Organizational development (commonly referred to as OD) is a practical and systematic approach to launching and diffusing change in Organisations. It is an attempt to improve the overall Organizational efficiency. It is basically a long range programme, not a one shot deal, attempting to change the behavioural attitudes and performance of the total Organisation.
Learn about:- 1. Introduction to Organisational Development 2. Meaning and Concept of Organisational Development 3. Definition 4. Characteristics 5. Objectives 6. Process 7. Principles 8. Causes
9. Intervention Techniques 10. Models 11. Pre-Requisites for Effective Use of OD 12. Ethical Issues 13. Values of OD Professionals 14. Advantages 15. Disadvantages.
Organizational Development: Introduction, Meaning, Definition, Concept, Characteristics, Objectives, Techniques and Principles
Organizational Development – Introduction
Organisational Development (OD) is a systematic process for applying behavioural science principles and practices in organisational effectiveness.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
Organisational development is an organisational improvement strategy. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, it emerged out of insight from group dynamics and from the theory and practice of planned change. Today, the field offers an integrated framework capable of solving most of the operant problem confronting the human side of organisations.
OD is a field of practice aimed at analysing the functioning of an organisation, facilitating change and, through its process-consulting capabilities, bringing disparate elements of the organisation into alignment, generally around planned change. OD is characterised by facilitation and communication practices.
OD frequently employs surveys in its professional work. Its aim is the smooth, coordinated, and aligned functioning of the organisation. OD deals with the overall health of the organisation. It comes into play when the organisation is not functioning properly or will have to alter its way of operating.
OD emphasises organisational effectiveness and is called upon when a major change affecting the entire organisation is anticipated or occurring. It relies on consultant intervention, bringing together all the affected players and groups, and facilitating communication and decision making.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
OD is the field of study and practice that focuses on various aspects of organisational life, including culture, values, systems, and behaviour. The goal is to increase organisational effectiveness and maintain optimal organisational health through planned interventions in process or operations.
Generally, OD services are requested when an organisation or one of its major parts requires or experiences significant change. OD consultants provide planned approaches and structured activities to work through change to achieve desired improvements.
OD is characterised by a distinct consulting method that focuses on the people, culture, processes, and structure of the organisation. A primary OD goal is to optimise the entire organisational system by ensuring all elements are harmonious and congruent. Performance suffers when organisational structure, strategy, culture, and processes are misaligned.
Organisational development is now about the people and organisational function and how to get them to function better. The field is based on knowledge from behavioural science disciplines such as psychology, social psychology, sociology, anthropology, system theory, organisational behaviour, organisational theory and management. OD practitioners are consultant trained in the theory and practice of organisational development, with knowledge from the underlying behavioural science.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
OD programs are long termed, planned sustained efforts. Such efforts begin when a leader identifies undesirable situation and seek to change it. The leader contacts an OD professional and together they explore whether organisational development suits the task at hand.
If the answer is yes, they enlist other in the organisation to help design and implement the change program. The participants develop an overall game plan or strategy that includes a series of activities, each intended to achieve an outcome that moves the organisation towards its goal.
The two major goals of OD program are:
1. To improve the functioning of individuals, teams, and the total organisation, and
ADVERTISEMENTS:
2. To teach organisational members how to continuously improve their own functioning.
Organisational development deals with the gimlet of “people problem’ and ‘work system problems’ in organisations like-poor morale, low productivity, poor quality, interpersonal conflicts, and intergroup conflict, in clear or inappropriate goals, inappropriate leadership styles, poor team performance, in appropriate organisational structure, poor relation, inadequate alignment among the organisation’s strategy, structure culture, process, and the like, in short, where individuals, teams, and organisation are not realising their potential, OD can improve the situation.
Organisation Development (OD) has emerged to help the planned change for organisational effectiveness. Thus, it is said that the organisation development is the modem approach to management of change and human resource development. Organisation Development (OD) concentrates on people dimensions like norms, values, attitudes, relationships, organisational climate, etc.
Organizational Development – Meaning and Concept
Organization development (OD) is the study of successful organizational change and performance. OD emerged from human relations studies in the 1930s, during which psychologists realized that organizational structures and processes influence worker behaviour and motivation.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
More recently, work on OD has expanded to focus on aligning organizations with their rapidly changing and complex environments through organizational learning, knowledge management and transformation of organizational norms and values. Key concepts of OD theory include – organizational climate, organizational culture and organizational strategies.
Modern Concept of OD:
In recent years, serious issue has emerged about the relevance of OD to managing change in modern organizations. The need for “reinventing” the field has become a topic that even some of its “founding fathers” are discussing critically.
The, scholars have begun to examine organization development from an emotion-based standpoint. DeKlerk has considered how emotional trauma can negatively affect performance. Due to downsizing, outsourcing, mergers, restructuring, continual changes, invasions of privacy, harassment, and abuses of power, many employees experience the emotions of aggression, anxiety, apprehension, cynicism, and fear, which can lead to performance decreases.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
Accordingly, he suggested that in order to heal the trauma and increase performance, O.D. practitioners must acknowledge the existence of the trauma, provide a safe place for employees to discuss their feelings, symbolize the trauma and put it into perspective, and then allow for and deal with the emotional responses.
Organizational Development – Definition
Organisational development (commonly referred to as OD) is a practical and systematic approach to launching and diffusing change in Organisations. It is an attempt to improve the overall Organisational efficiency. It is basically a long range programme, not a one shot deal, attempting to change the behavioural attitudes and performance of the total Organisation.
