The modern business environment requires that organizations keep developing the behaviors and attitudes of workers to help the address match up to the ever-changing demand. To help satisfy the new challenges, organizations must plan to implement necessary strategies and manage efficiently the transition from the old to the new.
This is organizational development (Morrison, 2011). Many organizational managers think that changes influence the realization of the desired results. However, Bridges (2003) explains that it is managing the transition that influences the outcome. Thus, managing transition becomes a key element in organizational development.
The finance industry requires continuous organizational development to keep up with new and emerging trends. Some of the organizational development needs in the finance industry involve its public relations, a department that is given the mandate to create a very positive image of the organization.
Thus, the organization, a bank, whose services to the public depends on the marketing of its products as well as maintaining a good public image and has to make sure that among other things clients are satisfied with the organizational services.
The organization needed to increase its marketing activities at a minimal budget and one of the possible ways was to incorporate marketing as part of public relations. Thus, the PR personnel had to acquire new behavioral characteristic to enable than to perform their expanded roles.
The organizational management has had to facilitate the department’s transition to its multi tasking roles. The personnel thus had to developed in such a way that they will acquire marketing skills, embrace the new roles while still maintaining the production levels of PR duties.
For successful transition organizations needs a transitional agent, what Bridges (2003) calls transitional a manager. Every organizational development plan must be assigned to a manger thus the roles were given to one of the assistant marketing managers. The organization development plan involves identifying the gaps in development needs in the department.
His was done by identifying information and behavior that existed in the PR workers and the desired behavioral outcomes In this case the desired needs included learning of marketing skills. This stage also involved motivational training for the staff to encourage them to adapt to the new behaviors.
Developing the Human resource in the department is not enough and the organizational finance department must make the necessary structural and business process adjustments to facilitate the desired change.
As such the organization had to break the existing operational gaps between the marketing an public relations department by marrying their operations, beliefs, aims and objective while still maintaining the core PR functions of the public rations department.
It was also important to help the employees make the necessary transition at this stage by helping them to deal with the negative attitudes brought about by the increased job roles (Cummings and Worley, 2009; Bridges, 2003).
The new behaviors needed to be reinforced and cemented in the department through a series of motivation activities and support mechanism within the organization. As such, the company had to implement the right strategy and develop a reward scheme for employees in the public relations department who exhibited the right behavioral and attitude adjustments. Employees at the public relations department were now eligible for sales and marketing bonuses for those who met sales target.
To facilitate the awarding of bonuses a performance measurement scheme was implemented (Cummings and Worley, 2009; Bridges, 2003). This saw the employees take to the new challenge positively and eventually help the organization progressively move towards it attainment of its goals in increasing sales and marketing activities at a minimal cost.
Reference List
Bridges, W., (2003). Managing transitions. Cambridge, MA: DaCapo/Perseus.
Cummings, T., & Worley, C., (2009). Organization development & change. Mason, OH: South-Western/ Cengage Learning.
Morrison, M., (2001). What is organizational development?Rapid BI. Web.