1. The impact of early organisational development theories
and perspectives on business today
-Sascha Michel-
saschamichel@gmail.com
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2. Organisational development and learning (ODL) is an approach to change, which
acknowledges and cares for people at all levels of an organisation. ODL sees the individual
and the group, as the main catalyst and drivers for change. The assumption is that people are
the most important asset. They are most productive in an environment promoting a high
quality of working life, thus determining effective organisational design (Senior et al., 2006).
There is a great deal of ambiguity associated with the OD approach to development, in the
areas relating to strategic management and situational change agenda.
Whilst individuals could be seen as the most important asset, we cannot ignore the
challenges that lie in determining the correct behavioral interventions; and if this alone can
direct change in hard and soft areas of culture, structure, strategy and leadership (Holbeche,
2009; French and Bell, 1999). We will review early organisational development theories and
perspectives and how they might impact on organisational development and change
initiates. Firstly, we need to look at what makes an organisation, and then assess if early
approaches to ODL are realistic and appropriate, in these complex social ’organisms’ we call
organisations.
Organisations are social systems that consist of processes, systems, structures, people,
culture and leadership. People group together to coordinate activities, are allocated
responsibilities, usually within a system of boundaries and control, by management design.
The term ‘organised’ suggests that throughout this system, a sense of order and predictability
can be attained. However, with the unpredictability of group dynamics, culture, power and
politics, the idea of an ‘organised’ system could simply be a facade. Quinn (1988) argues that
traditional definitions of organisations as predictable stable contexts do not apply; because
organisations are dynamic, suiting leadership styles capable of directing intuition, ambiguity,
in a constantly evolving and adapting environment.
To clarify the debate we need to first define ODL, then asses the relativity of behavioral
interventions in unpredictable states, and see how we might solve this conundrum.
Organisational development and learning (ODL) as a process is the creation of ongoing
learning and progression by intervening in the complexities of behavior, culture, strategy
and systems. An environment where the people are the key drivers for delivering change,
forming part of a detailed interoperable organisational system. Beckard (1969) defines
organisational development as a planned change effort, involving the total “system”,
managed from the top, with the goal of increasing organisational effectiveness. French and
Bell (1999) describe ODL as a process of behavioral interventions, including gestalt, process
work, feedback mechanisms, and an array of tools and techniques appropriate to the
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3. individual, group and organisational level. ODL is useful if you are looking to embark on a
change in culture, managerial strategy, motivation, by creating open communications, and
leadership, which can adapt to new environments.
ODL is based on humanistic principles, borne out of the human relations movement of
the 1930’s. The key drivers for this new approach was primarily associated with the
industrial revolution, where organisations ran tightly controlled, militant, rational
management or bureaucracies. People were seen as only being motivated by money. They
worked in machine-like organisations, where roles were formalised by task, with no channel
for individual creativity and individual thinking. This was a formidable approach, which has
gathered much support. The Classical approach gave rise to working factories, helping to
build Europe after the war, and contributing to the success of the assembly lines in
automobile manufacturing.
ODL was founded in the late 1940’s through the pioneering work of Kurt Lewin and his
National Training laboratories. Lewin was interested in resolving social conflict through
behavior change, in particular minority and disadvantages groups. His contribution over the
last 40 years has helped to develop a deeper understanding of the dynamics of change
involving people and organisations (Greiner and Cummings, 2004; Burnes, 2004). ODL was
seen as a step up from the classical and bureaucratic approach from before. It supported the
view of human beings having emotional, as well as economic needs, with respect to human
dignity, integrity, responsibility and justice (Burnes, 2009).
Lewin developed a 3 phase process for change, which he called unfreezing, moving, and
refreezing, along with force field analysis, group dynamics and action research (Senior et al.,
2006). Unfreezing is classified as the shaking up of modes of thinking and behavior to
heighten the awareness for change. It involves consultation with heads of departments, and
decision making to create unity of purpose and reasons for change. The second stage of
Levin’s process was the ‘doing’ or the process of making the change. This could include new
strategies and organisational structures to ensure movement to the new desired state. The
final stage is the stabilising process, which institutes these changes. The problem with this
whole approach is that the 3 stage process assumes an organisation can in fact stabilise. It
ignores the turbulent environment in which organisations operate and are having to
continually change (Burnes, 2009).
