Organizational Development. Case History - En Trilix new

THE CUSTOMER REQUEST AND THE CONTEXT

“There is a problem with the method. In fact, the employees are competent: however, some of them, recently hired, were not involved in the last training sessions, so the problem is that the techniques learned are not applied in a methodological and widespread manner.  
The knowledge gained is considered a kind of precious personal stock, but is not applied, so does not become a professional habit.
In general, people have no method of problem setting and solving and of making a proposal.
Similarly, at Management level, for example, the meetings are not very productive: in this case not all the necessary decisions are made and some people do not contribute to making decisions”.

These are the words of the CEO and Country Manager Italy  of a market leading German Service Company, in a particular, complex moment due to the presence of new, important competitors.

The original request was: create a training project to enforce the techniques related to problem solving and decision-making and support their extended application, and provide a rigorous method for Executive and Middle Management.     
In fact, at the start the problem seemed to be that employees in general did not have enough ability to transfer the techniques, partly already learned, into practices – in a widespread way – and to transform these into professional habits. Their employment was interpreted as an exercise, in a different dimension as opposed to the normal activities. In professional interactions, the use of techniques has not yet become a new language to communicate and behave more effectively.           

But this request was too general and, on the surface, in contradiction to the organizational culture. In the first interview with the HR Manager and the CEO, in fact, the culture and the organization should encourage – not block – the transformation of the techniques into professional practices. Indeed, the CEO, when he arrived 10 years ago, had built a management team able to lead important economic growth and market share. In the last four years, the staff almost doubled from 60 to 110 units .  In addition, a corporate culture became apparent, focused on sense of loyalty and targets based on the vision, confident in the young employees’ potential and characterized by a shared attitude of challenging themselves (an attitude necessary for organizational learning). Furthermore, there was no evident tension in a hierarchical structure (as all the organizational culture features indicated) and the system of competence evaluation was well accepted .  

In this, substantially positive, context it was necessary to explore better the request and the insistence on the “method”.
The key questions were:

• How had the last training projects and related on-the-job application been structured and which tools have been acquired;
  

• What were, in the context, the strengths and the opportunities to transform the techniques into professional habits, widespread and well-established, beyond apparent learning;
  

• What was the meaning of “gain the method” in a problem setting/solving process and what were the expectations about the application of these techniques to real work processes (i.e. “No method of problem setting and solving and of making a proposal”);
  

• Which were the main critical points in a decision-making process to apply the techniques and make them more effective (“the meetings are not very productive: in this case not all the necessary decisions are made and some people do not contribute to making decisions”);
  

• In general, what kind of management culture was produced in organizational practices and how were the decision-making processes structured in the Executive Management and in the relationship between each Executive and his Department.
  

To understand all these points, it was necessary to introduce specific actions in the design phase and then define a well customized project to ensure that the learning of methods and techniques became “knowledge in action”, shared by the people and effective in the organization’s efficient working and so in the business.  


PROJECT DESIGN ACTIONS

The project design was strictly defined with the HR Manager and the CEO.

In a cultural analysis perspective, we proceeded as follows:

• Meetings with the HR Manager in which we analyzed in detail:
  

1. The History of the Company, and the Vision, with initial notes related to the organizational culture
2. The organizational structure and personnel management and development system (people strategy)
3. The professional characteristics of employees involved in the project
Main documents: Vision (last release), organizational chart, competences map for “Management” and “People”, last training projects, tools in use for problem analysis and decision-making;

• Interviews with the Executives to understand the real value assigned to possession of techniques in the context;
  

• Observation of a Executive Management Group (EMG) meeting and Executives’ meetings with their Staff, to identify methods in use for problem analysis and decision-making;
  

• Focus group with Middle Management representatives, to identify the expectations, experiences, key-processes and problem situations.
  

From the analysis, some critical points emerged:

1. At the level of Middle Management on one hand there was an insufficient sharing of techniques and methodologies of problem setting/solving processes, on the other hand the problem was the agreement with Executive Management in proposal and development of the projects which – by applying techniques – should promote real processes of organizational development. The problem of contents and methods was linked to some resistance by Executives (to accepting proposals from Staff) and Middle Management (in correctly promoting improvement proposals and projects).

