III. ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
On one level, organization development is simply the way organizations change and evolve. Thus,
in the broadest sense, organization development means organization change.
The term as used here, however, means something more specific. Our definition of organization
development is an attempt to describe a very complex process in a simple manner.
A. Organization Development Defined
“Organization development (OD) is a system-wide application of behavioral science
knowledge to the planned development and reinforcement of organizational strategies,
structures, and processes for improving an organization’s effectiveness.”
First, organization development involves attempts to plan organization changes, which excludes
spontaneous, haphazard initiatives.
Second, the specific intention of organization development is to improve organization
effectiveness.
Third, the planned improvement must be based on knowledge of the behavioral sciences such
as organizational behavior, psychology, sociology, cultural anthropology, and related fields of
study rather than on financial or technological considerations.
The three most basic types of techniques for implementing organization development are
system-wide, task and technological, and group and individual.
B. System-Wide Organization Development
The most comprehensive type of organization change involves a major reorientation
or reorganization—usually referred to as a structural change or a system-wide rearrangement
of task division and authority and reporting relationships.
Reengineering and rethinking the organization are two contemporary approaches to system-
wide structural change.
Reengineering can be a difficult process, but it has great potential for organizational
improvement.
It requires that managers challenge long-held assumptions about everything they do and set
outrageous goals and expect that they will be met.
No system-wide structural change is simple. Employees may resist the change for a number of
reasons; therefore, organizations must manage the change process.
Another system-wide change is the introduction of quality-of-work-life programs, defined as
the degree to which members of a work organization are able to satisfy important personal
needs through their experiences in the organization.
Quality-of-work-life programs focus strongly on providing a work environment conducive to
satisfying individual needs.
Any movement with broad and ambiguous goals tends to spawn diverse programs, each
claiming to be based on the movement’s goals. These programs vary substantially, although
most espouse a goal of “humanizing the workplace.”
Richard Walton divided them into the eight categories shown in Figure 16.3.
Total quality management can also be viewed as a system-wide organization development
program.
The benefits gained from quality-of-work-life programs differ substantially, but generally they
are of three types.
A more positive attitude toward the work and the organization, or increased job satisfaction, is
perhaps the most direct benefit. Another is increased productivity.
A third benefit is increased effectiveness of the organization as measured by its profitability,
goal accomplishment, shareholder wealth, or resource exchange.
C. Task and Technological Change
Another way to bring about system-wide organization development is through changes in the
tasks involved in doing the work, the technology, or both.
The direct alteration of jobs usually is called “task redesign.” Changing how inputs are
transformed into outputs is called “technological change” and also usually results in task
changes.
Strictly speaking, changing the technology is typically not part of organization development
whereas task redesign usually is.
Several approaches to introducing job changes in organizations have been proposed. One
approach is an integrative framework of nine steps that reflect the complexities of the interfaces
between individual jobs and the total organization.
The process, shown in Table 16.2, includes the steps usually associated with change, such as
recognizing the need for a change, selecting the appropriate intervention, and evaluating the
change.
But this approach inserts four additional steps into the standard sequence: diagnosis of the
overall work system and context, including examination of the jobs, workforce, technology,
organization design, leadership, and group dynamics; evaluating the costs and benefits of the
change; formulating a redesign strategy; and implementing supplemental changes.
Diagnosis includes analysis of the total work environment within which the jobs exist.
Diagnosis must also include evaluation of the work group and teams, as well as the intragroup
dynamics. Furthermore, it must determine whether workers have or can easily obtain the new
skills to perform the redesigned task.
It is extremely important to recognize the full range of potential costs and benefits associated
with a job redesign effort. Some are direct and quantifiable; others are indirect and not
quantifiable.
Implementing a redesign scheme takes careful planning, and developing a strategy for the
intervention is the final planning step. Strategy formulation is a four-part process.
First, the organization must decide who will design the changes.
Next, the team undertakes the actual design of the changes based on job design theory and the
needs, goals, and circumstances of the organization.
Third, the team decides the timing of the implementation, which may require a formal transition
period during which equipment is purchased and installed, job training takes place, new
physical layouts are arranged, and the bugs in the new system are worked out.
Fourth, strategy planners must consider whether the job changes require adjustments and
supplemental changes in other organizational components such as reporting relationships and
the compensation system.
D. Group and Individual Change
Groups and individuals can be involved in organization change in a vast number of ways.
There are four popular types of people-oriented change techniques: training, management
development, team building, and survey feedback.
1. Training
Training generally is designed to improve employees’ job skills. Training may also be used
in conjunction with other, more comprehensive organization changes.
One important type of training that is becoming increasingly more common is training
people to work in other countries.
Among the many training methods, the most common are lecture, discussion, a lecture-
discussion combination, experiential methods, case studies, films or videos, and online
training modules.
A major problem of training programs is transferring employee learning to the workplace.
2. Management Development
Management development programs, like employee training programs, attempt to foster
certain skills, abilities, and perspectives.
