36 Engaging, Assessing, and Identifying Organizational Change Interventions

Similar to community change work, the strategies for organizational change follow the steps of engagement,  assessment, and intervention.  Therefore, this chapter will follow these same steps in a more condensed form and highlight assessments used by organizations depending on the type of external or internal factors and forces that are driving the change. The recommendations provided in this chapter are based on current and recent trends that have been observed as primary drivers of organizational change.

Engagement Methods

The engagement phase of organizational change work will differ significantly depending on whether you are already a part of the organization or not. Similar to engagement with a community, engaging at the organizational level includes getting to know the organization and establishing trust.

Engaging as an Existing Member of an Organization

If you are an existing member of an organization you will want to engage your coworkers, team, or supervisors by bringing attention to the external or internal factors or forces for change. These were covered in the previous chapter and include:

• External
  • Demands by the community, often in response to tragedy
  • Mandated change driven by policy
  • Trends or shifts in context or funding that require a shift in strategy
• Internal
  • Evaluation results that demonstrate outcomes not being achieved
  • Evaluation results that demonstrate the organization is consistently not culturally relevant to the population being served
  • Evaluation results are inconsistent between staff and services
  • Difficulty with recruitment and retention of staff and/or board members
  • People being served are disproportionate to the population

You may start your engagement with speculation about the above factors but should have some form of evidence or observations to share when engaging others. Given the importance of establishing wide versus narrow bridges of communication, it is important to engage with more than one person so that you are not reliant on them to validate or give credibility to your observations.

Engaging as a New Member of an Organization

If you are new to an organization you have an important opportunity with engagement because you will be asking questions and making observations as a part of the introductory or orientation period. And, you haven’t been absorbed into the culture or organizational norms yet, so you bring a fresh perspective and sense of naivety. You also haven’t had the opportunity to establish trust or mistrust, so you may have more leeway for the types of questions you ask or observations you share that other members of the organization don’t have.

Similar to engaging with a community, it is best to begin by asking questions and listening to the response before forming any judgments.  The questions can be related to observations but they will be heard and responded to differently if they are delivered in a question. For example:

• I am curious, does the organization use a trauma-informed approach?
• Out of curiosity, why does the assessment form only include male and female as gender categories?

The goal of your questions should be to encourage your coworkers to pause and consider what you are asking about and the observations you are making. Do they have an answer to your question that explains the observation? If so, you likely learned some critical information about the organization. If not, are they willing to explore the idea or question a little further by engaging in a type of assessment?

Assessment Stage

The next phase of organizational change is assessment. This is where the observations, factors, and forces are explored more intentionally and more in-depth. This phase is very important because it establishes and reinforces credibility and trust.

Here are a few commonly used assessment tools:

Assessment Tools

• Anti-racist organizational assessments: The past decade has seen a rise in expectations for racial justice work at the organizational level, primarily driven by external forces and demands for change. As noted by Winters (2020) an organization that has integrated diversity, equity, and inclusion into all aspects of their work can maintain a more thriving environment for their staff and their work^[1]. Therefore, it is critical to begin with an assessment and then identify specific gaps, needs, and strategies for moving forward. Here are two of the many resources for assessments:
  • Resource Guide for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Organizational Assessment Tools. (2021) Prepared by Trinidad Tellez, MD, Principal, [Health] Equity Strategies, LLC in partnership with the Institute for Economic and Racial Equity, Brandeis University.
  • Organizational Change Tools supports work that goes beyond the DEI approach to focus more on bringing anti-racist strategies into the organization.
• LGBTQ+ organizational assessments and strategy work: The past decade has also witnessed a rise in expectations for inclusion work for lesbian, gay, transgender, queer, asexual, intersex, and two-spirit folx in our organizations, in our work, and in our community, while also responding to social and legislative erosions of rights in many parts of the U.S. Thankfully, the current Biden administration has signed an executive order expanding workplace nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ+ individuals^[2] and there are organizations leading the way for assessing and transforming organizations to be more inclusive. Here are two related resources:
  • Beyond Visibility: Assessing your Transgender and Nonbinary workplace (2022). Prepared by Out and Equal. The assessment tools shared on their website provide a global perspective on LGBTQ+ workplace equity.
  • Transgender Inclusion in the Workplace: A Toolkit for Employers (2016). Prepared by the Human Rights Campaign and begins with a “gender audit” that examines whether a workplace recognizes and supports the unique needs of its transgender employees.
• Disability Inclusion: It has been over 30 years since the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), a civil rights law that expressly prohibits discrimination based on disability. Since this federal law guides organizational and workplace expectations regarding access, it is critical that people understand the expectations of the law, but should view this as a baseline for their disability inclusion work.
  • ASAN (Autistic Self Advocacy Network). This organization, run by and for people with autism, is working to create a world more inclusive for autistic people. They have publicly available resources, training, and assessments to support people with autism across their lifespans and help them reach their potential.
• Trauma-Informed Organizational Assessment: The practice of trauma-informed work recognizes that people and families are impacted by a variety of traumas that influence the extent to which help can be provided and accepted.
  • Trauma Stress Institute’s Trauma Informed Organizational Assessment. A toolbox for assessing a variety of organizations for the extent they are engaged in trauma-informed practice or care.

