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The Organization Development Practitioner
learning objectives
Discuss the roles and characteristics of OD practitioners.
Describe the competencies required of effective OD practitioners.
Compare the internal versus external OD practitioner.
Understand the values and ethics guiding the practice of OD.
Chapters 1 and 2 provided an overview of thefield of organization development and adescription of the nature of planned change. This chapter extends that introduction by examining the people who perform organization development (OD). A closer look at OD practi- tioners can provide a more personal perspective on the field and can help us understand how and why OD relies so heavily on personal relationships between practitioners and organization members.
Much of the literature about OD practitioners views them as internal or external consultants providing professional services—diagnosing systems, developing interventions, and helping to implement them. Perspectives that are more recent expand the practice scope to include professionals in related disciplines, such as industrial psychology, human resource management, and strategic management, as well as line managers who have learned how to carry out OD to change and develop their organizations.
A great deal of opinion and some research studies have focused on the necessary skills and knowledge of an effective OD practitioner. Studies
of the profession provide a comprehensive list of basic skills and knowledge that all effective OD practitioners must possess.
Most of the relevant literature focuses on people specializing in OD as a profession and addresses their roles and careers. The OD practitioner’s role can be described in relation to its position: internal to the organization, external to it, or in a team comprising both internal and external consultants. The OD practitioner’s role can also be examined in terms of its marginality in organizations, of the emotional demands made on the practitioner, and of where it fits along a continuum from client-centered to consultant-centered functioning. Finally, organization development is an emerging profession providing alternative opportunities for gaining competence and developing a career. The stressful nature of helping professions, however, suggests that OD practitioners must cope with the possibility of professional burnout.
As in other helping professions, such as medicine and law, values and ethics play an important role in guiding OD practice and in minimizing the chances that clients will be neglected or abused.
45
3-1 Who Is the Organization Development Practitioner? Throughout this text, the term organization development practitioner refers to at least three sets of people. The most obvious group of OD practitioners are those people spe- cializing in OD as a profession. They may be internal or external consultants who offer professional services to organizations, including their top managers, functional depart- ment heads, and staff groups. OD professionals traditionally have shared a common set of humanistic values promoting open communications, employee involvement, and per- sonal growth and development. They tend to have common training, skills, and experi- ence in the social processes of organizations (for example, group dynamics, decision making, and communications). In recent years, OD professionals have expanded those traditional values and skill sets to include more concern for organizational effectiveness, competitiveness, and bottom-line results, and greater attention to the technical, struc- tural, and strategic parts of organizations. That expansion, mainly in response to the highly competitive demands facing modern organizations, has resulted in a more diverse set of OD professionals geared to helping organizations cope with those pressures.1
The second set of people to whom the term OD practitioner applies are those spe- cializing in fields related to OD, such as human resource management, organization design, quality control, information technology, and business strategy. These content- oriented fields increasingly are becoming integrated with OD’s process orientation, par- ticularly as OD projects have become more comprehensive, involving multiple features and varying parts of organizations. For example, the integrated strategic change interven- tion described in Chapter 18 and the dynamic strategy-making intervention presented in Chapter 21 are the result of marrying OD with business strategy.2 A growing number of professionals in these related fields are gaining experience and competence in OD, mainly through working with OD professionals on large-scale projects and through attending OD training sessions. Most of the large accounting firms, for example, diversi- fied into management consulting and change management.3 In most cases, professionals in these related fields do not subscribe fully to traditional OD values, nor do they have extensive OD training and experience. Rather, they have formal training and experience in their respective specialties, such as industrial engineering, information systems, or cor- porate strategy. They are OD practitioners in the sense that they apply their special com- petence within an OD-like process, typically by engaging OD professionals and managers to design and implement change programs. They also practice OD when they apply their OD competence to their own specialties, thus spreading an OD perspective into such areas as compensation practices, work design, labor relations, and strategic planning.
The third set of people to whom the term OD practitioner applies are the increasing number of managers and administrators who have gained competence in OD and who apply it to their own work areas. Studies and recent articles argue that OD increasingly is applied by managers rather than by OD professionals.4 Such studies suggest that the fas- ter pace of change affecting organizations today is highlighting the centrality of the man- ager in managing change. Consequently, OD must become a general management skill. Along those lines, Kanter studied a growing number of firms, such as General Electric, Hewlett-Packard, and 3M, where managers and employees have become “change masters.”5 They have gained the expertise to introduce change and innovation into the organization.
Managers tend to gain competence in OD through interacting with OD profes- sionals in actual change programs. This on-the-job training frequently is supplemented
46 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
with more formal OD training, such as the various workshops offered by the National Training Laboratories (NTL), USC’s Center for Effective Organizations, the Center for Creative Leadership, the Gestalt Institute, UCLA’s Extension Service, the Tavistock Insti- tute, the Institute for Socio-Economic Enterprises (ISEOR), and others. Line managers increasingly are attending such external programs. Moreover, a growing number of orga- nizations, including Capital One, Disney, and General Electric, have instituted in-house training programs for managers to learn how to develop and change their work units. As managers gain OD competence, they become its most basic practitioners.
In practice, the distinctions among the three sets of OD practitioners are blurring. A growing number of managers have transferred, either temporarily or permanently, into the OD profession. For example, companies such as Procter & Gamble have trained and rotated managers into full-time OD roles so that they can gain skills and experience needed for higher-level management positions. Also, it is increasingly common to find managers and staff specialists using their experience in OD to become external consultants. More OD practitioners are gaining professional competence in related specialties, such as business process reengineering, reward systems, and strategic planning. Conversely, many specialists in those related areas are achieving professional competence in OD. Cross-training and integration are producing a more comprehensive and complex kind of OD practitioner— one with a greater diversity of values, skills, and experience than a traditional practitioner.
3-2 Competencies of an Effective Organization Development Practitioner The literature about OD competencies reveals a mixture of personality traits, experiences, knowledge, and skills presumed to lead to effective practice. For example, research on the characteristics of successful change practitioners yields the following list of attributes and abilities: diagnostic ability, basic knowledge of behavioral science techniques, empathy, knowledge of the theories and methods within the consultant’s own discipline, goal- setting ability, problem-solving ability, ability to perform self-assessment, ability to see things objectively, imagination, flexibility, honesty, consistency, and trust.6 Although these qualities and skills are laudable, there has been relatively little consensus or research about their importance to effective OD practice.
Two projects have sought to define, categorize, and prioritize the skills and knowl- edge required of OD practitioners. In the first effort, a broad group of well-known practitioners and researchers were asked to review and update a list of professional competencies. This survey resulted in a list of 187 statements in nine areas of OD prac- tice, including entry, start-up, assessment and feedback, action planning, intervention, evaluation, adoption, separation, and general competencies.7 The statements ranged from “staying centered in the present, focusing on the ongoing process” and “under- standing and explaining how diversity will affect the diagnosis of the culture” to “basing change on business strategy and business needs” and “being comfortable with quantum leaps, radical shifts, and paradigm changes.” Other items added to the list relate to inter- national OD, large group interventions, and transorganization skills.
To understand the relative importance of this long list, Worley and his colleagues collected data from 364 OD practitioners.8 The average respondent had about eight years of OD experience, a master’s degree, and came from the United States. The results suggested an underlying structure to the list. Twenty-three competencies were generated that reflected both the skills and knowledge necessary to conduct planned change
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 47
processes and the individual characteristics necessary to be an effective OD practitioner. Similar to other lists, the competencies included the ability to evaluate change, work with large-scale change efforts, create implementation plans, and manage diversity. One of the more surprising results, however, was the emergence of “self mastery” as the most important competence. The results supported the long-held belief that good OD practi- tioners know themselves and that such knowledge forms the basis of effective practice.
The second project, sponsored by the Organization Development and Change Division of the Academy of Management,9 sought to develop a list of competencies to guide curricu- lum development in graduate OD programs. More than 40 OD practitioners and researchers worked to develop the two competency lists shown in Table 3.1. First, foundation competen- cies are oriented toward descriptions of an existing system. They include knowledge from organization behavior, psychology, group dynamics, management and organization theory, research methods, and business practices. Second, core competencies are aimed at how sys- tems change over time. They include knowledge of organization design, organization research, system dynamics, OD history, and theories and models for change; they also involve the skills needed to manage the consulting process, to analyze and diagnose systems, to design and choose interventions, to facilitate processes, to develop clients’ capability to manage their own change, and to evaluate organization change.
The information in Table 3.1 applies primarily to people specializing in OD as a profession. For them, possessing the listed knowledge and skills seems reasonable, espe- cially in light of the growing diversity and complexity of interventions in OD. Gaining competence in those areas may take considerable time and effort, and it is questionable whether the other two types of OD practitioners—managers and specialists in related fields—also need that full range of skills and knowledge. It seems more reasonable to suggest that some subset of the items listed in Table 3.1 should apply to all OD practi- tioners, whether they are OD professionals, managers, or related specialists. Those items would constitute the practitioner’s basic skills and knowledge. Beyond that background, the three types of OD practitioners likely would differ in areas of concentration. OD pro- fessionals would extend their breadth of skills across the remaining categories in Table 3.1; managers would focus on the functional knowledge of business areas; and related specialists would concentrate on skills in their respective areas.
Based on the data in Table 3.1 and the other studies available, all OD practitioners should have the following basic skills and knowledge to be effective.
3-2a Intrapersonal Skills or “Self-Management” Competence Despite the growing knowledge base and sophistication of the field, organization devel- opment is still a human craft. As the primary instrument of diagnosis and change, prac- titioners often must process complex, ambiguous information and make informed judgments about its relevance to organizational issues.
