Strategic Organisational Development: The Key Principles for Success

How can you get ahead of your competitors?  What is your organisation’s key differentiator/USP (Unique Selling Point)?  How can leverage your USP to your strategic advantage? How can you demonstrate value on your people development ROI (Return on Investment)?

These, and many other questions, are posed to HR/OD professionals within an organisation. Having the answers to these will ensure growth and competitive sustainability for your organisation, resulting in increased market share and greater profits. But how can this be achieved?

It is often cited that real competitive advantage in the modern business world is down to the speed of acquiring knowledge, as well as the focused skills needed to implement this; i.e., having the knowledge to be innovative, creative and surpass your rivals, as well as having a highly skilled workforce to accomplish the strategic vision. If your rate of learning and acquiring knowledge falls behind the rate of change – this will result in failure. This requires strong leadership and sustainable OD throughout. The answer can be seen in two primary parts.

The first, is the rate at which an organisation learns and manages knowledge as well as being able to utilise the skills needed.  By the time a ‘static’ or slow organisation has time to respond to change it will be too late. So, flexibility, dynamism, excellent structure and strong leadership is required.

The second, and probably the most important part of the answer, can be found in your people. It is the people that make the difference. Your processes, equipment, systems and procedures can be copied and improved on by your competitors – but they cannot copy your workforce. It is therefore of key strategic importance that you identify, develop and retain the best; as well as target and develop the key focused skills needed for sustainable growth.

In this rapidly changing global market, Strategic Organisational Development has never been more important to an organizations’ success than now. It’s important to the outcome of a successful Strategy runs like a ‘Golden Thread’ – from conception to implementation and beyond. ‘Organisations now need to be agile, adapt to respond quickly to fluctuating economic environments. In addition, they need to develop the best, talented people for continued sustainable growth. The OD strategy, the structure, and associated systems have to be right to ensure this success, along with strong leadership.  Getting this wrong would be like building a ship out of paper.’

If your role involves, Strategy, Talent Management, Learning and Development, HR and, more importantly, OD (Organisational Development), you cannot afford not to be the best in your discipline. Because if you’re not – your competitor will be. In addition, you will need to demonstrate that your work adds value, rather than seen as an overhead, so a greater understanding of ROI (Return on Investment) is needed.

If you think that you want to learn more and master the skills needed to be the key catalyst for your Organisation Development, then our leading-edge Oxford programme ‘Strategic Organisational Development’ has been designed to meet your needs.