2016 Theses Doctoral

Change Leader Behavioral Inventory: Development and Validation of an Assessment Instrument

Stilwell, Rebecca A.

The increased rate of change in organizations, and a failure rate up to 70% (Kotter, 1990; Higgs & Rowland, 2000; Pasmore, 2011), has led to an increase in research concerning organizational change. However, the literature still has yet to identify the ideal set of change implementation strategies. While leadership is argued to be an essential element to successful change the research on the specific behaviors and skills needed of change leaders is still in development (Beer & Walton, 1987). More investigation needs to be done concerning the identification and measurement of behaviors and skills related to successful organizational change. The current study contributes to this area in the literature. The aim was to develop and validate an instrument, the Change Leader Behavioral Inventory. The instrument identifies distinct behavioral dimensions associated with organizational change and the relationships among them. The goal was to provide a tool for individuals who lead change to receive feedback from their direct reports on how well they perform change related behaviors during a change initiative. The feedback will be beneficial to guide the professional development of change leaders.
In order to develop the Change Leader Behavioral Inventory many areas of the change literature were considered. The psychometric validation of the Change Leader Behavioral Inventory was based on a modified version of Hinkin’s (1998) framework for instrument validation. The instrument was administered in an online survey to employed individuals who had been through organizational change. The analysis of the survey responses (N = 405) provided support for the hypothesized model which consisted of seven categories of change. There was also support for the addition of another dimension to the instrument, resulting in an eight-factor model which will be used for future research. The results and implications for future research and practice will be discussed.