Organisational Development and Change Management Case Study: Timber

This case study analyzes the B.R. Richardson Timber Products Corporation, focusing on organizational development and change management. The analysis identifies issues related to employee satisfaction, plant manager leadership, outdated technology, and unclear organizational structure. It explores interventions like training, process consultation, and self-development, with a focus on decentralization and strategic interventions. The document recommends actions such as a systematic problem-solving approach using an action research model and fostering a learning culture to improve organizational effectiveness. The goal is to enhance employee engagement, improve decision-making, and drive organizational success through strategic changes and improved internal processes.

Running Head: Organisational development
Organizational Change Management
Case Study on B.R. Richardson Timber Product

Organisational development
Table of Contents
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................2
Issues with B.R. Richardson Timber Products Corporation and its impact............................................3
Resolving the interventions...................................................................................................................3
Selecting the intervention and justifying the appropriateness................................................................5
Actions to be implemented for organisational success..........................................................................6
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................7
References.............................................................................................................................................7
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Organisational development
Introduction
The entire report is based on the case study analysis of the B. R. Richardson Timber Products
Corporation. B. R. Richard is the president of the quoted organisation and Bowman is the
relationship manager within the company who see towards the growing relations among the
employer and the employee. The discrepancies in relation to the employees’ satisfaction
were the concern for the company and the strategy adopted by the plant manager was not
satisfactory enough. Thus, Lawler was contacted to arbitrate the particular issue by
constructing the motivational plan for the organisation.
On analysing the case certain issues were recognised and studied to know the root
cause of their occurrence along with the impact of these issues on the organisation as a
whole. Afterwards the interventions related to the company were well defined and specific
issues were identified so that the problems could be resolved on the basis of priority. Thereby
the specific interventions were selected and examined; decentralisation and strategic
interventions were chosen to improve the condition of the organisation. For that sake the
strategy and structure aspect was given the priority. At the end, the necessary implementation
was recommended and action research model was selected to perform the action and
implement the selected changes and interventions.
In nutshell, the organisational development is the combination of employee
satisfaction, organisational strategy, culture and structure. If the appropriate concern is paid
on these attributes most of the problems are likely to get resolved and the staff becomes
resistant to changes which results in the overall development of the employees and
organisation.
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Organisational development
Issues with B.R. Richardson Timber Products Corporation and its impact
B.R. Richardson is the president of the company and Richard Bowman I the industrial
relationship officer. He assists in building up the relations among the industries. Lawler had
mastered in managing the training and development consulting reputation. The issue that
arouse was there’s a need for the motivational session to be conducted in the organisation
specifically for the blue collar employees. This is because the environment within the plant
was less morale and the fatality was noted in the surroundings. Also there was an issue in
relation to the plant manager. He carried the bossy nature and was authoritative which could
have become the hurdle in solving the motivational issues. Another problem is that
everything within the organisation is connected with one another; a discrepancy in one
section automatically affects the other portions as well (Dupray, Guillemot & Melnik-Olive,
2017). In one or the other section there occurs the issues related to setting up of goal,
constructing the mission and the strategies to be adopted are not clear to the plant manager.
Even the machinery used in the timber plant was out dated and the manager was not bothered
about it. Such ignorance might result in the severe accidents and injuries to the workers
working over the machinery. The workers were not allotted the specific role to perform, they
report to the superior cross-functionally (Woody, 2014). Company should specify the
designation to make the situation clearer. Another major problem that occurred was the
depletion of the resources, the allocation of resources is inappropriate and this results in
imbalance in nature and its natural resources. Mission and vision of the organisation is also
not clear which affects the objective of the company. The directions are not clear and in such
a case there are chances that the value of the business is lost (Baumgartner & Rauter, 2017).
Since the plant has been established there is a need for certain advancement in terms of
technology, but in the B.R. Richards Timber Products Corporation the technology is not as
per the standard. There occurs the technological intercession which imbalances the structure
of the organisation and affects the quality of the product within the organisation. If such
circumstance continues it will adversely affect the development of the company (Usrpudlia,
2017).
Resolving the interventions
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Organisational development
On analysing the issues and its impact the resolution need to be driven. It was seen
that organizational structure of the company was weak and the leadership qualities are
lacking in the plant manager. Though the manager was authoritative yet the required
leadership styles were not there. For this concern the appropriate training session must be
organised where lessons to deal with the human resources should be rendered. Even the staff
must be given timely training so that adequate working takes place and specialisation is
gained. For the sake of conducting the training program T-groups must be created, these
groups’ renders training to the managers so that they could handle the organisational
behaviour and solve the employee grievances (Harinck & Druckman, 2017). The
technological advancement must be promoted so that innovations and modifications could
take place. This helps in maintaining the standards and building up the positive position in the
market so that the company could stand along with the competitors and market value gets
increased. Also the plant manager must focus on building relationship among the employees
and peers it will not only strengthen his very position but also develops a sense of
belongingness among the peers, superior and subordinate. For this sake team building must
be opted and they must be given the common goal to fulfil. This will help the employees to
know each other in a better way and the hidden potential of the person gets reflected in the
team work (Sylvester et al, 2017). Another way to resolve the interventions are the process
consultation. It diagnoses the situation and assists in improvising the behaviour of
employees. Through process consultation the staffs wisely uses the resources and solves the
interpersonal issues occurring within the organisation. This interpersonal problem often
creates a barrier in resolving the work related circumstances. Also there is a need for self-
development as well (Kumpfer, Magalhaes & Xie, 2017). Most of the problems could be
resolved if self-development has been encouraged. It not only solves the personal problems
