Practice for Change OD - Past, Present and Future

1. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Practice for ChangeOD - Past, Present and Future David Hain david@transformationpartners.co.uk November 26 2009

2. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Linda Holbeche - CIPD “OD – in contrast to HRM or HRD – is more of a ‘scavenger’ discipline. It is an eclectic field that borrows from many other disciplines and theories, and that offers insights about how people within organisations work – for example systems thinking, behavioural science disciplines, such as psychology, social psychology, sociology, anthropology, systems theory, organisation behaviour, organisation theory, culture and management literature – to name but a few.” “This perhaps explains why OD has been somewhat in abeyance for years and has failed to be ‘grafted on’ to HR professional practice.”

3. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Organizational Development Richard Beckhard - “A collection of planned interventions, built on humanistic-democratic values, that seeks to improve organizational effectiveness and employee well-being.” • OD Values: • Respect for people • Trust and support • Power equalization • Confrontation • Participation

4. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE History of OD • Relatively new field of study – 50’s & 60’s • No unifying theory – just models of practice • Emerged from study of group dynamics & planned change. Late 40’s • T-groups – training groups, behavioral skills and individual insight into problem solving • Kurt Lewin at MIT • “participants themselves learn about themselves (and about small group processes in general) through their interaction with each other.” • “…the most significant social invention of the century“ Carl Rogers

5. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Four Trunk Stems of OD Action Research Socio- technical Approaches Laboratory Training Survey research and Feedback Rensis Likert • Tavistock Clinic

6. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE How does OD Work? Lewin’s 3 Phase OD Model UNFREEZING Resistance to change lessened, need for change created (Equilibrium disturbed) MOVING From old behaviour to the new (Changes) REFREEZING Change made permanent

7. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE • NTL – National Training Laboratory (Institute) www.ntl.org T-Group • Other universities set up training labs • Invention of flip chart • Next 10 years were tough – frustration at inability to transfer NTL to real world – began to train teams. • Major Contributors - Kurt Lewin, Kenneth Benne, Leland Bradford and Ronald Lippitt

8. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Key Early Thinkers • Chris Argyris • 1957, Yale, First to conduct team building sessions with CEO’s. • Douglas McGregor • 1957, MIT – Started program in org studies • Union Carbide – transfer t-groups to complex organizations • Theory X and Y • The Human side of Enterprise. • Robert Blake (Jane Mouton) • WWII served in Psych unit of Army Airforce • Looked at systems rather than individuals in system on one-on-one basis • Link of systems process to OD • Managerial Grid – win/lose dynamics • Warren Bennis • Only T-grouper to actually try to reshape an organization from the top. • Led to his study of leadership

9. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE The Term “OD” Emerged from Baton Rouge T-groups called Development Groups “At that time we wanted to put a label on the program at General Mills. We didn’t want to call it management development because it was total organization-wide, nor was it human relations training. We didn’t want to call it organization improvement because that is a static term, so we labeled the program “organization Development” meaning system-wide change efforts.” Richard Beckhard

10. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Action Research Process Key executive perception of problems Action (new behaviours) Data gathering (reassessment of state of system) Consultation with behavioural scientist consultant Action planning (determine objectives and how to get there) Data gathering and diagnosis by consultant Feedback Discussion and work on data feedback and data by client group Further data gathering Discussion and work on feedback and emerging data Feedback to key client or client group Feedback to client group Action planning Joint action planning (objectives of OD programme and means of attaining goals, e.g. team building Data gathering Action

11. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE 2nd Generation OD • Interest in Organizational Transformation • Multi level, qualitative, radical, discontinuous change involving a paradigmatic shift, Levy & Merry. • Organizational Culture • Schein • Norms – values – artifacts – assumptions • Learning organization • Argyris, Schon, Senge • Condition under which individuals, team and organizations learn

12. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE More Recent Thinkers • Senge – Systems thinking • Learning disabilities in organizations • Different ways to think about complex problems. • The origin of the vision is much less important than how it is shared • TQM • Deming, Juran, Feigenbaum • “….a particular set of values about the individual and the individuals role in the organization. Total quality efforts in the companies encourage true employee involvement, demand teamwork, seek to push decision making power to lower levels in the company, and reduce barriers between people. . . These values are at the core of OD as well.” - Ciampa

13. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Current Themes • Appreciative inquiry • Coaching • Collaboration and partnerships • Complex adaptive learning • Continuous learning • Emotional intelligence • Large-scale interventions • Learning organization • On-line learning • Self-managed and self-directed and self-organizing teams • Systems thinking

14. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE The Paradox of Leadership and Change Managing performance, being accountable and in control AND Enabling change to happen – creating the conditions for innovation and creativity AT THE SAME TIME

15. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE The Context of Leadership and Change Far from agreement • Enabling Performance • Saying yes to the mess • Encouraging connectivity • Fostering diversity • Challenging habits and assumptions • Supporting initiative • Reducing power differentials • Keeping people motivated • Managing Performance • Technical/rational decision making • Simple structures • Effective procedures • Monitoring/co-ordinating • Providing direction Close to agreement After Ralph Stacey Near to certainty Far from certainty

16. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Systems Thinking • Organisations do not exist in a vacuum but are part of an ‘open system’. • OD focuses on ensuring that organisations are responsive to their environment and that internal capacity matches strategic ambition. • Environmental factors (input) affect what the organisation exists to deliver (output), and how the organisation affects the environment. • OD looks at the total system and linkages between all parts of the organisation, and how change in one part will affect the other parts. • ‘…a system-wide process of planned change aimed toward improving overall effectiveness by way of enhanced congruence of such organizational dimensions as external environment, mission, strategy, leadership, culture, structure, information and reward system, and work policies and procedures’ (Bradford and Burke 2005).

17. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE Three Key Phases • Diagnostic work • help all relevant parties to know where the system is at, and where it needs to get to • Interventions • what are the key activities to help the system move from A to B? • Mobilisation • The system must own the intervention for effective outcomes

18. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE OD Questions • What are the right skills to drive my organisation forward? • How do you engage the people you need to deliver success? • How do you speed up processes? • How will tomorrow’s leaders need to be different from today’s leaders? • How do you create collaborative, distributed leadership? • How does customer focus/lean thinking/personal accountability become embedded in the organisation’s DNA? • How do you create a climate for performance and innovation? • How can you create and transmit values that bind the organisation together? • How can we manage change effectively and not ‘throw the baby out with the bathwater’? • How do you maintain trust and keep people motivated through change?

19. PRACTICE FOR CHANGE The Environment in Wales