The core competency of analysis and diagnosis listed in Table 3.1 includes the ability to inquire into one’s self, and as noted above, it remains one of the cornerstone skills in OD.10 Practitioners must have the personal centering to know their own values, feelings, and purposes as well as the integrity to behave responsibly in a helping relationship with others. Bob Tannenbaum, one of the founders of OD, argued that self-knowledge is the most central ingredient in OD practice and suggested that practitioners are becoming too enamored with skills and techniques.11 There are data to support his view. A study of 416 OD practitioners found that 47% agreed with the statement, “Many of the new entrants into the field have little understanding of or appreciation for the history or values underlying the field.”12 Because OD is a highly uncertain process requiring
48 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
TABLE 3.1
Knowledge and Skill Requirements of OD Practitioners
Foundation Competencies Core Competencies
Knowledge 1. Organization behavior A. Organization culture B. Work design C. Interpersonal relations D. Power and politics E. Leadership F. Goal setting G. Conflict H. Ethics
2. Individual psychology A. Learning theory B. Motivation theory C. Perception theory
3. Group dynamics A. Roles B. Communication processes C. Decision-making process D. Stages of group
development E. Leadership
4. Management and organization theory A. Planning, organizing, lead-
ing, and controlling B. Problem solving and deci-
sion making C. Systems theory D. Contingency theory E. Organization structure F. Characteristics of environ-
ment and technology G. Models of organization and
system
5. Research methods/statistics A. Measures of central
tendency B. Measures of dispersion C. Basic sampling theory D. Basic experimental design E. Sample inferential statistics
1. Organization design: the decision process associ- ated with formulating and aligning the elements of an organizational system, including but not limited to structural systems, human resource systems, information systems, reward systems, work design, political systems, and organization culture A. The concept of fit and alignment B. Diagnostic and design model for various sub-
systems that make up an organization at any level of analysis, including the structure of work, human resources, information systems, reward systems, work design, political sys- tems, and so on
C. Key thought leaders in organization design
2. Organization research: field research methods; interviewing; content analysis; design of ques- tionnaires and interview protocol; designing change evaluation processes; longitudinal data collection and analysis; understanding and detecting alpha, beta, and gamma change; and a host of quantitative and qualitative methods
3. System dynamics: the description and under- standing of how systems evolve and develop over time, how systems respond to exogenous and endogenous disruption as well as planned interventions (e.g., evolution and revolution, punctuated equilibrium theory, chaos theory, catastrophe theory, incremental vs. quantum change, transformation theory, and so on)
4. History of organization development and change: an understanding of the social, political, eco- nomic, and personal forces that led to the emer- gence and development of organization development and change, including the key thought leaders, the values underlying their writ- ings and actions, the key events and writings, and related documentation A. Human relations movement B. NTL/T-groups/sensitivity training C. Survey research D. Quality of work life E. Tavistock Institute F. Key thought leaders G. Humanistic values H. Statement of ethics
continued
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 49
TABLE 3.1
Knowledge and Skill Requirements of OD Practitioners, (continued )
Foundation Competencies Core Competencies
6. Comparative cultural perspectives A. Dimensions of natural
culture B. Dimensions of industry
culture C. Systems implications
7. Functional knowledge of business A. Interpersonal communica-
tion (listening, feedback, and articulation)
B. Collaboration/working together
C. Problem solving D. Using new technology E. Conceptualizing F. Project management G. Present/education/coach
5. Theories and models for change: the basic action research model, participatory action research model, planning model, change typologies (e.g., fast, slow, incremental, quantum, revolutionary), Lewin’s model, transition models, and so on
Skills 1. Managing the consulting process: the ability to enter, contract, diagnose, design appropriate interventions, implement those interventions, manage unprogrammed events, and evaluate change process
2. Analysis/diagnosis: the abilities to conduct an inquiry into a system’s effectiveness, to see the root cause(s) of a system’s current level of effectiveness; the core skill is interpreted to include all systems—individual, group, organiza- tion, and multiorganization—as well as the ability to understand and inquire into one’s self
3. Designing/choosing appropriate, relevant inter- ventions: understanding how to select, modify, or design effective interventions that will move the organization from its current state to its desired future state
4. Facilitation and process consultation: the ability to assist an individual or group toward a goal; the ability to conduct an inquiry into individual and group processes such that the client system maintains ownership of the issue, increases its capacity for reflection on the consequences of its behaviors and actions, and develops a sense of increased control and ability
50 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
constant adjustment and innovation, practitioners must have active learning skills and a reasonable balance between their rational and emotional sides. Finally, OD practice can be highly stressful and can lead to early burnout, so practitioners need to know how to manage their own stress.
3-2b Interpersonal Skills Practitioners must create and maintain effective relationships with individuals and groups within the organization and help them gain the competence necessary to solve their own problems. Table 3.1 identifies group dynamics, comparative cultural perspectives, and busi- ness functions as foundation knowledge, and managing the consulting process and facilita- tion as core skills. All of these interpersonal competencies promote effective helping relationships. Such relationships start with a grasp of the organization’s perspective and require listening to members’ perceptions and feelings to understand how they see them- selves and the organization—a process called “active listening.” This understanding pro- vides a starting point for joint diagnosis and problem solving. Practitioners must establish trust and rapport with organization members so that they can share pertinent information and work effectively together. This requires being able to converse in members’ own lan- guage and to give and receive feedback about how the relationship is progressing.
To help members learn new skills and behaviors, practitioners must serve as role models of what is expected. They must act in ways that are credible to organization members and provide them with the counseling and coaching necessary to develop and change. Because the helping relationship is jointly determined, practitioners need to be able to negotiate an acceptable role and to manage changing expectations and demands.
3-2c General Consultation Skills Table 3.1 identifies the ability to manage the consulting process and the ability to design interventions as core competencies that all OD practitioners should possess. OD starts with diagnosing an organization or department to understand its current functioning and to discover areas for further development. OD practitioners need to know how to carry out an effective diagnosis, at least at a rudimentary level. They should know how to engage
TABLE 3.1
Knowledge and Skill Requirements of OD Practitioners, (continued )
Foundation Competencies Core Competencies
5. Developing client capability: the ability to conduct a change process in such a way that the client is better able to plan and implement a successful change process in the future, using technologies of planned change in a values-based and ethical manner
6. Evaluating organization change: the ability to design and implement a process to evaluate the impact and effects of change intervention, including control of alternative explanations and interpretation of performance outcomes
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organization members in diagnosis, how to help them ask the right questions, and how to collect and analyze information. A manager, for example, should be able to work with sub- ordinates to determine jointly the organization’s or department’s strengths or problems. The manager should know basic diagnostic questions (see Chapter 5), some methods for gathering information, such as interviews or surveys, and some techniques for analyzing it, such as force-field analysis or statistical means and distributions (see Chapter 6).
In addition to diagnosis, OD practitioners should know how to design and execute an intervention. They need to be able to define an action plan and to gain commitment to the program. They also need to know how to tailor the intervention to the situation, using information about how the change is progressing to guide implementation (see Chapter 9). For example, managers should be able to develop action steps for an inter- vention with subordinates. They should be able to gain their commitment to the pro- gram (usually through participation), sit down with them, assess how it is progressing, and make modifications if necessary.
3-2d Organization Development Theory The last basic tool OD practitioners should have is a general knowledge of organization development, such as is presented in this book. They should have some appreciation for planned change, the action research model, and the positive approaches to managing change. They should be familiar with the range of available interventions and the need for evaluating change programs. Perhaps most important is that OD practitioners should understand their own role in the emerging field of organization development, whether it is as an OD professional, a manager, or a specialist in a related area.
3-3 The Professional Organization Development Practitioner Most of the literature about OD practitioners has focused on people specializing in OD as a profession. In this section, we discuss the role and typical career paths of OD professionals.
3-3a Role of Organization Development Professional Positions Organization development professionals have positions that are either internal or exter- nal to the organization. Internal consultants are members of the organization and may be located in the human resources department or report directly to a line manager. They may perform the OD role exclusively, or they may combine it with other tasks, such as compensation practices, training, or employee relations.13 Many large organiza- tions, such as Boeing, Raytheon, Disney, Microsoft, Philip Morris, Procter & Gamble, Weyerhaeuser, Kimberly-Clark, and Citigroup, have created specialized OD consulting groups. These internal consultants typically have a variety of clients within the organiza- tion, serving both line and staff departments.
External consultants are not members of the client organization; they typically work for a consulting firm, a university, or themselves. Organizations generally hire external consultants to provide a particular expertise that is unavailable internally, to bring a dif- ferent and potentially more objective perspective into the organization development pro- cess, or to signal shifts in power.14 Table 3.2 describes the differences between these two roles at each stage of the action research process.15
52 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
During the entry process, internal consultants have clear advantages. They have ready access to and relationships with clients, know the language of the organization, and have insights about the root cause of many of its problems. This allows internal con- sultants to save time in identifying the organization’s culture, informal practices, and
TABLE 3.2
The Differences between External and Internal Consulting
Stage of Change External Consultants Internal Consultants
Entering • Source clients • Build relationships • Learn company jargon • “Presenting problem” challenge • Time-consuming • Stressful phase • Select project/client according to own
criteria • Unpredictable outcome
• Ready access to clients • Ready relationships • Knows company jargon • Understands root causes • Time efficient • Congenial phase • Obligated to work with everyone • Steady pay
Contracting • Formal documents • Can terminate project at will • Guard against out-of-pocket expenses • Information confidential • Loss of contract at stake • Maintain third-party role
• Informal agreements • Must complete projects assigned • No out-of-pocket expenses • Information can be open or confidential • Risk of client retaliation and loss of job
at stake • Acts as third party, driver (on behalf of
client), or pair of hands
Diagnosing • Meet most organization members for the first time
• Prestige from being external • Build trust quickly • Confidential data can increase political
sensitivities
• Has relationships with many organization members
• Prestige determined by job rank and client stature
• Sustain reputation as trustworthy over time
• Data openly shared can reduce political intrigue
Intervening • Insist on valid information, free and informed choice, and internal commitment
• Confine activities within boundaries of client organization
• Insist on valid information, free and informed choice, and internal commitment
• Run interference for client across organizational lines to align support
Evaluating • Rely on repeat business and customer referral as key measures of project success
• Seldom see long-term results
• Rely on repeat business, pay raise, and promotion as key measures of success
• Can see change become institutionalized • Little recognition for job well done
SOURCE: M. Lacey, “Internal Consulting: Perspectives on the Process of Planned Change,” Journal of Organizational Change Management 8 (1995): 76, © 1995. Reprinted with permission of the publisher. All rights reserved.