It is not a one-time training and development programme but is an on-going and cycling process. It is a “complex educational strategy which aims to bring about a better fit between the human beings who work in and expect things from Organisations and the busy, unrelenting environment with its insistence on adapting to changing times.”
OD is inconsistently defined and is used as a convenient label for a variety of activities. In some Organisations OD is an old wine put in a new bottle, a new buzzword attached to old activities-Organisation planning, personnel or management development. In other Organisations OD is employed as a comprehensive strategy for Organisation improvement. In fact, the field of OD is so rapidly changing that in a few years the label OD may be applied to a somewhat different set of activities.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
Organizational development is a technique used for bringing change in the entire aspect of the organization, rather than focusing attention on the individuals. So that change is readily absorbed.
Some of the definitions given by experts are explained below:
“Organisational Development is an effort planned, organisation-wide, and managed from the top, to increase organisational effectiveness and health through planned interventions in the organisation’s ‘processes’, using behavioural science knowledge.” – Beckhard
According to Schmuck and Miles, “organisation development is a planned and sustained effort to apply behavioural science for system improvement, using reflexive, self-analysis methods”.
According to Warren Bennis, organisational development (OD) is a complex strategy intended to change the beliefs, attitudes, values, and structure of organisations so that they can better adapt to new technologies, markets, and challenges.
Warner Burke emphasizes that OD is not just, “anything done to better an organisation”; it is a particular kind of change process designed to bring about a particular kind of end-result OD involves organisational reflection, system improvement, planning, and self-analysis.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
The term “Organisational Development” is often used interchangeably with organisational effectiveness, especially when used as the name of a department or a part of the Human Resources function within an organisation.
“Organisational Development is the attempt to influence the members of an organisation to expand their candidness with each other about their views of the organisation and their experience in it, and to take greater responsibility for their own actions as organisational members. The assumption behind OD is that when people pursue both of these objectives simultaneously, they are likely to discover new ways of working together that they experience as more effective for achieving their own and their shared (organisational) goals. And when this does not happen, such activity helps them to understand why and to make meaningful choices about what to do in the light of this understanding.” Neilsen
“Organisational development is a system-wide application of behavioural science knowledge to the planned development and reinforcement of organisational strategies, structures, and processes for improving an organisation’s effectiveness.” Cummings and Worley.
“Organisational development is a set of behavioural science based theories, values, strategies, and techniques, aimed at the planned change of the organisational work setting for the purpose of enhancing individual development and improving organisational performance through the alteration of organisational members’ on the job behaviour”. Porras and Robertson.
“Organisational Development is a body of knowledge and practice that enhances organisational performance and individual development, viewing the organisation as a complex system of systems that exist within a larger system, each of which has its own attributes and degrees of alignment OD interventions in these systems are inclusive methodologies and approaches to strategic planning, organisational design, leadership development, change management, performance management, coaching, diversity, and work/life balance.” Matt Minahan.
Organisational Development – Collaborating with organisational leaders and their groups to create systemic change on behalf of root cause problem-solving towards improving productivity and employee satisfaction through strengthening the human processes through which they get their work done. Michael Broom.
Burke has defined, “organisation development is a planned process of change in an organisational culture through the utilization of behavioural science, technologies, research and theories”.
Alderfer CP defined, “organisational development is a process used to enhance both the effectiveness of an organisation and the well-being of its members through planned interventions”. Notice three keys points here. First, OD enhances the effectiveness of the organisation. Effectiveness in this context is defined as achieving organisational goal and objectives. Second, OD enhances the well-being of organisational members.
Well-being refers to the perceived overall satisfaction each organisational member feels towards his or her job and work environment. Generally speaking, having challenging and meaningful work leads to high work satisfaction and if rewarded by the organisation to higher satisfaction with rewards as well Thus OD is intended to enhance both personal and work satisfaction.
Third, OD is used to enhance the effectiveness of organisation and individual well-being through planed interventions. Planned interventions refers to sets of structured activities in which selected organisational units, targets groups or individuals engage with a task or sequence of tasks where the task goals are related directly or indirectly to organisational improvement.
Thus, planned interventions or interventions strategies are the primary means through which organisational improvement and changes take place.
Organisational development is not simple approach. It is a planned and system process of organisational change. The changes are to be management to improve effectiveness of systems, individual and organisation as a whole.
Organizational Development – Top 7 Characteristics
1. Long Range Effort:
OD is not designed to solve short term, temporary or isolated problems. It is a long term approach meant to elevate the Organisation to a higher level of functioning by improving the performance and satisfaction of Organisation members. OD programmes generally cover a period of three to five years.
2. Broad-Based:
OD is used broadly to describe a variety of change programmes. It essentially deals with a big picture-an Organisation. It is a sophisticated attempt to bring about a comprehensive change in the entire Organisation. In other words, it is concerned not only with changes in Organisational design but also with changes in Organisational philosophies, skills of individuals and groups.
3. Dynamic Process:
OD includes the effort to guide and direct change as well as to cope with or adapt to impose change. OD recognizes the fact that the goals of the Organisation change and hence the methods of attaining them should also- change. OD is thus a dynamic process involving a considerable investment of time and currencies. It is not merely a one-shot deal; it is rather, an ongoing, interactive and cycling process.
4. Systems View:
OD utilizes systems thinking. It is based on open, adaptive systems concept. It recognizes that Organisation structure and managerial performance are mutually interdependent. The Organisation is treated as an interrelated whole and no part of the Organisation can be changed without affecting other parts.
5. Research-Based:
Most of the OD interventions are research-based. Change agents do not just introspect the employees and introduce changes rather; they conduct surveys, collect data, evaluate and then take decisions. OD programmes are generally conducted by a special task force and involve the utilization of outside behavioural consultant’s faculties.