2. At the level of Executive Management, it was necessary to review decision processes – starting from EMG meetings, frequently unproductive – and participation method in the business focused projects: in these cases, the EMG seemed ineffective in supporting strategic decisions and the CEO, viewed as a reference point but, sometimes, also as a man “to be feared”, from whom people expect operative orders more than a real involvement in decisional processes.

In an apparently collaborative and “no blame” culture, rigid hierarchy traits and a “soft” managerial role interpretation (in particular in some more recently appointed Executives) survived: the Executives showed a tendency to delegate their decisional competencies to the Top and, at the same time, to take power from their Direct Staff.
The CEO himself, demanding and meticulous, less emphatic and very distant but open to being immediately involved in the training process and in a clear relationship with the team, was perceived as authoritative, due to his history and ability to take the Company to success; however, for this reason, the Executives, especially the younger ones, had difficulty in having a more proactive relationship. The CEO was seen as a reference model, a kind of “founding father” who people had to treat with respect and wait for his instructions.
Instead the Company’s growth required more participation by the EMG and more acceptance of responsibility by each Executive.   

The training project strategy should consider all these points and – going beyond the techniques – focus on the cultural frames and the critical behaviors in change processes.


SOLUTIONS AND OUTCOMES

In summary, the proposals were:             

a) Middle Management

• Training sessions focused on technique reinforcement (team problem solving, process improvement, project management);
  

• Project Work with small groups (including some Employees]), supported by Consultants, aimed at problem finding in work processes and improvement project development (through learned tools): the groups had to acquire the correct information and make an appropriate report, assessment and presentation of purpose to the Executives.
  

Fundamental to the success of the Project Work were the constant relationship with the HR Manager, in particular in defining groups and areas of interest, and the presentation of analyses and purposes to the Executives, immediately involved in possible project definition as sponsors.          

The project outcomes were:

- a definition and implementation of real improvement projects (some relevant to the Organization) supported by the Executives;
- a revision of the communication process between Executives and Staff, to develop more participation by all people (with “the method”, thus using the analysis and development tools) considering the opportunities and the constraints in the Organization and the responsibility of the roles.

b) Executives

• Customized seminars focused on decision-making and organization of staff meetings and EMG meetings;
  

• Workshop with EMG (with the participation of the CEO), aimed at the analysis of decisional processes and their shared review.
  

An important outcome consisted of a kind of “Manual”, defined and shared by the EMG, with action items as follows:

- meeting participation and conduct (shared meeting management model);
- strategic project participation method (for example, in some cases, the EMG has a Steering Committee role and the responsibility – in unexpected situations or risks – for the most important decisions to realize a project; or the EMG supports organizational learning processes, etc.);   
- corporate governance review (for example the responsibility of the EMG, as a group; the role of the EMG in connecting and directing (finalizing) the support processes and business innovation processes).  

For us Consultants another action was: support the Management team in the learning process and on-the-job applications, providing team coaching sessions and, subsequently, giving feedback about the EMG meeting conduct.    
In some cases, individual Executive coaching sessions focused on management skills and listening and feedback abilities were developed.

A further outcome was a website (in the Intranet) with learning contents and a guide for use of techniques and tools: some of them were enriched by learners with examples of applications in the context.   


THE REASON OF SUCCESS AND PROJECT DEVELOPMENTS

The success depended on the real and cultural importance attributed by the CEO to the techniques and the tools proposed: the use of these techniques was considered a clear feature of a culture centered on performance improvement. Furthermore, during the project a real need – at all levels, including the Executive Management – came to light: real participation in the organizational development processes and, at the same time, reflection about the correct method of this participation.

Subsequently, the challenge was that people become independently able to transform the learning experience into working practices in the organization, paying real, and not ritualistic, attention to learned techniques and to the system of relationships and to respect of responsibility roles.
At the level of Executive Management, the target set was to continue – also in this case independently – to reflect on decisional processes and strategic project participation, involving all Executives (as individuals and group) in thinking about work practices and possible developments.    
At the same time, at the level of individuals, a development of specific managerial abilities was improved through Executive coaching.

The opportunity of parallel learning and consultancy actions for both the Middle Management and the EMG (in decision-making practices) was seen as an important starting point to build a real learning organization, able to think about its culture and practices.