The 4 P’s of Olympic Gold: Grooming the Next Generation of Shaun Whites in your Organization
March 15th, 2010 by Jeremy Lurey
Whether it’s a skater or skier or snowboarder or other, everyone who won a Gold Medal in Vancouver recently is a role model for us all. Practice, patience, persistence, and passion – the 4 P’s of Olympic Gold – are likely mantras for all these winners. Shaun White, in particular, is a true living example of exactly what every senior executive and business leader should be focused on creating in their organizations – not because he won gold on the half pipe, but because he won gold after winning gold on the half pipe!
That’s right. Shaun White was standing at the top of his second and final run when the results came in, and he found out that he already won the gold medal without even completing his last run. In that very moment, he had a choice- Read the rest of this entry »
Organization Development as a Profession: Will Certification or Licensing Help You Choose Your Consultant?
March 12th, 2010 by Cris Hagen
Should the profession of Organization Development (OD) require professional certification or licensing for practitioners to practice?
As we look to the future of OD, some questions come to mind :
- Should anyone wanting to “hang out a shingle” as an OD practitioner be allowed to do so?
- Should there be minimum educational requirements? If so, what should they be?
- Should OD practitioners be licensed through a formal licensing or certification process?
- How would a governing body for licensing or certification be “selected”?
- What risks to the OD profession are posed if licensing or certification is required?
- How do you market your practice to differentiate and distinguish yourself?
Having practiced in the field for 30 years, now, I have seen OD grow to encompass a broad range of “specialty” areas beyond its origins in the area of “group dynamics”, “human relations research”, and “action research” back in the 1940’s and 50’s. (See the Wikipedia article on OD here). Read the rest of this entry »
Employee Engagement: Changing Workplace Conversations
February 9th, 2010 by Cris Hagen
Every major consulting or research firm has the data to prove it. Engaged employees are not only happy employees, but they are much, much more productive employees. They make companies more profitable, and shareholders richer. (Click here to download a Gallup white paper on the power of employee engagement as a core business strategy.)
I think that most leaders are coming around to believe that this is a truth: engaged employees are a good thing for the business. The problem is that many leaders have trouble figuring out what it takes to get those employees “engaged”.
Let’s make it clear. “Engaged” employees are emotionally involved with their job, their company, and their co-workers. Some of their co-workers become friends outside the workplace, and they care about and support one another.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that HR departments in companies should start planning weekly company picnics or make a return to “fermentation Fridays”. I’m not suggesting that we run a “social Meet Up” application on the company intranet.
We don’t need to run “team building” meetings and ropes courses in every department to get employees engaged. And no, we don’t need executives to do a weekly “lunch with the President” meeting (UNLESS the “Pres” is willing to stick with the program and actually follow through on his/her commitment to meet with employees, get to know them, and do something about their suggestions).
What I am saying is that the major reasons employees:
- Enjoy being at work
- Are willing to give more effort to work
- Feel good when they tell their friends and family about their work
Lessons from an Organization Development Professional: Staying Centered and Clear on Values at Work & in Life
January 25th, 2010 by Cris Hagen
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Entertainment. It’s all around us. The late night talk show wars between Jay, Conan, and Dave. The new TV season is starting with American Idol and 24, and SuperBowl Weekend is just on the perceivable horizon. I don’t know about you, but we live in exciting times!
Really? Really? What have we become? Does Hollywood really dominate our attention so much as to dull our senses about what is going on in the world around us? Have we become so numb to our world that we let “The Tonight Show” shenanigans take precedence over what happened in Haiti these past weeks? Or to take precedence over what’s going on in our own homes with our spouse and children?
We are deluged daily, not only with entertainment, world news of disasters, war, and economic turmoil, but we are “attacked” with e-mails (let’s start a contest to see who gets more than 500 e-mails a day!), and overwhelmed with requests for our time to attend meetings and teleconferences. Where do we draw the line? When do we start to get control over our lives and our time? How do we start to manage our commitments and keep a focus on the important relationships in our lives to make a statement about what is important to us? How do we dig out of everything that gets piled on top of us so that we can breathe fresh air and regain a sense of balance that will both sustain us and energize our efforts to lead more productive and fulfilling lives? Is this all too much to ask? Is it pure fantasy that we can actually achieve this? Read the rest of this entry »
Plus Delta Presents at ASTD Los Angeles, Thursday, 1/28, on Strategic Organization Renewal
January 18th, 2010 by Cris Hagen
In today’s turbulent times, employees are discouraged by the continuing global economic crisis and broader world news, organizations are becoming completely consumed by draconian cost-cutting measures simply to stay afloat, and customers are still finding it difficult to make purchasing decisions. During this period of furious business change, now is the time for business leaders to take the offensive and renew their organizations.
STRATEGIC ORGANIZATION RENEWAL unlocks value in your business by optimizing organizational performance and protecting customer loyalty. By engaging this process, business leaders align near-term business strategies necessitated by today’s unprecedented economic challenges with not only the desire but also the ability to prosper in the recovery.
