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(An Example of Successful
Facilitated Intelligent Solution)
Assessment, Analysis, Reorganization, and Cultural
Change to Improve Performance in Civilian Work
Force at Navy (Space and Naval Warfare) Field Activity
600-person field activity wanted a performance measurement system
to provide a set of metrics for implementation of cultural changes,
organizational changes, and performance improvement.
Key Challenges
- The
Head of the Navy (Space and Naval Warfare) Field Activity was considering
the implementation of several different reorganization, strategic, and
cultural changes; but the top management wanted to see if there was a way to
measure performance that would help them prioritize their actions.
- While the highest level
manager (a naval officer) was committed to change, the second highest level
manager (a civilian) was not intensely interested in any new programs that
might require reorganization or cultural changes.
-
Organizational structure was defined, but very complex and multi-layered.
- Excessive
numbers of contracts had never been closed out over a 20 year period,
resulting in complexities in accounting and data acquisition.
- The underlying
motivation, incentives, and risks for
key influencers, gatekeepers, and decision makers both inside and outside
the organization were extremely complex because of the variation and
complexity of the customers, the way that contracts were created, and the
complexities in the sources of funding.
- It
was not possible to convince some of the middle level managers that they
would personally benefit from some organizational and cultural changes
because some managers would actually be demoted if the number of people
managed dropped below certain levels.
- Because funding for various parts of the organization came from so
many different sources, in many cases it was not possible to budget or count
on specific levels of funding. Therefore it was impossible to
completely align long-term and short-term budgets and funding with
desired cultural changes and performance improvement.
- Some of the key managers had the mental toughness and commitment
to see the changes through to the end, but many did not care to make changes
of any consequence. Some had seen many promises in the past that were
not kept and they had become numb to any more promises for effective and
useful cultural and performance changes.
Successful Results
The goals of the efforts were focused on performance improvement, as a
precursor to refining organizational goals and ultimate cultural change. Data
was successfully extracted from composite contract information (no specific
contract information was used) and the accounting system, and the data was
combined in a number of ways to create both direct and indirect performance
measures. The performance measures were used to identify those divisions
that were less productive and set standards for new performance measures.
The command was reorganized following this engagement and the reorganizations
along with new directives, training, and communication approaches were used to
work toward improvement in performance and positive cultural changes.
The direct and indirect performance (and cultural change metrics) were combined
into a small number of time series graphs that allowed the top level managers to
monitor the effectiveness of changes made in their organization and make
comparisons with historical performance.
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