Organisational Development Matters

Below you will find a list of the Skills topics for Aspiring Change Agents. Each of the links will take you directly to the additional information and resources for the selected topic. 

• Effective facilitation of groups
• Ability to ask questions
• Reflect on your practice
• Review and evaluate work
• Identify the need for learning or development interventions
• Provide feedback using effective OD Processes

Effective Facilitation of groups

What is it? 

The process and approach to guiding groups in meetings, planning, learning, and to help them function more effectively. 

Effective facilitation removes time wasted in unproductive discussions and enables decisions to be reached swiftly. 

A facilitator needs a good understanding of the core skills of listening, questioning, observing and feedback and how to adapt these in changing circumstances.  As a facilitator, you are a neutral third party and will have no decision-making authority on the topic under discussion with the group, although you will need to influence the group to keep on track. 

As a facilitator you should know what kinds of behaviour, process and structure will contribute to good problem solving and decision making and know which elements contribute to making an effective group.   

Why would I use it? 

The purpose is to help a group to increase its effectiveness without sharing your opinions so group members can discuss issues without you influencing the discussion. 

A facilitator has a wide range of tasks to perform in order to ‘make things easier’ for people who participate in a facilitated discussion.  Well facilitated discussions can help people collectively move through a process, keep discussions effective, encourage participation and get people to come up with ideas, thoughts and perspective. 

The larger a meeting is, the more effort it takes to contract and manage and therefore will require attention to manage both the preparation and the process. 

When would I use it? 

There are a number of circumstances when facilitation is the most appropriate technique to use.  For example, when a group needs to resolve a problem and the facilitators skills could improve the process.  

Read: Team review tool - Good Practice

Watch: The art of facilitation: changing the way the world meets - Jay Vogt

Listen: How to facilitate group decisions in 4 easy steps – Marjolijn de Graaf

Ability to ask questions which move the situation forward, listen well and reflect back; be suspenseful and non-judgemental

What are they? 

When leading large change, a key to success is to change individual and organisational mindsets. 

As a change agent, your use of powerful questions will be critical to shift thinking and support group and individual change. 

There are many tools available to support practitioners in uncovering and identifying fixed mindsets, but practitioners may not always have the opportunity to undertake formal activities such as interviews or group interventions and will require agility in being able to use questions to explore thinking and move situations forward. 

Why would I use it? 

Many change initiatives focus on the system or process change without being aware of or addressing behaviours that may hinder the implementation of the required change. 

Using powerful questions which require individuals or groups to explore deeply their response to situations, uncover fears or concerns, discuss patterns of behaviour can raise their self-awareness, provide space to explore different perspectives or frames and provide an opportunity to address unspoken or unseen issues which may prevent change landing positively. 

When would I use it? 

Observing individuals or groups will allow you to observe whether they are exploring issues without understanding the root cause or making assumptions about situations or employee behaviour.   

Questions can help individuals and group look at problems or situations differently.  By not intervening, you can also provide space to allow the group to explore not only the change issue, but how they are addressing it.  This can provide deep learning for individuals and groups as they become more aware of the impact of how they are making and implementing decisions. 

Read: The art of asking questions revised: the art of taking space

Watch: Humble inquiry - Edgar Schein

Reflective Practice

What is it? 

Reflective Practice is the ability to reflect on what you do and learn from that process. 

It is an important part of professional development and differs from reflection in that it is a more formalised process which can help you make sense of what you’ve learned and help you identify strategies which lead to greater personal development and organisational impact. 

Reflective practice allows you to understand and address how you think and feel in different situations and help you to develop new skills and behaviours.  It can also lead to clearer thinking and reduce our own internal emotional biases.  

There are many models of reflective practice including Kolb’s learning cycle, Borton’s Framework and Johns’ model of structured reflection.  These models can provide a framework for you to structure your process.  They are typically based around a set of questions around which you can gain greater insight into your practice include your own responses, behaviours and emotions.   

There are a wide variety of methods which can be adopted for reflective practice and these can include writing, drawing, mind-mapping, action learning, peer coaching or practice supervision. 

Why would you use it? 

Reflective Practice can not only help you learn from experience and develop new skills, but also by increasing your self-awareness can help you make better decisions, manage emotions and build resilience. 

By reflecting on your own practice, it enables you to identify patterns which may provide insight into what actions or behaviours help or hinder your relationship and/or impact with your organisational stakeholders.   

Reflection involves becoming aware of your thoughts, feelings, assumptions and actions.  It requires you to analyse a situation and then develop a perspective of it.   

As part of the process you can use techniques such as framing, re-framing, self-coaching questions to help you look objectively at a situation or experience. 

When would you use it? 

Ideally reflective practice should become a self-development habit.  However, many people find it hard to do this consistently.  If you cannot schedule time on regular basis to undertake reflective activities, then short reflective activities should become part of your working practice for example pre and post specific meetings, workshops etc. 

Read: Why you should make time for self-reflection - Harvard Business Review 

Watch: The importance of self-awareness for leaders - Good Practice

Review and evaluate work

What are they? 