Join us for an engaging session on January 28, 2010 at ASTD – Special Division (Organization Development)– where we explore the concepts and share practical tips for renewing your organization! Learn how to change the game by using this opportunity to renew your business and create a ready platform for growth and innovation in the future.
In this session, we will:
• Discuss today’s unprecedented economic challenges and our current context for change as the recovery sets in
• Review the concepts of Strategic Organization Renewal – a proven approach for optimizing organizational performance and protecting customer loyalty
• Develop specific strategies you can use to put this powerful approach into action and produce better business results before it’s too late.
5 Steps to Improved Performance As You Kickoff the New Year
January 13th, 2010 by Jeremy Lurey
All of us at Plus Delta Consulting have been reflecting on what we will do as we enter the New Year to improve performance in our organization – and with our client organizations. 2009 was a rocky year for many, and I for one am very glad to put it behind me. With that said, I’d be remiss if I simply said, “Thank God it’s over!” without doing any planning for 2010.
As we enter the New Year then, we’d like to recommend 5 simple steps for you to drastically improve performance in your organization. What steps have you taken or do you plan to take as you begin the New Year to produce better results? Please take a moment to comment below and share your own actions and ideas with us and all of our readers. Until then, here’s our list!
1. Plan your future from the future:
If anything was possible for you and your organization in one year from now (or even 10), how would you have the future be? Suspend reality for just a moment, and don’t worry about being practical or even reasonable. Focus on defining your ideal future based on your most important values and longer-term business objectives. And don’t frame this as “fixing” something that already exists or working within your current constraints. Read the rest of this entry »
Managing Your Organizational Processes During the Economic Recovery
January 6th, 2010 by Michael Liskin
The following is a guest post by our own Jack Weber, Executive Consultant at Plus Delta Consulting:
At Plus Delta, we have experienced an ever increasing flow of feedback from our clients and others that the long anticipated economic recovery is happening and the pace of the recovery will increase significantly. The information we have received is corroborated by government figures and statistics – for example: the Consumer Confidence Index rose in December, the first time in over a year; the Monthly Home Sales Prices are up for the 5th straight month and over the last 3 months have risen nearly 20%; the Gross Domestic Product increased 2.2 percent in the third quarter of 2009 as compared to the 2nd quarter of 2009.
A recovering economy dictates that your organization must be prepared for changes. Our business climate dramatically changed in 2008 and early 2009 when the U.S. economy nearly came to a complete halt. Processes in your organization were also changed; people assumed multiple roles while they tried to accomplish the same amount of work as two or more downsized workers.
Getting frustrated by conflicting demands to continue to stabilize your organization through the traditional methods of cost cutting, job layoffs, hiring part time workers, early retirement of older workers, etc.– while trying to ramp up for the arriving economic recovery will do no good.
What is mandatory is that planning must start right now. Youmust begin to work with your organization to prepare for a long anticipated positive move forward. You hoped for it; you asked for it, even begged for it. Now you have got it. But what to do? Here are 5 steps to get you started:
Have you ever considered the possibility that the language we use in organizations can have a direct impact on the experience of an individual worker or larger group? How many times have you seen individuals or work groups that seem to exude a culture that undermines either their own stated goals or those of the organization as a whole? In what ways do they speak of themselves, their co-workers, and the work itself, and how has this correlated with their success?
Alternatively, have you seen individuals or groups within organizations that seem to “get it?” How do they speak about themselves and others, and what culture tends to form around them and spread to other parts of a larger organization?
Tribal Leadership, written by Dave Logan, John King, and Halee Fischer-Wright, provides a framework from which to understand the various “tribes” in an organization and the cultural stages in which they reside. One of their goals is to educate leaders on how to take a tribe (or set of tribes, if in a larger organization) from one cultural stage to the next, until they align around core values and a noble cause. This is achieved both through providing specific coaching tips and through addressing how a leader and an employee can speak about themselves and others. Read the rest of this entry »
6 Suggestions on How to Work From Home and Stay Productive
December 10th, 2009 by Cris Hagen
More and more I see companies embracing “work-at-home” policies, not only as a way to be more “green” by keeping cars off the road, but as a way to reduce the real estate “footprint” in the office. Some companies estimate the cost of maintaining office space for an employee at around $9,000/year. These same companies are offering as much as $1,000 for work-at-home employees to purchase the necessary office equipment to set up and maintain a home office.
So as the economic drivers for working at home seem to be well established and as companies define the appropriate policies and procedures for determining which jobs lend themselves to “working-at-home” (not to mention the question of how managers will measure the productivity of employees working at home), the question is, how does the “work-at-home” employee stay productive?
Speaking from experience, I would like to offer the following suggestions, and then invite the reader to contribute their own ideas. Read the rest of this entry »
Six Ways to a Passionate Soul: An Interview with Steve Cady
November 30th, 2009 by Jeremy Lurey
Dr. Steven H. Cady is a Graduate Faculty member in the Organization Development Program at Bowling Green State University. He also researches, writes about, and consults to individuals and organizations about passion. Beyond that, Steve is an inspiration to me because he lives a life of passion and in doing so brings out the best in me whenever we are together – and more often than not, when we are thousands of miles apart! Read the rest of this entry »
