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Contents
Preface xiii Application 2.1 Planned change at Bord Na Mona – Irish

About the Authors xv Peat Development Authority 29
2-3 Different types of planned change 32
2-3a Magnitude of change 32
1 General introduction to organization
2-3b Degree of organization 33
development 1 2-3c International settings 34
1-1 Organization development defined 2 Application 2.2 Planned change in an underorganized
1-2 Trends shaping the role and relevance system 35
of organization development 4 2-4 Critique of planned change 37
1-3 A short history of organization development 6 2-4a Conceptualization of planned change 37
1-3a Laboratory training background 7 2-4b Practice of planned change 38
1-3b Action research and survey feedback background 8 Summary 39
1-3c Normative background 9 Discussion questions 40
1-3d Productivity and quality of work life background 10
Notes 40
1-3e Strategic change background 12
1-4 Evolution in organization development 12
3 The organization development
1-5 Overview of the book 13
practitioner 43
Summary 15
3-1 Who is the organization development
Discussion questions 16 practitioner? 44
Notes 16 3-2 Competencies of an effective organization
development practitioner 45
3-2a Intrapersonal skills or self management
competence 48
PART I 3-2b Interpersonal skills 48
3-2c General consultation skills 48
Overview of organization 3-2d Organization development theory 49
development 19 3-3 The professional organization development
practitioner 49
3-3a Role of organization development professional
2 The nature of planned change 20 positions 49
2-1 Theories of planned change 21 Application 3.1 Personal views of the internal and
2-1a Lewin’s change model 21 external consulting positions 51
2-1b Action research model 23 3-3b Careers of organization development
2-1c The positive model 25 professionals 54
2-1d Dialogical OD change process 26 3-4 Professional values 55
2-1e Comparisons of change models 27 3-5 Professional ethics 56
2-2 General model of planned change 27 3-5a Ethical guidelines 56
2-2a Entering and contracting 28 3-5b Ethical dilemmas 57
2-2b Diagnosing 28 Application 3.2 Kindred Todd and the
2-2c Planning and implementing change 28 ethics of OD 59
2-2d Evaluating and institutionalizing change 29 Summary 60
vi
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Contents vii
Discussion questions 61 5-5d Alignment 98

Notes 61 5-5e Analysis 99
Appendix Ethical guidelines for an organization Application 5.2 Top management team at Ortiv
development/human systems development Glass Corporation 101
(OD/HSD) professional 64 5-6 Individual level diagnosis 101
5-6a Inputs 101
5-6b Design components 102
5-6c Outputs 103
PART II 5-6d Alignment 103

5-6e Analysis 104
The process of organization Application 5.3 Job design at Pepperdine
University 104
development 69
Summary 107
Discussion questions 108
4 Entering and contracting 70
Notes 108
4-1 Entering into an OD relationship 71
4-1a Clarifying the organizational issue 71 6 Collecting, analyzing
4-1b Determining the relevant client 72
4-1c Selecting an OD practitioner 73
and feeding back diagnostic
Application 4.1 Entering the HSE 74 information 111
4-2 Developing a contract 75 6-1 The diagnostic relationship 112
4-2a Mutual expectations 75 6-2 Collecting data 114
4-2b Time and resources 75 6-2a Questionnaires 114
4-2c Ground rules 76 6-2b Interviews 116
Application 4.2 Contracting – the HSE 76 6-2c Observations 117
4-3 Interpersonal process issues in entering 6-2d Unobtrusive measures 118
and contracting 78 6-3 Sampling 118
Summary 80 6-4 Analyzing data 120
Discussion questions 80 6-4a Qualitative tools 120
Notes 80 Application 6.1 Collecting and analyzing data
at HSE 121
6-4b Quantitative tools 125
5 Diagnosing 82
6-5 Feeding back data 128
5-1 What is diagnosis? 83 6-5a Content of feedback 128
5-2 The need for diagnostic models 84 6-5b Process of feedback 130
Application 6.2 Training OD practitioners in data
5-3 Open systems model 85
feedback 131
5-3a Organizations as open systems 85
5-3b Diagnosing organizational systems 87 6-6 Survey feedback 132
6-6a What are the steps? 133
5-4 Organization level diagnosis 88
6-6b Survey feedback and organizational
5-4a Inputs 89
dependencies 133
5-4b Design components 90
