Chapter-Two ALIGNING TRAINING WITH STRATEGY

1. Chapter-TwoALIGNING TRAINING WITH STRATEGY Strategic Planning Formalized strategic planning is process used determine how best to pursue the organization’s mission while meeting the demands of the environment in the near (e.g., next year or two) and long term (e.g., next 5 to 10 years). A proactive strategy focuses on the longer term, and its process is more formalized, typically involving sophisticated analytical and decision-making tools. In a reactive strategy, less formal analysis and planning occur and more attention is focused on the immediate future. Many suggest that both reactive and proactive strategies are necessary for an organization to be effective. The proactive process uses a best guess about what the future will bring, whereas the reactive process addresses how operations will confront what exits now and in the next year or two.

2. Aligning Training with Strategy Strategic Planning/Cont.... A strategic plan that positions the firm for long-term expectations but is modified by the firm’s experiences as it moves forward is preferable to either having a rigidly held long-term plan or reacting only to short term experience. To be effective, strategic planning should occur throughout the organization with each higher level of the organization providing direction to the lower levels. Once a strategic plan has been developed, organizational units develop or are given objectives by higher-level units that, when combined, will implement the strategy. The organizational strategy provides the direction for HR’s strategic objectives to achieve (see Figure 2-1). In this way, plans for implementing the organization’s strategy are developed and coordinated throughout the organization.

3. Tactical Activities • Competitive • Strategy • Mission • Opportunities • Threats • Strengths • Weaknesses Unit Strategies And tactics Unit Objectives Employee Objectives Implementation, Evaluation, and Feedback Linkage between Strategy, tactics, And Objectives Aligning Training with Strategy

4. Aligning Training with Strategy STRATEGIC CHOICES For simplicity, we choose the term “competitive strategy.” Competitive strategy focuses on positioning company’s products or services in the marketplace. This important strategy encompasses the internal and external choices the company makes to improve or retain its competitive position. Two types of competitive strategy are market leader and cost leader. Firms that choose the market leader strategy are also referred to as prospectors and innovatior. Their strategy is to find and exploit new product and market opportunities. Success depends on the to move quickly into windows of environmental conditions, trends, and events and to move quickly into windows of opportunity. Market leaders typically use multiple technologies capable of being used in many different ways. Companies the adopt the cost leader strategy, also referred to as the defender stategy,10 represent the opposite end the continuum. This strategy’s main goal is to be the low-cost provider in the industry. Success depends on pricing competitiveness and having a product that acceptable to (but not necessarily the best in) the market.

5. Aligning Training with Strategy EXTERNAL ENVIRONMENT An organization’s external environment consists of elements outside the organization that influence the organization’s ability to achieved its mission, such as competitors, the economy, societal norms and values, laws and regulations, raw materials, suppliers, and technological innovation. Each organization must determine the threats and opportunities that exist its environment address those that are critical in the strategy. Environmental uncertainty is determined by two factors: complexity and stability. Environmentalcomplexity refers to the number of factors in the environment and the degree to which they are interrelated. Environmentalstability is the rate at which key factors in the environment change–the more rapid the change, the more unstable the environment.

6. Aligning Training with Strategy Complexity Stability High Low High Moderate Uncertainty Low Uncertainty High Uncertainty Moderate Uncertainty Low Factors influencing Environmental Uncertainty Environment Internal Strategy External Strategy Mission Technology Structure Mission, Strategy, Technology Structure Relationship

7. Aligning Training with Strategy Technology is how the work is done in the organization. Each unit in the organization uses technology to accomplish its tasks. Core technology refers to the main activities associated with producing the organization’s principal products and services. Technology can be categorized in a number of ways. Taking some liberties with these approaches, we use a simple continuum of “routine” to “non-routine” technologies. Al one end, the routine technology label is applied to tasks with outcomes that are highly predictable, demonstrate few problems, and use well-structured and well-defined solutions when problem do occur. A task using non-routine technology is characterized by results that are difficult to predict, problems that occur often and unexpectedly, and solutions to problems that are not readily available and need to be developed on a case-by-case basis. With this type of technology, management needs to provide lower-level managers and line employees with more decision-making authority to meet the challenges encountered.

8. Aligning Training with Strategy Structural Choices: The internal strategy should address the ability of the organization’s structure to carry out the competitive strategy. Organizational structure refers to how a firm is organized (how labor is divided) in the rules ,policies, and procedures used for making decisions and coordination its various activities. The organization’s structure defines how the internal orations interact with the external environment. OrganizationalDesign The number and formality of rules, policies, and procedures created to direct employee behavior is the essence of organizational design. An organization’s design can lie somewhere on a continuum ranging from mechanistic to organic.15 A highly mechanistic design reflects an organization with highly defend tasks, rigid and detailed procedures, high reliance on authority, and vertical communication channels. A highly organic design reflects n organization that expertise, and horizontal communication channels. Few organizations operate on the extremes of this continuum; most lean more toward one end the other.

