Organizational Behavior – Week #8 Lecture 1

Example Framework – Diagnosis and Proposed Intervention

Hi Class! Put your right hand over your left shoulder…and pat yourself on the back! You’ve made it to the final week of class! There is no assigned reading this week to ensure you have ample time to put the finishing touches on your final project. The intent of this lecture is to give you the framework of an acceptable example project. Please note that this is not all encompassing from a paper standpoint but rather provides a diagnosis and proposed intervention framework that can be built upon as a frame of reference. I repeat…your paper will include all of the sections listed prior and reinforced in this week’s PowerPoint slides…not just the diagnosis and proposed intervention which I list below. Enjoy!

Let’s assume you work for a defense contractor and have supervised a team of 24 individuals across various functions to include engineers, software developers, quality assurance, and logistics for the last six months. The multifunctional nature of your team coupled with multiple customers to support has made your job a challenging experience. To complicate matters, the team did not have a permanent supervisor prior to your arrival and therefore lacked much needed leadership and structure. Because of this, the information given to customers lacked consistency and quality.

Diagnosis:

Your team’s unspoken strategy prior to your arrival was to limit contact with customers because of unfavorable personal perceptions of key customer personnel. This method is in direct contrast to your organization’s overarching objective to harvest a customer-centered culture where customer satisfaction is at the heart of your organization’s purpose. Additionally, your team’s structure does not accurately reflect the customer base and your team’s process documentation lacks the necessary structure to provide consistent customer support.

The team’s misalignment has resulted in a lack of consistent, open communication with customers and within the team. This lack of communication has led to a lack of perceived value both internally among your group and externally with your customers. Your goal is to improve communication and overall team effectiveness and increase your team’s value to the customer.

Supporting Data — You conducted individual employee interviews and customer interviews. Your employees had comments such as:

· The customer doesn’t know what they’re talking about.

· There is no real focus on this team…we lack documented processes.

· Members of this team do not share information with each other.

· There are not enough people on the team to do the work.

Your customers relayed concerns as well:

· I didn’t even know you had software folks on your team.

· Requests for assistance have not always been supported.

In addition to the subject data you uncovered with interviews, you also researched your team’s processes and found that only approximately 40% of your team’s processes are properly documented across the functions. Additionally, you recently disciplined an employee for inconsiderate communication in front of a customer and fellow employees. This personnel action serves as evidence of both external and internal communication problems.

In summary, you’ve identified three major issues;

1. lack of information sharing,

2. lack of a structured way of doing business,

3. lack of mutual respect between customers and employees.

Recommended Intervention

Your recommended intervention is a three-pronged approach as noted below:

· Restructure — Your first recommendation is to restructure your team into a matrixed team with four integrated product teams (IPTs) within your team. Each IPT will be responsible for a certain product line that more accurately reflects the customer base. Each team will develop processes to support their respective product lines and produce work products on a regular basis. You will have a focal point for each team responsible for coordinating and reporting on the work. The new matrix structure will promote healthy communication with the customers and within the team while at the same time provide a structured, consistent way of doing business. The customer will no longer wonder about who to contact with a concern or question. Because the focal points will serve as the lead technical agents for their respective product lines, they will be the key point of contact for the customer.

· Employee Involvement — Your proposed matrixed team will promote employee involvement by increasing employees’ input into decisions and requiring greater participation from all team members thereby improving the capabilities of your team. By creating focal points, you are motivating and empowering employees at the lower levels by giving them the authority and ability to influence outcomes and develop work plans and team processes. This will promote a greater rewards structure for the focal points by giving them greater internal satisfaction and also external recognition because the leadership experience can be put on their resumes. Additionally, employees will be in an environment where they are strongly encouraged to share relevant information rather than withholding information for personal gain.

· Work Design — In addition to the already mentioned steps, you are also proposing a new work design such as self-managed teams, or IPTs. Under this new work design, your focus will go to being a leader and providing vision, direction, and inspiration. You will work on managing boundaries between customers and focal points and will provide overarching team goals and manage performance to those goals. You will specify the “what” but not the “how”. Each IPT will develop the “how” processes.