Application 6.3 Survey feedback and planned
5-4c Outputs 91
change at Cambia Health Solutions 134
5-4d Alignment 92
6-6c Limitations of survey feedback 136
5-4e Analysis 92
6-6d Results of survey feedback 137
Application 5.1 Steinway & Sons 93
5-5 Group level diagnosis 97 Summary 138
5-5a Inputs 97 Discussion questions 138
5-5b Design components 97 Notes 139
5-5c Outputs 98
viii Contents
7 Designing interventions 141 Summary 181

7-1 Overview of interventions 141
7-1a Human process interventions 142 Notes 181
7-1b Technostructural interventions 142
7-1c Human resources management interventions 143 9 Evaluating and institutionalizing
7-1d Strategic change interventions 144
organization development
7-2 What are effective interventions? 146
interventions 184
7-3 How to design effective interventions 146
7-3a Contingencies related to the change situation 147 9-1 Evaluating organization development
7-3b Contingencies related to the target of change 152 interventions 184
9-1a Implementation and evaluation feedback 185
Summary 156
9-1b Measurement 187
Discussion questions 156 9-1c Research design 192
Notes 156 Application 9.1 Evaluating Change at Alegent
Health 194
9-2 Institutionalizing organizational
8 Managing change 159
changes 196
8-1 Overview of change activities 159 9-2a Institutionalization framework 197
8-2 Motivating change 161 9-2b Organization characteristics 197
8-2a Creating readiness for change 162 9-2c Intervention characteristics 198
8-2b Overcoming resistance to change 163 9-2d Institutionalization processes 199
Application 8.1 Motivating change in the sexual 9-2e Indicators of institutionalization 200
violence prevention unit of Minnesota’s Health Application 9.2 Institutionalizing structural change
Department 164 at Hewlett-Packard 201
8-3 Creating a vision 165 Summary 203
8-3a Describing the core ideology 166 Discussion questions 203
8-3b Constructing the envisioned future 166 Notes 203
Application 8.2 Creating a vision at Premier 167
Selected cases 206
8-4 Developing political support 169 Diagnosis and feedback at Adhikar 206
8-4a Assessing change agent power 170 Managing change: Action planning for the Vélo V project
8-4b Identifying key stakeholders 170 in Lyon, France 210
8-4c Influencing stakeholders 171
Application 8.3 Developing political support for the
strategic planning project in the sexual violence
prevention unit 172
PART III
8-5 Managing the transition 173
8-5a Activity planning 173 Human process interventions 211
8-5b Commitment planning 174
8-5c Change management structures 174
10 Interpersonal and group process
8-5d Learning processes 174
Application 8.4 Transition management
approaches 212
in the HP–Compaq acquisition 175 10-1 Diagnostic issues in interpersonal and group
8-6 Sustaining momentum 177 process interventions 213
8-6a Providing resources for change 177 10-2 Process Consultation 214
8-6b Building a support system for change agents 177 10-2a Basic process interventions 215
8-6c Developing new competencies and skills 177 Application 10.1 Auto-consultation at Careem ride
8-6d Reinforcing new behaviours 178 hailing company 216
8-6e Staying the course 178 Application 10.2 Process consultation at Christian
Application 8.5 Sustaining change at RMIT University Caring Homes, Inc. 218
Library in Melbourne, Australia 178 10-2b Results of process consultation 220
Contents ix
10-3 Third Party Interventions 221

10-3a An episodic model of conflict 221
PART IV
10-3b Facilitating the conflict resolution process 222 Technostructural interventions 273
10-4 Team Building 223
10-4a Team building activities 224
12 Restructuring organizations 274
10-4b Interventions relevant to individual behaviour 227
10-4c Interventions relevant to the group’s 12-1 Structural design 275
behaviour 227 12-1a The functional structure 275
Application 10.3 Conflict management at Ross & 12-1b The divisional structure 277
Sherwin 228 12-1c The matrix structure 278
10-4d Interventions Affecting the Group’s Integration 12-1d The process structure 280
with the Rest of the Organization 230 Application 12.1 Healthways’ process structure 283
10-4e The manager’s role in team building 231 12-1e The customer centric structure 284
10-4f The results of team building 231 12-1f The network structure 286
