Critical Discussion On Amazon Change Management

Question

Task:
Scenario: Learners select an organisation and develop a model for change, incorporating issues related to strategic change in that organisation. They need to show how they will lead stakeholders in developing a strategy for change and how they plan to implement the chosen model for change. The report needs to start with an introduction to the background of change.

The report should include the following:
1.Executive Summary [8 Marks]

Simply an overview of the report, focusing on the key highlight.

2.Introduction of the Chosen Organization and background to change [7 Marks]

History of firm. What is the change? When is it / was it required?

Explain any two change management models and evaluate the relevance of these models to the chosen organization. [20 Marks]
Student should identify any 2 models. These models are recommendations in the main and will have their benefits in various areas.
Students must integrate both models. For example, where one model is weak, the other model might fill that gap. For instance, some elements of Kotter can be applied along with Lewin’s. Students must put the elements of the models to work. For example, Awareness in Prosci’s model should describe how this ‘awareness will be executed.
Consideration can be given to the use of the model in other situations, further justifying your application.
The choice of models might be dependent on culture, time frame for change, organizational structure, management style and so on.
A background of each model is encouraged but the models must be brought to life with the organization of choice.

3.Examine the need (reason) for change in the organization. Assess the factors that drive the need for strategic change and assess the resource implications for not responding to these changes. [30 Marks]

This question requires much discussion. Students must do a thorough review of the reasons for change in the organization chosen. This is likely to highlight many reasons such as: technology changes, new manager, new process, government policy, competition in the market environmental policies, internal factors such as employee safety, employee dissatisfaction.
Students can apply SWOT and PESTEL which can easily highlight reasons for changes. For example, in the case of SWOT, the weakness of poor output can justify the implementation of robotics at a car manufacturing plant. Further, the economic / macro factor of environmental laws to reduce carbon foot print, has influenced many car manufacturers to downsize engines and introduce electric and alternative energy sources of transportation.
Drivers for strategic change: this might be due to the impact of the change on the enterprise. For example, some changes are transformational, to avoid reverting or relapsing to previous situations , conditions , even the complexity of the change or general nature
Student should highlight the impact if the firm does not or did not proceed with the change itself. There are many resource The implications can be focused on internal issues – for example, staff not being prepared or trained for new business opportunities the firm is embarking on.
External implications can also be discussed. This might explore implications of the lack of market readiness to ward off competition.

4.Develop a change management strategy involving the stakeholders and also devise strategies to overcome resistance. [25 Marks]

Your change management plan might want to discuss the following:

Define the change ahead.
Ensure the change is aligned with the firm’s objective. This must be explained
Establish a time frame for the change management process. A Gantt chart can be considered here.
Ensure to have sound leadership and or management support to help drive the change process.
Communicating the change. This is very critical and must be considered and discussed. Communication must consider when to communicate, with whom to communicate in terms of groups or hierarchy or departments and if to communicate to one party first or all altogether (if applicable),what platform to communicate information (tweeter, Facebook, award ceremony, whatsapp etc) who should communicate the information, where to communicate the information if it is to be done in a live format and so on.
Appoint a change management sponsor or team leader for the change management project. Students can define the role of the sponsor and suggest the benefits of the appointment.
Student can highlight / or reiterate the importance of choosing the most appropriate model or models.
Monitor / measure the progress of the change. Although some models might emphasize this approach, it should be highlighted separately.
As part of the plan, it’s important to set up or establish a support structure for staff/ main stakeholders affected. An open door policy might be needed here. The change management leader or champions appointed, can be used to provide this support.
As part of your plan, one might argue that the strategy should consider a level of flexibility. Flexibility might relate to a change in time frame or even a change in the change management model due to some changes in the circumstances or in the event that the model/s applied is not working as planned.
Determine the impact and those affected. (This can be addressed under stakeholder management. Student can decide here)
Stakeholder management must form part of your plan. This involves, communicating with all stakeholders, before, during and after the change has been implemented. Defining stakeholder management and giving a thorough review of its elements are critical here.
Here are some areas for discussion re stakeholders: who are they? What do they do? Why are they important? Which ones have greater influence over others? Which ones we should simply inform vs closer management? Also, recognize the 4Cs of engagement for stakeholders. Students must be very thorough for the stakeholder part of the question.

