1st Edition

Organization Development Ideas and Issues

By Robert Golembiewski Copyright 2008

    Organization Development provides a forum for the ideas and experiences of a researcher and consultant concerned with change in organizations. It shows how choice and change can be guided in a world now characterized by what the author terms "permanent temporariness." The book is at heart an approach to increasing the amount of responsible freedom at work. In this respect, the volume responds to an avalanche of social criticism that has been directed at bureaucracy, "organizational America," and the "organizational ethic." The field at organization development is informed by such criticisms but transcends it via technology and values that drive change and choice alike.

    1: What OD is, and Aspires To; Introduction; 1: “A Rose by Any Other Name . . .”: OD? OE? OI? HRD?; 2: Process Observation as the Key: Where and When to Practice Skills; 3: OD as Stool: Ruminations about a Metaphor; 4: Why OD? Putting Values in Their Prominent Place; 5: OD as Increasing Responsible Freedom in Organizations; 6: OT and OD: Transformation, Fine Tuning, or Rechristening?; 7: Some Differences between OD Generations, I: Four Generations and a Few Differentiae; 8: Some Differences between OD Generations, II: Socialization and Lode Stars; 9: Two Faces of OD: Populism and Elitism; 10: OD’s Near-Term Destiny: Professional Maturation or Time’s Dumpster?; 11: The Yellow Envelope on the Floor: Does Paying the Piper Imply Calling the Tune?; 12: Is OD Universalistic or Particularistic? Some Similarities between Private- and Public-Sector Consultation *; 13: Is OD Narrowly Culture-Bound? Well, Yes; and Then, No; 2: What OD Might Become; Introduction; 14: “So, What about Success Rates?”

    Biography

    Robert Golembiewski