All Blog Posts (68)

What is OD? Defining the practice and profession of Organisational Development

There was a fascinating discussion during the first meeting of the St Albans AMED group about what connected us as OD practitioners. For one thing, we mostly didn't call ourselves OD practitioners, but felt we might be thought of in that way from time to time.

When we discussed what OD was, I certainly recognised some of the practices.

It was said:

When organisations have complex, intangible problems that are difficult to articulate, those problems belong to… Continue

Added by Paul Z Jackson on August 4, 2009 at 22:50 — 1 Comment

Launch of SFCT - the professional body for solution-focused coaches, consultants and managers

Here is the press release about the launch of SFCT: 15 July 2009

A new professional body for Solution Focused (SF) coaches, consultant and managers was launched in May 2009.

SFCT – the Association for the Quality Development of Solution Focused Consulting and Training – offers international professional recognition and standards to anyone using the Solution Focused in business and organisational settings.

SFCT also publishes the InterAction journal, and offers… Continue

Added by Mark McKergow on July 16, 2009 at 6:00 — No Comments

Managing High Potential Individual Contributors

In career and talent management practice the high potential employee who is a business critical, individual contributor represents one of the most valuable resources an organisation has. They are a sizeable investment and managing their careers can be challenging task - especially for the manager whose personal career plan looks very different. Getting the best out of them can be a critical factor in an organisation's shared success and is an important part of many manager’s roles. These… Continue

Added by John Evans on July 7, 2009 at 5:51 — No Comments

Redundancy Communication

More and more managers are today having to manage redundancy programmes. One of the most difficult communication challenges they face takes place on the very day employees leave. Perhaps this is because the formal announcements can be scripted and prepared for, perhaps it is because "leaving day" combines informality, challenge, emotion and real, physical change in a very poignant way. (It is difficult not to be impacted by the sight of valued colleagues literally "packing up their bags" and… Continue

Added by John Evans on July 7, 2009 at 2:57 — No Comments

Providing 360 Degree Feedback - as a Mentor

When Mentors have agreed to providing participants in a development programme with the results of their 360 degree feedback their role "takes on new clothing".

The Mentor role is extremely important to the 360 degree process, and needs to be carried out well to ensure that the participant gets the maximum out of the feedback. Effective facilitation of the feedback session will enable individuals to get the most out of this development opportunity. Ineffective facilitation is likely… Continue

Added by John Evans on July 6, 2009 at 10:00 — No Comments

Good looking questions

Some questions we pose as consultants are 'good-looking ones'. I mean they will always draw a fulsome response. For instance, if you ask some people in a 'coasting' organisation 'what are the barriers to achieving excellence here?' they will probably give you a list long enough to make your ears bleed.

However, for every good looking question there is always an 'ugly' one just round the corner. The one here is 'What have you done about these barriers?' These are questions which must be… Continue

Added by Donal Carroll on June 6, 2009 at 8:30 — 4 Comments

Evaluating Executive On Boarding

With President Obama's first 100 days fresh in the mind, I have been reflecting on "executive on-boarding programmes". Do they really make a difference and enable senior executives - new to the complexities of our corporate environment - to be effective as soon as possible? Have we got the balance of activities right? Is an accent on building a network really helping? Could we, perhaps, boil the whole thing down to five simple questions that incoming business leaders should ask their… Continue

Added by John Evans on May 11, 2009 at 11:09 — 2 Comments

Social Media

Trends in social media for the next year - interesting article and set of comments.

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/10_ways_social_media_will_change_in_2009.php

Added by Paul Z Jackson on April 26, 2009 at 3:37 — 1 Comment