Organization Development Consulting Services

Organization Development at UVIC can be described as an ongoing effort to create a healthy, effective and productive organization that supports our vision to be a “university of choice for outstanding students, faculty, and staff from BC, Canada and the world…”

Organization Development (OD) services include Human Resource related consulting, coaching, and facilitation services that assist leaders in developing and improving individual, team, department and organizational effectiveness over the long term.

The OD consultant can work work with you to clarify what is working well already and help you create "what you want more of" individually and in your work team, department, or program.

The field of organizational development (OD) was originally based on a blend of psychology and sociology; it now incorporates many business elements such as strategic planning, production, accounting, and others. OD looks at how groups and organizations function - how people interact to accomplish their work. Common types of OD work include change management, conflict resolution, strategic planning, diversity, performance development, teambuilding and organization design. Our OD Services to support this work are described below.

• When to seek OD Consultant Services
• OD Consulting Services
• Leader Coaching Services
• Manager Tool Kit
• Change and Transition Services
• Team Building

When to seek OD Consultant Services

• when you need a sounding board or coach (i.e. someone to ask good questions and help you find your own solutions)
• to facilitate new and existing team development
• when a change is not going well or you are anticipating problems with a change
• when your team or department needs to learn new skills together (e.g. to improve communication, meetings, decision making etc.)
• when you have a problem, struggle, issue or conflict within a team

Your assigned HR consultant can help you determine if OD services are required. They can also meet with you and the OD consultant to determine the best course of action.

Your OD consultant can be called in to help you deal with issues when there are no ‘hard and fast’ rules on how to handle something – when its about relationships, about working together or about building a better workplace.

OD Consulting Framework

The OD Consultant (and in appropriate situations, the HR Consultant) will use a consulting framework to guide their work with you.  The framework includes some or all of the following phases:

Contracting Phase

Where we help you clarify needs, identify desired outcomes and determine options for proceeding. We explore how we can support you in achieving your objectives.

Assessment Phase

Where we gather more information as required and bring it back to you to identify areas for growth and build a plan for development. We may collect information using interviews, focus groups, surveys, observations, or review historical material.

Implementation Phase

Where we work with you to implement strategies, make changes, and ‘grow your strengths’.

Evaluation Phase

Where we seek immediate written feedback on our work and if applicable longer term assessment (e.g. 3 – 12 months) of results.

Manager Tool Kit

This Toolkit provides some of the tools that will enable you as a leader to tap into the learning, experience and creativity of all your employees. Although each tool is intended to be self-explanatory, please contact Ardis Myette at amyette@uvic.ca (Local 5446) or Terrie Conway at tconway@uvic.ca (Local 5490) if you want guidance in how to apply the tool with your team or work group. Our intention is to continually add to this tool kit over the weeks and months ahead.

Change and Transition Services

The OD Consultant uses various models for effective decision-making, problem solving and change and transition management. You can find tools for Change and Transition in the Manager Toolkit. Also available are workbooks for Managing Change and Transition, Take Charge of Change and Steps and Tools for Managing Change and Transition.

Team Building

The OD Consultant provides support to new, existing and amalgamated teams using the following team model:

Developing Effective Teams Model

Typically they work with the leader or a smaller working group to determine what they would like to get from the teambuilding session and develop an agenda to meet those desires.  Depending on the time the group has allotted to the session, they may develop pre-work for members to help them do some thinking prior to the session. You can find more information on Team Building in the Manager Toolkit.