[Table 3.2]
issues and assess the organization more objectively. In the intervention phase, both types of consultants must rely on valid information, free and informed choice, and internal commitment for their success.16 However, an internal consultant’s strong ties to the organization may make him or her overly cautious, particularly when powerful others can affect a career. Internal consultants also may lack certain skills and experi- ence in facilitating organizational change. Insiders may have some small advantages in 54
being able to move around the system and cross key organizational boundaries. Finally, the measures of success and reward differ from those of the external practitioner in the evaluation process.
A promising approach to having the advantages of both internal and external OD consultants is to include them both as members of an internal–external consulting team.17 External consultants can combine their special expertise and objectivity with the inside knowledge and acceptance of internal consultants. The two parties can use complementary consulting skills while sharing the workload and possibly accomplish- ing more than either would by operating alone. Internal consultants, for example, can provide almost continuous contact with the client, and their external counterparts can provide specialized services periodically, such as two or three days each month.
External consultants also can help train their organization partners, thus transferring OD skills and knowledge to the organization.
Although little has been written on internal–external consulting teams, studies suggest that the effectiveness of such teams depends on members developing strong, supportive, collegial relationships. They need to take time to develop the consulting team, confronting individual differences and establishing appropriate roles and rela- tionships. Members need to provide each other with continuous feedback and also make a commitment to learn from each other. In the absence of these team-building and learning activities, internal–external consulting teams can be more troublesome and less effective than either internal or external consultants working alone.
Application 3.1 provides a personal, first-person account of the internal and external consulting positions as well as interactions between them.18
Marginality A promising line of research on the professional OD role centers on the issue of marginality.19 The marginal person is one who successfully straddles the boundary between two or more groups with differing goals, value systems, and behav- ior patterns. Whereas in the past, the marginal role always was seen as dysfunctional, marginality now is seen in a more positive light. There are many examples of marginal roles in organizations: the salesperson, the buyer, the first-line supervisor, the integra- tor, and the project manager.
Evidence is mounting that some people are better at taking marginal roles than are others. Those who are good at it seem to have personal qualities of low dogma- tism, neutrality, open-mindedness, objectivity, flexibility, and adaptable information- processing ability. Rather than being upset by conflict, ambiguity, and stress, they thrive on it. Individuals with marginal orientations are more likely than others to develop integrative decisions that bring together and reconcile viewpoints among opposing organizational groups and are more likely to remain neutral in controversial situations.
Thus, research suggests that the marginal role can have positive effects when it is filled by a person with a marginal orientation. Such a person can be more objective and bet- ter able to perform successfully in linking, integrative, or conflict-laden roles.20
A study of 89 external OD practitioners and 246 internal ones (response rates of 59% and 54%, respectively) showed that external professionals were more comfort- able with the marginal role than were internal professionals. Internal consultants with more years of experience were more marginally oriented than were those with less experience.21 These findings, combined with other research on marginal roles, suggest the importance of maintaining the OD practitioner’s marginality, with its flexibility, independence, and boundary-spanning characteristics.
Emotional Demands The OD practitioner role is emotionally demanding. Research and practice support the importance of understanding emotions and their impact on the practitioner’s effectiveness.22 The research on emotional intelligence in organizations suggests a set of abilities that can aid OD practitioners in conducting successful change efforts. Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to recognize and express emotions
The Internal Consultant’s View
I am an agent of change. I am also a member of this organization. I was hired for my OD skills, but also for the fact that I was seen as a “cultural fit.” Sometimes I struggle between my dual roles of “team member” and “free radical.” After all, it is my job to disrupt the status quo around here, helping leaders to find ways to make the organiza- tion more effective.
I have the great advantage of knowing and under- standing how my organization works—its pro- cesses, policies, norms, and areas of resistance. I can usually anticipate how difficult a given change will be for members of the organization, and where the resistance will come from. Because I believe in the mission of my organization, I am able to cope with the inevitable challenges of the change pro- cess. Still, I am frequently a magnet for resistance and a receptacle of institutional anxiety. While I understand how people can be frustrated and frightened by change, it can still be difficult for me to bear the disruption I help to create.
To keep myself sharp and healthy, I breathe, run, meditate, and read. I take every learning oppor- tunity that comes my way, and work diligently to create and maintain a network of colleagues who can support me through the rough patches. I find that my best support comes not from friends, but from people who know and understand the hard work of planned change.
As an internal consultant, I have exposure to many of the same people over time—executives, managers, and employees get to know who I am and what I do. I get to know who they are and what they do. I have the opportunity to lever- age my executive relationships from project to project; over time the executives here have come to understand my work and trust my skills as a consultant. This understanding and trust saves us time and energy each time we work together. Of course, I realize that if I fail one of my executive clients, my life in this organization could become less pleasant. That can stress me out when I’m working on a messy or unpopular project. After all, my performance review is affected by client
feedback, and my compensation is tied to people’s perceptions of my performance. This can make it difficult to press forward with risky interventions.
