Time to Change: Temporal Shifts as Enablers of Organizational Change

In this paper, we integrate findings from three field studies of technology intensive organizations to explore the process through which change occurred. In each case, problems were well recognized but had become entrenched and had failed to generate change. Across the three sites, organizational change occurred only after some event altered the accustomed daily rhythms of work, and thus changed the way people experienced time. This finding suggests that temporal shifts—changes in a collective's experience of time—can help to facilitate organizational change. Specifically, we suggest that temporal shifts enable change in four ways: (1) by creating a trigger for change, (2) by providing resources needed for change, (3) by acting as a coordinating mechanism, and (4) by serving as a credible symbol of the need to change. {Time and Timing; Organizational Change; Punctuated Change; Qualitative Methodology) Introduction It is well accepted that the timing of events can shape the significance of the events themselves. McGrath et al. (1984), Ancona and Chong (1996), Barley (1988), Gersick (1988), Eisenhardt and Brown (1998) and others have all demonstrated the enormous power of time and timing to structure organizational life. The timing of events has been found to enforce routines, focus energies and attention, shape how people approach their tasks, and give meaning to actions and events. Albert (1995) showed that military policy and action in the Persian Gulf War were heavily influenced by the limited time window available to stage an attack. At a micro level. Van de Ven and Polley (1992) describe how "red flag" problems typically go unrecognized when they occur very early in a new technical project, but are attended to, at a much higher cost, in later stages. At a practical level, in many industries a promising new product becomes a mere alsoran if it is introduced just days after a competitor's offering. In this paper, we explore the idea that the opposite is also true: In many cases, events shape time itself. We flnd that many unusual events are not only surprising in content, but they also alter entrenched organizational rhythms. Such rhythm-changing events, in tum, can change actors' experience of time. That is, such events can change actors' perceptions of time pressures and time horizons, their sense of competing time demands, their sense of control over time and, ultimately, the way they understand time. Furthermore, our data suggest that this ability of events to alter the experience of time can help 1047-7039/02/1305/0583/$05.0