XXIII Congreso Internacional De Desarrollo Organizacional Monty G. Miller, Ed.D

1. The Efficacy of Appreciative Inquiryin Building Relational Capital in a Transcultural Strategic Alliance XXIII Congreso Internacional De Desarrollo Organizacional Monty G. Miller, Ed.D International Performance Solutions, Ltd.

2. Presentation’s New Title:Who Took The Flip Charts Home?

3. Objective: Share Learning’s for Creating Successful Strategic Alliances • Shared strategic direction, understanding, and vision. • Establish project agreements, expectations and goals. • Define accountable roles and responsibilities. • Appreciate and respect how people think and do their work. • Build relationships and community to deal with issues and conflict.

4. Agenda • Part I: • Research on methods to build strategic alliances • Part II: • Appreciative Inquiry as a philosophy in strategic alliance building • Part III: • Conclusions • Part IV: • Discussion

5. Dissertation Title:Case study of building relational capital in a transcultural strategic alliance.

6. Part I: Research on methods to build strategic alliances

7. Opportunity Statement (1998) Conduct a non-experimental case study to learn how Appreciative Inquiry (Ai) and a management education session (ME) succeed or fail in building relational capital in a transcultural strategic alliance.

8. Definitions Strategic Alliance: A cooperative effort by two or more entities in pursuit of their own strategic objective. • Marks and Mirvis, 1998, p. 9 Relational Capital: The goodwill and trust that partners accumulate in a relationship as they gain mutual confidence. • P. Kale, 1998, AoM

9. Why Pursue This Study? • High Failure Rate of Strategic Alliances: • Harrigan, Columbia U: • 55% Failure rate • McKinsey: study of 200 Alliances and JVs: • Median life 7 years • 80% sell out to partner • Bleeke & Ernst: 49 Alliances from 1981-87: • 53% both partners cited success • 33% both partners cited failure • 17% partners differed – success/failure

10. Why Pursue This Study, Cont’d • Why Strategic Alliance Failures Occur -- It’s the relationships! • The cultural dynamics are often overlooked as the focus is generally on strategic intent, and financial and legal issues (Fedor and Werther, 1996, p. 39). • Partners are more worried about controlling the relationship than nurturing it (Kanter, 1994, p. 96). • Empirical evidence suggests that technical issues are less likely to lead to conflicting situations compared to interrelationship during implementation (Morosini, 1998, p. 15).

11. Alliances Struggle With A Sense of Purpose and Vision • Alliance Partners’ stories and baggage: • Assumptions, Mental Models, and Gnosis • Leadership may understand common “strategic context”, however... • Unless told, retold, and reinforced, employees create their own stories as to why the alliance exists. • Partners have public and private agendas for creating the alliance. • Leadership and management benefits from a continuous dialogue to flush out the partners’ strategic intent and opportunities for collaboration.

12. Mahyco Largest producer of hybrid seed in India. Established in 1964 Competencies: Germ plasm Production Distribution Marketing R&D Complex Quality Monsanto Global life science company Est.1901 / India 1947 Competencies: Biotechnology Crop protection Global systems: Development, Production, Regulatory and Marketing The Alliance

13. Mahyco & Monsanto’s Headquarters *New Delhi *Jalna -- Mahyco *Mumbai (Bombay) Mahyco and Monsanto

14. Mahyco Family Patriarchal Seed India Tight-Knit Community Monsanto Multinational Blend of hierarchical, team, and transformational Agricultural chemicals and biotechnology United States Loose-Knit Community Cultural Differences

15. Business Cultures: Fundamental Differences Mahyco Low Formal High High Low High Monsanto High Informal Moderate Low High Low Business Culture Component Levels of Employee Involvement: Employee-Management Relations: Loyalty and Commitment: Expectations Regarding Tenure: Variety of Job Experiences: Connections and Networks (ie Gov’t):

16. Proposal To Mahyco and Monsanto Management • Conduct a large scale alliance building session using Ai with senior management, upper management, and R&D people from both organizations. Appreciative Inquiry: A large-scale change philosophy that leverages the organization/participants’ positive “historical” experiences to help them co-create their future.

