ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on efforts to bring about major changes in the way that organization function. These efforts, which involve altering many facets of organization including structures, policies, procedures, technologies, role design, and cultural patterns, are increasingly common as organizations adapt to accelerating rates of change in markets, technologies, and competitive pressures. The chapter addresses the relationship between the levels of toxicity produced and the conditions surrounding change efforts. Since management practices in general, and change efforts in particular, entail significant aggression, the defences employed against the remorse and guilt experienced in the depressive position is an important variable in understanding organizational dynamics. The chapter provides that the case vignettes illustrate severely disturbed efforts to bring about major change in organizations. It explores issues of change management from a systems psychodynamic perspective and considers the reciprocal impact of psychic and systemic factors on the ability of organizations to implement new approaches.
