We present a four-phase organizational change model formulated and refined based on qualitative analysis of in-depth, structured interviews with managers and upper-level executives sampled from five organizations from two different industries. These managers were involved in implementing within their respective organizations, different planned changes. Our model illustrates how strategic actions, personnel involvement, and the employees’ collective self-concept evolves through four states of the organizational change process labeled: awareness, initiating, emergent, and institutionalized. We capture the core actions and mechanisms within each phase of the change process that characterize these states and their role in motivating an organization’s members to move from one state to another. Our focus on how a new collective self-concept emerges among organizational members during the change process offers an important perspective contribution to explaining planned organizational change. Implications for organizational research on change management and applications of this work are discussed.