Application 10.4 Aligning senior teams at Vaycot Application 12.2 Amazon.com’s network structure 289
Products 232 12-2 The evolution of organizational structure 290
Summary 236 12-2a A self-managed organization 291
Discussion questions 237 12-1b Some misconceptions about holacracy 291
12-1c Advantages and drawbacks of holacracy 291
Notes 237
12-1d The end of bureaucracy? 292
12-3 Downsizing 292
11 Organization process 12-3a Application stages 293
approaches 240 Application 12.3 Downsizing in Menlo Park,
California 295
11-1 Diagnostic Issues in Organization Process 12-3b Results of downsizing 296
Interventions 241
12-4 Reengineering 297
11-2 Organization Confrontation Meeting 241 12-4a Application stages 298
11-2a Application stages 242 Application 12.4 Honeywell IAC’s TotalPlant™
Application 11.1 A work-out meeting at General Electric reengineering process 300
Medical Systems business 243 12-4b Results from reengineering 302
11-2b Results of confrontation meetings 244
Summary 303
11-3 Intergroup Relations Interventions 244
11-3a Microcosm groups 244
11-3b Resolving Intergroup Conflict 246 Notes 303
Application 11.2 Improving intergroup relationships
in Johnson & Johnson’s Drug Evaluation
13 Employee involvement 307
department 248
11-4 Large Group Interventions 250 13-1 Employee involvement: what is it? 308
11-4a Application stages 251 13-1a A working definition of employee involvement 308
Application 11.3 Using the decision accelerator to 13-1b The diffusion of employee involvement
generate innovative strategies in Alegent’s women’s practices 309
and children’s service line 254 13-1c How employee involvement affects
11-4b Results of large group interventions 258 productivity 309
Summary 259 13-2 Employee involvement interventions 311

13-2a Parallel structures 311
Application 13.1 Using the AI Summit to build
Notes 259 union–management relations at Roadway
Selected cases 262 Express 313
Motivating change at United Drug 262 13-2b Total quality management 315
Large Group Interventions at Airbus’ ICT Application 13.2 Tqm at the Ritz-Carlton 320
Organization 264 13-2c High involvement organizations 321
x Contents
Application 13.3 Building a high involvement 15-2a Characteristics of goal setting 367
organization at Air Products and Chemicals, 15-2b Application stages 368
Inc. 324 15-2c Management by objectives 369
Summary 327 Application 15.1 Changing the human capital
management practices at Cambia Health
Solutions 370
Notes 327 15-2d Effects of goal setting and MBO 372
15-3 Performance appraisal 372
14 Work design 331 15-3a The performance appraisal process 373
15-3b Application stages 374
14-1 The engineering approach 332
Application 15.2 Adapting the appraisal process at
14-2 The motivational approach 333 capital one financial 375
14-2a The core dimensions of jobs 333 15-3c Effects of performance appraisal 377
14-2b Individual differences 334
15-4 Reward systems 377
14-2c Application stages 335
15-4a Structural and motivational features of reward
Application 14.1 Enriching jobs at the Hartford’s
systems 378
Employee Relations Consulting Services Group 337
15-4b Reward system design features 379
14-2d Barriers to job enrichment 339
15-4c Skill and knowledge-based pay
14-2e Results of job enrichment 340
systems 380
14-3 The sociotechnical systems approach 340 15-4d Performance-based pay systems 381
14-3a Conceptual background 341 15-4e Gain sharing systems 383
14-3b Self-managed work teams 341 Application 15.3 Revising the reward system
14-3c Application stages 345 at Lands’ End 385
Application 14.2 Developing self-managed teams 15-4f Promotion systems 386
at Bord na Mona: Irish Peat Development 15-4g Reward system process issues 387
Authority 346
Summary 388
14-3d Results of self-managed teams 347
14-4 Designing work for technical and personal
needs 349 Notes 389
14-4a Technical factors 349
14-4b Personal need factors 350
14-4c Meeting both technical and personal needs 352
16 Talent management 393
Summary 352 16-1 Coaching and mentoring 394

16-1a What are the goals? 395
Notes 353 16-1c The results of coaching and mentoring 397
Selected cases 357 16-2 Management and leadership development
City of Carlsbad, California: Restructuring the Public interventions 397
Works Department 357 16-2a What are the goals? 397
