Well-known author and management consultant, Peter Drucker, once said: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”, in other words, if your people don’t live and breathe your culture, your strategy will fall flat.
New tech and processes will improve business performance, but understanding organisational behaviour (OB) should be a priority rather than a “soft” focus area. And if your business is planning to introduce a big change to a department or team, embedding organisational change as part of your transformation will be the key to your success.
What is organisational behaviour and why does it matter?
Organisational behaviour is the study of human behaviour at an individual, group, or company-wide level. The findings are used to inform business change.
Whether we like it or not, change is necessary to remain competitive and meet the needs of customers and the marketplace. So, how closely aligned everyone is to your organisation’s values and desired behaviours is crucial to activating change. If just one person isn’t on board with your transformation, its adoption will be compromised.
Understanding people is important, but there are three further areas an organisational behaviour study will investigate.
Three areas an organisational behaviour study will investigate
-
Structure
Structure is about understanding how work is divided across the business, how roles and responsibilities are assigned (in theory and in practice), and how this impacts the way individuals and teams work with each other.
In the field of organisational behaviour, there are four repeated organisational models that are often discussed: autocratic, custodial, supportive, and collegial.
Supportive organisations encourage employees with great leadership skills and those deemed “collegial” go one step further – to behave responsibly through partnership and teamwork.
Custodial businesses are more likely to use money, benefits, and security to control employees. And the autocratic model relies on power to control employees.
-
Technology
No business operates without technology, so an organisational behaviour study will assess the type of tech, software, and/or tools that a business is using and will investigate whether the workforce understands how to use it to its full capability. It will also look at whether the tech is good enough.
-
External factors
External factors include the impact the wider world has on your business, such as a global pandemic and customer behaviour.
To sum up, organisational behaviour analysis will give you:
- A better understanding of your employees
- A better understanding of what your current and aspiring leaders require
- Increased employee satisfaction which in turn should have a positive impact on customer satisfaction
- Less attrition and more new hires who are aligned with your vision and values
- Improved culture that transcends the written vision and values statements
- Improved team collaboration and dynamics
- Higher productivity
How can you bring organisational behaviour change into your organisation?
Any organisational behaviour change initiative should ensure your people understand the reason why you’re transforming.
Change comes in various forms: think about whether yours is reactive or proactive. Is it strategic or structural? Process or people-oriented? If you can demonstrate why the change is necessary, you’ll reduce resistance. You should also get more meaningful engagement from your people as you conduct the activities necessary to conduct an analysis.
The person conducting organisational behaviour activities, whether it’s an internal colleague or an external expert, should be willing to be challenged by those they engage with. This will build trust and help gather more meaningful data.
Key activities that underpin a good organisational behaviour study will include:
- Desk research that could include analysis of internal and external data
- Extensive interviews with C-suite, operational staff, and ideally clients (customer perception is incredibly valuable)
- Observation of any boards associated with your organisation
Once you’ve conducted your observations and analysis, you’ll want to articulate the key themes to present back to your people. It may feel uncomfortable, especially if what you’ve discovered isn’t aligned with your values or behaviours, but transparency is the way forward.
In my experience, it’s refreshing for leaders to talk openly about what isn’t working and show commitment to being a part of the change. Credibility is your friend, even if it means hard conversations ahead.
Being transparent about the findings is one thing, but you’ll swiftly want to create a backlog of items that need to be tackled to improve the current state. To do this, collaborate with people across the business and prioritise activities based on what will return the greatest value to your teams/customers first.
Perhaps you’ve learned that your biggest challenge is a lack of clarity on roles and responsibilities that is contributing to the wrong behaviour. In this instance, you may want to review the way teams work together, cross reference what people really do day-to-day versus what their job description says, and review and refine their roles and responsibilities collaboratively. This will give a sense of ownership to those who will be executing the work.
As a part of any organisational behaviour review, it’s prudent to reflect on how people in your organisation treat reward and risk; you want to know what they value. And you’ll want to use this to understand how to reward, recognise, and develop your people in the future.
Do you need help with transforming your business or completing an organisational behaviour review? Our people and change management services may be able to support you. To find out more, please get in touch.