Proper research and referencing, expected at this level. Such may also contribute to your grade

5.Conclusions and recommendations. [10 Marks]

6.References (Adhering to Harvard Referencing Format)

Answer

Executive Summary
Amazon change management is inevitable for the business in order to look forward to twin goals of growth and sustainability. Without change there is no business which can survive for a longer time. Every successful company in the past, may it be Walmart, Netflix, Apple, Samsung, and Google has accepted that they need to change in order to grow and they have done the same. Change is important because customers demand and preferences keeps on changing, the technological landscape keeps on changing, competition, economic factors and numerous other factors are responsible for a company to implement relevant change in its business organization.
I have chosen Amazon as the business organization and will be exploring the Amazon change management process, because I am a believer of Jeff Bezos’s transformational leadership and I am a loyal customer of Amazon.
Undoubtedly, Amazon is the number 1 e-commerce company in the world and Jeff Bezos is the richest individual in the world. This does not necessarily imply that Amazon does not require any strategic changes even in these VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex & Ambiguous) Times. In US , over 72% of customers ordering online order products from Amazon. However these markets are saturated now. Amazon has to look forward to the developing /emerging economies to churn out the bigger revenues.
Considering the current scenario of Amazon change management, it has been identified that all the countries are moving towards solution which are environmental friendly. Amazon has to apply the same in its packaging solution and also adopt cleaner sources of energy for its operations in its offices Technology is another important aspect of e-commerce industry, and the tech keeps on evolving every second. Amazon has created a solid tech infrastructure through its AWS (Amazon Web Services), now the company is required to leverage the same and use it to fight the problem of counterfeit products. Additionally, Amazon should also get into a business model or brick and mortar. This would help the company build a better connect and engage with its customers.
Towards the end, a set of recommendations are suggested for Amazon change management. These recommendations are based on the changes identified in the report, which would be in the right direction to achieve the business goal of sustainable future.

Introduction of Chosen Organization & Background to Change
Amazon.com is one of the Fortune 500 companies based out of Seattle, Washington which has the distinction of being one of the first e-commerce companies to sell goods over the Internet. The company was launched much before the people were well accustomed to even the term “Internet”, and here was CEO & Founder Jeff Bezos selling goods online. Amazon.com, an online retailer, Web Service Provider and Manufacturer of electronic book reader (Kindle) is the largest e-commerce company on the face of planet Earth (Laemmel, Alon & Vega, 2019). Amazon.com started its journey with an online book store and within a span of 5 years, the company was selling Music, DVD’s , Video, Clothing, Electronic Goods , Clothing and much more, the very same year, Its founder & CEO was named the “Times Person of the Year” for his breakthrough innovation with Amazon. One of the biggest reasons behind Amazon becoming an e-commerce giant is, the vision of the organization which is customer centric in nature. Jeff Bezos unlike other entrepreneurs is customer obsessed and not competition obsessed, this is one of the biggest reasons Amazon has taken the e-commerce industry by storm and changed it for the Best. US is the biggest market for Amazon, where almost 70% of online shoppers buy products only from Amazon, the company has shown remarkable growth in developing countries and especially APAC region(Huy & Hung, 2019).

With more than 197 Million monthly visitors on the Amazon Application, the company in Q4 (2019) made a revenue of USD 87 Billion, making Jeff Bezos the richest man in the world (Cirjevskis, 2019). The company which operates in over 16 countries and ships its product across 100 countries banks heavily on its cloud service platform AWS (Amazon Web Services) and its innovation capabilities to provide customer with better and efficient services every single time they order something from Amazon.com. Looking at the performance of Amazon change management, it surely looks like a winner e-commerce industry never had, but business is highly uncertain, thus requiring the companies to come up with strategic changes in the organization for sustainable growth (Lopatovska et. Al, 2019). Some of the changes which would make Amazon an invincible player in the industry and a respectable global citizen are:

Focus on its in-house Sustainability efforts- Environment friendly Offices and Packaging solutions.
Focus and expand into its offline business model- Click and Mortar( More stores for retail buying have to be opened up, also to give Walmart a steady competition)
Amazon to leverage technology and focus on fighting the threat of counterfeit products.

The report further will be divided into the following sections:

Description of two Amazon change management models and their relevance for change.
Ascertaining the need for change in the organization and the resource implication for the same.
Developing Amazon change management strategy and devising strategies to overcome resistance to change.
Recommendation and Conclusion.