6. Goal Felting and Planning:
Since OD is concerned with the entire Organisation, the change agent defines the goals of the group and will see to it that together they all work to achieve them. Beck hard contends that healthy- Organisations tend to have goal setting at all levels.
7. Normative Re-Educative Strategy:
OD is based on the principle that “norms form the basis for behaviour and change is a re-educative process of replacing old by new ones”. For instance, some, OD programmes signify major departures from bureaucratic structure of an Organisation and call for changes in managerial leadership styles.
OD is based on well-established principles regarding the individual and group behaviours in the Organisation and hence ‘it is relatively easy for the OD practitioners to launch and diffuse the required changes by educating them.
OD does not include:
1. Management development – OD is a broader concept and includes management development as its subsystem. Management development is concerned with training and other processes aimed at improving manager’s knowledge, skills and job performance. The primary objective of OD is to change the total system. Management development, however, attempts to change individuals so as to achieve a better fit with the system.
2. Exclusively concerned with people – It is also concerned with the development of Organisational competence, increasing Organisational efficiency and effectiveness.
3. A no-fail formula – OD is not concerned with no-fail formulae for attaining perfection. Rather, it provides room for helpful tactics for moving the Organisation in the right direction to enhance the effectiveness of its members.
4. Aimed at simply making Organisations more productive and efficient – It also strives to make work places satisfying and pleasant.
5. A gimmick or fad – It is solidly based upon the theory and research of a number of disciplines.
6. Not a separate discipline – It draws heavily from other disciplines such as psychology, sociology and anthropology.
Organizational Development – Objectives
Organisation development efforts broadly aim at improving the organisational effectiveness and job satisfaction of the employees. These aims can be attained by humanising the organisations and encouraging the personal growth of individual employees.
Specifically, the OD Objectives are:
(1) To increase openness of communication among people.
(2) To increase commitment, self-direction and self-control.
(3) To encourage the people who are at the helm of affairs or close to the point of actual action to make the decisions regarding their issues through collaborative effort.
(4) To involve the members in the process of analysis and implementation.
(5) To encourage confrontation regarding organisational problems’ with a view to arriving at effective decisions.
(6) To enhance personal enthusiasm and satisfaction levels.
(7) To increase the level of trust and support among employees.
(8) To develop strategic solutions to problems with higher frequency.
(9) To increase the level of individual and group responsibility in planning and execution.
Organizational Development – Process (With 7 Steps)
The OD process is complicated and it takes long time to complete the process. It takes minimum of one year and sometimes continues indefinitely. There are different approaches to OD process but the typical process consists of seven steps, viz., initial diagnosis, data collection, data feedback and confrontation, action planning and problem solving, team building, intergroup development and evaluation and follow-up.
(1) Initial Diagnosis:
If executives recognise that there are inadequacies within organisation which can be corrected by OD activities, it is necessary to find out the professional and competent people within the organisation to plan and execute OD activities.
If competent people are not available within the organisation the services of the outside consultants to help in diagnosing the problem and developing OD activities are to be taken. The consultants adopt various methods including interviews, questionnaires, direct observation, analysis of documents and reports for diagnosing the problem.
(2) Data Collection:
Survey method is used to collect the data and information for determining organisational climate and identifying the behavioural problems.
(3) Data Feedback and Confrontation:
Data collected are analysed and reviewed by various work groups formed from this purpose in order to mediate in the areas of disagreement or confrontation of ideas or opinions and to establish priorities.
(4) Selection and Design of Interventions:
The interventions are the planned activities that are introduced into the system to accomplish desired changes and improvements. At this stage the suitable interventions are to be selected and designed.
(5) Implementation of Intervention:
The selected intervention should be implemented. Intervention may take the form of workshops, feedback of data to the participants, group discussions, written exercises, on-the-job activities, redesign of control system, etc. Interventions are to be implemented steadily as the process is not a “one-shot, quick cure” for organisational malady. But it achieves real and lasting change in the attitudes and behaviour of employees.
(6) Action Planning and Problem Solving:
Groups prepare recommendations and specific action planning to solve the specific and identified problems by using data collected.
(7) Team Building:
The consultants encourage the employees throughout the process to form into groups and teams by explaining the advantages of the teams in the OD process, by arranging joint meetings with the managers, subordinates, etc.
(8) Intergroup Development:
The consultants encourage the intergroup meetings, interaction etc., after the formation of groups/teams.
(9) Evaluation and Follow-Up:
The organisation evaluates the OD programmes, find out their utility, and develop the programmes further for correcting the deviations and/or improved results. The consultants help the organisation in this respect.
All the steps in the OD processes should be followed by the organisation in order to derive full range of OD benefits.
Organizational Development – Principles
The principle of organisation development is that, the ideal way to achieve change in organisations is to alter each person’s entire formal or informal role set to support the change. It is more difficult to change an individual alone because he is placed into role conflict as his peers, superiors and sub-ordinates to retain the same role expectations of him. In such circumstances it would be worthwhile to revise the entire role set to support the change.
Organisational development is an intervention strategy that uses group processes to focus on the whole culture of an organisation in order to bring about a planned change. It makes heavy uses of laboratory training approaches such as role playing, gaming and sensitivity training.
It is important from the point of view of society, customers and workers, themselves because overall costs are reduced that may be a result of reduction of wastage of human efforts and machine etc. In addition to that quality of the product improves and more effective organizational climate is developed.
It is a long range effort to improve an organisation’s problem-solving and renewal processes, particularly through a more effective and collaborative management culture—with special emphasis on culture of formal work teams—with the assistance of a change agent, or catalyst, and the use of the theory and technology of applied behavioural science including action research.