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 53
sources of power. They have access to a variety of information, including rumors, com- pany reports, and direct observations. In addition, entry is more efficient and congenial, and their pay is not at risk. External consultants, however, have the advantage of being able to select the clients they want to work with according to their own criteria. The con- tracting phase is less formal for internal consultants and there is less worry about expenses, but there is less choice about whether to complete the assignment. Both types of consultants must address issues of confidentiality, risk project termination (and other negative consequences) by the client, and fill a third-party role.
During the diagnosis process, internal consultants already know many organization members and enjoy a basic level of rapport and trust. But external consultants often have higher status than internal consultants, which enables them to probe difficult issues and assess the organization more objectively. In the intervention phase, both types of consul- tants must rely on valid information, free and informed choice, and internal commit- ment for their success.16 However, internal consultants’ strong ties to the organization may make them overly cautious, particularly when powerful others can affect a career. Internal consultants also may lack certain skills and experience in facilitating organiza- tional change. Insiders may have some small advantages in being able to move around the system and cross key organizational boundaries. Finally, the measures of success and reward differ from those of the external practitioner in the evaluation process.
A promising approach to having the advantages of both internal and external OD consultants is to include them both as members of an internal–external consulting team.17 External consultants can combine their special expertise and objectivity with the inside knowledge and acceptance of internal consultants. The two parties can use com- plementary consulting skills while sharing the workload and possibly accomplishing more than either would by operating alone. Internal consultants, for example, can pro- vide almost continuous contact with the client, and their external counterparts can pro- vide specialized services periodically, such as two or three days each month. External consultants also can help train their organization partners, thus transferring OD skills and knowledge to the organization.
Although little has been written on internal–external consulting teams, studies sug- gest that the effectiveness of such teams depends on members developing strong, sup- portive, collegial relationships. They need to take time to develop the consulting team, confronting individual differences and establishing appropriate roles and relationships. Members need to provide each other with continuous feedback and also make a commit- ment to learn from each other. In the absence of these team-building and learning activ- ities, internal–external consulting teams can be more troublesome and less effective than either internal or external consultants working alone.
Application 3.1 provides a personal, first-person account of the internal and external consulting positions as well as interactions between them.18
Marginality A promising line of research on the professional OD role centers on the issue of marginality.19 The marginal person is one who successfully straddles the bound- ary between two or more groups with differing goals, value systems, and behavior pat- terns. Whereas in the past, the marginal role always was seen as dysfunctional, marginality now is seen in a more positive light. There are many examples of marginal roles in organizations: the salesperson, the buyer, the first-line supervisor, the integrator, and the project manager.
Evidence is mounting that some people are better at taking marginal roles than are others. Those who are good at it seem to have personal qualities of low dogmatism, neu- trality, open-mindedness, objectivity, flexibility, and adaptable information-processing
54 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
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3 1 PERSONAL VIEWS OF THE INTERNAL AND EXTERNALCONSULTING POSITIONS
THE INTERNAL CONSULTANT’S VIEW
I am an agent of change. I am also a member of this organization. I was hired for my OD skills, but also for the fact that I was seen as a “cul- tural fit.” Sometimes I struggle between my dual roles of “team member” and “free radical.” After all, it is my job to disrupt the sta- tus quo around here, helping leaders to find ways to make the organization more effective.
I have the great advantage of knowing and understanding how my organization works—its processes, policies, norms, and areas of resis- tance. I can usually anticipate how difficult a given change will be for members of the orga- nization, and where the resistance will come from. Because I believe in the mission of my organization, I am able to cope with the inevi- table challenges of the change process. Still, I am frequently a magnet for resistance and a receptacle of institutional anxiety. While I understand how people can be frustrated and frightened by change, it can still be difficult for me to bear the disruption I help to create.
To keep myself sharp and healthy, I breathe, run, meditate, and read. I take every learning opportunity that comes my way, and work diligently to create and maintain a network of colleagues who can support me through the rough patches. I find that my best support comes not from friends, but from peo- ple who know and understand the hard work of planned change.
As an internal consultant, I have exposure to many of the same people over time— executives, managers, and employees get to know who I am and what I do. I get to know who they are and what they do. I have the opportunity to leverage my executive relation- ships from project to project; over time the executives here have come to understand my work and trust my skills as a consultant. This understanding and trust saves us time and energy each time we work together. Of course, I realize that if I fail one of my execu- tive clients, my life in this organization could become less pleasant. That can stress me
out when I’m working on a messy or unpopular project. After all, my performance review is affected by client feedback, and my compen- sation is tied to people’s perceptions of my performance. This can make it difficult to press forward with risky interventions. I am proud of my reputation around here—proud of the fact that I have built solid relationships at the executive level, that managers respect my work, and that employees value having me in the organization. Still, I am ever aware that I must walk the fine line between “respected insider” and “paid agitator.”
Sometimes I’m lonely—often I’m the only OD person working in an organization; some- times there are two or more of us, but we’re always spread so thin that connecting is diffi- cult and truly supporting one another is virtually impossible. I may work with other staff people—HR for instance—but they don’t always understand my role and can’t really relate to my challenges. Sometimes they can be resentful of my relationship with the client, which makes me feel alienated. I enjoy my client groups, but I must be careful not to over-identify with them; the greatest value I bring to my clients is a clean “outsider” per- spective. I can’t do hard change efforts with them if I’m worried about them liking me. Being a lone ranger can be thrilling, but being an outsider can get tiring.
Occasionally I bring in an external consul- tant to work on a specific project or problem in my organization. This can be both challenging and rewarding for me. It is time-consuming to bring an outsider up to speed on my organiza- tion’s business, processes, and politics. I seek external consultants who will fit in our culture, while helping us see our issues more clearly and realistically. I enjoy the process of partner- ing with people who have exposure to other organizations, who possess different skills and strengths from mine, and who understand the inherent discomfort of the change process. Still, this can be risky, because my reputation will be affected by this person’s work and the
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 55
outcomes we are able to achieve. When it works best, my partnership with the external consultant leads to improved effectiveness for my organiza- tion, while affording me a valued learning opportu- nity and professional support.
The best thing to me about being an internal consultant is knowing that I am contributing to the mission of my organization with every client I work with, every day.
THE EXTERNAL CONSULTANT’S VIEW
I am an agent of change. I work for many different organizations of varying sizes with different missions and goals. I spend most of my time help- ing managers, HR people, and internal consultants initiate and manage change—both planned and unplanned. I enjoy the variety in my work and the learning that comes from seeing the way change happens in different organizations and contexts.
But it is hard being an “outsider.” I must work quickly to understand each new organization I work with. As an outsider it can be frustrating to navi- gate the inner workings of the organization—its politics, pecking order, and culture—and to root out what’s important and what’s not. In my role, I’m not around while the unglamorous, time- consuming, and important work of nurturing a change along is being done. So, although I experi- ence the risk and excitement of some part of the change, I do not always get to experience the whole change process from start to finish. I rarely get to see the project bear fruit and the organiza- tion become more effective as a result of the work I’ve done. Sometimes the process feels incom- plete, and I almost always wonder how much I’ve actually helped.
Being an external consultant is both reward- ing and risky work. On the one hand, I am seen as an expert. I am appreciated for my assistance, applauded for my knowledge, and liked for my interpersonal skills. I have the benefit of many revenue sources, so I’m never overly dependent on one client. I am often rewarded handsomely for my time and effort, although most people mis- take “daily fee” as actual income and forget about
self-employment taxes and the health benefits I have to pay myself. The other truth is that I am always at risk—economic crises, budget cuts, personnel changes, executive shake ups, organi- zational politics, and the occasional hostile HR person are but a few of the land mines an external consultant faces. For the most part, I feel pleased and rewarded for my work as a consultant. But I always know that my situation is dependent on my client’s situation, and I can never afford to get too comfortable.
When I’m hired by an executive or manager, sometimes the HR person or internal consultant may be resistant, feeling threatened by my pres- ence. When this happens, I have to find ways to address their concern, partner with them, and still do the important work of organizational change. Sometimes just creating space for the conversa- tion by using simple probes—“You seem very con- cerned about this situation” or “You must feel pretty unsupported right now”—help me uncover their discomfort so we can move forward. Some- times these relationships are difficult throughout the engagement. It’s the downside of being brought in as an “expert.”
I am asked by clients to perform a wide vari- ety of tasks ranging from content expert to process expert to personal coach. Regardless of the request, however, I am frequently aware of an unspoken need on the part of the client— manager, HR person, or internal consultant—to have me support his or her project, position, or person. When the request is to support a project, it is usually clear. When the request is to support a position, it is less clear but typically surfaces during the course of our work together. However, when the request is to support the individual per- sonally, the request is almost never overt. This is where my self-as-instrument work serves me best, helping me to understand the unspoken— the question behind the question. While my goal is always to help my client organizations become more effective, I never forget that change can happen many different ways and at multiple levels of the system. It is my work to be aware of opportunities to intervene, and to have the skill and courage to do so as an outsider.
