Understanding factors and triggers for change

Covering Assessment Criterion 3.1 of the Level 3 unit 3CO01 – Business, Culture and Change in Context, this video examines why organisations are compelled to change and how those pressures manifest in practice. The discussion centres on the distinction between externally driven and internally driven change, with competition and technological advancement positioned as the two most prominent external forces. The video addresses how globalisation and digital platforms have altered the competitive landscape, and how the race for talent shapes decisions around reward, culture and development programmes.

The video also works through three conceptual lenses used to characterise different kinds of environmental instability: turbulence, discontinuity and chaos. Each represents a different degree and pattern of unpredictability in the business environment, and the 2020 pandemic is referenced as a concrete illustration of conditions associated with chaos. Alongside these external triggers, the video covers process-driven change — the kind that originates from within an organisation through mechanisms such as performance reviews, audits and benchmarking — and considers how this internally generated variety of change differs in character from responses to outside disruption.

The final portion of the video brings these triggers together in the context of planning and managing change, which sits at the heart of AC 3.1. Automation and artificial intelligence are named as specific technological forces that are reshaping how organisations operate and deliver value, and the video considers both the opportunities and the complications — including employee anxiety and investment demands — that accompany them. The role of people professionals in anticipating and responding to these varied triggers, rather than reacting to change only after it arrives, runs throughout the discussion.