In recent years Levin’s theories have come under much criticism, as it has bygone a
period of fad and fashion (Griener and Cummings, 2004). It could be seen as a process,
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4. which firstly suits an idealistic portrayal of how organisations could function, as well as un-
defining of the practitioner’s ability to place interventions, relative to the context in which
change happens. Although there seems to be major gaps in the thinking, it is undeniable that
Lewin, seen as the father of ODL, has influenced much of OD literature and models. His
work is evident in much of the contemporary OD and change agenda.
Much of what Lewin has laid out in the early stages of ODL is closely related to the
context of planned change. This places a great deal of emphasis on the ability to make
rational and planned decisions, with predetermined goals, in a linear and predictable
environment. However this is a naive approach to looking at the type of change situations
that organisations find themselves. The emergent approach sees organisational change as a
continuous, open and evolving process. The school of open systems and complexity see
organisations as flexible systems or organisms, that are innovating and operating at the ‘edge
of chaos’. ODL and the planned approach might only be appropriate in certain
environmental situations i.e slow incremental change, and less relevant in situations that
require rapid change or unstable environments. Within these stable environments we might
also expect an established culture or norms of behavior “the way we do thing around here”.
ODL does not take into account different cultures; especially those that may not share
values, in situations where power and politics, within a complex system wide change, may be
prevalent (Senior et al., 2006; Burnes, 2004).
Where ODL tends to neglect an involvement in large scale rapid change, globalisation,
mergers and acquisitions and virtual organisations (Griener and Cummings, 2004), a new
proposed definition could be to focus specifically in the areas of behavioral teaching,
research and practise. ODL has an important part to play in organisational change. Where its
limitations lie in strategic planning and systems thinking, it might be better suited to a more
holistic approach, acting in counterpoint to the more hard elements of system, structure and
strategy.
While organisational development is associated with behavioral interventions, learning
on the other hand is a process, by which an entire workforce can identify with the need for
change, and then develop it. The assumption is that organisations need to learn at least as
fast as the environment dictates. Organisations need to move away from traditional forms of
learning and intervention, toward a distributed process of learning and leadership (Thorpe et
al., 2011). Senge (2006) calls this the “learning organisation”. His seminal work takes into
account the behavioral elements of OD combined with leadership, strategy, learning and
development. This integrated approach covers 5 main disciplines, namely systems thinking,
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5. personal mastery, mental models, shared vision and team learning. The role of OD and
behavior has influenced much of his work. This contemporary perspective harnesses the
behavioral forms of early OD and recent systemic thinking from a prescriptive perspective.
This in turn creates an integrative process of how individuals and organisations might learn
and develop together.
In summary, I looked at the role of organisational development and learning in
organisational change, and how this was influenced by the work of Kurt Lewin. It is evident
that ODL has a major part to play in the development and learning in organisations.
However, organisational development does present a dichotomy of opposing forces. Firstly it
supposes the need for a fixed state organisation with the need to develop learning
continuously as a process of becoming a “learning organisation”. The environmental,
structural and cultural context can provide awareness for prescribed change initiatives, but
notwithstanding its restrictions. Therefore, success is largely dependent on understanding
the context in which organisations find themselves. To cement the ODL approach as a viable
component in the change process, we need a willingness to intervene with a range of
approaches, which tackle not only behavioral aspects, but also changes in the dynamics of
structure, systems, strategy and culture.
References
HOLBECH, L. (2009) Organisational Development-what’s in a name?. Impact quarterly
update on CIPD Policy and Research, 26, 6-9.
BURNES, B. (2004) Kurt Lewin and the Planned Approach to Change: A Re-appraisal.
Journal of Management Studies, 41(6), 977-1002.
BURNES, B. (2009) Managing change : a strategic approach to organisational dynamics,
Harlow, Financial Times Prentice Hall.
FRENCH, W. L. & BELL, C. H. (1999) Organization development : behavioral science
interventions for organization improvement, Upper Saddle River, N.J., Prentice Hall
; London : Prentice-Hall International.
GREINER, L. E. & CUMMINGS, T. G. (2004) Wanted. The Journal of Applied Behavioral
Science, 40(4), 374-391.
SENGE, P. M. (2006) The fifth discipline : the art and practice of the learning organization,
London, Random House Business.
SENIOR, B., FLEMING, J. & MYILIBRARY. (2006) Organizational change, Harlow,
Pearson Education.
THORPE, R., GOLD, J. & LAWLER, J. (2011) Locating Distributed Leadership.
International Journal of Management Reviews, 13(3), 239-250.
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