A process for shining the spotlight on Organisational Health
What I heard…
On Wednesday I spent the day in the company of 100 terrific women and addressed the assembled group about culture and change. It seemed to connect well with and put a focus on organisational health. It was wonderful to hear the thoughts of the great speakers who preceded the panel session and the women who addressed the room to conclude the day.
As I thought through the messages and questions I heard and responded to, I applied the organisational health filter as I reflected after the event.
My first understanding was how the personal becomes organisational.
The women who spoke provided key messages about:
- knowing who you are
- understanding your purpose
- being brave and stepping into the leadership space you can see.
They provided valuable encouragement to have a go, to stand-up and to feel the fear. Because you can see the leadership needed it therefore fits you and your leadership size and capacity.
We all talked about how to champion change.
The conversation also stretched to the workplace and:
- what is happening for women, and of course, by default everyone
- issues that need to be addressed
- how do you instigate change?
Well, you could call a party room (oops did I actually say that? I meant workplace) meeting and ensure issues are discussed.
Or...you could do the thinking and get your ideas well sorted. Start thinking through your approach to ensure the change that must happen actually occurs.
The other thing I noticed during Wednesday’s session was how stories and connecting with people’s heart and finding out about their why assists you in getting your opinions heard. I also observed that when I put the solutions into the room people were writing and follow-up conversations affirmed that hearing some solutions was really useful.
Solutions
So, the solutions for understanding your organisation and its health. It starts with questions:
- How can an organisation understand its health?
- Do you have a framework?
- Do you have a process?
- Is there a strong culture of trust and openness?
The process
We have developed an initial thinking process template for an internal organisational health activity.
Before you launch into the process I would counsel you to consider the first step and a leadership task. Assess one of the key organisational atmospherics. Assess whether there is an embedded sense of trust and openness? This needs to be the first step because leading your organisation through an organisational health process will not necessarily provide a strong action agenda if the team/tribe/people have a low level of trust/openness.
How do you develop trust quickly?
Why would you ask that? You can but think about why you are wanting to do that...
The more important question is how can I ensure we have the internally robust atmosphere of trust.
Now that you have sorted that, and you have run an eye over the level of openness and trust, you can safely embark on reviewing the organisational health from a broader perspective. Our template may assist you.
We, of course, are happy to develop a customised process for your team. And now you will know what our first question will be; trust and openness – how are you tracking?
Read our other blogs on organisational health here.