56 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
ability. Rather than being upset by conflict, ambiguity, and stress, they thrive on it. Indi- viduals with marginal orientations are more likely than others to develop integrative decisions that bring together and reconcile viewpoints among opposing organizational groups and are more likely to remain neutral in controversial situations. Thus, research suggests that the marginal role can have positive effects when it is filled by a person with a marginal orientation. Such a person can be more objective and better able to perform successfully in linking, integrative, or conflict-laden roles.20
A study of both external and internal OD practitioners showed that external profes- sionals were more comfortable with the marginal role than were internal professionals. Internal consultants with more years of experience were more marginally oriented than were those with less experience.21 These findings, combined with other research on mar- ginal roles, suggest the importance of maintaining the OD practitioner’s marginality, with its flexibility, independence, and boundary-spanning characteristics.
Emotional Demands The OD practitioner role is emotionally demanding. Research and practice support the importance of understanding emotions and their impact on the practitioner’s effectiveness.22 The research on “emotional intelligence” in organiza- tions suggests a set of abilities that can aid OD practitioners in conducting successful change efforts. Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to recognize and express emo- tions appropriately, to use emotions in thought and decisions, and to regulate emotion in one’s self and in others.23 It is, therefore, a different kind of intelligence from problem- solving ability, engineering aptitude, or the knowledge of concepts. In tandem with tra- ditional knowledge and skill, emotional intelligence affects and supplements rational thought; emotions help prioritize thinking by directing attention to important informa- tion not addressed in models and theories. In that sense, some researchers argue that emotional intelligence is as important as cognitive intelligence.24
Reports from OD practitioners support the importance of emotional intelligence in practice. From the client’s perspective, OD practitioners must understand emotions well enough to relate to and help organization members address resistance, commitment, and ambiguity at each stage of planned change. Despite the predominant focus on rationality and efficiency, almost any change process must address important and difficult issues that raise emotions such as the fear of failure and of the unknown, rejection, anxiety, and anger.25 OD practitioners can provide psychological support, model appropriate emotional expression, reframe client perspectives, and provide resources. OD practi- tioners must also understand their own emotions. Ambiguity, unfamiliarity, or denial of emotions can lead to inaccurate and untimely interventions. For example, a practitioner who is uncomfortable with conflict may intervene to defuse an argument between two managers because of the discomfort he or she feels, not because the conflict is destruc- tive. In such a case, the practitioner is acting to address a personal need rather than intervening to improve the system’s effectiveness.
Evidence suggests that emotional intelligence increases with age and experience.26
Research also supports the conclusion that competence with emotions can be developed through personal growth processes such as sensitivity training, counseling, and therapy. It seems reasonable to suggest that professional OD practitioners dedicate themselves to a long-term regimen of development that includes acquiring both cognitive learning and emotional intelligence.
Use of Knowledge and Experience The professional OD role has been described in terms of a continuum ranging from client-centered (using the client’s knowledge and experience) to consultant-centered (using the consultant’s knowledge and experience),
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 57
as shown in Figure 3.1. Traditionally, OD consultants have worked at the client-centered end of the continuum. Organization development professionals, relying mainly on pro- cess consultation and team building (see Chapter 10), have been expected to remain neu- tral, refusing to offer expert advice on organizational problems. Rather than contracting to solve specific problems, the consultant has tended to work with organization members to identify problems and potential solutions, to help them study what they are doing now and consider alternative behaviors and solutions, and to help them discover whether, in fact, the consultant and they can learn to do things better. In doing that, the OD professional has generally listened and reflected upon members’ perceptions and ideas and helped clarify and interpret their communications and behaviors.
The recent proliferation of OD interventions in the structural, human resource man- agement, and strategy areas has expanded that limited definition of the professional OD role to include the consultant-centered end of the continuum. In many of the newer approaches, the consultant may have to take on a modified role of expert, with the con- sent and collaboration of organization members. For example, managers trying to bring about a major structural redesign (see Chapter 12) may not have the appropriate knowl- edge and expertise to create and manage the change and need the help of an OD practi- tioner with experience in this area. The consultant’s role might be to present the basic concepts and ideas and then to work jointly with the managers to select an approach that might be useful to the organization and to decide how it might best be implemen- ted. In this situation, the OD professional recommends or prescribes particular changes and is active in planning how to implement them. This expertise, however, is always shared rather than imposed.
With the development of new and varied intervention approaches, the OD profes- sional’s role needs to be seen as falling along the entire continuum from client-centered
FIGURE 3.1
Use of Consultant’s Versus Client’s Knowledge and Experience
SOURCE: Adapted by permission of the authors from W. Schmidt and A. Johnson, “A Continuum of Consultancy Styles” (unpublished manuscript, July 1970), p. 1.
58 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
to consultant-centered. At times, the consultant will rely mainly on organization mem- bers’ knowledge and experiences to identify and solve problems. At other times, it will be more appropriate to take on the role of an expert, withdrawing from that role as man- agers gain more knowledge and experience.
3-3b Careers of Organization Development Professionals In contrast to such long-standing occupations as medicine and law, organization devel- opment is an emerging practice, still developing the characteristics of an established pro- fession: a common body of knowledge, educational requirements, a recognized code of ethics, and rules and methods for governing conduct. People enter professional OD careers from various educational and work backgrounds. Because they do not have to follow an established career path, they have some choice about when to enter or leave an OD career and whether to be an internal or external consultant.27
Despite the looseness or flexibility of the field, most professionals have had specific training in OD. That training can include relatively short courses (one day to two weeks), programs, and workshops conducted within organizations or at outside institu- tions (such as NTL, USC, University Associates, Columbia University, the University of Michigan, Stanford University, and UCLA). OD training also can be more formal and lengthy, including master’s programs (for example, at Pepperdine University, American University, Benedictine University, Bowling Green State University, Case Western Reserve University, Loyola University, and the Fielding Institute) and doctoral training (for example, at Benedictine University, Case Western Reserve University, Columbia University Teachers College, the Fielding Institute, and George Washington University).
As might be expected, career choices widen as people gain training and experience in OD. Those with rudimentary training tend to be internal consultants, often taking on OD roles as temporary assignments on the way to higher managerial or staff positions. Holders of master’s degrees generally are evenly split between internal and external consultants. Those with doctorates may join a university faculty and do consulting part-time, join a consulting firm, or seek a position as a relatively high-level internal consultant.
External consultants tend to be older, to have more managerial experience, and to spend more of their time in OD than do internal practitioners. However, one study sug- gested there were no differences between internal and external consultants in pay or years of consulting experience.28 Perhaps the most common career path is to begin as an inter- nal consultant, gain experience and visibility through successful interventions or publish- ing, and then become an external consultant. A field study found that internal consultants acquired greater competence by working with external consultants who purpo- sely helped develop them. This development took place through a tutorial arrangement of joint diagnosis and intervention in the organization, which gave the internal consultants a chance to observe and learn from the model furnished by the external consultants.29
There is increasing evidence that an OD career can be stressful, sometimes leading to burnout.30 Burnout comes from taking on too many jobs, becoming overcommitted, and generally working too hard. The number one complaint of OD practitioners is con- stant traveling.31 OD work often requires six-day work weeks, with some days running as long as 15 hours. Consultants may spend a week working with one organization or department and then spend the weekend preparing for the next client. They may spend 50%–75% of their time on the road, living in planes, cars, hotels, meetings, and restau- rants. Indeed, one practitioner has suggested that the majority of OD consultants would repeat the phrase “quality of work life for consultants” this way: “Quality of work life? For consultants?”32
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 59
OD professionals increasingly are taking steps to cope with burnout. They may shift jobs, moving from external to internal roles to gain more predictable hours or avoid travel. They may learn to pace themselves better and to avoid taking on too much work. Many are engaging in fitness and health programs and are using stress-management techniques, such as those described in Chapter 17.
3-4 Professional Values Values have played an important role in organization development from its beginning. Traditionally, OD professionals have promoted a set of humanistic values, including a con- cern for open inquiry, democratic principles, and personal well-being.33 They have sought to help organizations build trust and collaboration among members, an open, problem- solving climate, and member self-control. More recently, OD practitioners have added to those humanistic values a concern for improving organizational effectiveness (for example, to increase productivity or to reduce turnover) and environmental sustainability (for exam- ple, to reduce the organization’s carbon imprint). They have shown an increasing desire to promote human, economic, and ecological values in practicing OD.34
The values of humanizing organizations, improving their effectiveness, and sustain- ing the environment have received widespread support in the OD profession as well as increasing encouragement from executives, employees, labor leaders, government offi- cials, and global organizations such as NATO. Indeed, it would be difficult not to sup- port those joint concerns. However, in practice, OD professionals face serious challenges in simultaneously promoting human, economic, and ecological values.35 More practi- tioners are experiencing situations in which there is conflict between employees’ needs for greater meaning and the organization’s need for more effective and efficient use of its resources. For example, expensive capital equipment may run most efficiently if it is highly programmed and routinized, but people may not derive satisfaction from working with such technology. Should efficiency be maximized at the expense of people’s satisfac- tion? Can technology be changed to make it more humanly satisfying while remaining efficient? What compromises are possible? How do these trade-offs shift when they are applied in different regional cultures? These value dilemmas are inherent in trying to optimize human benefits, organizational effectiveness, and environmental sustainability.
In addition to value issues within organizations, OD practitioners are dealing more and more with value conflicts with powerful outside groups. Organizations are open sys- tems and exist within increasingly turbulent environments. For example, hospitals are facing complex and changing task environments. This has led to a proliferation of exter- nal stakeholders with interests in the organization’s functioning, including patients, sup- pliers, medical groups, insurance companies, employers, the government, stockholders, unions, the press, and various interest groups. Those external groups often have different and competing values for judging the organization’s effectiveness. For example, stock- holders may judge the firm in terms of earnings per share, the government in terms of compliance with equal employment opportunity legislation, patients in terms of quality of care, and ecology groups in terms of hazardous waste disposal. Because organizations must rely on these external groups for resources and legitimacy, they cannot simply ignore these competing values. They must somehow respond to them and try to recon- cile the different interests.