Change management Models and their relevance to Amazon
There are multiple Amazon change management models that can be applied to the company, however the 2 best fitments with the change management at Amazon are:

Prosci’s Change Model
Kotler 8 Step Change Model

Prosci Change Model
The Prosci ADKAR model can be seen as a goal-oriented Amazon change management which is applicable both for individuals and organization. The uniqueness of this Amazon change management model lies with the effectiveness it integrates individual change management with organization change management for best results. The ADKAR model is also effective when planning change in the organization as it empowers the leaders with facilitating and supporting the employees during Amazon change management (Das, 2019). The mnemonics ADKAR stands for:

(Galli, 2019)

What is the application of ADKAR for Amazon change management?
Awareness: Businesses in order to be in a competitive position at all times must be aware of the changes required in the business organization. These changes might be a result of trigger of the changes in the internal and external environment, however, staying aware and on the feet is always advisable(Galli, 2019).

The leadership at Amazon, including Jeff Bezos (he has a small personal team who are called as Jeff Bots) and other senior leaders have to make aware all the stakeholders of the changes required in the organization, with a consideration of how would the employees benefit from it and show them the bigger picture.

Desire: As the word suggest, Desire is linked with the willingness of the leaders in the organization to make the Amazon change management, as it is for the holistic good of the organization as well as for the employees. The change leaders or the agents must understand that the resultant of such Amazon change management would only yield better profits and results for organization.

Amazon leaders have to believe that the change would be better for the growth of the organization and they have to carve out better Amazon change management process with better efficiencies to earn better profits while reaching closer to sustainability goals.

Knowledge: Identifying the change is just the beginning of the long process of Amazon change management, it is required that business and leader must and should have all the knowledge pertaining to Amazon change management. Knowledge in the term of know-how of the change, the role of people who will be responsible for the change and also the ones to be impacted by the change. Besides this the leaders must also have the knowledge about the skills, job roles, behavior of its people and knowledge of the tools required for the change(Wong et. Al., 2019).

In short Amazon leadership has to craft a fool proof plan with regards to the Amazon change management so that it can be implemented effectively without encountering any resistance in the process, and all this can be possible with deep knowledge of the change, process and its people.

Ability: This is the stage where the knowledge is turned into action. It is the ability of the individual change agents or the groups who can carry out and implement the change in the organization encountering any resistance in the process (Khan & Smuts, 2019).

Amazon in this step has to identify the resources or train the resources for new skills that are required to carry out the Amazon change management in organization.

Reinforcement: This is the last yet most important step of the model, here it is important to ensure that the changes “stick” in the organization. It is important to make sure the changes in the organization are reviewed carefully and it sticks within, with people knowing of the change and abiding to it(Jones- Schenk, 2019).

Amazon in order to reinforce the change have to repeatedly keep monitoring the effect of the Amazon change management, make good or amend of any further changes have to be made and also rewards its employees who have been a pivotal part of this change process. According to the model, there are 3 Phases for Change in the ADKAR model, Preparing for the Amazon change management, managing the change & lastly reinforcing the change.

Application of ADKAR model to Amazon
Phase 1: Preparation for Change: The first phase is about finding the right team of leaders to lead the change and a sponsor for the Change. Jeff Bezos is the man who has all the power and control in the organization, he can be the best sponsor for the change and his team of close associates can become the leaders for the change. Also, in this phase the Amazon change management leaders have to identify the challenges on the path and work on resolving them(Wang, Saade & Wan, 2019).

The team is also required to identify the change strategy, what exactly has to be change will have to be written down in a document. On the basis of the document the team has to prepare for the next phase which is managing change in the organization.

Phase 2: Managing the Change
The second phase consist of 5 plans, which Amazon has to cater in order to create a formidable plan of managing the change

Communication: Amazon is required to communicate the changes to the key audience or the people who are part of this change process or audience who will be impacted by the change.

Sponsor Roadmap: This includes the necessary actions that sponsor has to take for the change. The roadmap also includes when and where the sponsor has to be and what has to be communicated with the audience.

Training Plan: Training is important for the audience as it will provide them with the knowledge of the Amazon change management plan. Amazon has to carefully craft out a training plan, define the requirements of the plan to the employees who will take the training (Mukwenda, 2019)

Coaching Plan: In this step, the leaders and the managers will be guided on how to lead their teams during this Amazon change management

Resistance Management Plan: This is both a proactive and reactive approach that the management has to take to manage the resistance of the employees regarding Amazon change management.