17. Mahyco Management’s Considerations on Ai Alliance-Building Design • Agreed on the Opportunity: • Use the Alliance as a catalyst for change • Gave Cultural Push-Back Regarding Ai: • Job Responsibility -- Scope of Mahyco employees’ historical business purview • Mixing employee classes • Ai is too personal: • Hi-points shared prematurely with strangers • Core values penetrated too quickly • Too childish for men in their 50s and 60s with 30 years of experience • Participants will go through the steps, but not willingly, and it would set back the Alliance

18. Ai Alliance Building Session Design Objectives For R&D Joint Team Meeting: • Build participants’ understanding of their partner organization’s: • Business • Culture and • Expectations for the Alliance • Build productive relationships, and • Support cross-Alliance teams to build plans

19. Alternative to Ai Design Created for Senior Management Education (ME) Meeting Educational Format – Objectives: • Provide Mahyco’s top 30 managers an opportunity to learn about Monsanto. • Provide ample time for Q&A and discussion. • Create desire by Mahyco’s top 30 managers to meet with a broader group of Monsanto people to build working relationships.

20. RESEARCH QUESTION 1 How do two different types of group interventions (Ai and ME) support the development of: a) relational capital, and b) collaborative work in a transcultural strategic alliance?

21. Data Sources - Triangulation • Quantitative: • Pre-session questionnaires (December 1998) • Post-session questionnaires (December 1998) • Follow-up questionnaires via email (Jan-March 1999) • Qualitative: • Narrative responses to open-ended questions on all 3 questionnaires • Descriptive and reflective notes of the: • Researcher and • Learning manager • The most compelling data resulted from an inter-rater reliability analysis

22. Inter-Rater Content Analysis of Post- and Follow-up Questionnaires % of Questionnaires With Detected Growth In Indicators Post-Q Ai Ses. (n=32) Post-Q ME Ses. (n=34) Fw-up Q Ai Ses. (n=26) Fw-up Q Me Ses. (n=26) Key Indicators Relationships 56.2%1 17.7% 142.3 % 2 0.0% 2 Trust 12.5% 8.8% 23.1% 23.5% Collaboration 65.5% 3 11.8% 353.8% 4 11.8% 4 Understanding 81.2% 79.4% 73.1% 88.2% 1,2,3,4 Ai participants had significantly higher counts at p<.05 level

23. Part II:Appreciative Inquiry as a philosophy in strategic alliance building

24. RESEARCH QUESTION 2 How can Ai and other group formation concepts be used to create a sample intervention to support the forming of a transcultural strategic alliance?

25. Appreciative Inquiry -- 4-D Cycle Discover “Best In Our Past” Destiny “How to empower, learn, and adjust?” Dream “What might be” Design “What should be—the ideal?” Cooperrider, D.L. & Srivastva, S., (1987) and Banaga Jr., G. (1998)

26. Cooperrider, et. al. Discovery Dream Design Destiny Used in Session Discovery Dream DIALOGUE DESIGN Modifications to Ai ProcessUsed in Ai Session

27. Appreciative Inquiry Template • Day 1 • Discover • Knowledge building on people, cultures, partners’ business, strategies and expectations, etc. • Leadership shares their vision for the alliance

28. Divided The Participants Into Four Teams • By Their Alliance Work Team • Rooms, shirts, name tags were color coded: • Cotton Projects • Insect Control Projects • Hybrid Technology Projects • R&D Operations & Facilities Mgmt

29. Ice-breaker -- Discover • Participants interview each other in pairs in their teams. Please share job responsibilities, location (birth and current location on map), family background, significant event from a given year in their lives and/or name (learn about each others history/family as depicted by their name). Each participant then introduces his/her interviewee to their team.

30. Day 1 AM –Additional Critical Content • Pre-Session Questionnaire • Realities of Creating An Alliance • Alliance Vision and Mission Presentation by Alliance Leadership • Review of Partner’s History and Values • Mahyco • Monsanto

31. High Points: Discover • Describe a “high point” in your organization (Mahyco or Monsanto). Obviously organizations experience ups and downs, and peaks and valleys. For the moment, I would like you to reflect on the “high point,” a time when employees were involved in something significant or meaningful and felt most alive, proud, creative, effective, or engaged. Share your story. What made this experience important? How did you feel deep down inside? What were some the organizations values that emerged?

