Organizational Development Assessment: A Nine-Step Process

Demonstrating the use of OD processes for organizational problem solving

Upon completion of this unit, students should be able to:

1. Demonstrate how organizational development (OD) processes are used to diagnose organizational problems, design strategies for change, communicate the strategies, and adapt organizational resources to accomplish changes necessary to achieve its goals.

2. Develop a layout for the nine stages of the OD assessment.

3. Determine the reasons for engaging employees in the assessment process. 

As we briefly covered in Unit I, there are nine steps in the OD assessment process. We will explore each of these steps in greater detail during this unit using an organization as an example of how the steps are used.

Step 1: Determine the goals of the assessment. For most organizations, the goal of the OD assessment will be to identify issues that are keeping the organization from being as successful as possible. Once the goal is identified, the organization can begin to determine what information is needed from the employees and also to see how the issues are connected to the organization’s strategic plan (Rothwell et al., 2017). ABC Bank is concerned with the number of tellers who are on staff at any one time during the bank’s business hours. The leadership team has noticed that the branches are often overstaffed. This has created a wasted expense during non-busy hours of the bank. However, the issue becomes that each branch must have at least two tellers working at one time for safety concerns. The issue has been identified as how to reduce the downtime for the employees and make them more productive when not waiting on customers.

Step 2: Consider the goals. The goals will be based on the details that are collected from the employees’ feedback (Rothwell et al., 2017). We talked about the diagnostic models that are often used in Chapters 3 and 4. ABC Bank would like to solicit feedback from the employees on other tasks that they believe could be accomplished when the branch is not busy with customers. 

Step 3: Determine the time of the assessment. This step is based on how long it will take to collect the feedback from the employees. It is important to capture as much of the employees’ feedback as possible in order to have the most reliable data to work with during the assessment process (Rothwell et al., 2017). ABC Bank has decided to hold a meeting after hours with all employees. This will be a mandatory meeting, and the employees will be paid for attending the meeting.

Step 4: Determine the location of the assessment. This step involves how the data will be collected. ABC Bank will use an online survey tool that the employees will take during the mandatory meeting. In addition, the employees will participate in a round-table discussion of the issues with the bank’s leadership team. This will allow for open dialogue and for even more information to be obtained during the meeting (Tolchinsky, 2015).

Step 5: Develop the survey mapping. This step involves determining how to identify the employees in terms of their department or location in order to narrow down where certain issues might exist. ABC Bank has determined that a code will be given to the employees depending on the branch at which they work. This will allow the leadership team to identify the employees for a specific location without asking for their names. Employees may not be willing to provide their honest opinions if their names are used.

Step 6: Consult with the stakeholders. Stakeholders can take many different forms, depending on the organization. For ABC Bank, the customers and the employees are the most important stakeholders in regard to this issue. The customers need to be taken care of and not wait in line, and the employees do not want to lose their jobs. The key for ABC Bank is to find alternative tasks for the employees to complete during downtime at the branches. The employees’ opinions are important because they are a critical asset to the bank and they have the most interaction with the customers. Their ideas can help to identify other tasks that could be accomplished and to keep the bank from having to eliminate any positions.