Phase 3: Reinforcing the change
It is most important to ensure that the changes which have been brought into the system are permanent and not temporary in nature. A 5 step process has to be followed by Amazon for this, which goes as:

Check for the changes in the behavior of people after implementing the change model.
Find out for any discrepancy in the plan implementation and take corrective actions for the same.
Humans have to be reinforced for a new habit or a new process, therefore Amazon has to ensure that consistently training is provided to the employees.
Reward the people and the teams who had been an important part of the change in organization (Mathur & Gaur, 2020).
Lastly, celebrate the outcome and success of a successful change implementation at Amazon.

Kotter’s 8 Step Change Model
In this model the author has described the 8 most important steps which are required to identify and create Amazon change management.

(Haas, et. Al., 2020)

The 8 Step mode can be grouped together in 3 sub-divisions to better understand the implementation at every division.

Creating a Climate of Amazon change management

Creating a sense of Urgency
Building a Guiding coalition
Developing a strategic vision

Engage the entire organization (Rose, 2018)

Communicating the vision
Empowering the actions
Creating Short term wins

Implementation and Sustaining Changes

Acceleration of the changes
Reinforcing or Sticking up the changes

Implementation of the 8 Step Change model for Amazon
Step 1: Creating a climate of Change

Creating an Urgency for change-In this step Amazon has to call for an urgent meeting of its internal and external stakeholders (Owners) and communicate the urgency for the change. The same can be communicated by stressing the needs for the Amazon change management and how the change will be good for the organization. They can also show what the competition like Walmart and others have been doing.
Creating the guiding coalition-As in the ADKAR model, in this also Amazon has to identify the brightest and smartest of the minds and put them in charge of the change in the organization. These individuals will act as a guide for the entire organization and help other carry out the change (Tang, 2019).
Creating a vision for the Amazon change management -In this Step, Amazon has to create a new vision statement for the entire organization. It will be on the basis of this new vision the roles of the impacted employees in the organization would also be change. Hence, Jeff Bezos and the team have to envision the future with the change proposed(Sato, Lucente, Meyer & Mrazek, 2020).

Step 2: Engage with the entire organization

Communicate the vision-The second step as mentioned is related to engaging the entire organization on the change which has to be implemented. The first step here is to gather all the stakeholder and communicate the vision of the change to all employees. Herein it is urged to Amazon to use all the possible communication channels and talk as much as possible with the audience (Radwan, 2020).
Empower the action- In this Step, Amazon is required to push forward the goals of Amazon change management removing all the possible barriers in the path. Amazon can create small teams and give them power to make the changes and steer clear of any resistance in the process(Calegari, Sibley & Turner, 2015).
Creating short term wins/goals- It is extremely important to keep the staff motivated when carrying out the Amazon change management process. The change leaders have to make small milestones or the goals and celebrate on achieving them. This would keep up the spirits of the audience and push everyone to look forward to the change with positivity(Das, 2019).

Step 3: Implement and Change sustenance

Acceleration of the change-Whoever said that Amazon change management is easy, was definitely wrong. Amazon has to consistently work towards the implementation of change, tweak its strategy wherever required, but keep the momentum going of the Amazon change management. The company would be facing resistance in the process, but they would have to deal with it in a cogent way(Wentworth, Behson & Kelley, 2020).

Incorporating the change in organizational culture- This is the last, yet the most important step of the model. Amazon has to make sure that all the employees in the organization are fine tuned to the new vision led by the Amazon change management carried out. Also, this new vision should be made a part of the organizational culture, and everyone has to abide by the same in order to have the same vision as that of organization and the leadership (Chappel, et., Al 2020).

Examine the need (reason) for Amazon change management in the organization. Assess the factors that drive the need for strategic change and assess the resource implications for not responding to these changes
Amazon (1994), started its e-commerce journey by being an online book seller, however with changing times and increasing penetration of internet in the lives of consumer the company grew in all sizes. It was just a matter of time, the company started selling consumer goods, electronic, toys, clothes, stationary and anything to everything which can be sold online (Tou, et. Al, . 2019) Now, this strategic move for Amazon change management can be attributed to a couple of factors such as:

Increasing Internet penetration
Change in consumer behavior
Technology Advancement
Growth in Industry
Global Economy (Yang, 2019).

