Organization Development: A Process of Learning and Changing, 2nd Edition Review

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(More customer reviews)To me, this book represents the soul of OD. It defines for the practitionaire what it means to be an OD consultant, its values and consequently, the type of interventions we choose to use. A must buy.

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New to the second edition of this text are two chapters on defining the client and the Burke-Litwin model of organizational development and change. All the other chapters, except for chapter three, have been revised to reflect changes in the field of organizational development. The book presents an overview of organizational development, discusses the organization and the factors which will influence its structure and development in the future, contains a synopsis of each chapter presented to encourage the reader to develop a position and make choices and describes the theories underlying the field and the way OD practitioners typically work.

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Organizational Dynamics: Diagnosis and Intervention (Prentice Hall Organizational Development Series) Review

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(More customer reviews)After extensive research in 1975 and 1976 of twenty-six organizations, Kotter developed a model to supplement or replaces other diagnosis models of the time. His criteria for determining the elements was support for their importance from convincing research literature; that they were mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive; and they illustrate the dynamic life cycle of a real organizations. The purpose of his model is to integrate common findings among several fragmented and often opposing studies. The model contains seven major conceptual elements that can describe most organizations from the simplest to the most complex.
In its time, Kotter's model was quite unique and revolutionary. He broached the concepts of systems thinking with his cause and effect analysis, alignment/non-alignment, and homeostatic driving force aspects long before experts and researchers were considering it important to analyze all of the seven elements and their relationship. Kotter's model probably met with some severe resistance from experts who had been analyzing and creating models for organizations for years. Other consultants did not begin to think systemically for at least another decade. His intent was to create model to fill in the gaps and cross lines that other models were not designed to handle.
Like any well-developed model, I believe this model will stand the test of time and evolution. The model still has the criteria required to analyze and diagnose any organization in today's business world. It maps the life cycle of an open system, from the time the environment provides input, to the systems processing of that input, to the output for the environment to dispose. The model is simple enough that it requires minimal explanation to the client, yet detailed enough to capture virtually any variable that affects organization development and change. Questions developed with the model cover valid and reliable specifications for how a system should look when it is running efficiently. Most importantly, it reminds the user to analyze all facets of an organization to diagnose the problem instead of a symptom. Along with it's 90 page descriptive guidebook, the model is a practical way to grasp the philosophy, discipline and common pitfalls of effective diagnosis and intervention with minimal exposure to the process.

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A member of the AWL OD Series! This book offers managers and OD specialists a powerful way of diagnosing organizational problems and of deciding when, where, and how to use (or not use) the diverse and growing number of organizational improvement tools that are available today. Comprehensive and fully integrated, the book includes many different concepts, research findings, and competing philosophies and provides specific examples of how to use the information to improve organizational functioning.

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IT Problem Management Review

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(More customer reviews)This is a great book for anyone involved in help desk or service center activities. I recommend this book for all IT professionals involved with production systems or anyone interested in IT methodology. This book gives the reader an appreciation for the documented processes and documentation that must be in place for a successful help desk venture.
This book has process flows for the entire problem management arena complete with guidelines on how to pick the most successful strategy for your company. It helps you with the decision process by offering pros and cons for each strategy so that you can tailor the strategy for your own goals and objectives. Also present are strategies for escalating problems and the structure that must be in place to support the strategy.
Other strong points of this book include the detail provided concerning the problem prioritization process, documented Triage processes, and escalation procedures. It also covers the documentation that must exist in order for a help desk to strive for cost effectiveness while meeting the goals of its customers.
This books helps IT professionals in the decision making process, whether you are currently involved in help desk activities, preparing to start a help desk, or migrating your current help desk into a service center. I gave this book to our help desk and they quickly ordered a couple of copies for the other managers. This is truly a first rate narrative.

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Whether you manage in-house or outsourced IT operations, your problem resolution processes may be the #1 factor that will determine your ultimate success or failure. What's more, help desks are increasingly called upon to "move up the food chain," becoming true service centers capable of delivering complex, strategic solutions. Finally, there's a single source for all the information you need to build world-class problem management processes -- and deliver the value today's enterprises are demanding. Drawing upon extensive real-world consulting experience, Gary Walker presents specific process improvements IT organizations and outsourcers can make to achieve breakthrough results in their help desks and service centers. Walker reviews every key element of the problem management process, including problem identification, customer validation, problem logging, service delivery, knowledge capture and sharing, and finally, management review and oversight.Walker introduces the Immediate Response Model, which gives IT managers a formal way to account for request variability, complexity, and volume; shows how to use metrics to measure your progress; and offers guidance on creating and using service level agreements. The book includes a detailed chapter on tools for communications with customers, service delivery, and proactive monitoring, as well as opportunities to use the Internet and Integrated Voice Response (IVR) systems to empower customers. Finally, Walker addresses the human side of help desks and service centers, offering practical guidance on motivation.

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