Tami Bennett-Tait Patrice Howard Nerita Hughes Rebecca Stuart

1. Strategic Change Interventions
Chapters 18, 19, & 20
Tami Bennett-Tait, Patrice Howard,
Nerita Hughes, & Rebecca Stuart
EDD 855 Organization Development

2. Strategic Change Interventions
Strategic Change
Interventions are whole
system interventions
Interventions include:
★ transformational
★ continuous
★ transorganizational
Click on this video link Resistance to
Change in an Organization (3:46 minutes)

3. Transformational Change Interventions
Characteristics (Cummings & Worley, 2015,
p. 530-33)
● triggered by environmental &
internal disruption
● initiated by senior executives &
line manager
● involves multiple stakeholders
● systemic & revolutionary
● involve significant learning & a
new paradigm
Watch Sustainability creates culture
(2:46 minutes)
Interventions Include:
● Organization Design
● Integrated Strategy
● Culture Change

4. Organization Design
Organization design
is “the process of
constructing and
adjusting an
organization’s
structure to achieve
its business strategy
and goals” (Nelson
and Quick, 2011).
Configures the
organization’s structure,
work designs, human
resource practices,
management and
information systems to
guide members behaviors
in strategic direction.
(Cummings and Worley,
2015).
Key Characteristics -
*Congruence* *Alignment*
*Strategic Fit*
“Among elements”

5. 1. Strategic organization (strategy and
organization design)
2. Creating a strategic plan, gaining
support, plan implementation and
execute
3. Individuals and groups throughout the
organization are integrated into analysis,
plan and implementation process
Three Key Features

6. Strategic Plan Strategy Implementation
Example of ISC Process: Implementation of Google
Apps, i.e. Google Mail, Google Drive, etc.
Checkout this video, Larimer County benefitting
from Google strategy, click on video to view (3.21
minutes)

7. Culture Change
● It starts with a clear vision which
include shared values and beliefs
● It must be managed from the top
of the organization
● Communicate the culture through
their own actions
● Supporting organization structure,
human resources, and
management resources
● This is especially important and
key in leadership positions

8. Culture Change
Values
• Deeper level of awareness and
include beliefs about the
organization
Norms
• This refers to how people behave
and interact with each other
Artifacts
• Symbols of deeper levels of
culture such as: clothing and
language, etc..

9. Culture Change
• Each piece represents the means
to assessing the fit and describing
a comprehensive approach to
transformational change through
organizational culture

10. Culture Change
• The relationships show how work
is performed and evaluated.
• The relationships show the
correlation between individual
work and group or collective
work.
• The relationships show the
connection between culture and
the systems from which they are
organized.

11. Culture Change
• Implementing the culture of change
process through four quadrants from
the internal and external focus
• These quadrants represent how
things are shared and often respond
to the following questions:
1)what really matters around here?
2) how do we do things around
here? And
3) what we do when a problem
arises? (Cummings & Worley,
p.557-58)

12. Continuous Change Interventions
Characteristics (Cummings & Worley, 2015)
● Organizations that are in
continuous change include
biotechnology, high technology,
and entertainment and fashion.
● The organization’s focus is on
learning, changing, and adapting.
● Adapting to a rapidly shifting
environment, organizations need
dynamic capabilities to renew
forms of competitive advantage.
Interventions Include:
● Dynamic Strategy
● Self-designing Organization
● Learning Organization
● Built-to-Change Organization
Watch Microsoft 2020 (1:54 minutes)

13. Dynamic Strategy Making
Watch Whitbread PLC continuous change (1:44 minutes)
Characteristics (Cummings & Worley, 2015)
● coordinated realignments between organization and the
environment
● intended to improve performance and effectiveness over time
● criteria include speed over delay, flexibility over rigidity,
simplicity over complexity, empowerment over autocracy, unity
over fragmentation, and breadth over narrowness
● framework is ongoing and built into the organization and
includes data collection and assessment that is continuous

14. Dynamic Strategy Making
Application Stages
1. Choose relevant stakeholders
2. Hold the first retreat
➢ in large group, understand data
➢ in small groups, formulate goals and competitive logic
➢ prepare for organizational involvement
3. Engage stakeholders between retreats (ask questions of the draft)
4. Hold the second retreat
➢ question priorities, resources needed, and who will do what, when, &
where
5. Implement actions
➢ leaders model the behavior and enact strategy effectively