I am proud of my reputation around here—proud of the fact that I have built solid relationships at the executive level, that managers respect my work, and that employees value having me in the organization. Still, I am ever aware that I must walk the fine line between “respected insider” and
“paid agitator.”
Sometimes I’m lonely—often I’m the only OD per- son working in an organization; sometimes there are two or more of us, but we’re always spread so thin that connecting is difficult and truly sup- porting one another is virtually impossible. I may work with other staff people—HR for instance—
but they don’t always understand my role and can’t really relate to my challenges. Sometimes they can be resentful of my relationship with the client, which makes me feel alienated. I enjoy my client groups, but I must be careful not to over- identify with them; the greatest value I bring to my clients is a clean “outsider” perspective. I can’t do hard change efforts with them if I’m worried about them liking me. Being a lone ranger can be thrilling, but being an outsider can get tiring.
Occasionally I bring in an external consultant to work on a specific project or problem in my organi- zation. This can be both challenging and rewarding for me. It is time consuming to bring an outsider up to speed on my organization’s business, processes, and politics. I seek external consultants who will fit in our culture, while helping us see our issues more clearly and realistically. I enjoy the process of partnering with people who have exposure to other organizations, who possess different skills and strengths from mine, and who understand the inherent discomfort of the change process. Still, this can be risky, because my reputation will be affected by this person’s work and the outcomes we are able to achieve. When it works best, my partnership with the external consultant leads to improved effectiveness for my organization, while affording me a valued learning opportunity and professional support.
Personal Views of the Internal and External Consulting Positions
application 3.1
The best thing to me about being an internal consultant is knowing that I am contributing to the mission of my organization with every client I work with, every day.
The External Consultant’s View
I am an agent of change. I work for many different organizations of varying sizes with different mis- sions and goals. I spend most of my time helping managers, HR people, and internal consultants initiate and manage change—both planned and unplanned. I enjoy the variety in my work and the learning that comes from seeing the way change happens in different organizations and contexts.
But it is hard being an “outsider.” I must work quickly to understand each new organization I work with. As an outsider it can be frustrating to navigate the inner workings of the organiza- tion—its politics, pecking order, and culture—and to root out what’s important and what’s not. In my role, I’m not around while the unglamorous, time-consuming, and important work of nurturing a change along is being done. So, although I experience the risk and excitement of some part of the change, I do not always get to experience the whole change process from start to finish.
I rarely get to see the project bear fruit and the organization become more effective as a result of the work I’ve done. Sometimes the process feels incomplete, and I almost always wonder how much I’ve actually helped.
Being an external consultant is both rewarding and risky work. On the one hand, I am seen as an expert. I am appreciated for my assistance, applauded for my knowledge, and liked for my interpersonal skills. I have the benefit of many revenue sources, so I’m never overly dependent on one client. I am often rewarded handsomely for my time and effort, although most people mistake
“daily fee” as actual income and forget about self- employment taxes and the health benefits I have to pay myself. The other truth is that I am always
at risk—economic crises, budget cuts, personnel changes, executive shake ups, organizational poli- tics, and the occasional hostile HR person are but a few of the land mines an external consultant faces.
For the most part, I feel pleased and rewarded for my work as a consultant. But I always know that my situation is dependent on my client’s situation, and I can never afford to get too comfortable.
When I’m hired by an executive or manager, sometimes the HR person or internal consultant may be resistant, feeling threatened by my presence. When this happens, I have to find ways to address their concern, partner with them, and still do the important work of organizational change. Sometimes just creating space for the conversation by using simple probes—“You seem very concerned about this situation” or “You must feel pretty unsupported right now”—help me uncover their discomfort so we can move forward.
Sometimes these relationships are difficult throughout the engagement. It’s the downside of being brought in as an “expert.”
I am asked by clients to perform a wide variety of tasks ranging from content expert to process expert to personal coach. Regardless of the request, however, I am frequently aware of an unspoken need on the part of the client—manager, HR person, or internal consultant—to have me sup- port his or her project, position, or person. When the request is to support a project, it is usually clear. When the request is to support a position, it is less clear but typically surfaces during the course of our work together. However, when the request is to support the individual personally, the request is almost never overt. This is where my self- as-instrument work serves me best, helping me to understand the unspoken—the question behind the question. While my goal is always to help my client organizations become more effective, I never forget that change can happen many different ways and at multiple levels of the system. It is my work to be aware of opportunities to intervene, and to have the skill and courage to do so as an outsider.
