Sunday, March 20, 2011

ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

A.  Introduction

    
     Managing a successful organization  or building up the health of an already established organization -- requires healthy, ongoing leadership and management, planning, product and service development, marketing and financial management. To carry out these practices in a healthy manner, it's important to first understand the basic "territory" in which these practices are carried out.
      These practices are all systems that occur within the larger system of the organization. This is not academic talk -- this is a highly practical point to understand. To truly understand and to be effective at these practices, it helps greatly if leaders, managers and employees have some basic understanding of the overall system of the organization, including its common dimensions, cultures and life cycles. Too often, this basic nature is not understood. Instead, people tend to focus only on the day-to-day events and then when problems occur, they don't see the big picture in order to resolve these problems for the long term. Consequently, they mistakenly focus on what's urgent, rather than on what's important -- if you focus on what's important, you'll reduce what's urgent.

B. General Goals

  • Work effectively with senior management in the organization to plan and implement change and improvement.
  • Provide products and services to the University community to improve performance and effectiveness.
C. Specific Objectives

  • Provide consulting and facilitation expertise that meet or exceed the needs of  Office Administration Student.

  • Enhance the quality of performance management systems ..


  • D. Calendar of Activities


    January 1, 2011                             New Year's Eve Celebration

    February 14, 2011                         Valentines Party

    March 15- 30, 2011                      Sport's Fest

    April 20, 2011                               Summer Vacation in Boracay

    May 7, 2011                                 Anniversary Celebration

    June 15, 2011                               Training for employees

    July 30, 2011                                Motorcade Promoting Development

    August, 2011                                Yearly Workshop for Top Employees

    September 1, 2011                        Charity Works

    October 28, 2011                          Seminars for Managers

    November 12, 2011                      Thanks Giving
          
    December 20, 2011                       Christmas Party



    E. Knowledge and Skills Activities with description and date

    Tuesdays
    Boating  (Optional dinner afterward)
    Meet: 4:00 pm at boathouse
    Location: In Manila Bay, Pasay, Manila
    Leaders: Jennilyn Luzara


    Wednesdays
    Group Study (Optional dinner afterward)
    Meet: 4 pm in parking lot
    Location: Manila Hotel, Manila
    Leaders: Jinno Lumba

    Thursdays
    Mountain Climbing (Optional dinner afterward )
    Meet: 8 am in Mount Samat, Bataan
    Location: Mount Samat, Bataan
    Leaders: Greggy Lucas


    F. Organizational Development Norm
    • Organizational / Personal Pride
      Satisfaction or pleasure taken in ones own or the organization's success / achievements.
    • Performance / Excellence
      Manner or quality of functioning when striving to meet or beat standards of performance. This includes setting personal standards when none are set/ defined.
    • Teamwork / Communication
      The perception that organizational goals and objectives are communicated to and shared by members of the group. The organization has effectively shared it's vision or sense of purpose so that all employees can articulate and subscribe to.
    • Leadership / Supervision
      The style of management / supervision in engaging employees to deliver willingly their best efforts towards organizational goals.
    • Profitability / Cost Effectiveness
      Awareness of employees of their roles and actions to the organizations 'bottom line'.
    • Colleague / Associate Relations
      Personal connections or dealings between or among individuals and groups.
    • Customer / Client Relations
      Personal and group attitude towards clients, both internal (i.e. other departments in the case of service departments) and external suppliers and customers.
    • Innovation / Creativity
      To be aware of, appreciate the need for and strive for new ways of performing a function, process, procedure or the organization's business model in terms of the need flowing from constant changes in the external environment, the need to be competitive and the need to retain customer loyalty and confidence.
    • Training / Development
      The opportunities within the organization and the climate set that promote personal growth and development.
    • Candor / Openness
      The willingness to promote open, honest and direct dialog by all employees at all levels on issues that affect individuals, groups and the organization as a whole. This includes the sharing of information, respect for the diverse backgrounds and experiences of members, the absence of 'competition over territory' and the agreement of goals and levels of performance/ quality.
    G. ACTIVITIES NORMS

    Activities for Collaboration

     TREASURE HUNT    
          Not everyone likes the idea of working as a team. For some, working in a team environment is daunting, for others it's just plain annoying. Creating a treasure hunt that rewards players with fun prizes is an effective lure to get groups to work together, like it or not. An obstacle course can be set in a large recreational park or neighborhood with pitstops along the way from the starting point leading to the end. Divvy teams up in even numbers and issue index cards with directions for the route. Pop trivia such as "Who won the Academy Awards for best actress this year?", math equations and spelling games can be used to link the pitstops. Once the group gets to one stop successfully, they would pick up the next clue and be awarded smaller gifts such as movie tickets, gift cards or even money. At the conclusion of the hunt, award the winners with a catered lunch and invite all participants to attend for a mini awards ceremony to crown the best team.