This can also be seen as Amazon change management in the company’s earlier strategic direction and the new direction was to sell not just books, but everything that could be sold online. Now, in order to arrive at the changes required now in the company, one must take a hard look at themselves and the business environment surrounding the company. In this section, 2 tools will be used and applied to determine the changes required in the organization to reach closer to its goals of sustainability.

PESTLE Analysis
PESTLE analysis is a macro or an external environmental analysis carried out by the companies to assess the environment in which it is operating. All these factors are external to the organization and thus a proactive study or research is required here in order to stay clear of any surprises in the near future. This exercise here will help to identify the changes required at Amazon (Sastry, Katvi & Tourani, 2019).

Political Factors Influencing business of Amazon
As mentioned in the Introduction section, Amazon operates in over 16 countries and ships products in more than 100 countries. This implies that the company operates under a lot of political and government influence which can be an opportunity or threat for the company, and changes would have to be made.

Efforts by the Government in different countries to fight again the cyber-security (This can be seen as an opportunity for Amazon).
Political Stability of the Developed Countries( US, Europe & others is opportunity for Amazon)
Increasing support of Government towards e-commerce (This is both an opportunity & Threat for Amazon)

The changes that can be identified from the assessment of political factors and are valuable for Amazon change management are:

Amazon can expand its Brick and Mortar model in the US & UK due to the governmental support and stability of the developed economies.
Government has pledged to fight against cyber security, this initiative is in a positive direction for Amazon as it would further help the company to deal with the counterfeit products (Smits & Nikdel, 2019).

Economic Factors influencing Amazon
The Economic factors have an influence on Amazon in the following ways:

Stability of the Developed economies is an opportunity for Amazon
Increasing disposable income in the developing countries is again an opportunity for Amazon, as people are able to spend more on the shopping online.
Under developed countries slowly gearing up to the pace of e-commerce is again an opportunity for Amazon(Cirjevskis, 2019).

Now, the above analysis points in two directions actually, one being both the developed and developing economies are being good markets for Amazon and the company has to focus on both these market, which it is already doing. The second being under developed economies gearing up to e-commerce is a sign of more business, and the company can actually spend on its tech and operations infrastructure to even serve those countries (Cachon, 2020). Thus, opportunity of Rapid expansion both in developing and under developed economies has to be part of company’s strategy which can be included in the Amazon change management.

Socio-Cultural Factors influencing Amazon

The increase in wealth disparity is a potential threat for employees.
Increasing consumerism in developing economies is a great opportunity for Amazon.
Globally the buying habits of consumers are increasing; this is again a positive sign for Amazon.

The socio cultural factors considered for Amazon change management point out in the direction of expansion for Amazon, it might be related to its product or expansion of its model from click to brick and mortar and give a tough fight to Walmart and other retail giants(Raj & Pandey, 2019).

Technological Factors Influencing Amazon
Technological advancements impacts Amazon as tech is the backbone of its entire business. The influence of Tech for Amazon can be seen as:

Technology is getting obsolete at High speed ( Both a threat & Opportunity )
Increasing efficiencies of IT resources (Opportunity for Amazon)
Increase in Cyber Crime ( This is a threat)

The rapid obsolescence of technology puts high pressure on Amazon to further develop its technological asset. Hence technological advancement both in fighting cyber –crime & counterfeit goods is like need of the hour for Amazon and a change that has to be brought in the organization (Veilleux, 2019).

Legal Factors influencing Amazon
It is a must and should condition for Amazon to adhere to the legal requirement of its e-commerce business operation, else the company can find itself in a big problem. The following factors are significant here:

Increasing product regulations is an opportunity for Amazon
The Amazon change management in the import and export regulation can again be seen as an opportunity for Amazon.
Increasing environmental protection laws can again be seen as an opportunity for Amazon.

The company is already focusing on making its packaging more environmental friendly, this would be setting newer benchmarks in the industry(Wadhwa, Vashisht & Phutela, 2020).

