Page 24 - An Indispensible Resource for Being a Credible Activist

Richard Beckhard defines organizational development as a planned, top-down, company-
wide effort to increase the company’s effectiveness and health. OD is achieved through inter-
ventions in the company’s “processes,” using behavioral science knowledge. .
Warren Bennis defines OD as “a complex strategy intended to change the beliefs, attitudes,
values, and structure of companies so that they can better adapt to new technologies, markets,
and challenges.”
Warner Burke emphasizes that OD is not just “anything done to better an organization”;
it is a particular kind of change process designed to bring about a particular kind of end result.
OD involves company reflection, system improvement, planning, and self-analysis.
The OD field has learned a great deal about what makes any kind of company succeed or
fail and why. This book will spare you the boring case studies and endless research and pre-
sent what has proven to work and what will provide you with a competitive edge via cost-
saving governance practices that can be influenced, recommended, and implemented by the
credible activist HR/OD professional who wishes to improve his or her workplace and do his
or her job ethically and with excellence.
What the HR/OD professional must always remember is that the HR/OD department, no
matter how large or small, is the government of an organization, and the employee handbook
is the constitution. Whether the HR/OD professional reading this book has the authority of
the executive, legislative, or judicial power in the company, or some combination of those,
depends on the company, its culture, and its leadership. The HR/OD professional must clearly
understand his or her role in the company in order to be effective and credible, and, frankly,
to remain personally calm.
The new world is flat—and apparently hot and crowded, too. In the not-so-distant past,
discussion of wages could get an employee fired; nepotism ran rampant; people took care of
“their own”; racial and gender ceilings were impenetrable; there was no recourse for harass-
ment or discrimination and retaliation; and all of this was completely allowable under the law.
The world has changed, and employment laws are ever changing. A growing global middle
class, increased educational opportunities, global markets, and technological advances have
eliminated almost all commerce and communication barriers, resulting in increased competi-
tion not only for the best jobs but also for the best employees.
The existence of various “corporate governance indices” illustrates that the direct relation-
ship between profitability and OD principles is what I call “competitive corporate governance.”
HR/OD professionals can and must influence ethical and legally compliant competitive corpo-
rate governance. HR/OD professionals have the benefit of being able to stand on the shoulders
of countless scholars, researchers, and successful business leaders who came before them.
Even nonprofits and government entities must use every dollar as efficiently as possible.
Several corporate governance indices have been developed to rate publicly traded companies
in terms of the quality of their corporate governance so investors have information they need
to make determinations. Would you invest in a company that had no written EEO policies?
Would you invest in a company that had policies but didn’t follow them consistently? Would
you invest in a company that hired only family members and close friends who weren’t prop-
erly trained for crucial positions such as chief executive officer (CEO), chief financial officer
(CFO), internal controls officer, ethics officer, chief of staff, or chief compliance officer? If
investors would not, then taxpayers and donors will not either.

CHAPTER 1 • W hy Credible Activism? 7