Organizational Development – 3 Main Causes Responsible for its Origin and Growth
There are three main causes which are responsible for the origin and growth of organizational development:
(1) Reward structure on the job.
(2) Fast speed of change.
(3) Desire for more experimental learning processes.
(1) Reward Structure on the Job:
The first primary cause of organizational development is the fact that reward structure on the job did not adequately reinforce training; hence training momentum in the transition from a classroom to a work situation is excessively lost.
The environment in the organisation does not support the training and therefore many well designed training and development programmes failed. So it is better to change the entire organisation so that it will support the training that is provided. This is exactly organizational development tries to do.
(2) Fast Speed of Change:
The second reason is the fast speed of change itself. It needs organisation to be more effective so that it may survive and prosper. The organizational development attempts to develop the culture of the whole organisation so that it may respond to change more uniformly and capably. It develops free communication among workers. It improves the problem solving ability by improving group dynamics or force. Thus, it reaches into all aspects of organizational culture in order to make it more humanly responsive.
(3) Desire for More Experimental Learning Process:
A third reason for the organisation of organizational development is the desire for more experimental learning processes in employees training. It means that the people learn during training period by human problems they face on the job. As soon as they experience the problems relating to human behaviour, they discuss and analyse them with their superiors or colleagues and learn something from this experience.
This type of behavioural approach is much better than the traditional approaches of lectures and discussions. It is training on the job about human behaviour and the person concerned learns from experience on the job. Thus, the programme emphasis work on real problems in real situations and the experience helps to make confirm or refresh their new learning.
Organizational Development – Top 11 OD Intervention Techniques
Organisation development intervention techniques are the methods created by OD professionals and others. Single organisation or consultant cannot use all the interventions. They use these interventions depending upon the need or requirement. The most important interventions are- Survey feedback, process consultation, sensitivity training, the managerial grid, goal setting and planning, team building and management by objectives.
Technique # 1. Survey Feedback:
This intervention provides data and information to the managers. Attitudes of employees about wage level, and structure, hours of work, working conditions and relations are collected and the results are supplied to top executive teams. These teams analyse the data, find out the problems, evaluate the results and develop the means to correct the problems identified. The teams are formed with the employees at all levels in the organisation hierarchy, i.e., from rank and file to the top level.
Technique # 2. Process Consultation:
Under this method, the process consultant meets the members of department in work teams, observes their interactions, problem identification skills, problem solving procedures, etc. He feeds back the team with the information collected through observation, coaches and counsels individuals and groups in moulding their behaviour.
Technique # 3. Goal Setting and Planning:
Each division in an organisation or branch/zonal office sets the goals or formulates the plans relating to profitability, markets share, human resources productivity, etc. These goals are sent to the top management, which in turn sends them back to the divisions/zones/ branches after modifications. A set of organisation-wide goals thus emerge thereafter.
Technique # 4. Managerial Grid:
Industrial psychologists Blake and Mouton developed the managerial grid on the basis of the Ohio State Study. The managerial grid identifies a range of management behaviour based on the different ways that how production/service-oriented and employee-oriented slates interact with each other. Different styles of leadership. The style 1-1 is impoverished management — low concern for both people and production.
This Style is also called laissez faire management. Style 1-9 management is country club-management — high concern for employees, but low concern for production. Style 9-1 management is task or authoritarian-oriented high concern for production and low concern for employees. Style 5-5 is middle of the road management — an intermediate amount of concern for both production and employees.
Style 9-9 management is team- oriented management — a high concern for both production and employees. Blake and Mouton strongly argue that the 9-9 management style is most effective type of leadership style. Hence, it is felt that the management may adopt 9-9 style, for effective goal attainment.
Managerial grid is also called as instrumental laboratory training as it is a structured version of laboratory training. It consists of individual and group exercises with a view to developing awareness of individual managerial style, interpersonal competence and group effectiveness.
Thus, grid training is directly related to the leadership styles. The managerial grid focuses on the observations of behaviour in exercises specifically related to work. Participants in this training are encouraged and helped to appraise their own managerial style.
Technique # 5. Management by Objectives:
Management by objectives (MBO) is a successful philosophy of management. It replaces the traditional philosophy of “management by domination.” It was popularised as an approach to planning by Peter F. Drucker in 1954 in his famous book The Practice of Management. Since that time it has acquired momentum and of late it has become a movement.
There are many MBO type programmes like “management by results”, “goals management”, “work planning and review” “goals and controls”, “appraising by results.” These programmes are similar in nature in spite of the difference in names.
According to Howell, the concept of MBO has passed through different stages of management development, viz.:
1. MBO for performance appraisal;
2. MBO for integrating the individuals with the organisation; and
3. MBO for long range planning.
Management by objectives has been defined as “a result-centred, non-specialist, operational managerial process for the effective utilisation of material, physical and human resources of the organisation, by integrating the individual with the organisation and organisation with the environment.”
In other words, MBO is a process by which managers at different levels and their subordinates work together in identifying goals and establishing objectives consistent with the organisational goals and attaining them.” Thus, MBO is not only an aid to planning but also a motivating factor.
The steps in MBO process are summarised as follows:
(i) Preliminary Setting of Objectives at the Top
(ii) Clarification of Organisational Goals
(iii) Setting of Subordinate Objectives
(iv) Recycling of Objectives, and
(v) Performance Appraisal.
Technique # 6. Sensitivity Training:
The most commonly used OD intervention is sensitivity training. It is also called laboratory training. It is called laboratory training as it is conducted by creating an experimental laboratory situation in which employees are brought together, in groups, to interact in an unstructured environment. The members are encouraged to interact with new members and new individual behaviours.
