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The emphasis throughout this series of articles has been on drawing comprehension, rather than on drawing production, it being felt that this is the logical order of priority for the majority of students in technical education. This most certainly is the case for those following the Mechanical Engineering Craft Practice Course, 193. Whilst there is no requirement for the ability to produce a formal drawing, the student is required to produce sketches, but little or no attention appears to be paid to the ‘reading’ and comprehension of a drawing.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the success factors in a large organization that contributed to the success of organizational transformation (OT) through business diversification using a complex adaptive systems (CAS) framework. This assessment is done to determine how well the CAS framework can explain the success factors that contribute to the success of large-scale organizational change in complex organizations. If the CAS framework is capable of explaining the organizational factors that lead to the success of change implementation, the managers can employ this framework to increase the likelihood of success while implementing change.

This study uses qualitative research methodology. The data were collected from the case study organization (CSO) through 40 in-depth semi-structured interviews and analyzed using thematic deductive analysis approach.

The CAS framework explains the success factors that contribute to the success of OT through business diversification.

This paper provides a comprehensive guide for change implementation by combining the insights from the CAS framework with identified success factors (for change implementation) from the case organization.

The originality of this paper lies in extending the principles of existing change models, for successful change implementation by using the CAS framework. The prescribed change models and the CAS framework/complexity theory are two distinct sets of literature; this paper successfully merges the two to develop a comprehensive set of guidelines for change implementation. By doing so, this paper highlights the fact that alternative, non-linear, change approaches, instead of conventional multistep change models, can be effective in implementing large-scale organizational change successfully given the complexities of current organizational environments.

This paper seeks to provide guidance on specific ways by which organizations can overcome resistance by matching readiness strategies with forms of resistance.

The paper summarizes literature on resistance to change and readiness to change, leading to the development of specific recommendations for reducing resistance through specific readiness strategies.

Resistance, though common, may be more effectively managed if specific readiness strategies are matched with requisite sources of resistance.

The paper provides guidance on addressing primary sources of resistance by matching them with specific elements proposed by Armenakis et al. that lead to readiness for change.

The synthesis of literature related to creating readiness for change and resistance to change leads to a resistance to change typology, including three domains. While these domains have been addressed in change literature, the paper further expands on these domains by offering potential sources of resistances within each domain. This should lead to future research that explores these domains and sources within each domain in greater depth.

A slew of conventional change models and theories appear in the extant change literature. Despite being theoretically sound, these a priori structured approaches to organizational change management have questionable application given the rapidly changing business environments. Novel approaches, offering greater flexibility to fast changing external conditions, may offer superior models to organizational change and organizational transformation (OT) in particular. In this paper, the application of a complex adaptive system (CAS) framework, from complexity theory (CT), for managing OT is assessed theoretically.

A conceptual paper.

A review of the extant change literature suggests that current approaches and models for organizational change are limited in their ability to reflect OT responses to today's highly dynamic external environments. New models are required to inform and guide organizations. A new model, i.e. CAS framework, is deemed suitable to guide the OT implementation.

This paper critically analyses different approaches to change management, consolidates CAS framework, reviews its applications in the field of management and presents a case for CAS's application for the management of OT.