MSOD 614 ASSIGNMENT #5 Cassone, M.

Seven-Figure Insight A Small-Systems Field Assessment

Marco Cassone

March 16, 2013

Dr. Ann Feyerherm MSOD 614 Assignment Five Graziadio School of Business Management Pepperdine University

MSOD 614 ASSIGNMENT #5 CASSONE, M.!

The Team. Alchemy is a highly diverse group of

team and learning group within the MSOD Program at Pepperdine University. Our rst engagement provided short-term organizational assessment and feedback to

help a southern California business leader gain clarity on issues related to his organization.

The Client System. Alchemy worked directly with Mr. Le Blanc managing director of a highly successful branch of a corporation in the nancial services and risk management industries. Client interaction included one-on-one interviews with 34 of the branchs 70 employees, ranging from new interns to tenured, high-income eld agents called Financial Representatives. Feedback and recommendations were subsequently provided to Mr. Le Blanc and his recruiting director, Bianca.

Context of eld assignment. The presenting opportunity was a diversity and inclusion (D&I) inquiry spearheaded by leadership: How do we start to develop a future eld force that can handle the changing demography of southern California in the decades to come? As a referral-based business, warm markets and relationships are key to accessing untapped and/or emerging markets. In this way, gender and ethnic diversity may play a big part of strategic positioning and should be seen as an important, organization-wide priority. As such, key decision makers made themselves available over our 3-day engagement to share their quite contrary perspectives on change.

Day 1 Intake. Our initial meeting with the client was a 90-min exchange during which overt and covert objectives surfaced to test our new relationship. The clients introductory overview showed polish, surface humor, and controlled comfort, often resembling a routine sales pitch lled with accolades, yet lacking in pain point. Alchemys team lead for the meeting managed interaction

A l c h e my

student professionals that form a practice consulting

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on many levels: a) information intake switching between pure inquiry and exploratory diagnostic inquiry (Schein, 1999, p. 44)1, and b) indirectly advancing the discussion through a sequence of contracting steps understood by the consulting team. As Alchemy achieved trust and status equilibration in our relationship (another unexpressed need), the client felt comfortable disclosing his awkward position: leading the companys top branch in nancial performance with no capacity to retain women or people of color in his eld force. The likely irony of sharing his conundrum with an ethnically diverse and predominately female group of promising business students might have occasionally pulled Mr. Le Blanc into recruiting mode, which seemed always present in the background. These unexpressed needs and manifest goals on the part of both parties are depicted in the chart above. Expressed & manifest goals Unexpressed & hidden needs Client system Disclose presenting problem Opportunity for recruitment Consulting team Active inquiry & intake Contracting & status equilibration

Conclusion #1: Insight Happens when it Happens Fully, Disruptively, with Grace.
One of the many paradoxes Im coming to understand about organization development is the

duality inherent in any research-based perspective on human behavior that is, the occasional absurdity of trying to quantify and make predictable the elusive and unpredictable nature of people. Cause-and-effect is a convenience of science, but its not necessarily how life is experienced, as noted by the existentialist philosopher, Kierkegaard, Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.2 Cause-and-effect locks paradigms in place; insights shift them. A rst conclusion of this paper can be inserted here yes, too early, out of order, and lacking in proper substantiation: INSIGHT is a sudden, disruptive quantum shift in awareness, often clearly linked only to CLIENT READINESS. Why this paper would prematurely ash forward to conclusion directly ties back to our eld intake; Mr. Le Blancs insights in our rst meeting also occurred proportionately too early, out of order

MSOD 614 ASSIGNMENT #5 CASSONE, M.!

(in terms of our contracting model), and with no identiable cause beyond his own readiness. Breakthroughs can be shocking yet soft like quiet potential in the air.like Grace.

My Point of View. My OD lens is starting to distinguish the science of Blocks step-by-step methodology from the art of Scheins principle-based philosophy. Despite Alchemys unexpressed goal of completing in sequential order each of the contracting steps prescribed in Flawless Consulting3, I noticed Mr. Le Blanc himself demonstrating a few of Scheins principles: Everything is an intervention; and All data can be a source for learning4. As he shared his story outside his normal comfort zone of lilly-white (his words) colleagues, it was clear his narration was disrupted by insight about his own resistance to the presence of unfamiliar ears. As a musician, I have noticed how music comes through me differently depending on the receptivity of different audiences. Perhaps more in tune with himself than Id given him credit for, Mr. Le Blanc may have similarly noticed authority and leadership coming through him differently, given the new and diverse listening we had brought into the room. How powerful to witness active inquiry itself inviting a client system to wake up, become self-aware, and start to challenge the ingrained assumptions of its own mythos.