The objectives of laboratory training are:
(i) To help people understand themselves better;
(ii) To create better understanding of others;
(iii) To gain insight into the group process; and
(iv) To develop specific behavioural skills.
Some people never understand why they feel and act as they do and how the others feel about them. Some people are insensitive to the effects of their behaviour upon others and their orders upon subordinates. Laboratory training helps such people to understand the impact of their behaviour on others.
Most of the people concentrate on what they are going to say rather than what the others are saying. This training develops the communication skills of the employers and develops them as good listeners. It also helps the participants to form into informal groups and teams and work more effectively.
Modus Operandi of Sensitivity Training:
Sensitivity training provides face-to-face interaction. This training is carried out by largely unstructured groups without an agenda, leader and predetermined goals. The group is given complete freedom in developing their own devices, interactions and ongoing process for interaction.
Sometimes, the trainer introduces certain planned activities involving one or two professional trainers set in with each “T” group. The emphasis in this training is not upon learning specific facts but upon gaining understanding of feelings, gestures, attitudes and emotions, i.e., sensitivity to oneself and others.
Another type of group is encounter group. These groups involve unstructured small group interaction under stress in a situation that requires people to become sensitive to one another’s feelings in order to develop group activity. These groups seek to improve understanding of self and others, group process, culture and general behaviour skills.
Laboratory training may include role playing, intergroup competitive exercises, self-insight questionnaires, and theory sessions with lectures, background readings, panel discussions and audio-visual aids in addition to ‘T’ groups.
Technique # 7. Team Building:
Most of the laboratory training takes place among the employees of the same department. These employees work together as a team. Team building is nothing but application of various techniques of sensitivity training to the actual work groups in various departments. These work groups consist of peers and a supervisor.
Laboratory techniques are also applied to short-term work teams. The technique, like laboratory training, aims at improving intergroup relations. This technique is designed to improve the ability of the employees to work together as teams.
Technique # 8. Job Enrichment:
Job enrichment as is currently practised all over the world is a direct outgrowth of Herzberg’s two-factor theory of motivation. It is therefore based on the assumption that in order to motivate workers, the job itself must provide opportunities for achievement, recognition, responsibility, advancement and growth.
The basic idea is to restore to jobs the elements of interest that were taken away under the intensive specification. However, job enrichment is significantly different from horizontal loading. Horizontal loading does not enrich the task. Washing dishes to begin with, then the silverware, and gradually switchover to pots and pans does no more to satisfy and provide an opportunity to grow.
Under job enrichment, there is a conscious effort to build into jobs a higher sense of challenge and achievement. In a job enrichment programme, the worker decides how the job is performed, planned, and controlled, and makes more decisions concerning the entire process.
The job enrichment approach to boring jobs is to give the individual employee more autonomy in that job. Employees decide how the job will be performed and receive less direct supervision on the job. Consequently, the employee receives a greater sense of accomplishment as well as more authority and responsibility, job satisfaction. This in turn contributes for better employee performance and higher productivity.
Technique # 9. Changes in Organisational Structure:
Various models or organisational structure, particularly matrix organisation, improves intergroup interaction and relations. Further, changes may be introduced in organisational structure lo provide the scope for team work, group interaction and increased interpersonal relations.
Technique # 10. Participative Management and Quality Circles:
Participative management and quality circles are extension to team work. They provide for voluntary formation of groups/teams, association, interaction, etc. They encourage open discussion on various problems and arriving at a commonly agreed solutions and execution of the agreements by the members themselves.
Technique # 11. Use of a Consultant:
Top management engages a consultant or a change agent to help in establishing OD programmes when the qualified, competent and professional employees are not available within the organisation, OD professionals generally possess advanced qualifications in behavioural science and knowledge and experience in designing and conducting laboratory training programmes.
The consultant examines the routine activities, provides information, helps the management in designing and administering the OD programme. He also helps and trains the members to become self-sufficient in problem solving.
The consultant prepares the report and submits to the top management regarding OD policy and programmes on the basis of data and information collected by him from various sources of the organisation. He also helps the organisation in executing the OD programmes. The consultant helps much in developing the members to become more effective in dealing with one another.
Organizational Development – Top 4 Models
The suitability of structure to strategy is dependent on a number of situational factors. Absence of fit between strategy and structure leads to inefficient functioning of the company. The stages of organisation development is an important factor that influence the match between strategy and structure.
Stages of Organisation Development:
Generally successful companies grow larger in size and diversify their activities. The growth of the company brings a number of changes.
These changes include:
(i) Increase in financial resources (gross profits and investments)
(ii) Increase in resource needs (human resources, financial resources, material resources).
(iii) Increase in number of products and markets.
(iv) Increase in operating and managerial specialisation.
(v) Increase in size, complexity and risk of operating and managerial problems.
As organisations develop, the dominant strategic issues change with organisation’s developmental changes. The three most frequently discussed stages of development models are those developed by Thain, Cannon and Greiner.
1. Cannon’s Stages of Development Model:
Cannon developed comprehensive stages of development model. His model consists of five stages of development. He argues that firms are found in one of these five stages of development. Though, Cannon does not contend that firms move through stages, strategic issues facing a firm move with each stage.
Stage I:
The Entrepreneurial Stage- This stage represents the small business, generally operated by the owner-manager. The market of the firm in limited to a specific geographical area.
Stage II:
When the company grows in size, the owner-manager cannot perform increased volume of managerial functions. Therefore, the owner-manager, hires an accountant, sales representatives and other agents. The other functional managers will also be hired with the further increase in the organisational size.