Recent attempts to help firms manage external relationships suggest the need for new interventions and competence in OD.36 Practitioners must have not only social skills like those proposed in Table 3.1 but also political skills. They must understand the distribution
60 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
of power, conflicts of interest, and value dilemmas inherent in managing external relation- ships, and be able to manage their own role and values with respect to those dynamics. Research suggests this is especially true in interorganizational and international applica- tions of OD.37 Interventions promoting collaboration and trust may be ineffective in this larger arena, especially when there are power and dominance relationships among organi- zations and competition for scarce resources. Under those conditions, OD practitioners may need more power-oriented interventions, such as bargaining, coalition forming, and pressure tactics, which traditionally have not been associated with OD.
For example, organizations are coming under increasing pressure to align their prac- tices with ecologically sound principles. Popular and scientific concerns over global warming, toxic waste, and natural resource depletion each have formidable nonprofit groups, citizen action committees, and professional lobbyists representing them. In addi- tion, an increasing number of consulting firms are marketing services to help organiza- tions achieve a more sustainable relationship with the environment. In response, more and more firms have “gone green,” announced contributions to environmental funds, and created alliances with environmental, nongovernmental groups. Critics argue that these changes are more window-dressing than real, more political than operational, and more public relations than substantive. To be fair, a growing number of organizations are making important changes in their business practices, strategies, and resource alloca- tions. As a result, the relationships between organizations and environmental groups range from benign to hostile to collaborative. OD practitioners increasingly may need to help organizations manage these relationships and implement strategies to manage their constituencies effectively. That effort will require political skills and greater atten- tion to how the OD practitioner’s own values fit with those of the organization.
3-5 Professional Ethics Ethical issues in OD are concerned with how practitioners perform their helping rela- tionship with organization members. Inherent in any helping relationship is the potential for misconduct and client abuse. OD practitioners can let personal values stand in the way of good practice, use the power inherent in their professional role to abuse (often unintentionally) organization members, or favor one group of stakeholders at the expense of other stakeholders.
3-5a Ethical Guidelines To its credit, the field of OD always has shown concern for the ethical conduct of its practitioners. There have been several articles and symposia about ethics in OD.38
In addition, statements of ethics governing OD practice have been sponsored by the American Society for Training & Development (www.astd.org), Organization Development International (www.theodinstitute.org/od-library/code_of_ethics.htm), and a consortium of professional associations in OD. The consortium has sponsored an ethi- cal code derived from a large-scale project conducted at the Center for the Study of Ethics in the Professions at the Illinois Institute of Technology. The project’s purposes included preparing critical incidents describing ethical dilemmas and using that material for preprofessional and continuing education in OD; providing an empirical basis for a statement of values and ethics for OD professionals; and initiating a process for making the ethics of OD practice explicit on a continuing basis.39 The ethical guidelines from that project appear in the appendix to this chapter.
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 61
3-5b Ethical Dilemmas Although adherence to statements of ethics helps prevent the occurrence of ethical problems, OD practitioners still encounter ethical dilemmas. Figure 3.2 is a process model that explains how ethical dilemmas can occur in OD. The antecedent conditions include an OD practitioner and a client system with different goals, values, needs, skills, and abilities. The entry and contracting phase of planned change is intended to address and clarify these differences. As a practical matter, however, it is unreasonable to assume that all of the differences will be identified and resolved. Under such circumstances, the subsequent intervention process or role episode is almost certainly subject to role conflict and role ambiguity. Neither the client nor the OD practitioner is clear about respective responsibilities. Each party is pursuing different goals, and each is using different skills and values to achieve those goals. The role conflict and ambiguity may produce five types of ethical dilemmas: misrepresentation, misuse of data, coercion, value and goal conflict, and technical ineptness.
Misrepresentation Misrepresentation occurs when OD practitioners claim that an intervention will produce results that are unreasonable for the change program or the situation. The client can contribute to the problem by portraying inaccurate goals and needs. In either case, one or both parties are operating under false pretenses and an ethical dilemma exists. For example, in an infamous case called “The Undercover Change Agent,” an attempt was made to use sensitivity training in an organization whose top management did not understand it and was not ready for it. The OD con- sultant sold this interpersonally intense intervention as the activity that would solve the problems facing the organization. After the president of the firm made a surprise visit to the site where the training was being held, the consultant was fired because the
FIGURE 3.2
A Role Episodic Model of Ethical Dilemmas
SOURCE: Wooten, K. C. and White, L P.: 1983, “Ethical Problems in the Practice of Organization Development,” Training and Development Journal 37(4), p. 19.
62 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
nature and style of the sensitivity training was in direct contradiction to the president’s concepts about leadership.40 Misrepresentation is likely to occur in the entering and contracting phases of planned change when the initial consulting relationship is being established. To prevent misrepresentation, OD practitioners need to gain clarity about the goals of the change effort, and to explore openly with the client its expected effects, its relevance to the client system, and the practitioner’s competence in executing the intervention.
Misuse of Data Misuse of data occurs when information gathered during the OD pro- cess is used punitively. Large amounts of information are invariably obtained during the entry and diagnostic phases of OD. Although most OD practitioners value openness and trust, it is important that they be aware of how such data are going to be used. It is a human tendency to use data to enhance a power position. Openness is one thing, but leaking inappropriate information can be harmful to individuals and to the organization. It is easy for a consultant, under the guise of obtaining information, to gather data about whether a particular manager is good or bad. When, how, or if this information can be used is an ethical dilemma not easily resolved. To minimize misuse of data, practitioners should reach agreement up front with organization members about how data collected during the change process will be used. This agreement should be reviewed periodically in light of changing circumstances.
Coercion Coercion occurs when organization members are forced to participate in an OD intervention. People should have the freedom to choose whether to participate in a change program if they are to gain self-reliance to solve their own problems. In team building, for example, team members should have the option of deciding not to become involved in the intervention. Management should not decide unilaterally that team build- ing is good for members. However, freedom to make a choice requires knowledge about OD. Many organization members have little information about OD interventions, what they involve, and the nature and consequences of becoming involved with them. This makes it imperative for OD practitioners to educate clients about interventions before choices are made for implementing them.
Coercion also can pose ethical dilemmas for the helping relationship between OD practitioners and organization members. Inherent in any helping relationship are possi- bilities for excessive manipulation and dependency, two facets of coercion. Kelman pointed out that behavior change “inevitably involves some degree of manipulation and control, and at least an implicit imposition of the change agent’s values on the client or the person he [or she] is influencing.”41 This places the practitioner on two horns of a dilemma: (1) Any attempt to change is in itself a change and thereby a manipulation, no matter how slight and (2) there exists no formula or method to structure a change situa- tion so that such manipulation can be totally avoided. To attack the first aspect of the dilemma, Kelman stressed freedom of choice, seeing any action that limits freedom of choice as being ethically ambiguous or worse. To address the second aspect, Kelman argued that the OD practitioner must remain keenly aware of her or his own value sys- tem and alert to the possibility that those values are being imposed on a client. In other words, an effective way to resolve this dilemma is to make the change effort as open as possible, with the free consent and knowledge of the individuals involved.
The second facet of coercion that can pose ethical dilemmas for the helping relation- ship involves dependency. Helping relationships invariably create dependency between those who need help and those who provide it.42 A major goal in OD is to lessen clients’ dependency on consultants by helping clients gain the knowledge and skills to address
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 63
organizational problems and manage change themselves. In some cases, however, achiev- ing independence from OD practitioners can result in clients being either counterdepen- dent or overdependent, especially in the early stages of the relationship. To resolve dependency issues, consultants can openly and explicitly discuss with the client how to handle the dependency problem, especially what the client and consultant expect of one another. Another approach is to focus on problem finding. Usually, the client is looking for a solution to a perceived problem. The consultant can redirect the energy to improved joint diagnosis so that both are working on problem identification and prob- lem solving. Such action moves the energy of the client away from dependency. Finally, dependency can be reduced by changing the client’s expectation from being helped or controlled by the practitioner to a greater focus on the need to manage the problem. Such a refocusing can reinforce the understanding that the consultant is working for the client and offering assistance that is at the client’s discretion.
Value and Goal Conflict This ethical conflict occurs when the purpose of the change effort is not clear or when the client and the practitioner disagree over how to achieve the goals. The important practical issue for OD consultants is whether it is justifiable to withhold services unilaterally from an organization that does not agree with their values or methods. OD pioneer Gordon Lippitt suggested that the real question is the following: Assuming that some kind of change is going to occur anyway, doesn’t the consultant have a responsibility to try to guide the change in the most constructive fashion possible?43 That question may be of greater importance and relevance to an internal consultant or to a consultant who already has an ongoing relationship with the client.
Argyris takes an even stronger stand, maintaining that the responsibilities of profes- sional OD practitioners to clients are comparable to those of lawyers or physicians, who, in principle, may not refuse to perform their services. He suggests that the very least the consultant can do is to provide “first aid” to the organization, as long as the assistance does not compromise the consultant’s values. Argyris suggests that if the Ku Klux Klan asked for assistance and the consultant could at least determine whether the KKK was genuinely interested in assessing itself and willing to commit itself to all that a valid assessment would entail concerning both itself and other groups, the consultant should be willing to help. If later the Klan’s objectives proved to be less than honestly stated, the consultant would be free to withdraw without being compromised.44
Technical Ineptness This final ethical dilemma occurs when OD practitioners try to implement interventions for which they are not skilled or when the client attempts a change for which it is not ready. Critical to the success of any OD program is the selec- tion of an appropriate intervention, which depends, in turn, on careful diagnosis of the organization. Selecting an intervention is closely related to the practitioner’s own values, skills, and abilities. In solving organizational problems, many OD consultants emphasize a favorite intervention or technique, such as team building, total quality management, or self-managed teams. They let their own values and beliefs dictate the change method.45
Technical ineptness dilemmas also can occur when interventions do not align with the ability of the organization to implement them. Again, careful diagnosis can reveal the extent to which the organization is ready to make a change and possesses the skills and knowledge to implement it.
