Organizational assessments are an important strategic tool when prepared and implemented thoughtfully. Whether you are conducting an Organizational assessment to evaluate how well you are performing against your strategic goals or the organization’s readiness to begin the process of achieving against those goals it is important to keep a few things in mind:
- Tie your questions to your goals
When you review your assessment scores as a whole you may mistakenly see a score of 80% as within range and therefore a positive outcome. What could be overlooked is an area scoring near zero where the organization is under-performing and has tremendous room for improvement. Depending on the Strategic goals of an organization it may be meaningful to look at questions in areas such as Senior Leadership, Management, Team Dynamics, Innovation, Gratitude, and Organizational Agility.
For instance, if you are measuring the gratitude of your employees you will want to tie those questions to that performance goal. Gratitude is an important measure to include because when this indicator scores high you typically see a positive corporate culture, job satisfaction, decreased turnover, and reduced absenteeism. The inverse is true where gratitude measures poorly.
- Diversity
Diversity is possibly the biggest buzzword in corporations in 2017. However, few companies are succeeding in this area. I recently read about a company that underwent a tremendous overhaul to improve the diversity of its workforce. Increasing diversity within the organization had been a long term strategic goal. To achieve this important initiative, they brought in consulting teams to educate the staff on diversity, hired a Diversity Director, and changed their recruitment process to attract more diverse applicants. What they didn’t do?
They did not reach out to the minority groups represented within the organization at the start to understand what the Organization was doing right and what they were doing wrong to be inclusive. Instead, leadership presumed they knew how their employees felt and assumed everything was ok.
It turns out when leadership finally did ask the question, they were shocked to learn many employees were not satisfied with the steps the organization was taking to be inclusive. Lessons learned from this?
You want your employees to be evangelists for your organization, especially the employees that represent the population you are trying to reach. If you have a goal to increase diversity make sure you are keeping your ear to the ground to those folks that represent the group you are trying to reach.
- Even Selection Choices
This may seem like a no brainer but is often overlooked. Some employees are happy to answer all questions with the middle of the road option (for example 3) when given odd-numbered answer sets such as 1-5. By providing even answer sets (for example 4 options) you force team members to pick a side and get increased clarity on the item you are trying to measure.
- Feedback
At best organizational assessments allow you to focus on where you need to improve and boast about what you are doing well. At worst they ruin team morale by failing to communicate results to all employees. Remember your ability to communicate results timely is an indicator of your organizational agility. If you are humbled by some of the results, communicate that as well. Your team will welcome the transparency and want to help turn it around. Your integrity is on the line so don’t hold back. Transparent communication is key to building and keeping a positive culture.
Lastly don’t forget to do it all over again and again. Keep the conversation going. Assessments are valuable tools not a means to an end. Refine, redo and keep adjusting as needed. Good luck and if you need help Clinton Street is always here to assist.
Need help creating an Organizational assessment? Email: MicheleLeedom@ClintonStreet.Consulting.
Want to learn more about what we do? Visit us at https://clintonstreet.consulting
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Michele is passionate about connecting people, developing business strategies and leading people and organizations through change. Michele’s career began in the healthcare industry where she held several financial leadership roles. She now works as an Executive Consultant where she enjoys partnering with organizations to assist in their strategic planning, team building and executive coaching. With intellectual curiosity, humor and deep empathy, Michele nurtures, inspires, and empowers teams to rethink the way they do things so they can fulfill their greatest potential.
Clinton Street Consulting 