15. Self-Designing Organizations
Application Stages
1. Clarify the strategy
2. Lay the foundation
➢ valuing
➢ acquiring knowledge
➢ diagnosing
3. Create the design criteria
4. Designing
5. Implementing and Assessing
Note: incorporating all steps increases the
quality of learning and change effectiveness
Characteristics (Cummings & Worley,
2015)
● cycles of diagnosing,
designing, implementing
activities that all members
can carry out
● help change the organization
systematically
● requires onsite innovation
and learning by doing
Watch Healthways Change (3:01 minutes)

16. Built-to-Change Organizations
Application Stages
1. Reframe culture as a
facilitator of change
2. Redefine organization
design components for
flexibility
3. Build an orchestration
capability
Characteristics
● from strategy to strategizing
● from design to designing

17. Learning Organizations
● Possible for the individual to learn
without the organization or vice
versa.
● Communication is key.
● Success relies heavily on members
having knowledge and applying it
effectively in their work.
● Modifications to behavior should
occur from new insights.
Cummings & Worley (2015) p. 582
● Aimed at helping organizations
develop and use knowledge to change
and improve themselves constantly.
● Helps organizations acquire and
develop new knowledge.
● Learning is embedded in structures,
routines, policies, and organizational
cultures.

18. How Organizational Learning
Affects Performance
Organization Learning
Knowledge
Management
From W. Snyder and T. Cummings, “Organization Learning Disorders: Conceptual Model and Intervention Hypothesis,”
Human Relations 51 (1998): 873-95.
Organization
Characteristics:
● structure
● *information
systems
● human
resources
practices
● culture
● leadership
Organization
Learning
Processes:
● discovery
● invention
● production
● generalizati
on
Organization
Knowledge:
● explicit
● tacit
Organization
Performance
Competitive
Strategy

19. Learning Organizations
Model 2 Learning: Based on promoting
valid information, free, informed choice,
action, and continuous improvement of
learning process.
● 4 categories of organizational
design: structure, work design,
human resource practices,
management processes
Cummings & Worley (2015) p. 588
Model 1 Learning: Unilateral control of
environments and tasks; protecting
oneself, focused only on learning that
improves the status quo.

20. Learning Organizations
Organizational learning process consists of four interrelated activities: discovery,
invention, production, and generalization.
● Discovery- gaps between desired and actual conditions
● Invention- devising solutions to close the gap between conditions
● Production- implementing solutions
● Generalization- drawing conclusions about effects of solutions and extending
knowledge to other relevant situations
Cummings & Worley (2015) p. 589

21. Applying Learning Process
Single-Loop Learning (adaptive
learning): improving the status quo
Double-Loop Learning (generative
learning): changing the status quo,
transformational change
Deutero-Learning: learning how to
learn
Works draws heavily from Argyris
and Schon and Senge

22. Peter Senge-
Introduction to Systems Thinking Video
Watch
Senge-Systems
Thinking

23. Transorganizational Change
Whitbread History (2:18 minutes)

25. SUMMARY: Strategic Change Interventions
Strategic Change
Interventions are whole
system interventions
Transformational
★ Organization Design
★ Integrated Strategic
★ Culture
Continuous
★ Dynamic Strategy Making
★ Self-Designing Organization
★ Built-to-Change Organization
★ Learning Organization
Transorganizational
★ Merger & Acquisitions
★ Alliances
★ Networks

26. References
Cummings, T. G. & Worley, C. G. (2015).
Organization Development & Change
(10th ed). Stamford, CT: Cengage.
http://infed.org/mobi/chris-argyris-theories-of-action-
double-loop-learning-and-organizational-learning/
http://www.iff.ac.at/oe/media/documents/Paper_15_Stein
inger.pdf
Videos -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZFiN00QALE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMZgTW9Eqt8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wto6SFl13A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VnmM1P3vp0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGa8-04aq3E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXdzKBWDraM&feature=
youtu.be
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMu9Yf8NTD0