A functional form of organisation structure will be adopted. But the problems of functional structure will come to the surface with the further increase in the company’s operations. These problems include- delay in getting approval for new products and other innovations. These problems may push the company to the next stage.
Stage III:
Organisation will be restructured either based on product or geographic or customers. Control may become difficult when each division develops its own view of product quality, pricing, etc.
Stage IV:
To regain control of the organisation, management may employ additional human resources to assist top management.
Stage V:
This stage involves increasing involvement of top management in strategic decision making. This move to recentralisation may be as part of a cutback and turnaround strategy.
2. Thain’s Stages of Corporate Development Model:
Thain proposed a different conceptualisation of organisational stages of development. It identifies three stages of organisational development with different factors relevant to top management in each stage.
Stage I:
Stage of Thain is similar to Cannon’s entrepreneurial stage. The manager maintains absolute ownership and control. The company’s strengths, weaknesses, and performance are shaped by the owner-manager’s personality, ability and style. The increase in the size of the business forces the owner to appoint managers for different functions.
Stage II:
In this stage, there is the existence of a management team built around one business and selling primarily to one market. The company in this stage specialises in one product and concentrates in one area. These characteristics, may threaten the survival of the firm consequent upon changes in consumer preferences or ability to buy. Companies try to overcome this danger by diversifying the activities.
Stage III:
The firms in this stage are conglomerate diversified with multiple operating units controlled by corporate office. Companies in this stage can often operate independently of outside resources. But the organisation adopts a bureaucratic structure to manage and control a large size and diversified business.
3. Greiner’s Phases of Organisational Growth:
Greiner explains how growth affects management style. There are two stages in each phase of Greiner’s model. Those stages are- evolution-steady organisational growth period and revolution periods upheaval or turmoil. The accumulated problems in each phase will be solved only when a breaking point is reached.
This breaking point causes revolutionary change in organisational structure. Managers should prepare revolutionary change by identifying the phase through which the organisation is passing.
Phase 1:
In this phase, creativity centres around the development of products and markets. Management spends most of the time in solving operating problems, rather than in managing the company. Organisational structure is mostly informal and authority for decision-making is centralised.
The growth of the company in size makes the informal organisation ineffective and crisis in management and leadership. The revolution ends this phase by employing functional specialists.
Phase 2:
Functional managers improve the organisational efficiency and performance. However, decision-making is centralised among the functional managers. The absence of strategic decisionmaking authority among the lower level managers results in revolution in autonomy.
Phase 3:
This phase is concerned with delegation. Lower-level managers are delegated with strategic decision-making authority for particular products or markets. Top level management concentrates on business growth and diversification. Absence of coordination among business units relating to products or markets creates revolution. This revolution leads to Phase 4.
Phase 4:
Improvement and maintenance of coordination is the main concern in this phase. Co-ordination systems are introduced. Decentralised units are combined into strategic business units. The coordination efforts will result in formalised communication system, centralised decision-making, and formulation of rules, regulations and controls. These factors result in a bureaucratic organisation, which causes a crisis and brings Phase 5.
Phase 5:
This phase strives to enhance collaboration. Behavioural orientation, group working, project teams and matrix structures are adopted to improve problem solving.
Greiner argues that only a limited number of firms have reached Phase 5. Phase 5 brings organisational changes due to the emphasis on behavioural skills and behavioural modification.
4. Leontiades Stages of Growth Model:
Leontiade’s growth model is one of the recent model. Leontiades states that growth is best understood by examining single business and multi-business firms. Two sub-categories of strategies exist within each classification as presented in Exhibit 11.13.
Organisational structure appears to vary between single-business and multi-business firms. Single business firms follow a functional design and multi-business firms use a divisional structure.
Organizational Development – Pre-Requisites for the Success of OD Programme
Successful Organisation development tends to be a total system effort. It is not a programme with a temporary quality;’ it is rather aimed at developing the Organisation’s internal resources for effective change.
To increase the probability of success of the OD programme the following conditions must be fulfilled:
a. Support for od programme should begin with top management:
OD is a system-wide concept requiring at least psychological involvement of all the parts of system in the Organisation. Of all the support for the programme is essential and this support should begin with the top management. In certain cases the programme dies just beet use of lack of support of top management.
To overcome such failures OD programmes are designed using a vertical slice of the Organisation where all the members in the chain of command are exposed to the development process. For the success of the programme the support of individual members is also essential.
b. Organisation must communicate the objectives of programme clearly:
The objectives of the programme must be made crystal-clear to all the participants and Organisational members before the programme is launched. If the Organisation cannot communicate the objectives effectively then it is quite likely that the programme may be doomed to fail.
Further, Organisation must recognize that a problem exists and must desire moving toward a solution to the problem. Some Organisations, even when they do not confront problem, take chances by introducing changes that, may prove to be costly later. Organisations should ‘see and hit’ the target; rather than ‘hit and then see’ if any target as there. Quite often Organisations become aware of the new programme and have a feeling that it would be good to try to implement it even if no specific problem exists at that time.
c. Enough time must be allowed so that the effects of an od programme are realized:
Things in Organisation are not expected to change drastically over a brief period of time Managers who introduce intervention to change will be invariably disappointed if they expect quick results of OD programmes. It is because OD aims at changing the conditioned behaviour of members which is rather difficult and time-consuming affair.
