The Emotional Landscape of Organizational Change: A Qualitative Study of Teachers in Lasbela, Balochistan.

Abstract

This study delves into understanding the emotional relations that teachers navigated during organizational change in Lasbela, Balochistan. For this study, the qualitative design involved semi-structured interviews with teachers to understand their experiences and understandings of the change being enacted. Thematic analysis provided the participants’ primary emotions under four themes: uncertainty and anxiety, resistance and uncertainty, resilience and coping, and hope for transformation. The cyclical, non-linear, and emotionally charged nature of anxiety and skepticism evolving into resilience and salient hope demonstrates the complexity of the participants’ emotional responses. The resistance noted in the data is better termed professional critique, as it highlighted misalignment leading to professional engagement, not change rejection. The organizational lack of change in the Balochistan context revealed the burden placed on teachers to rely on professional community, cultural, and spiritual frameworks. The study illustrates the emplaced emotionality of change and organizational restructuring in education, built on the absence of transformative equity. Recommendations focus on targeted systemic and emotional investments to support change through inclusive frameworks, teacher agency, context-appropriate professional development, horizontal collegial integration, and systemic resources, as change is best emotionally defended when viable reform is enacted.