The Sullivan Hospital System 359 16-2b Application stages 397
Application 16.1 Leading your business at Microsoft
Corporation 399
16-2c The results of development interventions 400
PART V 16-3 Career planning and development
interventions 400
Human resource interventions 363 16-3a What are the goals? 401
15 Performance management 364 Application 16.2 PepsiCo’s career planning
and development framework 408
15-1 A model of performance management 365 16-3c Alternative approach to career planning
15-2 Goal setting 367 and development 410
Contents xi
Application 16.3 From career ladders and paths 18-1e Change involves significant learning and a new
to rivers 410 paradigm 449
16-3d The results of career planning and 18-2 Organization design 450
development 412 18-2a Conceptual framework 450
Summary 412 18-2b Basic design alternatives 451
Discussion questions 413 Application 18.1 Organization design at Deere &
Company 453
Notes 413
18-2c Worldwide organization design alternatives 454
Application 18.2 Implementing the global strategy:
17 Workforce diversity and changing the culture of work in western China 457
18-2d Application stages 460
wellness 417
18-3 Integrated strategic change 462
17-1 Workforce diversity interventions 418 18-3a Key features 462
17-1a What are the goals? 418 18-3b Implementing the ISC process 463
17-1b Application stages 419 Application 18.3 Managing strategic change at
17-1c The results for diversity interventions 422 Microsoft Canada 465
Application 17.1 Aligning strategy and diversity at
18-4 Culture change 466
L’Oréal 423
18-4a Defining and diagnosing organization culture 467
17-2 Employee stress and wellness
18-4b Implementing the culture change process 470
interventions 424
Application 18.4 Culture change at Fiat 472
17-2a What are the goals? 424
Summary 473
17-2b Applications stages 425
17-2c The results of stress management and wellness Discussion questions 474
interventions 429 Notes 474
Application 17.2 Johnson & Johnson’s health and
wellness programme 430
19 Continuous change 478
Summary 432
19-1 Dynamic strategy making 479
19-1a Conceptual framework 479
Notes 432 19-1b Application Stages 482
Selected cases 435 Application 19.1 Dynamic strategy making at Whitbread
Employee benefits at Healthco 435 PLC 484
Designing and implementing a reward system at Disk 19-2 Self-designing organizations 486
Drives, inc. 439 19-2a The demands of turbulent environments 486
Application 19.2 Self-design at Healthways
Corporation 489
PART VI 19-3 Learning organizations 490
19-3a Conceptual framework 491
Strategic change interventions 445 19-3b Organization learning interventions 493
Application 19.3 Dialogue and organization
learning at DMT 498
18 Transformational change 446
19-4 Built to change organizations 500
18-1 Characteristics of transformational 19-4a Design guidelines 500
change 447 19-4b Application stages 501
18-1a Change is triggered by environmental and internal Application 19.4 Creating a built to change organization
disruptions 447 at Capital One Financial 503
18-1b Change is initiated by senior executives and line
Summary 504
managers 448
18-1c Change involves multiple stakeholders 449 Discussion questions 505
18-1d Change is systemic and revolutionary 449 Notes 505
xii Contents
20 Trans-organizational change 509 21-2b Application stages 562

Application 21.2 Social and environmental change at
20-1 Trans-organizational rationale 510 LDI Africa 565
20-2 Mergers and acquisitions 511 21-2c Change agent roles and skills 567
20-2a Application stages 512 21–3 Organization development in healthcare 568
Application 20.1 Planning the United-Continental 21-3a The healthcare sector: A snapshot 568
merger 515 21-3b Trends in healthcare 569
20-3 Strategic alliance interventions 518 21-3c Opportunities for organization development
20-3a Application stages 518 practice 574
Application 20.2 Building alliance relationships 520 21-3d Conclusions 576
20-4 Network interventions 522 Summary 577
20-4a Creating the network 522 Discussion questions 577
20-4b Managing network change 525
Notes 578
Application 20.3 The Alaska Workforce Coalition 527
Summary 532
Discussion questions 532 22 Future directions in organization
Notes 533 development 581
Selected cases 537 22-1 Trends within OD 582
Global Mobile Corporation 537 22-1a Traditional Trend 582
