Seven major approaches are applicable to improving organizational development in practice.

INTRODUCTION

Organizational development is concerned with the planning and implementation of programmes designed to enhance the effectiveness with which an organization functions and response to change.

Organization development is concerned with process, not systems or structure, process refers to the ways people act, react and interact.

There are seven approaches for improving organizational development, which exists in their own right and is seldom if ever referred to as organizational development interventions, which includes team building, change management, organizational transformation, total quality management, customer care programmes, business process re-engineering and performance management.

• TEAM BUILDING 

A organizational development team is defined as a group of people working together toward a common goal.

Team building activities aim to improve the effectiveness of a group of people who work permanently or temporarily together in the organization. their aims are to:

1. increase the awareness of the social processes that exist in teams
2. develop the interactive or interpersonal skills that enable individuals to function effectively as team members
3. increase the overall effectiveness with which teams operate.

Organizational development involves a group of motivated individuals working toward a common goal, and team building is a critical aspect of success. Managers of sd such structures must have a robust understanding of personality types to ensure a productive and collaborative work environment. Team building games and activities promote the formation of creative skills and relationships in the organization.

• CHANGE MANAGEMENT

The only thing that is constant is change. change is inevitable of existence. without change, there are no improvements .change and improvement goes hand in hand.therefore in order for development to take place in the organization, there is a need to change some of the status quo.

Change to a business or what we change mean to somebody can include the followings:

• New ways of doing work
• New systems or tools
• New reporting structures
• New job roles
• New products or services
• New markets or geographical locations etc

Greatest change management obstacles that will come across in the organizations.

• Employee and staff resistance
• Middle management resistance
• Poor executive sponsorship
• Limited time, budget and resources
• Corporate inertia and politics etc

Resistance to change: types of resistance that are conversants in the organization.

• Organizational development in terms of structural inertia, limited focus on change, group inertia, a threat to established power relationship, a threat to established resource allocations etc
• Individual resistance in terms of habit, security, economic factors, fear of the unknown, selective information processing, defect of perception etc

Remedies to change resistance in the organization:

• Maintain a clear focus
• Acknowledge resistance
• Hear people’s concern
• Understand their concern
• Focus on common objectives

Other methodologies on how to deal with resistance to change in the organization:

• Education and communication, participation, facilitation and support, negotiation
• Use ADKAR model i.e by creating an awareness of the need, the desire of the need

Change management is the conception, planning, organization, implementation, control and stabilization of the change processes of a company, with the aim to maximize the effectiveness and efficiency of the change process and to reach the widest possible acceptance of managers and employees.

Change management is also known as the process of identifying the need for change, deciding on what change is required, evaluating the implication of change, developing and implementing change programmes, overcoming resistance to change, seeing that change takes place as smoothly, and ensuring that the change is embedded and effective. Change management also serves as one of the tools consider in developing an organizational system.

Hence change management plays an important role in an organisation. This allows the organisation to give a reactive or proactive response to the changes that happen internally or externally. Knowing the change management and its process would help an organization and its processes to be stable.

• ORGANIZATIONAL TRANSFORMATION

Organizational transformation is the process of ensuring that an organization can plan and implement major change programmes which will ensure that it responds strategically to new demands and continues to function effectively in the dynamic environment in which it operates.

There are three types of organizational transformation which can be considered here:
1. Improving operation: To achieve a quantum improvement in the firm’s efficiency, often by reducing costs, improving quality and services and reducing development time.
2. Strategic transformation: Strategic transformation has to do with the process of changing strategy, seeks to regain a sustainable competitive advantage by redefining business objectives, creating new competencies and harnessing these capabilities to meet market opportunities.
3. Corporate self-renewal: This has to do with creating the ability for a firm to anticipate and cope with change so that strategic and operational gap does not develop.

• TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT (TQM)

Total Quality Management is an integrative management philosophy for the continuous improvement of product and process quality.

There are also other three meaning of total quality management listed below that can be considered as a useful approach to develop  an organizational system in a practical sense:

1. TQM is also considered as a systematically and continuously approach in improving the quality of products, service and life using all available human and capital resources.
2. TQM is also known as an organisation-wide problem solving and process improvement methodology.
3. TQM can also be regarded as a system of means to economically produce goods or services that satisfy consumer requirements.

• CUSTOMER CARE PROGRAMMES

The customer care programme (CCP) is a structured process to collect feedback and referrals from clients or customers.this approach can also serve as a useful tool or techniques for organization development improvement.

The positive impact of implementing  customer care programme will result in the followings competitive advantage:

• Enhance customer service
• Maximise sales to existing customers
• Improve customer retention
• Increase profitability (ROI) e.t.c

• BUSINESS PROCESS RE-ENGINEERING(BPR)

Business process reengineering (BPR) is the analysis and redesign of workflows within and between enterprises in order to optimize end-to-end processes and automate non-value-added tasks.

Business process re-engineering is also known as a business management strategy. BPR aimed to help organizations fundamentally rethink how they do their work in order to dramatically improve customer service, cut operational costs, and become world-class competitors. Business process re-engineering is also known as business process redesign, business transformation, or business process change management  which all attributes can be to the improvement of organization development

• PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT

Performance management (PM) includes activities which ensure that goals are consistently being met in an effective and efficient manner in the organizational system. Performance management focuses on the performance of an organization, a department, employee, or even the processes to build a product or service, as well as many other areas.

Performance management can also be visualized as a process by which organizations align their resources, systems and employees to strategic objectives and priorities which can serve as a competitive advantage in improving the organizational structures.

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