Organizational Interventions and Strategies for Change

Communicating and Networking for Change

Centola (2021) shares insights on how systems can be more able to adapt to change when they focus on promoting new behaviors and innovations rather than just sharing information^[3]. They describe this in the 7 fundamental strategies for change:

1. Don’t rely on contagiousness. Instead of relying on the contagion spread of information, use strategies to intentionally change people’s beliefs and behaviors. Maintaining too much reliance on influencers can backfire.
2. Protect the innovators. Support ‘wide’ versus ‘narrow’ bridges to connect innovators who can not only spread information within their network but can reinforce their ideas.
3. Use the network periphery. People in the periphery of a network are less connected and therefore are more insulated, which makes it the ideal part of a system for innovations to ‘take hold.’ Instead, the more highly connected influencers may be the largest roadblock to change since they are likely to be connected to many people who are conforming to the status quo.
4. Establish wide bridges. Wide bridges (versus narrow ones) have redundancy built into the design which reinforces ties between points and translates into networks that are more successful at spreading new ideas and preferable behaviors. A narrow communication channel is efficient at spreading information but not reinforcing it. A wider bridge is important for establishing trust, credibility, and legitimacy.
5. Create relevance. Context is important for establishing relevance and can then influence whether similarity or diversity of influences is most important. For example, if the behavior change requires belief that the behavior is widely accepted then it is important that there is diversity in the source of the influence (variety of people accepting the change). If the behavior change requires a feeling of solidarity or excitement, then it helps if the influencing sources are similar to the person or group you are focused on.
6. Use the snowball strategy. Focus on strategic places to spread the behavioral change rather than just strategic people. Research shows that too much exposure to people who resist adoption will backfire. Instead, focusing on particular change agents can reduce the percentage of the ‘tipping point’ for change, which research demonstrates as needing to be approximately 25%. So, focus on persuading a quarter of the network or team in the need for change.
7. Design team networks to improve discovery and reduce bias. Research conducted with a variety of networks shows that smaller teams that established connections for information sharing but met less frequently were more effective at improving discovery, fostering innovation, and reducing bias than those that were larger but communicated more frequently.

Trainings & Creative Organizational Learning for Change

A very common outcome of an organizational assessment is the need for additional and specific training. This is particularly the case with change efforts related to anti-racism, equity, and inclusion. I want to suggest that training can come in many forms and it may be optimal to mix up the types of trainings and learning experiences that are intended to drive and support organizational change efforts. Consider the following ideas:

• Off-site conferences and workshops. It is common for organizations to support staff to attend conferences and workshops on topics relevant to their mission and work. These can be important training opportunities for networking and idea generation. They also can be an incentive for employees to spend time away from their day-to-day work and engage with others in an environment that can be fun and engaging. Conferences and workshops are resource intensive, however, which can limit the number and frequency of opportunities for staff, so it is important to consider other ways of learning.
• On-site trainings and workshops. In addition to supporting attendance at off-site conferences and workshops, organizations can host their own trainings and workshops using internal and external expertise. One benefit of this is that the content of the training can be tailored to specific organizational needs, however, this can also be resource-intensive.
• Learning and discussion groups. Another valuable strategy for organizational learning is a discussion group, which typically involves reviewing, listening, or watching similar content and then discussing it. A common structure for this is a book club that revolves around the reading and discussing of a book focused on content relevant to the organizational change goals. These groups could also consider podcasts, documentaries, videos, or even TED Talks since there are a plethora of options that are publicly available or low or no cost.

Creating or Modifying Policies for Change

Another common strategy for facilitating organizational change is to establish or update an organizational policy. This is an important way to clearly communicate decisions that have been made and guide the expectations of staff, volunteers, and a board of directors. Policies are also often used to translate federal and state policies which dictate organizational practices and expectations.

Common organizational policies cover the following areas:

• Functions of the Board of Directors
  • number of members
  • frequency of meetings
  • responsibilities
  • decision-making process
• Employee behaviors
  • social media use
  • diversity, equity, and inclusion
  • harassment
  • remote work and networking
• Organizational functions
  • caseloads
  • confidentiality and privacy protections
  • vehicle use
  • computer use and protections
  • financial and recordkeeping processes

A common outline for an organizational policy includes:

1. Purpose: ­A brief description of the intention of the policy.
2. Definitions: Specific definitions that provide clarity and a shared understanding of what the policy is addressing.
3. Guidelines for Behavior: Outlines or describes what is acceptable and preferred behavior as well as what is unacceptable.
4. Procedures: ­Identifies rights, responsibilities, and steps for complaint investigation and resolution.

If the policy is likely to change a cultural norm, it is optimal to involve a team of staff to assist in the development of the policy.  This would likely positively impact the awareness and compliance of the policy.

All organizational policies should be reviewed by someone who can provide legal consultation to ensure that the policy components and procedures are compliant with workplace laws and employee protections. Once approved, it is important that all people impacted by the policies be directly communicated with to ensure that the policy is understood—both the purpose and methods for compliance.