A critical part of OD work is the process of evaluation and measurement to see if the change process has achieved its objectives and made a difference. 

From the outset, you should consider how you can evaluate the impact of a change on those affected. 

It is important that you are able to report back to your main stakeholders, detailing what has been achieved, the impact the intervention has had and highlighting any further actions that are required to achieve the final objectives. 

Often in a change process, there are clearly defined benefits to undertaking the change.  The process of tracking and reviewing benefits realisation throughout the project cycle will allow you to evaluate progress. 

Why would I use it? 

You can consider the impact of change at a number of levels including organisationally (on end users, those affected, other stakeholders), individually by those who led and participated in the change process and finally on yourself. 

The tools you use to evaluate impact and effectiveness will depend on what aspects your intervention is focused on.  

Evaluation can be quantitative on areas such as cost savings, numbers hired, promotions made and so on or it can be qualitative using data gleaned from employee surveys, exit interviews and especially behavioural indicators. 

When would I use it? 

There are many methods you can use to measure impact including questionnaires which can be used to gather qualitative and quantitative information from employees and stakeholders on a range of topics.  They can be used at the start of a process to gather data which will help in diagnosing the issues to be addressed, or when evaluating the impact of a change project. 

Focus groups are also a useful tool which can be used at the start of an engagement for fact finding, as well as being used for evaluation to assess impact or generate further recommendations. 

Read: Project Start-Up - Good Practice

Watch: Impact framework - NHS England

Listen: Outputs and outcomes: the two sides of workshop results - Tim Ferguson

Identify the need for learning or development interventions 

What are they? 

These are the methods and skills required to identify and diagnose the need for appropriate development interventions. 

An OD practitioner might provide advice around identifying learning and development needs – this could be through one-to-one sessions or by group facilitation sessions with key individuals, using 360-degree feedback mechanisms to identify strengths, areas for development, and advising how to meet specific development needs.  

You might lead a formal training needs analysis to review learning and development needs where the skills, knowledge and behaviours that employees need are assessed, and gaps are identified and addressed through appropriate development interventions. 

There are a range of diagnostic tools and approaches which can be used to understand development needs and then develop solutions to address the gap. 

Why would I use them? 

A needs assessment should be undertaken at 3 levels: 

• Organisational level  
• Team/departmental level  
• Individual level 

An analysis of needs is vital to ensure that development interventions are effective and appropriate.  It will enable the organisation to focus resources in the areas where they will contribute most to organisational effectiveness and improved performance. 

There are a range of tools and techniques which can be used including: - observation of individuals in action in their role/task, interviews, surveys, questionnaires, focus groups and also review of data, for example patient satisfaction data to could reveal why there are high levels of patient complaints. 

When would I use them? 

Learning and Development needs are normally identified on an ongoing basis as part of an organisation’s learning and development strategy which should be aligned to the organisational strategy. 

In additional learning and development needs may be assessed as part of a specific intervention such as a change of organisational direction or strategy, new services being introduce or following a restructure. 

Watch: Corporate learning: companies investing in their future - Jane Dowd

Listen: Evidence-informed learning design

Provide feedback using effective OD Processes

What are they? 

These are processes which help people learn more about themselves and the situations they operate in.  A range of tools and models can be utilised to do this. 

As an OD practitioner you are focused on improving an organisation’s ability to effectively respond to changes in its environment and increasing internal capabilities. 

Feedback is an integral part of the OD process, providing leaders and managers with information on what is happening within the organisation including cultural norms, organisational systems, organisational climate, leadership and managerial approaches. 

Feedback tools not only measure the current state, but also identify what needs to be focused on to improve effectiveness in terms of building on strengths and overcoming blockages.  

Why would I use them? 

Often as part of the diagnostic phase of an intervention it is important to ask those affected by the current problems and potential change for their view of the situation, the issues and why it has arisen. 

This can be done through questionnaires, focus groups, interviews or observations. This stage establishes what people think, feel and do in terms of the tasks they perform, their ways of working and the relationships they have with each other. 

These findings can form part of the feedback to key stakeholders to gain buy-in to an intervention approach, or to identify the priority issues to be addressed through an intervention. 

Feedback can also be used as part of a development intervention to raise the self-awareness of leaders and managers on how they performance and the impact they have on others.  This may then form the basis of their own personal development journey. 

When would I use them? 

As outlined above, you may need to undertake feedback following the diagnostic or data gathering phase of a project. Feedback should include an analysis of what the data says (both quantitative and qualitative), and your understanding of the problem.  

Alternatively, you may be involved in a development intervention where feedback is part of the process for leaders and managers involved. 

Finally, as part of your role, you may need to give feedback to your stakeholders at any part of an intervention or project as part of progress updates, how the intervention is being received and any further changes needed.   

Read: How to create and present excellent OD feedback reports - Dr Nancy Zentis

Watch: Neuroleadership case study - NeuroLeadership Institute