32. Day 1 PM –Additional Critical Content • Partners Leadership Present • Business Strategies • Why They Have Created the Alliance • Their Vision of the Opportunity, • Why Each Other, and • Scope • Panel Discussion with Alliance Leadership • Evening Assignment: • Identify Alliance’s Top 10 Core Competencies

33. Appreciative Inquiry Template, Cont’d • Day 2 • Discover, Dream and Dialogue • Share best practices • Realize competencies formed by the alliance • Set the proper parameters for “Dreaming” • Allow for issues, concerns and challenges

34. Day 2 AM –Additional Critical Content • Partners’ Present a Best Practice

35. Core Competencies -- Discover • Identify the Alliance’s top 5-10 potential R&D core competencies and prepare a creative presentation (1-2 min.) to depict these strengths.

36. Project Your Future -- Dream • You are creating a unique Alliance based on your respective company’s core competencies. This is an unprecedented endeavor. There are no guidelines, no examples, no formulas, no Arthashastra for success. As you are entering the 21st century, what is the world calling for your team in the Mahyco & Monsanto Alliance to do? Why now? On 1 July 2005, Mr. Indranil Ghosh of Business World and Paula Williams of the Wall Street Journal co-author a feature story. What is on the cover, what are the titles, and what is the story?

37. Day 2 PM –Additional Critical Content • Partner Leaders’ Present Their Agreements and Mutual Expectations

38. Provocative Propositions -- Dream and Dialogue • We have been exposed to information on both parent organizations. We have spent time learning about each other personally and as organizations. We have identified our competencies and strengths, which is our sources to create synergy. Now our challenge is to stretch our imagination and state what this Alliance can achieve. Create Provocative Propositions (Possibility Statements) on projects, novel concepts, and ways your team can create new value. Put them on flip charts to share with the entire group.

39. Provocative Propositions -- Dialogue • In teams discuss, combine, and narrow the Provocative Propositions (Possibility Statements) as reality forces to prioritize and focus. While discussing, listen to each other on what are the possibilities of these concepts. It may stimulate new ideas. Identify the top 3-5 projects your team wishes to pursue. Place projects on newsprint and be prepared to share with other teams.

40. Appreciative Inquiry Template, Cont’d • Day 3 • Dialogue and Design • Create action plans • Allow for discussion and concerns

41. Creation of Team’s Research Projects and Joint Collaborations -- Design • Possible Format: • Project/s name and scope (What is the work) • Opportunity and barriers to success • Desired outcomes? • Action Plans (by when, what and who) and next steps • Team member skills and names of candidates • Required resources • Team work working norms: i.e. communications, meetings, e-mail, etc • Other notes and comments

42. Presentation of Plans • On Newsprint or Power Point • Time: Per team 30 min. presentation and 15 min. for Q&A. • Other ??

43. Symbolic Close -- Design The Teams and Alliance Leadership Planted Trees at Mahyco's R&D Complex

44. Part III: Conclusions

45. Alliance Status April 2002 – Major Accomplishment: • Government of India registered Mahyco/Monsanto’s Transgenic Cotton 2003 – Successfully Selling Bollgard™

46. Appreciative Inquiry Achieved: • Significantly higher levels of relationship and collaboration (than did the ME session). • Greater ownership of output by participants. • Higher levels of creativity.

47. Ai Session Participants Recommended that Ai Be Used in Future Alliance Building Sessions • 91% said Yes and 9% No • Frequency of Reasons Cited: • 47% -- Builds respect, trust & promotes collaboration • 33% -- Empowering, produces positive energy and builds confidence • 13% -- Don’t know • 7% -- Beyond formation stage

48. Because, For Example: “Ai bases building alliances on the positives and then approaches areas of conflict more constructively. [It] avoids the muck in the beginning that can break up something.” • Follow-up questionnaire response from Ai session participant

49. Ai Session Can Benefit From Airing the Negatives • Breakthrough: Mahyco consultant’s insight into the “storming” over professionalism • Timing Is Key • Create place to air negatives during a Dialogue Cycle in the Ai process • Use constructive processes, enabling +/- • Exercise Using: Keep – Stop – Start • Negatives May Be Dilemmas with no clear cut answers -- achieve the best from both

50. Ai Helps Build Relational Capital • Relational Capital defined as: • The goodwill and trust that partners accumulate in a relationship as they gain mutual confidence. • Study found significantly higher levels of relationship and collaboration from Ai session. • Goodwill and trust are earned over time based on follow-through on partners’ commitments (actions/respect rather than words).