Application 3.2 presents an ethical dilemma that arises frequently in OD consulting.46
What points in the process represent practical opportunities to intervene? Do you agree with Todd’s resolution to the problem? What other options did she have?
64 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
a p
p li
ca ti
o n
3 2 KINDRED TODD AND THE ETHICS OF OD
K indred Todd had just finished her master’s degree in organization development and had landed her first consulting position with a small consulting company in Edmonton,
Alberta, Canada. The president, Larry Stepchuck, convinced Todd that his growing organization offered her a great opportunity to learn the busi- ness. He had a large number of contacts, an impressive executive career, and several years of consulting experience behind him.
In fact, the firm was growing; adding new clients and projects as fast as its president could hire consultants. A few weeks after Todd was hired, Stepchuck assigned her to a new cli- ent, a small oil and gas company. “I’ve met with the client for several hours,” he told her. “They are an important and potentially large opportunity for our firm. They’re looking to us to help them address some long-range planning issues. From the way they talk, they could also use some con- tinuous quality improvement work as well.”
As Todd prepared for her initial meeting with the client, she reviewed financial data from the firm’s annual report, examined trends in the cli- ent’s industry, and thought about the issues that young firms face. Stepchuck indicated that Todd would first meet with the president of the firm to discuss initial issues and next steps.
When Todd walked into the president’s office, she was greeted by the firm’s entire senior management team. Team members expressed eagerness to get to work on the important issues of how to improve the orga- nization’s key business processes. They believed that an expert in continuous quality improvement (CQI), such as Todd, was exactly the kind of help they needed to increase effi- ciency and cut costs in the core business. Members began to ask direct questions about technical details of CQI, the likely timeframe within which they might expect results, how to map key processes, and how to form quality-improvement teams to identify and implement process improvements.
Todd was stunned and overwhelmed. Noth- ing that Stepchuck said about the issues facing this company was being discussed and, worse,
it was clear that he had sold her to the client as an “expert” in CQI. Her immediate response was to suggest that all of their questions were good ones, but that they needed to be answered in the context of the long-range goals and strate- gies of the firm. Todd proposed that the best way to begin was for team members to provide her with some history about the organization. In doing so, she was able to avert disaster and embarrassment for herself and her company, and to appear to be doing all the things neces- sary to begin a CQI project. The meeting ended with Todd and the management team agreeing to meet again the following week.
Immediately the next day, Todd sought out the president of her firm. She reported on the results of the meeting and her surprise at being sold to this client as an expert on CQI. Todd suggested that her own competencies did not fit the needs of the client and requested that another consultant—one with expertise in CQI—be assigned to the project.
Larry Stepchuck responded to Todd’s con- cerns: “I’ve known these people for over ten years. They don’t know exactly what they need. CQI is an important buzzword. It’s the flavor of the month and if that’s what they want, that’s what we’ll give them.” He also told her that there were no other consultants available for this project. “Besides,” he said, “the president of the client firm just called to say how much he enjoyed meeting with you and was looking forward to getting started on the project right away.”
Kindred Todd felt that Stepchuck’s response to her concerns included a strong, inferred ultimatum: If you want to stay with this company, you had better take this job. “I knew I had to sink or swim with this job and this client,” she later reported.
As Todd reflected on her options, she pondered the following questions:
• How can I be honest with this client and thus not jeopardize my values of openness and honesty?
• How can I be helpful to this client?
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 65
SUMMARY
This chapter has examined the role of the organization development practitioner. The term OD practitioner applies to three sets of people: individuals specializing in OD as a profession, people from related fields who have gained some competence in OD, and managers having the OD skills necessary to change and develop their organizations or departments. Comprehensive lists enumerate core and advanced skills and knowl- edge that an effective OD professional should possess, but a smaller set of basic skills and knowledge is appli- cable for all practitioners at all levels. These include four kinds of background: intrapersonal skills, interper- sonal skills, general consultation skills, and knowledge of OD theory.
The professional OD role can apply to internal consultants who belong to the organization undergoing change, to external consultants who are members of universities and consulting firms or are self-employed, and to members of internal–external consulting teams. The OD practitioner’s role may be described aptly in terms of marginality and emotional demands. People with a tolerance for marginal roles seem especially suited for OD practice because they are able to main- tain neutrality and objectivity and to develop integra- tive solutions that reconcile viewpoints among opposing organizational departments. Similarly, the
OD practitioner’s emotional intelligence and awareness are keys to implementing the role successfully. Whereas in the past the OD practitioner’s role has been described as standing at the client end of the con- tinuum from client-centered to consultant-centered functioning, the development of new and varied inter- ventions has shifted the role of the OD professional to cover the entire range of that continuum.
Although OD is still an emerging field, most practi- tioners have specific training that ranges from short courses and workshops to graduate and doctoral educa- tion. No single career path exists, but internal consulting is often a stepping-stone to becoming an external con- sultant. Because of the hectic pace of OD practice, spe- cialists should be prepared to cope with high levels of stress and the possibility of career burnout.
Values have played a key role in OD, and tradi- tional values promoting trust, collaboration, and open- ness have been supplemented recently with concerns for improving organizational effectiveness and environ- mental sustainability. OD specialists may face value dilemmas in trying to optimize human benefits, orga- nization performance, and sound environmental prac- tices. They also may encounter value conflicts when dealing with powerful external stakeholders, such as the government, stockholders, and customers. Dealing
• How much do I know about quality-improvement processes?
• How do I satisfy the requirements of my employer?
• What obligations do I have? • Who’s going to know if I do or don’t have the
credentials to perform this work? • What if I fail?
After thinking about those issues, Todd sum- marized her position in terms of three dilemmas: a dilemma of self (who is Kindred Todd?), a dilemma of competence (what can I do?), and a dilemma of confidence (do I like who I work for?). Based on the issues, Todd made the following
tactical decisions. She spent two days at the library reading about and studying total quality management and CQI. She also contacted sev- eral of her friends and former classmates who had experience with quality-improvement efforts. Eventually, she contracted with one of them to be her “shadow” consultant—to work with her behind the scenes on formulating and implement- ing an intervention for the client.
Based on her preparation in the library and the discussions with her shadow consultant, Kindred Todd was able to facilitate an appropriate and effective intervention for the client. Shortly after her assignment was completed, she resigned from the consulting organization.
66 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
with those outside groups may take political skills, as well as the more traditional social skills.
Ethical issues in OD involve how practitioners per- form their helping role with clients. As a profession, OD always has shown a concern for the ethical conduct
and several ethical codes for OD practice have been developed by various professional associations. Ethical dilemmas in OD arise around misrepresentation, misuse of data, coercion, value and goal conflict, and technical ineptness.
NOTES
1. A. Church and W. Burke, “Practitioner Attitudes about the Field of Organization Development,” in Research in Organization Change and Development, ed. W. Pasmore and R. Woodman (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1995).
2. L. Greiner and T. Cummings, Dynamic Strategy Making: A Real-Time Approach for the 21st Century Leader (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009); C. Worley, D. Hitchin, and W. Ross, Integrated Strategic Change (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1996).
3. L. Greiner and F. Poulfelt, Management Consulting Today and Tomorrow (New York: Routledge, 2010); N. Worren, K. Ruddle, and K. Moore, “From Organization Develop- ment to Change Management: The Emergence of a New Profession,” Journal of Applied Behavioral Science 35 (1999): 273–86.
4. M. Beer and E. Walton, “Organization Change and Development,” Annual Review of Psychology 38 (1987): 229–72; S. Sherman, “Wanted: Company Change Agents,” Fortune, December 11, 1999, 197–98.
5. R. Kanter, The Change Masters (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983).
6. R. Lippitt, “Dimensions of the Consultant’s Job,” in The Planning of Change, ed. W. Bennis, K. Benne, and R. Chin (New York: Holt, Rinehart, & Winston, 1961), 156– 61; C. Rogers, On Becoming a Person (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971); “OD Experts Reflect on the Major Skills Needed by Consultants: With Comments from Edgar Schein,” Academy of Management OD Newsletter (Spring 1979): 1–4; K. Shepard and A. Raia, “The OD Training Challenge,” Training and Development Journal 35 (April 1981): 90–96; E. Neilsen, Becoming an OD Practitioner (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1984); S. Eisen, J. Cherbeneau, and C. Worley, “A Future-Responsive Perspective for Competent Practice in OD,” in Practicing Organization Development, 2nd ed., ed. W. Rothwell and R. Sullivan (San Diego: Pfeiffer, 2005); A. Church, “The Professionalization of Organization Development,” in Research in Organization Change and Development, ed. R. Woodman and W. Pasmore (Oxford: JAI Press, 2001); A. Freedman and R. Zackrison, Finding Your Way in the Consulting Jungle (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2001).
7. R. Sullivan and K. Quade, “Essential Competencies for Internal and External OD Consultants,” in Practicing
Organization Development, ed. W. Rothwell, R. Sullivan, and G. McLean (San Diego: Pfeiffer, 1995).
8. C. Worley, W. Rothwell, and R. Sullivan, “Competencies of OD Practitioners,” in Practicing Organization Develop- ment, 2nd ed., ed. W. Rothwell and R. Sullivan (San Diego: Pfeiffer, 2005).
9. C. Worley and G. Varney, “A Search for a Common Body of Knowledge for Master’s Level Organization Development and Change Programs—An Invitation to Join the Discussion,” Academy of Management ODC Newsletter (Winter 1998): 1–4.