The Merger of Jamelia and Imbali Health 22-1b Pragmatic Trend 583
and Beauty 545 22-1c Scholarly Trend 583
22-1d Implications for OD’s future 583
22-2 Trends in the context of organization
development 585
PART VII 22-2a The economy 585
22-2b The workforce 587
Special applications of organization
22-2c Technology 587
development 549 22-2d Organizations 588
22-2e Implications for OD’s future 589
21 Organization development Summary 594
for economic, ecological, Discussion questions 594
social and health outcomes 550 Notes 594

Integrative case 598
21-1 Sustainable management organizations 551
B. R. Richardson Timber Products Corporation 598
21-1a Design guidelines 552
Building the Cuyahoga River Valley Organization 612
The Transformation of Meck Insurance 621
Application 21.1 Interface Carpet’s transformation
to sustainability 559
Glossary 630
21-2 Global social change 561
21-2a Global Social Change Organizations Name Index 638
(GSCOs) 561 Subject Index 641
Preface
W elcome to the first adaptation for Europe, the Middle East and Africa of Cummings and Worley’s popular
textbook (10th edition) which has gained significant acceptance and much acclaim worldwide. In this adap-
tation, I have respected the core elements that have contributed to its success while sensitively adapting elements to
make this classic text more suited for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
The content serves courses in organization development, change management and human resources management
at university. It should also be of interest to practitioners who wish to understand the theoretical underpinnings of
this important area. Lecturers will choose for themselves the appropriate university level for this text. I have tried
to ensure that the ideas expressed in the text appear in a way that is both accessible to newcomers to the topic and
those who are more familiar with the ideas. At most universities, second and third year undergraduates and masters
level students will benefit most from the text.
One of the key changes in this adaptation is the inclusion of some new case studies (called Applications) with
regionally relevant organizations. A less obvious change is the recognition, in this adaptation, of the development
of Dialogical OD in recent years. This edition proudly takes a positivist stance as its ontology. It is a philosophical
viewpoint that is common in Diagnostic OD. I felt however, that there should be a recognition of the emergence of
other approaches to OD that have been gaining ground recently. I refer to these approaches mainly to alert the student
that these alternatives exist, and to inform readers that OD has developed in many and different ways.
Existing users will note that I have retained the structure, chapters and sections for the most part in their original
form as Cummings and Worley laid them out. The text follows a reasonably traditional path through the subject.
Parts 1 and 2 deliver an overview and a description of the process of OD. Parts 3, 4, 5 and 6 deal with OD interven-
tions. Part 7 comprises special applications.
I have updated and added references where appropriate but retained most of the classic OD references because of
what they are – classics. I have introduced new ideas where I believed developments have called for them. In chap-
ters 1 and 22 the drivers and future directions of OD required revision. Time does that to a text. I have introduced
briefly the General Data Protection Regulation, which is mandatory in EU countries and affects all nations trading
with that bloc. In Chapter 12, I have described holacracy, the controversial new organizational form, to augment
this chapter on organizational structure. I have introduced a new approach to careers in Chapter 16 to add a new
twist to the traditional career ladder approach. The recent arrival of Athena Swan in the university sector has added
interest in Chapter 17 in the area of equality and diversity. In Chapter 18, I have introduced some of the debates on
organizational learning to reflect that an easy consensus in this area is quite elusive. Chapter 20 benefits from an
additional diagnostic model on Trans-organizational Systems to complement the original diagnostic models shown
in Chapter 5.