    Activities for Evaluation

    TEAM BUILDING

          Team-building exercises and activities also provide a wonderful opportunity to bring to life the increasing awareness and interest in 'ethical organizations'. These modern ethical business ideas and concepts of sustainability, 'Fairtrade', corporate social responsibility, the 'triple bottom line', love, compassion, humanity and spirituality, etc., are still not well defined or understood: people are unclear what it all means for them individually and for the organization as a whole, even though most people are instinctively attracted to the principles. Team-exercises and discussions help bring clarity and context to idealistic concepts like ethics and social responsibility far more effectively than reading the theory, or trying to assimilate some airy-fairy new mission statement dreamed up by someone at head office and handed down as an edict. Fundamental change has to come from within, with support from above sure, but successful change is ultimately successful because people 'own' it and see it as their change, not something handed down

    Activities for Recommendation

          With the growing importance of global governance (think climate, environment, financial crisis, diseases, human rights, inequality, information technology, nuclear proliferation etc.) it becomes increasingly important to develop educational approaches that respond to the global challenges, both at the global level and relate to the impact at the local level ….

    Activities for Personal Learning

         Organization Development is a body of knowledge and practice that enhances organizational performance and individual development, viewing the organization as a complex system of systems that exist within a larger system, each of which has its own attributes and degrees of alignment. OD interventions in these systems are inclusive methodologies and approaches to strategic planning, organization design, leadership development, change management, performance management, coaching, diversity, and work/life balance.


    Monday, March 7, 2011

    ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

     1.  What type of change(s) at Bayer?
          

    >The plant had changed ownership three times and the workforce seemed to have dissolved as fast as the     analgesic tablets rolling off production lines - down from 800-360 workers in less than a year.  
    > The plant manager post had been vacant for a while
    2.  What type of employee resistance to change did Bayer have to address?
        

    Bayer management realized that given competitive forces and the rate of change in their industry, they needed to streamline operations to have a more secure future in Bayer Corp.'s newly formed Consumer Care Division. 

    3.  What are the positive and negative lessons learned from how change was handled at Bayer?

    The equal treatment of the managers and the employees helped to improve the company. 

    Sunday, March 6, 2011

    ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

    More changes at Nokia

     
    With Nokia shares tumbling the company has replaced another executive with an ex-Microsoft guy. Chris Webber replaces Mark Louison and heads up the Markets team for North America as of yesterday. Head honcho Stephen Elop is also an ex Microsoft guy but staff in Finland have already walked out in protest, albeit using their flexi-time and presumably not handing in their resignations just yet.

    IBM Changes
    If there's a company that most people are going to name when they think about information technology, I'd say it is IBM. IBM's roots are in hardware, but they've expanded in to software and services to round out the mix. I can't think of an IT skill that wouldn't be in use somewhere within this massive enterprise.
    So it was with interest that I read Robert Cringley's musings that 150,000 employees will be laid off from IBM by the end of this year. I have no inside knowledge about any such plans, but Cringley certainly seems to have a strong opinion on the matter. Of course, it's his job to have opinions. Because of my lack of knowledge, I'm not going to refute any of his original commentary or his follow-up post. Instead, I'm going to highlight some of the 1,000+ comments that his original post generated. In particular, I was most interested in comments posted by those identifying themselves as past or current IBM employees. I think these are very telling about the thoughts and morale of the company.
    "One internal rumor regarding LEAN was that the external consultancy hired to actually perform the analysis was discharged after their principal finding was that IBM is far too top heavy in the executive and management ranks. Not having heard the answer they thought they were paying for, the executives subsequently took ownership of LEAN to pursue the path they had already planned." -- Anonymous IGS Employee
    "I was once proud to wear an IBM badge. I was part of the best technology company around the globe. Since then we have lost our top talent. Our remaining employees come up with reasons they cannot do something versus justing completing work. They are scared to put themselves out their since they are just 1 layoff away from unemployment." -- IBM Employee
    "Those times are long gone. In my CUSTOMER-FACING position, I'm continually embarrassed by our ever-diminishing capabilities and excuses for not just getting the job done. I feel bad for our customers who are getting screwed for the most part." -- IBM Employee X
    "It may take several years, but this lack of management vision and leadership will bite IBM in the end. But for Sam and the other senior execs, they are just lining their golden parachutes and getting ready to leave the mess behind for some other poor sap to try to resolve when the real crap hits the fan." -- Tim IBMer
    "I work at IBM now and it's the most miserable place in the world to be. It's just a pit of despair right now and I'm willing to take a pay cut to get out! I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy." -- IBMer
    Admittedly every company has its share of angry and frustrated folks and these people are also the ones most likely to make their views known (people really do like to complain). Still, there's a lot of negativity in the 1,000+ comments making it hard to brush these people aside.
    Could Cringley be on the money with this one?

    Apple to bring changes to retail stores

    As the holiday season brings additional shoppers to Apple's retail stores, they'll be making changes to ensure a pleasant experience for the new customers, ifoAppleStore reports.

    First, they're going to ditch the color-coded Starfleet uniform T-shirts, which shoppers have found confusing. Instead, all employees will wear the same color. Next, the handheld checkout devices will be swapped out for specially-equipped iPod touches. A new scanner accessory will interact with point-of-sale software on the iPods. Best of all, employees will be able to accept cash from customers right where the stand, eliminating the often time-consuming walk to the cash register.

    Watch for these changes at an Apple Store near you.