Environmental factors influencing Amazon
The company has only an online business model, however the operations of the company has a certain impact on the environment. And, as a responsible global citizen, Amazon has to ensure that it takes good care of the environment and doesn’t cause any harm or degrade it. Across the world, all the countries have pledged to reduce its carbon footprints, focus in environment sustainability and take interest in different environmental programs. The Amazon change management has to make sure that it focuses on energy saving policy for its business operation and preserve the environment (Kenny, 2019)

SWOT Analysis
SWOT analysis is a micro environmental analysis model wherein the Strength and weakness which are internal to the organization are assessed, whilst identifying the opportunity and threats for the organization. The idea here is to leverage the strength, minimize the weakness, take advantage of the opportunity and stay clear of the threats identified (Goel, et.,Al 2020).

Strength of Amazon

The company has an experience of over 26 years of being an industry leader and has surplus cash for any technological innovation and market expansion.
Amazon is customer centric organization, which is strength because the customers rely on Amazon for better and quality products with a timely delivery.
Amazon is a cost leader and this is due to its vertical business model. The company has acquired most of the businesses keeping in mind of reducing the costs for the end customers.
The company has an efficient delivery network primarily due to its fulfillment centres and partnership with various delivery partners all across the globe.
Amazon adopts a GLOCAL strategy which is “Go Global and Act Local” . This strategy has helped Amazon to overcome the competition in domestic markets and build a strong supply chain network globally(Tosun., et. Al 2020).
Amazon has recently acquired Whole foods to expand its grocery arm of the business. All its acquisitions have been strategic in nature which is again a strength of its leadership.
AWS or Amazon web services is earning good revenue for the company and it has become the leader In cloud computing beating the likes of Microsoft and Google.

Weakness of Amazon change management

Due to high marketing spends, increasing supply chain network and passing most of the benefits of its value chain model to customers has reduced the profit margins for the company.
Amazon has faced a lot of heat in the European market and US for avoiding taxes. This has tarnished the image of the company quite a bit.
The company recently got into profits in India, however, Amazon is yet to make profits in a lot of emerging markets, thereby shows weak financial position.
Amazon in the past has seen a lot of flak for its product failure. Products such as Kindle Fire, Fire phone and couple of others were super flop, questioning its manufacturing capabilities (Hajizadeh, 2019).

Opportunities for Amazon change management

The company has the opportunity to further leverage its brand by getting into backward integration model and create its own clothing and other brands in different product categories. This would also serve as differentiation for Amazon.
The company has to pace up its strategy of global expansion, as the developed markets are already saturated and it is the developing or under developed economies which would churn out higher revenue for Amazon.
The company has to get into a red ocean and acquire some more e-commerce organization and reduce the competition.
The retail and supermarket industry is growing by leaps and bounds. At the same time brands like Woolworths, Coles, Target & Walmart are coming up with new concept store to provide an experience to the customers. Amazon has to also get into the similar brick and mortar model to give customer an added experience and to acquire more market (Joshi, 2020).
The company has just a store in the US; Amazon has to open up a couple more stores in developing economies like APAC so that the customers can better engage with the brand.

Threat for Amazon

The entry barriers in the e-commerce industry are low; this is a small threat for Amazon. However, high marketing and infra costs still make it difficult for new companies to make a mark in the industry.
Government regulations on FDI are getting stringent in the developing economies; this can be a potential threat for Amazon if the company doesn’t starts acting on it immediately.
A lot of local competition has emerged in the recent times, and the government always supports the regional players. Thus it is required that company has a clear vision with striking up an alliance with the regional players so it can protect its position in the industry (Dixit, Clouse & Turken, 2019).

Impacts on Amazon on avoiding the threats & weakness
It is must and should for Amazon change management to have a step back, have a closer look at the macro and micro environment and plan for the future. In case, the company overlooks the same, there can be plenty of worrisome reasons for Amazon. A few of the impacts and implications can be highlighted.

The company has to suffer financial losses in a developing economies like China & India if it does not takes a closer look at its financial resources, its marketing spend, its employee costs and other such factors.
The company has identified that it needs to scale up its pace of global expansion, now the employees working with Amazon has to come terms with it, else it would be a half-hearted attempt by Amazon.
It has been identified that technology plays a pivotal role in the e-commerce industry, and with AWS doing so well for Amazon, the company is in the front gear to develop technology infrastructure in the world which no one has ever built. This would put company right at the zenith of tech equilibrium as well. If this aspect of business is involved, there will most definitely some company which would create better infrastructure and might put Amazon in a tough spot. Walmart has recently acquired Flipakart in India, is a sign that the US giant is getting into e-commerce industry in the developing economies as well. This step would most definitely hurt Amazon’s revenue in developing economies like India and China, which by the way are the biggest consumer markets(Correa, Van Der Hoff & Rajao, 2019).