I have added review questions to each chapter to assist lecturers in developing classroom exercises and so help
students revise their knowledge and make the content more applicable for them. Each set of review questions is
generally based on the learning objectives of the chapter which are shown in each chapter’s introduction.
Paul Donovan, 2019
xiii
Acknowledgements
T he authors and publisher would like to thank the following people for their valuable input in the development
of this book:
USC Center for Effective Organizations: Ed Lawler, Sue Mohrman, John Boudreau, Alec Levenson, Gerry Ledford,
Theresa Welbourne, Jim O’Toole, Jay Conger and Jay Galbraith
Booz & Co: Tom Williams
Pepperdine University: Ann Feyerherm, Miriam Lacey, Terri Egan, Julie Chesley, Gary Mangiofico and Kent Rhodes
For their contributions: James Byron, JoAnn Carmin, John Childers, Charles Hathorn, David Jardin, Marianne
Tracy, Ann McCloskey, Darlene O'Connor, Nora Hughes, Kitty Farnham, Kimberley Jutze, Karen Whelan-Berry,
Susan Donnan, R. Wayne Boss, Craig C. Lundberg
Reviewers
Jack Cox, Amberton University
Stacy Ball-Elias, Southwest Minnesota State University
Bruce Gillies, California Lutheran University
Jim Maddox, Friends University
Shannon Reilly, George Brown College
New to this edition:

Souleiman Hasan, Maynooth University
Marian Crowley-Henry, Maynooth University
Giovanni Maccani, Maynooth University
Caitriona Heslin, HSE
Fidelma Browne, HSE
Pat Sammon, Bord na Mona
John Quilliam, Trinity College Dublin
Austin McEvoy, McKesson Ireland
Eliza Tomczyk, Change Consultations
Reviewers:
Ashika Maharaj, University of Kwazulu-Natal
Faisal Mahfooz, King Saud University
Monwabisi Nazo, Walter Sisulu University of Technology and Science Eastern Cape
Blath McGeough, Institute of Technology Tallaght
Dirk Geldenhuys, UNISA
Marc Bonnet, University of Lyon 3
Ingo Fischer, Berlin School of Economics and Law
Neil Coade, Coade Management Consultants, UK
xiv
About the Authors
Thomas G. Cummings, professor, Chair of the Department of Management and Organization, received his BS
and MBA from Cornell University, and his PhD from the University of California at Los Angeles. He has authored
over 70 articles and 22 books and was formerly President of the Western Academy of Management, Chair of the
Organization Development and Change Division of the Academy of Management, and Founding Editor of the
Journal of Management Inquiry. Dr Cummings was the 61st President of the Academy of Management, the largest
professional association of management scholars in the world with a total membership of over 19,000. He is listed in
American Men and Women of Science and Who’s Who in America. His major research and consulting interests include
designing high performing organizations and strategic change management. He has conducted several large scale
organization design and change projects, and has consulted to a variety of private and public sector organizations in
the United States, Europe, Mexico and Scandinavia.
Christopher G. Worley is a Senior Research Scientist at the Center for Effective Organizations (USC’s Marshall
School of Business) and Professor of Management in Pepperdine University’s Master of Science in Organization
(MSOD) programme. He received a BS from Westminster College, Master’s degrees from Colorado State University
and Pepperdine University, and his doctorate from the University of Southern California. He served as Chair of the
Organization Development and Change Division of the Academy of Management, received the Luckman Teaching
Fellowship at Pepperdine University, and the Douglas McGregor Award for best paper in the Journal of Applied
Behavioral Science. His most recent books are Management Reset and Built to Change, and he is completing a book
on organization agility. His articles on agility and strategic organization design have appeared in the Journal of
Applied Behavioral Science, Journal of Organization Behavior, Sloan Management Review, Strategy+Business, and
Organizational Dynamics. He and his family live in San Juan Capistrano, CA.