58 PART 1 Overview of Organization Development
appropriately, to use emotions in thought and decisions, and to regulate emotion in one’s self and in others.23 It is, therefore, a different kind of intelligence from problem- solving ability, engineering aptitude, or the knowledge of concepts. In tandem with traditional knowledge and skill, emotional intelligence affects and supplements ratio- nal thought; emotions help prioritize thinking by directing attention to important information not addressed in models and theories. In that sense, some researchers argue that emotional intelligence is as important as cognitive intelligence.24
Reports from OD practitioners support the importance of emotional intelligence in practice. From the client’s perspective, OD practitioners must understand emotions well enough to relate to and help organization members address resistance, commit- ment, and ambiguity at each stage of planned change. Despite the predominant focus on rationality and efficiency, almost any change process must address important and difficult issues that raise emotions such as the fear of failure, rejection, anxiety, and anger.25 OD practitioners can provide psychological support, model appropriate emo- tional expression, reframe client perspectives, and provide resources. OD practitioners must also understand their own emotions. Ambiguity, unfamiliarity, or denial of emo- tions can lead to inaccurate and untimely interventions. For example, a practitioner who is uncomfortable with conflict may intervene to defuse an argument between two managers because of the discomfort he or she feels, not because the conflict is destruc- tive. In such a case, the practitioner is acting to address a personal need rather than intervening to improve the system’s effectiveness.
Evidence suggests that emotional intelligence increases with age and experience.26 Research also supports the conclusion that competence with emotions can be devel- oped through personal growth processes such as sensitivity training, counseling, and therapy. It seems reasonable to suggest that professional OD practitioners dedicate themselves to a long-term regimen of development that includes acquiring both cogni- tive learning and emotional intelligence.
Use of Knowledge and Experience The professional OD role has been described in terms of a continuum ranging from client centered (using the client’s knowledge and experience) to consultant centered (using the consultant’s knowledge and experience), as shown in Figure 3.1. Traditionally, OD consultants have worked at the client- centered end of the continuum. Organization development professionals, relying mainly on pro- cess consultation and team building (see Chapter 12), have been expected to remain neutral, refusing to offer expert advice on organizational problems. Rather than con- tracting to solve specific problems, the consultant has tended to work with organization members to identify problems and potential solutions, to help them study what they are doing now and consider alternative behaviors and solutions, and to help them discover whether, in fact, the consultant and they can learn to do things better. In doing that, the OD professional has generally listened and reflected upon members’ perceptions and ideas and helped clarify and interpret their communications and behaviors.
The recent proliferation of OD interventions in the structural, human resource man- agement, and strategy areas has expanded that limited definition of the professional OD role to include the consultant-centered end of the continuum. In many of the newer approaches, the consultant may have to take on a modified role of expert, with the consent and collaboration of organization members. For example, managers trying to bring about a major structural redesign (see Chapter 14) may not have the appropri- ate knowledge and expertise to create and manage the change and need the help of an OD practitioner with experience in this area. The consultant’s role might be to present the basic concepts and ideas and then to struggle jointly with the managers to select an approach that might be useful to the organization and to decide how it might best be implemented. In this situation, the OD professional recommends or prescribes particular changes and is active in planning how to implement them. This expertise, however, is always shared rather than imposed.
With the development of new and varied intervention approaches, the OD profes- sional’s role needs to be seen as falling along the entire continuum from client cen- tered to consultant centered. At times, the consultant will rely mainly on organization members’ knowledge and experiences to identify and solve problems. At other times, it will be more appropriate to take on the role of an expert, withdrawing from that role as managers gain more knowledge and experience.
Careers of Organization Development Professionals
In contrast to such long-standing occupations as medicine and law, organization devel- opment is an emerging practice, still developing the characteristics of an established profession: a common body of knowledge, educational requirements, a recognized code of ethics, and rules and methods for governing conduct. People enter professional OD careers from various educational and work backgrounds. Because they do not have to follow an established career path, they have some choice about when to enter or leave an OD career and whether to be an internal or external consultant.27
Despite the looseness or flexibility of the field, most professionals have had specific training in OD. That training can include relatively short courses (one day to two weeks), programs, and workshops conducted within organizations or at outside institutions (such as NTL, USC, University Associates, Columbia University, the University of Michigan, Stanford University, and UCLA). OD training also can be more formal and lengthy, including master’s programs (for example, at Pepperdine University, American University, Benedictine University, Bowling Green State University, Case Western Reserve University, Loyola University, and the Fielding Institute) and doctoral training (for example, at Benedictine University, Pepperdine University, Case Western Reserve University, Columbia University Teachers College, USC, the Fielding Institute, George Washington University, UCLA, and Stanford University).
As might be expected, career choices widen as people gain training and experience in OD. Those with rudimentary training tend to be internal consultants, often taking on OD roles as temporary assignments on the way to higher managerial or staff positions.
Plans implementation
Recommends and/or prescribes Proposes criteria
Identifies available options Feeds back data
Probes and gathers data Clarifies and interprets Listens and reflects
Refuses to become involved Use of Consultant’s
Knowledge and Experience
Use of Client’s Knowledge and Experience
SOURCE: Adapted by permission of the authors from W. Schmidt and A. Johnson, “A Continuum of Consultancy Styles” (unpublished manuscript, July 1970), p. 1.
Use of Consultant’s Versus Client’s Knowledge and Experience