Abstract: Every organization must evolve and change over time to respond to market shifts, capitalize on new ideas and technology, make improvements, and adjust to internal and external factors. Change initiatives fail 40%–70% of the time (Burns, 2000). Poor internal communication (IC) is the leading factor causing organizational change to fail (Daly et al., 2003). Research into IC and organizational change has essentially been done in isolation from each other (Daly et al., 2003). IC is crucial in supporting organizational change because it connects the organization with its employees. IC that informs and engages employees is especially important in times of societal and digital transformation. Traditionally, change management focuses on identifying reasons of resistance to change and proposing solutions to overcome them. There are three key ways for successfully managing change resistance: (1) empathy and support; (2) communication; and (3) participation and involvement (Cummings and Worley, 2015, p. 183-184). According to Ford and Ford (1995), “change is created, sustained, and managed in and by communication” (p. 560). Internal communicators manage resistance to change by being responsible for the organization’s communication strategy. IC improves employees’ workflow and their overall experience. In some instances, there isn’t an IC team. Everyone must ensure that employees believe their success and advancement are important. When internal communicators open lines of communication by sharing quality content, employees show positive reactions towards change (Oreg et al., 2011). The purpose of this study is to define IC and conduct an integrated literature review to determine the relationship between IC and organizational change. The study was guided by the following research question: How does internal communication influence organizational change? To answer the research question, the author located scholarly sources utilizing databases such as EBSCOhost and ProQuest Educational Journals within a University Library’s database in the United States. Relevant scholarly literature was identified using internal communication and organizational change. Articles that included the above search terms as “subject terms” were considered. The reference lists from the initial articles were utilized to construct a list of additional literature to review. Although there is a growing interest in understanding the value of effective IC during organizational change, there is limited current empirical research on the subject. The researcher determined how IC influences organizational change by analyzing thirty nine articles. The researcher found various relationships between IC and organizational change. IC raises employee awareness of change and helps employees comprehend how it affects the organization's objectives (Welch & Jackson, 2007). Effective IC, according to Welch and Jackson (2007), allows for a better understanding of the relationship between current changes and the organization's future strategic direction. The researcher discovered that (1) transparent communication, (2) trust, and (3) sensemaking – all of which were themes in the literature – strengthen the relationship to change. Transparent communication is “an organization’s communication to make available all legally releasable information to employees whether positive or negative in nature—in a manner that is accurate, timely, balanced and unequivocal, for the purpose of enhancing the reasoning ability of employees, and holding organizations accountable for their actions, policies, and practices” (Men, 2014, p. 260). When an organization uses transparent IC to deliver accountable, truthful, and substantial information related to organizational change, employees cope better with the change (Li et al., 2021). Like transparency, trust in IC has been extensively examined. Welch and Jackson (2007) argue that “communication leads to trust and understanding of strategic direction” (p. 190). If internal communicators do not properly convey the organization's strategic direction to employees, they will be less dedicated to it and more likely to mistrust it or the organization's leadership. Sensemaking is a process in which the organization's internal and external environments are shaped by leadership and an updated vision of the organization is defined (Gioia & Chittipeddi, 1991). Communication between and among employees allows for shared reflections, sensemaking, experience sharing, and learning (Simmonsen & Heide, 2018). Leaders can support sensemaking by (1) clearly communicating what the organization wants; (2) personally living the change they’ve asked for; and (3) resourcing and measuring the change they’ve asked for (Johnson, 2017). Should leadership fail to support sensemaking, employees attempt to construct their own meaning, rationale, and response to the change. Employee perceptions of and responses to organizational change are critical to change implementation success. The literature revealed that IC can affect organizational change and employee experience. The research suggests that employees cope better with organizational change if they are given clear communication that allows them to trust and understand messages from leadership.
