GPI OD Strategy: Five Phases

Professionals should integrate OD skills with the growing number of L&D, performance improvement, and talent management solutions focused upon increasing organizational effectiveness. The process used by OD practitioners to design and implement organizational development strategies is structured in five phases:

• ⦿ Entry represents the initial contact between consultant and client in which they present, explore, and identify the problem, opportunities, or situation. The output of this phase is an engagement contract or project plan that establishes mutual expectations and preliminary agreements about project scope (such as time, money, and resources).
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• ⦿ Diagnosis (assessment) represents the fact-finding phase. It is a collaborative data gathering process between organizational stakeholders and the consultant in which relevant information about the presenting problem is gathered, analysed, and reviewed.
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• ⦿ Feedback represents the return of analysed information to the client or client system; exploration of the information for understanding, clarity, and accuracy; review of preliminary agreements about scope and resource requirements; and the beginning of ownership of data by the client. The output of this phase is typically an action plan that outlines the change solutions to be developed, along with defined success indicators based on the information and data analysis.
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• ⦿ Solution represents the design, development, and implementation of the solution or set of solutions meant to correct the problems, close gaps, improve or enhance organizational performance and effectiveness, or seize opportunities. Outputs may include a communication plan, a role-and-responsibility matrix, a training plan, a training curriculum, an implementation plan, a risk management plan, an evaluation plan, or a change management plan.
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• ⦿ Evaluation represents the continuous process of collecting formative and summative evaluation data to determine whether the initiative is meeting the intended goals and achieving defined success indicators. Outputs generally include an evaluation report with recommendations for continuous improvement.