A Field Guide for Organisation Development

Book excerpt: Organisation Development, as a field, is messy, imperfect and hard to get hold of - it is like nailing jelly to the wall. A Field Guide for Organisation Development offers a variety of perspectives and unparalleled experiences from practitioners and researchers who all share an interest and involvement in Organisation Development (OD). In it are multiple voices, mindsets and practices - not all of which necessarily agree with each other. Leading OD practitioners present a contemporary, practical guide that tackles the dilemmas and polarities that face anyone studying or practising within the OD arena, and encourages them to develop their own particular practice of OD in a way that is appropriate for their context, skills and preferences, while challenging them to look beyond what comes naturally. Here are new ways to support the growth and development of an organisation from modest endeavours that are small in scale to organisation-wide change programmes. A Field Guide for Organisation Development is as comprehensive a resource to support the practice of OD as can be found anywhere. It covers issues of organisational health as well as offering tools aimed at supporting practitioners to survive in the harsh realities of organisational life. It contains chapters on the OD practitioner, on groups, on culture, on data and evaluation. It offers perspectives on change, on the relationship between OD and HR, and on the use of external consultants.