Conditioned behaviour does not change quickly and instantaneously and it takes a considerable span of time. It is, therefore, increasingly apparent that to bring remarkable positive changes OD programmes consume months, in some cases years together.
d. The role of outside consultant must be understood:
A consultant is an OD practitioner, often labeled as “interventionist”, “change agent” or “Process consultant”. The OD consultant in his technical bag contains the necessary behavioural knowledge, technical problem- solving abilities and clinical skills. He also possesses the personality and interpersonal competence to use himself as an instrument of change.
But his role in the Organisation must be properly understood to ensure the success of OD programme. Organisations should not rely frequently on the consultants, if so, it becomes a lucrative practice. If the outside consultant diagnoses the problem and prescribes the solution himself then the Organisation is not better off to solve the problems in future. It will have to resort to consultant once again if any problem arises in future.
The actual role of consultant is that “he should help people in the Organisation to solve their problems on their own. He should not give expert advice but rather should encourage people to diagnose the true nature of the problem and arrive at workable and meaningful solutions. But nowadays the consultant has himself changed from a non-directive, purely process- oriented practitioner to an authoress specialist.”
The trouble with such authoritative flavour is that tier imposed solution to problem may be resisted just because it is externally imposed. From the Organisation’s point of view if the consultant’s orientation is toward the problem- solving process and development of problem-skills of the employees it is beneficial to the Organisation.
e. Use the appropriate intervention:
For the success of OD programme use of appropriate intervention is essential. If the intervention is inappropriate it will have undesirable consequences. Depending on the target group the Organisation must use the intervention. For, instance, if the focus is on individuals then sensitivity training or Grid Phase I or any other type is called for.
On the other hand, if the focus is on teams and groups, then survey feedback, or process consultation or family T-group training is called for. Further, if the target group is the intergroup relationships then Grid phase III or survey feedback are, used. Most of the failures of OD may be attributed to the inappropriate use of methods of intervention in programmes.
Organizational Development – Ethical Issues (With Examples)
Ethical issues in OD practice, that is, in terms of enhancement versus violation of basic values, Louis White and Kevin Wooten see five categories of ethical dilemmas on organisational development practice stemming from the action of either the consultant or client or both.
The types of ethical dilemmas they see are – misrepresentation and collusion; misuse of data; manipulation and coercion- value and goal conflicts; and technical ineptness (These five types largely encompass the several ethical dilemmas reported by Susan Devoget in a survey of OD practitioners).
We shall draw on and modify their categories to suggest what we see as some of the more serious areas for potential ethics violations in OD consulting. Some of these areas apply not only to OD consulting, but to management consulting in general.
They are discussed as below:
1. Misrepresentation of the Consultant’s Skills:
An obvious area for unethical behaviour would be to distort or misrepresent dene’s background, training, competencies, or experience in vita sheets, advertising, or conversation. A subtle form of misrepresentation would be to let the client assume one has certain skills when one does not.
2. Professional/Technical Incompetence:
The potential for unethical behaviour stemming lack of expertise is pervasive in OD. To give one example using, Harrison’s concepts of depth of intervention, it would seem to be unethical to ask people in a team-building session to provide mutual feedback about leadership style when neither preliminary interviews nor the client group has indicated a readiness or a willingness to do so.
Another example would be as follows-A preliminary diagnosis suggests the appropriateness of a feedback intervention, but the consultant has no experience from which to draw in order to design a constructive feedback exercise. The consultant goes ahead anyway. It would be unethical for the consultant to go ahead without some coaching by a more experienced colleague.
These situations may call for the ‘shadow consultant’, the consultant to a single individual in the case another consultant. Thus, we have hypothesised two solutions of ethical standards-using interventions that have a low probability of being helpful (and may be harmful in this circumstance), and using an intervention that exceeds one’s expertise.
3. Misuse of Data:
Again, the possibilities for unethical of behaviour in the form of data misuse on the part of either the client or the consultant are abundant. This is why confidentiality is so important in OD efforts. Data can be used to punish or otherwise harm persons or groups. An obvious example would be a consultant’s discloser to the boss, the names of those who provided information about the boss’s dysfunctional behaviour.
Another example would be showing climate survey results from department A to the head of department B without department A’s authorisation. Serious distortions of the data would also be unethical. Let’s imagine scenario in which the consultant interviews the top twenty members of management and finds several department heads are angry about the behaviour of fellow department head Z and the practices in Z’s department.
Further, due to Z’s hostile and uncooperative behaviour with the consultant in the data gathering interview, the consultant is now angry but is not conscious of the extent of the themes from the interviews to the groups; his or her anger takes the form of overstating and over emphasising the dysfunctional aspects of Z’s unit. In an ironic twist, the groups might turn on the consultant and defend Z. As it is said, never attack wrongly the worst member of the group, the group will reject you.
4. Collusion:
An example of collusion would be the consultant agreeing with the key client to schedule a team- building workshop when department head Z is scheduled to be on vacation. This tactic is hardly the way to deal with the problem created by Z, and is likely to create reduced trust in the consultant and the key client, Z’s boss, and is likely to intensify Z’s dysfunctional behaviour.
Another example illustrating the power that the consultant colluding with other members of the group to set up feedback situation in which Z’s deficiencies will be all too apparent, particularly to Z’s boss. Instead of creating a situation in which everyone, including Z, has a chance of improving performance, this pollution is maimed at Z’s undoing. If OD interventions are perceived as methods for getting anyone damaged, the OD process is doomed to be a failure.
5. Coercion:
It is unethical to force organisational members into setting where they are in effort, required to disclose information about them or their units which they prefer to keep private. The creation of a T- group with unwilling participants would be an example.
6. Promising Unrealistic Outcome:
Obviously, this is an unethical and unproductive practice. The temptation to make promises in order to gain a client contract can be great, but the consequences can be reduced credibility of the key client within his or her organisation.
