Grief and organisational change

Grief is an important, if underrated, element of organisational change. The limited treatment of grief is a remarkable deficit in change literature. One exception is transitions theory, which recognises the loss contingent on change. However, the theory, as well as change research generally, relies on a cyclical model of grief, which is increasingly called in to question as new and more sophisticated approaches arise within the grief research community. This paper considers change management in the automotive industry to illustrate the role of grief in workplace change. It argues that there is opportunity for grief research to inform change management and for grief practitioners to work with managers responsible for implementing change.