Assessing Data: Organizational Diagnosis

Catalog description

This course familiarizes students with approaches to assessing and feeding back data in organization development (OD) and consulting services. WF ED 582 Assessing Data: Organizational Diagnosis (3) This course familiarizes students with approaches to assessing and feeding back data in organization development (OD) and consulting services. It helps students to develop the specialized competencies essential to diagnosing organizations for change efforts/interventions.Students in the course will learn various ways by which to define and conceptualize assessment, feedback, and diagnosis for OD and consulting efforts. Students will learn how to distinguish between the unique approaches to organizational diagnosis used by OD consultants and by management consultants to detect the underlying root causes of problems rather than the mere symptoms of such problems. OD consultants who work inside organizations (internal consultants) may face unique challenges in organizational diagnosis that differ from those challenges faced by consultants who are brought in from outside (external consultants), and this course will explore those challenges faced by each type of consultant and how those consultants may overcome those special challenges. The course will encourage students to identify the consulting competencies that OD consultants need to diagnose organizational problems, and the students will be invited to compare themselves to those competencies so that they will know what special skills they need to develop to be effective organizational diagnosticians and how to develop those skills. The course reviews the important elements necessary in establishing a strategic diagnostic plan for OD, implementing it, and evaluating the assessment and feedback strategy. Students will learn how to demonstrate the skills essential to separating symptoms (presenting problems) from underlying root causes during initial meetings and contacts with prospective OD sponsors and clients. Additionally, the course will examine how to prepare assessment and feedback protocols and reports for OD and change management interventions. Finally, the course will summarize current thinking and research on organizational diagnosis, assessment and feedback methods as well as ethical issues affecting organizational diagnosis and OD assessment and feedback.