7. Deception and Conflict of Values:
Deception in any form is unethical and will destroy trust. For example, a telephone company that embarked on a major re-engineering effort after giving assurances of job security, and then proceeded to lay off a huge part of the workforce. The layoffs came after the company had promoted teamwork and empowerment and secured employees’ cooperation in streamlining operations.
For an OD professional on the scene under such circumstances, the ethical course of action would be to press top management to look at the probable consequences of re-engineering, to look at possible options and to be completely open with employees about the implications of whatever change strategy was selected and the ethical responsibilities of the OD profession and company management extend, of course, to mitigating the impact of any change effort on the lives of individual employees.
Thus, the values underlying ethical OD practice are honesty, openness, voluntarism, integrity, confidentiality, the development of people, and the development of consultant expertise, high standards, and self-awareness.
Organizational Development – Values of OD Professionals
OD movement is composed of various professionals like behavioural researchers, consultants, business executives, etc. There are a number of values to these professions.
The important among them are:
(1) People are Basically Good:
OD movement believes the assumptions of Theory of Y of McGregor. As such it emphasises supportive and relative opportunities for growth. Self-control and personal responsibility are to be provided to the employees in an organisation rather than using controls and punishments.
(2) Need for Confirmation and Support:
Every new employee needs confirmation and support of others. He is conditioned to believe that no ‘news is good news’ as he may be afraid of the negative aspects of support and security. Hence, when the new employee is appointed he is to be taken into confidence, invited to work place and into association for discussion on his personal and work related issues in private meetings.
(3) Accepting Differences among People:
People have different backgrounds, experiences, opinions and ideas, viewpoints and personality. Organisation is benefited by the differences in backgrounds, personality and viewpoints of employees.
(4) Expressing Feelings and Emotions:
Allowing the people to be rational, to express their feelings, sentiments, emotion, anger or tenderness. Full range of expression of feelings result in high motivation, commitment, and creative ability. The people may be allowed to exhibit their anger, emotion and exhilaration.
(5) Authenticity, Openness and Directness:
Most of the people exhibit duplicity tell half-truths and mask their true motives. Such behaviour inhibits the growth of the individuals and productivity as the resources are misused in this process. Honesty and directness enable people to put their energies into the real problems and improve effectiveness.
(6) Fostering Cooperation:
Some executives adopt the rule of divide and manage. Thus, they believe in win-lose competition for various employee benefits. This style results in wastage of human and other resources. Hence, executives should create and develop cooperation among employees for effectiveness.
(7) Giving Attention:
Giving attention to process activities not only at the time of assigning activities and bringing relations among employees but also at the later stages.
(8) Confronting Conflict:
Some executives suppress the conflict. But it has its long-run effect on employee morale. Hence, identifying the root causes of the problem and working out a satisfactory solution rather than suppressing the conflict are needed.
Organisational Development Values:
The OD paradigm values human and organisational growth, collaborative and participative processes, and a spirit of inquiry. The change agent may be directive in OD; however, there is a strong emphasis on collaboration. Concepts such as power, authority, control, conflict, and coercion are held in relatively low esteem among OD change agents.
The following briefly identifies the underlying values in most OD efforts:
1. Respect for people – Individuals is perceived as being responsible, conscientious, and caring. They should be treated with dignity and respect.
2. Trust and support – The effective and healthy organisation is characterised by trust, authenticity, openness, and a supportive climate.
3. Power equalization – Effective organisations deemphasise hierarchical authority and control.
4. Confrontation – Problems should not be swept under the rug. They should be openly confronted.
5. Participation – The more that people who will be affected by a change are involved in the decisions surrounding that change, the more they will be committed to implementing those decisions.
Organisational development is the field of study and practice that focuses on various aspects of organisational life, including culture, values, systems and behaviour. The goal is to increase organisational effectiveness and maintain optimal organisational health through planned interventions in process or operations.
Generally, OD services are requested when an organisation or one of its major parts requires or experiences significant change. OD consultants provide planned approaches and structured activities to work through change to achieve desired improvements.
Organizational Development – Advantages
Organisation development is an important technique of including change.
It has the following advantages which may be experienced:
(1) Tries Change in the Whole Organisation:
It tries to deal with the change in the whole organisation or in its major unit.
(2) Bring’s Overall Improvement:
It brings about more dispersed overall improvement in the organisation. It improves positive factors such as increased productivity, better quality of work, higher job satisfaction to workers, improved team-work and co-operation and improved resolution of conflict. It also reduces negative factors like absence and turnover.
Organizational Development – 6 Major Disadvantages
Organisational development carries the following disadvantages or limitations:
(1) Expensive and Time Consuming:
It is time consuming and expensive because services of capable trainer, instructor, or consultant are required. Change in behaviour takes a longtime.
(2) Gains after a Long Time:
Some benefits have long pay-off period that is they start gaining after a long time and organisation cannot wait for the benefits for such a long time.
(3) Training Useless Unless Capable Persons are Not Taken:
The training for organisational development will be useless, unless the services of professionally capable consultants are not used.
(4) Coercive Methods are Adopted:
In some of its methods such as sensitive training, the question of privacy arises. It is invariably charged that the participants are coerced towards group attitudes and conformity.
(5) Improvement of Behavioural Processes:
Excessive emphasis is laid on the improvement of behavioural processes rather than on job performance.
(6) Informal Processes are Given Precedence:
Informal interpersonal processes seem to be given precedence over needs of formal organisation. In spite of its serious criticisms, the organisational development is used in organisations successfully. It has contributed much to improve behavioural and organisational results.