【精读】What Are Effective Interventions? 什么是有效的干预措施

组织发展过程

The Process of Organization Development

1. 进入与签约 Entering and Contracting

1.1 进入组织发展 Entering into an OD relationship

1.2 签订合同  Developing a contract

1.3【进入和签约阶段】的人际关系问题 Interpersonal process issues in entering and contracting

2. 组织诊断 Diagnosing Organizations

2.1 What is diagnosis ? 诊断是什么？

2.2 The need for diagnostic models 对诊断模型的需求

2.3 Open systems model 开放系统模型

2.4 Organization-level diagnosis 组织层级的诊断

3. 群体与职位诊断 Diagnosing Groups and Jobs

3.1 Group-Level Diagnosis 群体层级的诊断

3.2 Individual-Level Diagnosis 个体层级的诊断

4. 收集和分析诊断信息 Collecting and Analyzing Diagnostic Information

4.1 The Diagnostic Relationship 诊断关系

4.2 Methods For Collecting Data 信息收集的方法

4.3 Sampling 抽样

4.4 Techniques For Analyzing Data 信息分析的方法

5. 反馈诊断信息 Feeding Back Diagnostic Information

5.1 Determining The Content Of The Feedback 确定反馈内容

5.2 Characteristics Of The Feedback Process 反馈过程的特征

5.3 Survey Feedback 调查反馈

6. 设计干预措施 Designing Interventions

6.1 Overview of Interventions 干预措施综述

6.2 What Are Effective Interventions? 什么是有效的干预措施

6.3 How to Design Effective Interventions 设计有效的干预措施

7. 领导和管理变革 Leading and Managing Change

8. 评估和制度化“组织发展变革” Evaluating and Institutionalizing Organization Development Interventions

What Are Effective Interventions?

OD interventions involve a set of sequenced and planned actions or events intended to help an organization increase its effectiveness. Interventions purposely disrupt the status quo; they are deliberate attempts to change an organization or subunit toward a different and more effective state. Three major criteria define an effective OD intervention:

(1) the extent to which it fits the needs of the organization; 干预措施对组织的匹配与适用程度

(2) the degree to which it is based on causal knowledge of intended outcomes; 干预措施 “对预期结果的因果认识上”的依赖程度

(3) the extent to which it transfers change management competence to organization members. 干预措施提高组织成员管理变革的能力

The first criterion concerns the extent to which the intervention is relevant to the organization and its members. Effective interventions are based on valid information about the organization’s functioning; they provide organization members with opportunities to make free and informed choices; and they gain members’ internal commitment to those choices.

Valid information is the result of an accurate diagnosis of the organization’s functioning. It must reflect fairly what organization members perceive and feel about their primary concerns and issues. Free and informed choice suggests that members are actively involved in making decisions about the changes that will affect them. This principle also means that they can choose not to participate and that interventions will not be imposed on them. This is an important distinction between change management—where a change legitimately can be imposed on people—and OD—where the intent of the change process is to build capacity for change and increase effectiveness. Internal commitment means that organization members accept ownership of the intervention and take responsibility for implementing it. If interventions are to result in meaningful changes, management, staff, and other relevant members must be committed to carrying them out.

The second criterion of an effective intervention involves knowledge of outcomes. Because interventions are intended to produce specific results, they must be based on valid knowledge that those outcomes actually can be produced. Otherwise, there is no scientific basis for designing an effective OD intervention. Unfortunately—and in contrast to other applied disciplines, such as medicine and engineering—knowledge of intervention effects is in a rudimentary stage of development in OD. Much of the evaluation research lacks sufficient rigor to make strong causal inferences about the success or failure of change programs. Moreover, few attempts have been made to examine the comparative effects of different OD techniques. All of these factors make it difficult to know whether one method is more effective than another.

Despite these problems, more attempts are being made to assess systematically the strengths and weaknesses of OD interventions and to compare the impact of different techniques on organization effectiveness. Many of the OD interventions have been subjected to evaluative research.

The third criterion of an effective intervention involves the extent to which it enhances the organization’s capacity to manage change. The values underlying OD suggest that following an intervention, organization members should be better able to carry out planned change activities on their own. From active participation in designing and implementing the intervention, they should gain knowledge and skill in managing change. Competence in change management is essential in today’s environment, where technological, social, economic, and political changes are rapid and persistent. Many organizations, such as Capital One, The Hartford, Limited Brands, and Microsoft, recognize this need and are systematically building their change management capabilities.