Day 2 & 3 Assessment & Recommendation. My background in performance has given me a chameleon-like capacity to adapt and bring forward different sides of me to t a particular situation. That shared, I noticed a distinct shift in the Marco that showed up on days 2 and 3 for the eld assessment and subsequent delivery of feedback. Data about each nancial rep I interviewed came from what I noticed about me. In front of wide-eyed college interns, my sleeves got rolled up, my pencil tapped incessantly, and we hung out at a jocular level just above bro-speak. Diversity? one exclaimed, Heck yeah, but thats a luxury, dude, Im too busy busting it to start my career and meet my quotas. This younger crew was well aware of the benets of building diverse teams that could access untapped markets; they simply lacked the time, know-how, and resources to do so.

MSOD 614 ASSIGNMENT #5 CASSONE, M.!

Conversely, I had the privilege of interviewing the top earner in the company, who had preceded

Mr. Le Blanc in the business by two decades and was his closest golf bud. Our suits remained on the rst 20 minutes of our 25-minute chat, during which this gentleman predominantly interviewed me. At a certain point, however, our suits were drapped over chair backs, and I noticed both of us leaning in across his leather-top desk to accommodate a quieter tone: You got a good head on your shoulders, Marco. Let me tell how diversity and inclusion REALLY work around here. He then spent an additional half hour divulging an incredible range of information, escorting me through the world of a man for whom a seven-gure income had been made a career reality long, long ago.

Conclusion #2: When the Consultant is Ready, the Client Appears. My emerging lens on the client-consultant relationship is not what I would have guessed. Learning to perceive the subtle complexity of norms, cultures, dynamics, hidden fears, and motivators during assessment is crucial, and organizational blindspots teach me the most about my own. Environments must be perceived before they can inuence decisions about how to respond to them (Weick, 1979).5 This Ive found to hold true across multiple levels of coexisting systems for Mr. Le Blanc leading his organization; for Alchemy entering our client system; and for me nding my place in my own learning group.
When Im truly present, every interaction shows me the distance I must travel to see from a

new point of view a lesson I hope will serve me translating my experience abroad into the cultural norms of other countries. As I learn to actively listen and connect directly at the pain point of the system or individual in front of me, Ive had the unusual experience of becoming SAME with quasiinterchangeable roles as if comrades on the front line facing the same direction. This is not to say that I disrespect proper client-consultant boundaries (which is not say that I may have to learn about them experientially). Whats becoming clear is that insight is possible on both sides of the table. Depending on my own readiness, every client is a potential teacher for me at this stage of the game a stage I hope to leave no time soon.

MSOD 614 ASSIGNMENT #5 CASSONE, M.!

Recommendations & Take-aways. A few notes about our nal presentation to the client: Alchemy lead with appreciative inquiry in order to build report and frame whats already working. Less is more when delivering assessment feedback to the client leave space for insights. Recommendations must be translated to t the perspectives and objectives of the client system. D&I goals, milestones, and success metrics must be identied, shared, and commonly understood. Adding branch-wide perks to the rewards system could drive collaboration on D&I objectives. Common pitfalls for new consultants are projecting, over-communicating, and over-helping.

Still Stuck. Our recommendations had been smart, substantiated, and on point, yet Mr. Le Blanc couldnt hide the yeah-but all over his face. If nothing hed tried had worked before, why should it now? As he confessed bewilderment about change-positive and change-aversive attitudes in both tenured vets and new recruits, a ash of insight (plus Lewins force eld analysis) came to me, and I saw the entire situation in driving vs. restraining forces6 and organizational design components in conict. My sharpie quickly sketched out the 2x2 diagram to the right, and I took the oor. What Id realized is the companys training and development function depends on enculturating recruits through mentoring by vets. This indirectly fosters the well-meaning propogation of success stories lacking women and people of color by a few of his most successful, but change-aversive, colleagues. Alignment here was crucial, but had been missing. Without a word more, the simple 2x2 diagram escorted Mr. Le Blanc into a seven-gure career reality that had been xed long, long ago. Not only was alignment doable, it was as close as a conversation between two golf buds over a few rounds. New Recruits Tenured Vets Changepositive Future champions Allies for change Changeaversive Trainable newbies Alignment needed here

Conclusion #3: Dont save the world. Know when to stop. Dont over-conclude.

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References

Schein, E. (1999). Process Consultation Revisited Building the Helping Relationship. Reading, ! MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc.

Kierkegaard, S. & Hannay, A. (1996). Soren Kierkegaard Papers and Journals: A Selection. ! London: Penguin Books, p. 63.

Block, P. (2011). Flawless Consulting: A Guide to Getting Your Expertise Used. Audiobook. ! San Francisco, California: Pfeiffer.

Schein, E. (1999). Process Consultation Revisited Building the Helping Relationship. Reading, ! MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc., p. 17 & 50.

Weick, K. (1979). The Social Psychology of Organizing, 2nd ed. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley ! Publishing Company, Inc.

Lewin, K. (1943). Dening the "Field at a Given Time" Psychological Review. 50: pp. 292-310. ! Republished in Resolving Social Conicts & Field Theory in Social Science, Washington, DC: ! American Psychological Association, 1997.