. A systems approach allows to define the attributes of change in a holistic way that captures the always paradoxical state change is in.

Organizational agility is becoming a critical component of organization development and change due to the increasingly continuous and iterative nature of change. This explanatory mixed methods study demonstrates the effect of collective thriving on change agility and positions collective thriving as a psychological state that contributes to organization agility. Attunement is hypothesized to be a point of leverage to increase the state of collective thriving and was found to moderate the relationship between collective thriving and change agility. The qualitative study investigates characteristics of high- and low-thriving teams and furthers the understanding of collective thriving and change agility.

The purpose of this study is to explore the link between continuous improvement (CI) and dynamic actor associations through a case of lean thinking implementation in healthcare.

The paper follows the qualitative case study strategy. Data were collected by interviewing (tape‐recording) managers and staff, analysing relevant written project material, and conducting non‐participant observations.

The findings suggest that the implementation of CI depends on the emergence of a “favouring” network from the dynamic associations between heterogeneous entities. This network aims at facilitating change leadership, establishing behaviour/culture prone to CI, and constructing a behaviour non‐resistant to CI needed for creating competencies for the continuous roll‐outs of such changes. Continuous translation is the underlying mechanism for establishing the favouring network.

The paper addresses the literature gap regarding the role of dynamic actor associations in shaping CI in a public sector context. It does not aim at generalising the results of the case study; it informs current theory by revealing that the success of CI deployment depends on the emergence of a CI‐favouring network, which will continuously transform opposing views into accepting CI.