'Do labels matter when implementing change? Implications of labelling an academic as a champion − results from a case study' by Moira Cordiner, Sharon Thomas and Wendy Green in (2018) 43(3)
Studies in Higher Education 484-499 comments
Organisational change literature is littered with labels for those who instigate, support, resist, or implement change. Absent is research into the perspectives of those who are given these labels. This paper reports findings from a literature search, journal scan and a case study of an Australian university where change agents were labelled ‘School Champions’. Data analysis of the authors suggests that labels do matter, not only to change agents, but also other academics who interacted with them such as Associate Deans. The authors found that, because a label implies an identity, when the choice of labels is unexamined, unintended consequences can result. These include ridicule, derision, and serious or light-hearted teasing, plus dismissive and cynical attitudes towards senior management’s endorsement of buzz words as labels. The authors suggest strategies to ensure that a label or identity badge suits academe, has minimal potential to cause emotional or professional harm, and is embraced rather than renounced.
The authors argue
There are numerous labels for those involved in organisational change with some having more longevity than others. For example, change agent and champion appeared in the literature over 60 years ago and remain current; while terms such as change maker arose in the early 1990s (Mabey and Mayon-White 1993), and change artist in 2012 (Jurow and Ruben 2012). Many of these labels are not mutually exclusive. Their definitions are not agreed upon and they are used inconsistently within different disciplines. These discrepancies mean that making a valid comparison of project outcomes extremely challenging. Absent from the literature is research into the perspectives of those who are given one of these labels. Do labels matter when implementing change? We answer this question by interpreting a dataset from a larger case study investigating the use of the distributive leadership model to implement change in an Australian university. The concept of rhetoric is used to analyse the mixed message responses of interviewees beyond the literal level (Billig 1987).
Our findings reveal that the impact of a label – how those labelled felt about it and how their peers reacted to it − has been neglected in the literature and underestimated. We contend that the choice of labels for change agents requires careful and sensitive consideration of the context, and the identity badge (Grant, Berg, and Cable 2014) implied by the label, so that it empowers rather than inadvertently disempowers or disaffects. Thus this choice has implications extending well beyond uncritical adoption of the latest management discourse buzz word as a label, in an attempt to appear current in the field of organisational change.