10. C. Worley and A. Feyerherm, “Reflections on the Future of Organization Development,” Journal of Applied Behav- ioral Science 39 (2003): 97–115; Worley, Rothwell, and Sullivan, “Competencies of OD Practitioners.”
11. B. Tannenbaum, “Letter to the Editor,” Consulting Practice Communique, Academy of Management Managerial Con- sultation Division 21, no. 3 (1993): 16–17; B. Tannenbaum, “Self-Awareness: An Essential Element Underlying Consultant Effectiveness,” Journal of Organizational Change Management 8, no. 3 (1995): 85–86.
12. A. Church and W. Burke, “Practitioner Attitudes about the Field of Organization Development,” in Research in Orga- nizational Change and Development, ed. W. Pasmore and R. Woodman (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1995).
13. M. Lacey, “Internal Consulting: Perspectives on the Pro- cess of Planned Change,” Journal of Organizational Change Management 8, no. 3 (1995): 75–84.
14. M. Kaarst-Brown, “Five Symbolic Roles of the External Consultant–Integrating Change, Power, and Symbolism,” Journal of Organizational Change Management 12 (1999): 540–61.
15. Lacey, “Internal Consulting.” 16. C. Argyris, Intervention Theory and Method (Reading,
MA: Addison-Wesley, 1973).
17. A. Foss, D. Lipsky, A. Orr, B. Scott, T. Seamon, J. Smendzuik-O’Brien, A. Tavis, D. Wissman, and C. Woods, “Practicing Internal OD,” in Practicing Organization Develop- ment, 2nd ed., ed. W. Rothwell and R. Sullivan (San Diego: Pfeiffer, 2005); E. Kirkhart and T. Isgar, “Quality of Work Life for Consultants: The Internal–External Relationship,” Consultation 5 (Spring 1986): 5–23.
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 67
18. This application was developed by Kimberly McKenna based on her experiences as both an external and internal OD practitioner and on Kirkhart and Isgar, “Quality of Work Life for Consultants.”
19. R. Ziller, The Social Self (Elmsford, NY: Pergamon, 1973). 20. W. Liddell, “Marginality and Integrative Decisions,”
Academy of Management Journal 16 (March 1973): 154–56; P. Brown and C. Cotton, “Marginality, A Force for the OD Practitioner,” Training and Development Journal 29 (April 1975): 14–18; H. Aldrich and D. Gerker, “Boundary Spanning Roles and Organizational Struc- ture,” Academy of Management Review 2 (April 1977): 217–30; C. Cotton, “Marginality—A Neglected Dimen- sion in the Design of Work,” Academy of Management Review 2 (January 1977): 133–38; N. Margulies, “Perspec- tives on the Marginality of the Consultant’s Role,” in The Cutting Edge, ed. W. Burke (La Jolla, CA: University Associates, 1978), 60–79.
21. P. Brown, C. Cotton, and R. Golembiewski, “Marginality and the OD Practitioner,” Journal of Applied Behavioral Science 13 (1977): 493–506.
22. C. Lundberg and C. Young, “A Note on Emotions and Consultancy,” Journal of Organizational Change Manage- ment 14 (2001): 530–38; A. Carr, “Understanding Emo- tion and Emotionality in a Process of Change,” Journal of Organizational Change Management 14 (2001): 421–36.
23. D. Goleman, Emotional Intelligence (New York: Bantam Books, 1995); R. Cooper and A. Sawaf, Executive EQ: Emo- tional Intelligence in Leadership and Organizations (New York: Grosset/Putnum, 1997); P. Salovey and D. Sluyter, eds., Emotional Development and Emotional Intelligence (New York: Basic Books, 1997); J. Allen, Emotional Intelli- gence: The Emotional Intelligence Book (Charleston, SC: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2013).
24. Goleman, Emotional Intelligence. 25. J. Sanford, Fritz Kunkel: Selected Writings (Mahwah, NJ:
Paulist Press, 1984); Lundberg and Young, “Note on Emotions”; Carr, “Understanding Emotion.”
26. J. Ciarrochi, J. Forgas, and J. Mayer, Emotional Intelli- gence in Everyday Life: A Scientific Inquiry (New York: Psychology Press, 2001).
27. D. Kegan, “Organization Development as OD Network Members See It,” Group and Organization Studies 7 (March 1982): 5–11.
28. D. Griffin and P. Griffin, “The Consulting Survey,” Consulting Today, Special Issue (Fall 1998): 1–11.
29. J. Lewis III, “Growth of Internal Change Agents in Orga- nizations” (Ph.D. Diss., Case Western Reserve University, 1970).
30. G. Edelwich and A. Brodsky, Burn-Out Stages of Disillusionment in the Helping Professions (New York: Human Science, 1980); M. Weisbord, “The Wizard of
OD: Or, What Have Magic Slippers to Do with Burnout, Evaluation, Resistance, Planned Change, and Action Research?” OD Practitioner 10 (Summer 1978): 1–14; M. Mitchell, “Consultant Burnout,” in The 1977 Annual Handbook for Group Facilitators, ed. J. Jones and W. Pfeiffer (La Jolla, CA: University Associates, 1977), 145–56.
31. Griffin and Griffin, “Consulting Survey.” 32. T. Isgar, “Quality of Work Life of Consultants,” Academy
of Management OD Newsletter (Winter 1983): 2–4. 33. P. Hanson and B. Lubin, Answers to Questions Most Fre-
quently Asked about Organization Development (New- bury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1995).
34. Church and Burke, “Practitioner Attitudes.” 35. D. Jamieson and C. Worley, “The Practice of Organization
Development,” in Handbook of Organization Development, ed. T. Cummings (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publica- tions, 2008); M. Wheatley, R. Tannenbaum, P. Griffin, and K. Quade, Organization Development at Work (San Francisco: Pfeiffer, 2003).
36. Church, “Professionalization of Organization Develop- ment”; S. Guastello, Chaos, Catastrophe, and Human Affairs (Mahwah, NJ: LEA Publishers, 1995); R. Stacey, D. Griffin, and P. Shaw, Complexity and Management (London: Rou- tledge, 2000); R. Garud, A. Kumaraswamy, and R. Langlois, Managing in the Modular Age (Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub- lishing, 2003); A. Shani and P. Docherty, Learning by Design (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2003).
37. R. Saner and L. Yiu, “Porous Boundary and Power Poli- tics: Contextual Constraints of Organization Develop- ment Change Projects in the United Nations Organizations,” Gestalt Review 6 (2002): 84–94.
38. D. Jamieson and W. Gellermann, “Values, Ethics, and OD Practice,” in The NTL Handbook of Organization Development and Change, ed. B. Jones and M. Brazzel (San Francisco: Pfeiffer, 2006); T. Egan and W. Gellermann, “Values, Ethics, and Practice in the Field of Organization Development,” in Practicing Organization Development, 2nd ed., ed. W. Rothwell and R. Sullivan (San Francisco: Pfeifer, 2005); D. Coghlan and A. Shani, “Roles, Politics, and Ethics in Action Research Design,” Systemic Practice and Action Research 18 (2005): 533–51; D. Bowen, “Value Dilemmas in Organization Development,” Journal of Applied Behavioral Science 13 (1977): 545–55; L. White and K. Wooten, “Ethical Dilemmas in Various Stages of Organization Development,” Academy of Management Review 8 (1963): 690–97; K. Scalzo, “When Ethics and Con- sulting Collide” (unpublished master’s thesis, Pepperdine University, Graziadio School of Business and Management, Los Angeles, CA, 1994); L. White and M. Rhodeback, “Ethical Dilemmas in Organization Devel- opment: A Cross-Cultural Analysis,” Journal of Business Ethics 11, no. 9 (1992): 663–70; M. Page, “Ethical dilemmas
68 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
in organization development consulting practice” (unpub- lished master’s thesis, Pepperdine University, Graziadio School of Business and Management, Los Angeles, CA, 1998).
39. W. Gellerman, M. Frankel, and R. Ladenson, Values and Ethics in Organization and Human System Development: Responding to Dilemmas in Professional Life (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1990).
40. W. Bennis, Organization Development: Its Nature, Origins, and Prospects (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1969).
41. H. Kelman, “Manipulation of Human Behavior: An Ethical Dilemma for the Social Scientist,” in The Plan- ning of Change, 2nd ed., ed. W. Bennis, K. Benne, and R. Chin (New York: Holt, Rinehart, & Winston, 1969), 584.
42. E. Schein, Process Consultation Revisited (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1999); R. Beckhard, “The Dependency Dilemma,” Consultants’ Communique 6 (July–September 1978): 1–3.
43. G. Lippitt, Organization Renewal (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1969).
44. C. Argyris, “Explorations in Consulting–Client Relation- ships,” Human Organizations 20 (Fall 1961): 121–33.
45. J. Slocum Jr., “Does Cognitive Style Affect Diagnosis and Intervention Strategies?” Group and Organization Studies 3 (June 1978): 199–210.
46. This application was submitted by Kathy Scalzo, an OD consultant in western Canada. It is based on an actual case from her interviews with OD consultants on how they resolve ethical dilemmas. The names and places have been changed to preserve anonymity.
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 69
APPENDIX
Ethical Guidelines for an Organization Development/Human Systems Development (OD/HSD) Professional
Sponsored by the Human Systems Development Con- sortium (HSDC), a significant integrative effort by Bill Gellermann has been under way to develop “A State- ment of Values and Ethics for Professionals in Organi- zation and Human System Development.” HSDC is an informal collection of the leaders of most of the profes- sional associations related to the application of the behavioral and social sciences. A series of drafts based on extensive contributions, comments, and discussions involving many professionals and organizations has led to the following version of this statement.