Typically, management development programs use the lecture-discussion method to some
extent but rely most heavily on participative methods such as case studies and role playing.
Skills are not easily transferred to the workplace. In addition, rapid changes in the external
environment can make certain managerial skills obsolete in a very short time.
As corporate America invests hundreds of millions of dollars in management development,
certain guiding principles are evolving:
(1) management development is a multifaceted, complex, and long-term process to which
there is no quick or simple approach;
(2) organizations should carefully and systematically identify their unique developmental
needs and evaluate their programs accordingly;
(3) management development objectives must be compatible with organizational
objectives; and
(4) the utility and value of management development remain more an article of faith than a
proven fact.
3. Team Building
Team building emphasizes members working together in a spirit of cooperation and
generally has one or more of the following goals:
1. To set team goals and priorities
2. To analyze or allocate the way work is performed
3. To examine how a group is working
4. To examine relationships among the people doing the work
Total quality management efforts usually focus on teams, and the principles of team
building must be applied to make them work.
Team development can be a way to train the group to solve its own problems in the future.
Research on the effectiveness of team building as an organization development tool so far
is mixed and inconclusive.
4. Survey Feedback
Survey feedback techniques can form the basis for a change process. In this process, data
are gathered, analyzed, summarized, and returned to those who generated them to identify,
discuss, and solve problems.
A consultant or change agent usually coordinates the process and is responsible for data
gathering, analysis, and summary. The three-stage process is shown in Figure 16.4.
The use of survey feedback techniques in an organization development process differs from
their use in traditional attitude surveys.
In an organization development process, data are
(1) returned to employee groups at all levels in the organization and
(2) used by all employees working together in their normal work groups to identify and
solve problems.
In traditional attitude surveys, top management reviews the data and may or may not
initiate a new program to solve problems the survey has identified.
In the data-gathering stage, the change agent determines the key issues to be examined and
develops a survey questionnaire. The change agent prepares a summary of the results for
the group feedback sessions.
The feedback meetings generally involve only two or three levels of management. During
the feedback sessions, participants discuss reasons for the scores and the problems that the
data reveal.
In the process analysis stage, the group examines the process of making decisions,
communicating, and accomplishing work, usually with the help of the consultant. Change
agents should ensure that managers hold these sessions and that they are rewarded for
doing so.
The process analysis stage is important because its purpose is to develop action plans to
make improvements.
A follow-up survey can be administered several months to a year later to assess how much
these processes have changed since they were first reported.
The survey feedback method is probably one of the most widely used organization change
and development interventions. A primary responsibility of the consultant or change agent,
then, is to ensure that the method is fully and faithfully carried through.
IV. RESISTANCE TO CHANGE
Change is inevitable; so is resistance to change. Paradoxically, organizations both promote and
resist change.
A commonly held view is that all resistance to change needs to be overcome, but that is not always
the case. Resistance to change can be used for the benefit of the organization and need not be
eliminated entirely.
By revealing a legitimate concern that a proposed change may harm the organization or that other
alternatives might be better, resistance may alert the organization to reexamine the change.
Resistance may come from the organization, the individual, or both. Determining the ultimate
source is often difficult, however, because organizations are composed of individuals.
Table 16.3 summarizes various types of organizational and individual sources of resistance.
A. Organizational Sources of Resistance
Daniel Katz and Robert Kahn have identified six major organizational sources of resistance:
overdetermination, narrow focus of change, group inertia, threatened expertise, threatened
power, and changes in resource allocation.
Of course, not every organization or every change situation displays all six sources.
1. Overdetermination
Organizations have several systems designed to maintain stability. Organizations control
employees’ performance by screening new hires for specific skills. Then the new employee
is given a job description, training, coaching, and counseling in job tasks. After a
probationary period, the employee receives a performance review. Finally, rewards,
punishment, and discipline are administered, depending on level of performance.
Such a system is said to be characterized by overdetermination, or structural inertia in that
one could probably have the same effect on employee performance with fewer procedures
and safeguards.
In other words, the structure of the organization produces resistance to change because it
was designed to maintain stability.
Another important source of overdetermination is the culture of the organization.
2. Narrow Focus of Change
Many efforts to create change in organizations adopt too narrow a focus. Any effort to force
change in the tasks of individuals or groups must take into account the interdependence
among organizational elements such as people, structure, tasks, and the information system.
3. Group Inertia
When an employee attempts to change his or her work behavior, group norms may act as a
brake on individual attempts at behavior change.
4. Threatened Expertise
A job redesign or a structural change may transfer responsibility for a specialized task from
the current expert to someone else, threatening the specialist’s expertise and building his or
her resistance to the change.
5. Threatened Power
Any redistribution of decision-making authority, such as with reengineering or team-based
management, may threaten an individual’s power relationships with others.
6. Resource Allocation
Groups that are satisfied with current resource allocation methods may resist any change
they believe will threaten future allocations.
These six sources explain most types of organization-based resistance to change. All are based
on people and social relationships. Many of these sources of resistance can be traced to groups
or individuals who are afraid of losing something—resources, power, or comfort in a routine.
