Change management approaches for successfully implementing change and reducing employee resistance. Organizational change is an ever-present feature of organizational life, both at the operational and strategic levels (Burns, 2004; Todnem, 2005). According to Luecke (2003), factors such as rapid technological changes mean that effective change management has become a necessity to survive and succeed in a highly competitive and ever-changing environment. However, despite the recognition of the importance of change management approaches, their success rate when adopted in organizations is low, with a failure rate of around 70% (Balogun and Hope, 2004). Low success rates may suggest a lack of structure and understanding in implementing organizational change. Todnem (2005) suggests that there is currently a wide range of contradictory and confusing theories and approaches available which may contribute to poor success rates in change management approaches. The literature review will analyze the effectiveness of planned and emerging approaches to change management in successfully implementing change. The ability to predict and manage different responses to change among employees is a key challenge for management (Stensaker and Meyer, 2012). Understanding employee resistance to change and the different factors that can contribute to the success of reducing resistance will be one of the focuses of this literature review. From the literature, one of the main approaches to managing change is that of planned approaches. (Bamford and Forrester, 2003; Todnem, 2005). The planned approach to change is based on the work of Kurt Lewin (1952 in Eldrod and tippet, 2002) who argues that before change and new behavior can be successfully adopted... half of the paper... and - scale changes. The literature supporting an emergent approach argues against recognizing change as pre-planned steps taken by management, but instead as an ongoing process that creates readiness for change. The importance of reducing employee resistance to change is also highlighted throughout the literature. It is suggested that when implementing change, management looks to communication and participation as an effective way to overcome resistance. In this way, employees can not only feel accepting of the proposed change, but can also contribute to the quality of the change implementation. It can be recommended that, to increase the success of a change in an organisation, managers are aware of the available literature in order to provide more in-depth and targeted guidance on different change approaches and models for different organizational needs..