As an OD/HSD Professional, I commit to support- ing and acting in accordance with the following guidelines:
I. Responsibility for Professional Development and Competence
A. Accept responsibility for the consequences of my acts and make every effort to ensure that my services are properly used.
B. Recognize the limits of my competence, culture, and experience in providing services and using techni- ques; neither seek nor accept assignments outside those limits without clear understanding by the cli- ent when exploration at the edge of my competence is reasonable; refer client to other professionals when appropriate.
C. Strive to attain and maintain a professional level of competence in the field, including
1. broad knowledge of theory and practice in a. applied behavioral science generally. b. management, administration, organizational
behavior, and system behavior specifically. c. multicultural issues including issues of
color and gender. d. other relevant fields of knowledge and
practice. 2. ability to
a. relate effectively with individuals and groups. b. relate effectively to the dynamics of large,
complex systems. c. provide consultation using theory and
methods of the applied behavioral sciences.
d. articulate theory and direct its application, including creation of learning experiences for individuals, small and large groups, and for whole systems.
D. Strive continually for self-knowledge and personal growth; be aware that “what is in me” (my percep- tions of myself in my world) and “what is outside me” (the realities that exist apart from me) are not the same; be aware that my values, beliefs, and aspirations can both limit and empower me and that they are primary determinants of my percep- tions, my behavior, and my personal and profes- sional effectiveness.
E. Recognize my own personal needs and desires and deal with them responsibly in the performance of my professional roles.
F. Obtain consultation from OD/HSD professionals who are native to and aware of the specific cultures within which I work when those cultures are differ- ent from my own.
II. Responsibility to Clients and Significant Others
A. Serve the short- and long-term welfare, interests, and development of the client system and all its sta- keholders; maintain balance in the timing, pace, and magnitude of planned change so as to support a mutually beneficial relationship between the system and its environment.
B. Discuss candidly and fully goals, costs, risks, limita- tions, and anticipated outcomes of any program or other professional relationship under consideration; seek to avoid automatic confirmation of predeter- mined conclusions, either the client’s or my own; seek optimum involvement by client system mem- bers in every step of the process, including managers and workers’ representatives; fully inform client sys- tem members about my role, contribution, and strat- egy in working with them.
C. Fully inform participants in any activity or proce- dure as to its sponsorship, nature, purpose, implica- tions, and any significant risk associated with it so that they can freely choose their participation in any activity initiated by me; acknowledge that their choice may be limited with activity initiated by rec- ognized authorities; be particularly sensitive to
70 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
implications and risks when I work with people from cultures other than my own.
D. Be aware of my own personal values, my values as an OD/HSD professional, the values of my native cul- ture, the values of the people with whom I am work- ing, and the values of their cultures; involve the client system in making relevant cultural differences explicit and exploring the possible implications of any OD/ HSD intervention for all the stakeholders involved; be prepared to make explicit my assumptions, values, and standards as an OD/HSD professional.
E. Help all stakeholders while developing OD/HSD approaches, programs, and the like, if they wish such help; for example, this could include workers’ representatives as well as managers in the case of work with a business organization.
F. Work collaboratively with other internal and exter- nal consultants serving the same client system and resolve conflicts in terms of the balanced best inter- ests of the client system and all its stakeholders; make appropriate arrangements with other internal and external consultants about how responsibilities will be shared.
G. Encourage and enable my clients to provide for themselves the services I provide rather than foster continued reliance on me; encourage, foster, and support self-education and self-development by individuals, groups, and all other human systems.
H. Cease work with a client when it is clear that the client is not benefiting or the contract has been com- pleted; do not accept an assignment if its scope is so limited that the client will not benefit or it would involve serious conflict with the values and ethics outlined in this statement.
I. Avoid conflicts of interest. 1. Fully inform the client of my opinion about
serving similar or competing organizations; be clear with myself, my clients, and other con- cerned stakeholders about my loyalties and responsibilities when conflicts of interest arise; keep parties informed of these conflicts; cease work with the client if the conflicts cannot be adequately resolved.
2. Seek to act impartially when involved in conflicts between parties in the client system; help them resolve their conflicts themselves, without taking sides; if necessary to change my role from serving as impartial consultant, do so explicitly; cease work with the client, if necessary.
3. Identify and respond to any major differences in professionally relevant values or ethics between myself and my clients with the under- standing that conditions may require ceasing work with the client.
4. Accept differences in the expectations and inter- ests of different stakeholders and realize that those differences cannot be reconciled all the time.
J. Seek consultation and feedback from neutral third parties in case of conflict between myself and my client.
K. Define and protect the confidentiality of my client– professional relationships.
1. Make limits of confidentiality clear to clients/ participants.
2. Reveal information accepted in confidence only to appropriate or agreed-upon recipients or authorities.
3. Use information obtained during professional work in writings, lectures, or other public for- ums only with prior consent or when disguised so that it is impossible from my presentations alone to identify the individuals or systems with whom I have worked.
4. Make adequate provisions for maintaining con- fidentiality in the storage and disposal of records; make provisions for responsibly pre- serving records in the event of my retirement or disability.
L. Establish mutual agreement on a contract covering services and remuneration.
1. Ensure a clear understanding of and mutual agreement on the services to be performed; do not shift from that agreement without both a clearly defined professional rationale for making the shift and the informed consent of the cli- ents/participants; withdraw from the agreement if circumstances beyond my control prevent proper fulfillment.
2. Ensure mutual understanding and agreement by putting the contract in writing to the extent fea- sible, yet recognize that
a. the spirit of professional responsibility encompasses more than the letter of the contract.
b. some contracts are necessarily incomplete because complete information is not avail- able at the outset.
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 71
c. putting the contract in writing may be neither necessary nor desirable.
3. Safeguard the best interests of the client, the profession, and the public by making sure that financial arrangements are fair and in keeping with appropriate statutes, regulations, and pro- fessional standards.
M. Provide for my own accountability by evaluating and assessing the effects of my work.
1. Make all reasonable efforts to determine if my activities have accomplished the agreed-upon goals and have not had other undesirable con- sequences; seek to undo any undesirable conse- quences, and do not attempt to cover up these situations.
2. Actively solicit and respond with an open mind to feedback regarding my work and seek to improve.
3. Develop, publish, and use assessment techni- ques that promote the welfare and best interests of clients/participants; guard against the misuse of assessment results.
N. Make public statements of all kinds accurately, including promotion and advertising, and give ser- vice as advertised.
1. Base public statements providing professional opinions or information on scientifically accept- able findings and techniques as much as possi- ble, with full recognition of the limits and uncertainties of such evidence.
2. Seek to help people make informed choices when making statements as part of promotion or advertising.
3. Deliver services as advertised and do not shift without a clear professional rationale and the informed consent of the participants/clients.
III. Responsibility to the Profession
A. Act with due regard for the needs, special competen- cies and obligations of my colleagues in OD/HSD and other professions; respect the prerogatives and obligations of the institutions or organizations with which these other colleagues are associated.
B. Be aware of the possible impact of my public behav- ior upon the ability of colleagues to perform their professional work; perform professional activity in a way that will bring credit to the profession.
C. Work actively for ethical practice by individuals and organizations engaged in OD/HSD activities and, in
case of questionable practice, use appropriate chan- nels for confronting it, including
1. direct discussion when feasible. 2. joint consultation and feedback, using other
professionals as third parties. 3. enforcement procedures of existing professional
organizations. 4. public confrontation.
D. Contribute to continuing professional development by
1. supporting the development of other profes- sionals, including mentoring with less-experienced professionals.
2. contributing ideas, methods, findings, and other useful information to the body of OD/HSD knowledge and skill.
E. Promote the sharing of OD/HSD knowledge and skill by various means including
1. granting use of my copyrighted material as freely as possible, subject to a minimum of con- ditions, including a reasonable price defined on the basis of professional as well as commercial values.
2. giving credit for the ideas and products of others.
IV. Social Responsibility
A. Strive for the preservation and protection of funda- mental human rights and the promotion of social justice.
B. Be aware that I bear a heavy social responsibility because my recommendations and professional actions may alter the lives and well-being of indivi- duals within my client systems, the systems them- selves, and the larger systems of which they are subsystems.
C. Contribute knowledge, skill, and other resources in support of organizations, programs, and activities that seek to improve human welfare; be prepared to accept clients who do not have sufficient resources to pay my full fees at reduced fees or no charge.
D. Respect the cultures of the organization, community, country, or other human system within which I work (including the cultures’ traditions, values, and moral and ethical expectations and their implica- tions), yet recognize and constructively confront the counterproductive aspects of those cultures whenever feasible; be sensitive to cross-cultural
72 PART 1 OVERVIEW OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
differences and their implications; be aware of the cultural filters which bias my view of the world.
E. Recognize that accepting this statement as a guide for my behavior involves holding myself to a stan- dard that may be more exacting than the laws of any country in which I practice.
F. Contribute to the quality of life in human society at large; work toward and support a culture based on mutual respect for each other’s rights as human
beings; encourage the development of love, trust, openness, mutual responsibility, authentic and har- monious relationships, empowerment, participation, and involvement in a spirit of freedom and self- discipline as elements of this culture.
G. Engage in self-generated or collaborative endeavor to develop means for helping across cultures.
H. Serve the welfare of all the people of Earth, all living things, and their environment.
CHAPTER 3 THE ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT PRACTITIONER 73
SELECTED CASES
© Pixmann/Imagezoo/Getty Images
PART 2 THE PROCESS OF ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT
4 Entering and Contracting
5 Diagnosing
6 Collecting, Analyzing, and Feeding Back
Diagnostic Information
7 Designing Interventions
8 Managing Change
9 Evaluating and Institutionalizing Organization
Development Interventions
Sunflower Incorporated
Kenworth Motors
Peppercorn Dining
Diagnosis and Feedback at Adhikar
Managing Change: Action Planning for the Vélo V Project in Lyon, France
74