B. Individual Sources of Resistance
Researchers have identified six reasons for individual resistance to change: habit, security,
economic factors, fear of the unknown, lack of awareness, and social factors (see Table 16.3).
1. Habit
It is easier to do a job the same way every day if the steps in the job are repeated over and
over. Learning an entirely new set of steps makes the job more difficult. For the same
amount of return (pay), most people prefer to do easier rather than harder work.
2. Security
Some employees like the comfort and security of doing things the same old way. People
who believe their security is threatened by a change are likely to resist the change.
3. Economic Factors
Change may threaten employees’ steady paychecks. Workers may fear that change will
make their jobs obsolete or reduce their opportunities for future pay increases.
4. Fear of the Unknown
Some people fear anything unfamiliar. Any disruption of familiar patterns may create fear
because it can cause delays and foster the belief that nothing is getting accomplished.
5. Lack of Awareness
Because of perceptual limitations such as lack of attention or selective attention, a person
may not recognize a change in a rule or procedure and thus may not alter his or her
behavior. They may therefore continue the current practice as long as possible.
6. Social Factors
People may resist change for fear of what others will think. Employees may believe
change will hurt their image, result in ostracism from the group, or simply make them
“different.”
V. MANAGING SUCCESSFUL ORGANIZATION CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT
In order to increase the chances of successful organization change and development, it is useful to
consider seven keys to managing change in organizations.
Table 16.4 lists the points and their potential impacts.
A. Consider Global Issues
Given the additional environmental complexities multinational organizations face, it follows
that organization change may be even more critical to them than it is to purely domestic
organizations.
A second point to remember is that acceptance of change varies widely around the globe.
B. Take a Holistic View
Managers must take a holistic view of the organization and the change project. A holistic view
encompasses the culture and dominant coalition as well as the people, tasks, structure, and
information subsystems.
C. Start Small
Peter Senge claims that every truly successful, system-wide change in large organizations starts
small. He recommends that change start with one team, usually an executive team.
If the change makes sense, it begins to spread to other teams, groups, and divisions throughout
the system. When others see the benefits, they automatically drop their inherent resistance and
join in.
D. Secure Top Management Support
The support of top management is essential to the success of any change effort.
As the organization’s probable dominant coalition, it is a powerful element of the social system,
and its support is necessary to deal with control and power problems.
E. Encourage Participation
Problems related to resistance, control, and power can be overcome by broad participation in
planning the change.
F. Foster Open Communication
Open communication is an important factor in managing resistance to change and overcoming
information and control problems during transitions.
A manager should always be sensitive to the effects of uncertainty on employees, especially
during a period of change; any news, even bad news, seems better than no news.
G. Reward Contributors
Although this last point is simple, it can easily be neglected. Employees who contribute to the
change in any way need to be rewarded.
From a behavioral perspective, individuals need to benefit in some way if they are to willingly
help change something that eliminates the old, comfortable way of doing the job.
These seven keys to managing organization change may also serve as general guidelines for
managing organizational behavior because organizations must change or face elimination.
VI. ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING
A learning organization is an organization that facilitates the learning of all its members and
continually transforms itself.
In a learning organization, continual learning and change become part of the culture.
To facilitate organizational learning, it is important that learning happen during a project and
continue after the project ends.
One of the best ways to encourage continual learning is through an after-action review, or a
professional discussion of an event that enables discovery of what happened, why it happened, and
how to sustain strengths and improve on weaknesses.
After-action reviews are conducted for both successes and failures and occur after any identifiable
event or milestone during a project or after the project is completed.
In an open and honest meeting usually lasting twenty minutes or less, everyone who participated in
the event or project discusses four simple questions:
1. What was supposed to happen?
2. What actually happened?
3. Why were there differences?
4. What did we learn?
Building trust and team integrity are additional outcomes of after-action reviews.
Another factor influencing an organization’s ability to learn is its approach to failure.
More learning-oriented firms recognize the learning opportunities presented by “intelligent
failures,” that is, the failures of events or projects that had a good chance of working, did not work
out, but provide a good learning opportunity.
Summary and Application
Change may be forced on an organization, or an organization may change in response to the environment
or an internal need.
Planned organization change involves anticipating change and preparing for it. Lewin described
organization change in terms of unfreezing, the change itself, and refreezing.
In the continuous change process model, top management recognizes forces encouraging change, engages
in a problem-solving process to design the change, and implements and evaluates the change.
Organization development is the process of planned change and improvement of organizations through
the application of knowledge of the behavioral sciences.
Quality-of-work-life programs focus on providing a work environment in which employees can satisfy
individual needs.
Frequently used group and individual approaches to organization change are training and management
development programs, team building, and survey feedback techniques.
Resistance to change may arise from several individual and organizational sources. Top management
support is needed, and those most affected by the change must participate. Open communication is
important, and those who contribute to the change effort should be rewarded.
A learning organization is an organization that facilitates the learning of all its members and continually
transforms itself. In a learning organization, continual learning and change become part of the culture.