but also analyses the issues within any organisation and take a font to solve them by their
own so that it do not get elongated to create the issue. For that first of all the formal training
is needed as discussed earlier. The proportion in which this training is divided is 70/20/10.
The 70 percent feedback is the outcome of learning the etiquettes of being good at their
position and how the person treats their job, 20 percent feedback is relevant to the role model
of the person and to what extent have they imitated their values and qualities and lastly, 10
percent feedback is through the formal training which could be in the classroom manner, on
the job and off the job training (Waddell, 2017).
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Organisational development
Selecting the intervention and justifying the appropriateness
The best intervention that needs to be selected is elimination of the decision making
hierarchy. Basically it is known as Decentralisation, where the responsibilities and authorities
are delegated to the employees and they are made independent to take certain limited decision
at their own level. This manner the confidence among the employees is developed. They feel
to be the important part of the organisation and these results in increasing the connectivity of
the staff within the company. The suggestions and ideas of the employees are valued and
organisational commitment increases along with the employee engagement. It is not only
beneficial aspect from the view point of the employee but also from the organisation
perspective because employees are those who hold one on one interaction with the customers
and they actually face the external market area (Takai & Kumar, 2017). They know the
choice, trend; fashion and tastes of the consumers. The consumer behaviour could be better
analysed by the lower level employees and they might access the competition prevailing in
the outer world within domestic boundaries and even the cut throat competition beyond the
boundaries (Nematollahi, Hosseini-Motlagh & Heydari, 2017). The position of the company
globally could be evaluated and accordingly the future steps might be inculcated. This build
up the healthy relations in the company and the internal environment gets strengthened and
the employer employee relationship also develops with the passing time. The decentralisation
approach led to the incoming of new varieties of ideas and suggestions which could result in
innovation of the out of the box techniques. This policy not only helps in modifications but
also builds up the unique image in the external environment and set up the level of
competition to the distinct extent thereby becoming the trend setter within the industry.
Though at the end final decision is taken by the top management only but the ideas, views
and opinions shared by the employees are highly valued and this also helps the top
management to invest this particular time in something more crucial and effective in terms of
the organisational development as a whole (Schoenlaub, 2015).
Also along with the elimination of decision making hierarchy the strategic
intervention could also be chosen as one of the intervention that might bring about good
results. The strategic intervention states the implementation of necessary changes in an
organisation and the relationship of the organisation with the outer world. Such an
intervention might lead to the merger and acquisition or opening up of the new venture or
undergo the joint venture. The expansion of the company in the domestic as well as
international market takes place and along with the increased market the competition also
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Organisational development
gets widen up and strict. The competitors become aware of the new strategy and they might
imitate the policy (Coleman, Sorensen, Yaeger & Hinchrus, 2017). Therefore before the
launch of competitors the urgent steps must be taken by the company to introduce their very
own schemes and set the trend within the market area. When the new strategies are launched
in the national and international market the relationship with the stakeholders also get build
up and moreover the chain of people grows with the growing business which is overall the
positive symbol for the company for the future development. Along with the varieties of
strategies the structure of the organisation must also be changed to introduce newness and
making the staff and other members resistant to the changes that are taking place and are
likely to take place in the near future. The organisational structure also affects the
organisational culture and thereby the entire organisational development takes place with the
invention and modification of the organisational strategies and structure (Wolfenden et al,
2017).
Actions to be implemented for organisational success
The two intervention strategies have been discussed in the earlier section. Firstly the decision
making right to be handed over to the employees to an extent and their ideas were welcomed
by the top management. Second important intervention that could be opted was the strategic
intervention where the expansion of business and relations among the peers were developed.
To make this strategy a big hit and successful in the external environment certain important
actions need to be adopted and implemented in a wise manner so that desired success could
be gained (Reynolds, 2017).
 Systematic approach towards the problem solving: In order to develop the internal
mechanism the action research model could be used this helps in improving the
organisation’s preparation and positively reciprocating to the prevailing and
upcoming dynamism. The action research model follows step by step approach and
the organisational development takes place in the professional manner and the
competitive skills are improvised.
 Employing the learning culture: The learning of the organisational culture develops
the functioning of the organisation and challenges grows up and along with the
growing challenges the alternatives to deal with these challenges also rises as the
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Organisational development
divergent ideas from the management and staff are collected and the one best
alternative is selected and implemented to achieve the desired goal (Huda et al, 2017).
 Facilitating the collaboration: The agents responsible for changing the environment
get collaborated to resolve the issues by identifying the problem and dealing with it as
per the priority. The mutual trust is developed and the confidence among the people
are developed which are not possible in the case of authoritative style of leadership
which the plant manager has opted (Watanabe, 2017).
Conclusion
Hence from the entire report it could be cultivated that B.R. Richard who is the
president of B.R. Richardson Timber Products Corporation was at the view that the issues
prevailing within the organisation are resolved and for that sake Bowman was appointed to
deal with the relationship within the organisation. On the orders of Richard, Bowman
contacted Lawler to design the best motivational plan for the organisation because the
scenario was deteriorating due to the authoritative style adopted by the plant manager. After
analysing the case study certain questions were answered to clarify the situation. Initially the
prevailing issues within the organisation were developed and necessary changes were
discussed. The impacts of these issues over the organisation were elucidated. Secondly, the
areas of the issues were specified and the particular interventions were given importance so
that better resolution could be drafted. Thirdly, the particularly selected interventions were
focussed and thee interventions were adoption of decentralisation approach and strategic
intervention. Both the aspects were crucially discussed keeping in mind the strategy and
structure of the organisation that matters a lot. Lastly, the action necessary to implement to
derive the success were investigated and for that sake the action research model was selected
which not only solves the problem but also lead the organisation to the very different level.
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