Develop Amazon change management strategy involving the stakeholders and also devise strategies to overcome resistance
Before going ahead with identifying the stakeholders for the Amazon change management and the impact on the different teams in organization, it is important to once again revisit the changes identified from the earlier sections in the report.

Focus on its in-house Sustainability efforts- Environment friendly Offices, Energy Saving policies and Packaging solutions.
Focus and expand into its offline business model- Brick and Mortar( More stores for retail buying have to be opened up, also to give Walmart a steady competition)
Amazon to leverage technology and focus on fighting the threat of counterfeit products and develop an infrastructure which puts the company in the front foot.

Stakeholders for Amazon
Stakeholders can be seen as an individual, group or a business entity which has an interest in the organization. For the purpose of clarity, internal stakeholders are the entities which are internal to Amazon, whilst the external are the ones who lie outside of the business entity.

Internal Stakeholders

Employees
Shareholders
Owners & Directors

External Stakeholders

Customers
Government
Suppliers
Competitors
Community

Once the stakeholders are identified, they are to be applied to the power V/s Interest matrix to ascertain their importance before formulating the Amazon change management strategy in the organization.

(Diaconu & Baraitaru, 2019)

High Power-Low Interest- Government falls into this category. Government might impose higher taxes on Amazon, and competitors can come up with a new strategy which might disrupt Amazon’s business. Hence, the government and the competitors have to be kept in check and to be keep satisfied.

High Power- High Interest-Shareholders, directors & owners are a part of this metric as they are the most important entities of and within the business. These type of stakeholder are to be managed closely and kept informed about the changes to be done in the organization.

High Interest-Low Power- Employees and the suppliers fall into this category and they are to be engaged & informed about the changes happening in the organization. In case Amazon fails to do so, both the stakeholders might feel left out and the Amazon change management process would come to fail.

Low Interest-Low Power- Public or the community falls under this category. The strategy here is to just inform the public on the changes being done in the organization.

4C’s of Stakeholder Engagement
Amazon’s strategy in implementing the change is to make sure that its stakeholders are informed about the change process and they are able to play the roles as defined by the change agent or the team responsible for carrying out the changes. The 4C’s of engagement for Stakeholders goes as:

Communicate- Amazon has to ensure it uses the available digital and offline platforms life ( Social Media, Internal Facebook page of the company , circulars, drafts & trainings) to communicate with its stakeholders and inform them on the Amazon change management plan.
Consult-This is important part of managing the resistance of the stakeholders as well. Amazon has to respond to all the questions of the stakeholders as they are unaware and scared of the changes, and by responding and consulting with them would flush out the resistance out of the system (Hilton & Azzam, 2019).
Collaborate- Amazon would have to partner or collaborate with its stakeholders, as without their cooperation the company cannot carry out the change effectively.
Co-Create-Amazon has to be on its feet to come up with creative and innovative ideas whenever they are stuck in a puddle.

Kotter’s 8 Step Change Management model can be applied to carry out the Amazon change management. The process as explained is quite simpler and can be carried out effectively, by following the 8 steps in the chronological order.

Conclusion & Recommendation
Studying the E-commerce industry and the market situation across the globe, it would be a profitable scenario for Amazon if it can open up a lot more offline stores in countries except the US to build a better and deeper connect with its customer and develop loyalty program for its customers. The company has been doing really well when it comes to its sales, however it has to focus on its packaging and making its offices more environmental friendly to maintain its reputation of a good corporate citizen. Amazon web services and Alexa Home device has proved metal of the company when it comes to technology advancement and application of technology in daily lives of its customers. The company has to keep up the same pace and leverage technology to combat the problem of counterfeit products.

Recommendation

The company has to start getting into the brick and mortar model to give a tough fight to Walmart and build a stronger brand and engage with its customers.
Amazon has to identify environmental friendly packaging solutions to reduce the waste pollution.
Amazon has to focus more on the developing or the emerging economies as the developed ones are mostly saturated, hence for higher revenues it has to look outside the developed economies.
Using Amazon web services and technology, the company has to fight the challenges of counterfeit products and also make a competitive edge amongst its competitors.
Company should keep on conducting an analysis of its internal and external environments to ensure that it keeps a check on the opportunities and the threats for its business.

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