9. Aligning Training with Strategy Structural Choices/Cont.... DecisionAutonomy: Decision autonomy is the amount of authority given to employees in deciding how to complete a task and the degree to which they are able to influence goals and strategies for their work unit. Individual or small-group decision autonomy is a function of whether decisions are centralized or decentralized. Cost efficiencies are associated with more centralization, whereas flexibility / adaptability is associated with decentralization. Thus, centralized structures are more appropriate for cost leader strategies and decentralized structures for market leaders. Division of Labor: The way in which the work of the organization is divided among the units and organized is called division of labor. One way in which labor is divided is between line (those working directly with the core technology) and staff (everyone else); another is between management and labor.

10. Eternal Environment Legal Environment Labor Market Competitive Strategy Employee KSAs, Labor relations, Corporate, Culture Core Technology Human resource Strategy HRD Strategy Organization’s internal, Environment Economic Conditions Competition Aligning Training with Strategy Strategy Development at Different Levels

11. Aligning Training with Strategy OD and Strategy: Organizational change is an inherent part of the process of develop and implementing strategy. Organizations must resolve the following three core issues in developing and implementing strategy. Technical design issues. These issues arise in relation to how the product or service will be determined, created, and delivered. Cultural/ideological issues. These issues relate to shared beliefs and values that employees need to hold for the strategy to be implemented effectively. Political issues. These issues occur as a result of shifting power and resources within the organization as the strategy is pursued.

12. Aligning Training with Strategy LEVELS OF CHANGE AND RESISTANCE: Whenever internal change is planned, the plan should address the following three levels in the organization: Theorganizationitself: The way organization is put together (i.e., what we call structure and design) must be examined to ensure that work is allocated appropriately and organizational system are supportive of the change. This level of analysis identifies how labor is to be divided and what rules and procedures will govern operations. Groups their interrelationship:The way work is performed in the organizational units (i.e., the socio technical systems) and how the outputs of the various units are integrated are the focus of this level of analysis. The issues here concern the design of jobs within units of the organization and the interrelationships of the jobs to one another. Individuals:The change in performance that will be required of employees must be identified and mechanisms-facilities, machines, equipment, and KSAs-put into place to enable the desired performance to occur.

13. Aligning Training with Strategy • Training and OD • Despite the seemingly obvious advantages of collaboration between OD and training professionals, a gulf sometimes seems to separate the two. Consider the following examples: • An executive complains that his training and OD people cannot seem to work together. • Training staff complain at length about a mange they consider unreasonable and attribute her faults to her background in OD. • A training staff member objects strongly when told that training needs analysis data could be used to identify performance problem solutions other than training.

14. Aligning Training with Strategy Why Trainers Need OD Competencies: Trainers can benefit from using OD, if only because its planning procedures help clarify what is needed in a given organizational situation. We believe that training programs will also benefit from the application of many other OD concepts and principles. The emphasis OD places on participative approaches to problem solving suggests that training is better when trainees take an active role in selecting there training opportunities and in the training itself. Force-field analysis is one among a multitude of OD techniques but can serve as an example of how these techniques can be of substantial benefit to trainers. The underlying concept is than any situation can be explained by the sets of counterbalancing forces that hold it in place.22 Force refers not only to physical forces but also to psychological forces that influences individual behavior.

15. Driving Forces Current Situation Restraining Forces • Identify the current state of the situation. • Envision the desired state. • Identify the forces restraining change. • Identify the forces that support or encourage change. • Assess the strength of the forces. • Develop strategies to • a. Reduce the forces restraining change and • b. Increase the forces of change (or capitalize on existing rivers) Force-field Analysis Model Aligning Training with Strategy

16. Aligning Training with Strategy • Why OD Professionals Need Training Competencies • OD interventions nearly always involve group of employees in structured activities such as planning , problem solving, and inter-group conflict management It is naïve to assume the one can bring people together to sole new problems, in new relationships, in new situations, with new processes, and without prior training. These employees need to- • Have ca common KSA base in these areas, • Understand group dynamics and be skilled at working in groups, and • Understand and be skilled at using a common problem-solving model. • It is especially helpful when a OD consultant, familiar with good training practices , is retained from outside the organization.

17. Aligning Training with Strategy • Why OD Professionals Need Training Competencies/Cont.... • If OD is to be a long-term effort, the change must institutionalize in to the way the company does business. In one study, only about one third of the OD efforts examined lasted more than five years.24 This finding indicates that raining is a critical component to institutionalizing the change. There situations are identified as key times for training: • When the OD process is started, training is needed to provided education about the change process and to provide the necessary KSAs. • After the process has been place for a while, some retraining or upgrading of KSAs is required to sustain the process. • As new employees enter the organization, they need an understanding of the process and the KSAs.