Paul Donovan is Senior Lecturer at the School of Business, Maynooth University. Prior to this, he was Head of
Management Development at the Irish Management Institute (IMI) in Dublin where he worked in senior manage-
ment positions, including Registrar, for 17 years. Before joining IMI, he worked as a General Operations Manager for
Bord na Mona, the Irish Peat Development Authority during its major transformation. While there, he participated
in major change initiatives, including the introduction of self managing teams in the production and transport func-
tions. He also wrote a thesis on the subject of major change in completion of a Masters Degree in Organizational
Behaviour at Trinity College Dublin and graduated with a doctorate in human resources from Leicester University.
He has considerable practitioner engagement experience and has delivered management development programmes
in 15 countries over a period of 20 years. His current teaching includes the Change Management and Organizational
Development module at Maynooth. His research interests include the transfer of learning from training interventions
back into the workplace, and effective teaching and learning in higher education. He has contributed articles to the
Journal of Management Education, Management Teaching Review and the Journal of European Industrial Training
as well as several book chapters. He currently serves as Associate Editor with Management Teaching Review. While
at IMI, he edited a series of six management textbooks aimed at supporting students of supervisory management.
xv
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1 General introduction to
organization development
Learning objectives
●● Define and describe the practice and study of organization development (OD).
●● Describe the history and relevance of OD.
●● Distinguish OD and planned change from other forms of organization change.
●● Distinguish between diagnostic OD and dialogical OD
Organizations exist for a purpose, a purpose that is usually shared by two or more individuals. “Organizations exist
because groups of people working together can achieve more than the sum of the achievements which the individu-
als in the organization could produce when working separately. For example, one person might struggle all day to
carry a piano upstairs, whereas a team of four people, each taking one corner, may need to put in much less than a
quarter of the effort of one person to complete the task.”1 However, the turnover of companies in the Fortune 500
Listing shows that merely having a purpose is not enough to maintain effectiveness. Not every organization is able
to cope with change that comes with the passage of time. Those successful organizations, who retain their place in
the rankings, seem to have mastered the art of their own development so as to thrive in times of significant change.
This is a book, therefore, about organization development (OD): a process that applies a broad range of behav-
ioural science knowledge and practices to help organizations build their capability to change and to achieve greater
effectiveness. This includes increased financial performance, employee satisfaction and environmental sustainability.
OD differs from other planned change efforts, such as project management or product innovation, because the focus
is on building the organization’s ability to assess its current functioning and to make necessary changes to achieve
its goals. Moreover, OD is oriented to improving the total system: the organization and its parts in the context of the
larger environment that affects them.
2 Chapter 1 General introduction to organization development
This book reviews the broad background of OD and examines assumptions, strategies and models, intervention
techniques and other aspects of OD. This chapter provides an introduction to OD, describing first the concept of OD
itself. Second, it explains why OD has expanded rapidly in the past 60 years, both in terms of people’s need to work
with and through others in organizations and in terms of organizations’ need to adapt in a complex and changing
world. Third, it briefly reviews the history of OD, and fourth, it describes the evolution of OD into its current state.
This introduction to OD is followed by an overview of the rest of the book.
1-1 Organization Development Defined

OD is both a professional field of social action and an area of scientific inquiry. The practice of OD covers a wide
spectrum of activities, with seemingly endless variations upon them. Team building with top corporate management,
structural change in a municipality and job enrichment in a manufacturing firm are all examples of OD. Similarly,
the study of OD addresses a broad range of topics, including the effects of change, the methods of organizational
change and the factors influencing OD success.
A number of definitions of OD exist and are presented in Table 1.1. Each definition has a slightly different empha-
sis. For example, Kenward’s definition describes alignment with the external business climate, whereas Coughlan and
Brydon-Miller emphasize organizational renewal. Burke’s description, on the other hand, focuses attention on culture
as the target of change; French’s definition is concerned with OD’s long term focus and the use of consultants; and
Beckhard’s and Beer’s definitions address the process of OD. More recently, Burke and Bradford’s definition broadens
the range and interests of OD. Worley and Feyerherm suggested that for a process to be called OD, (1) it must focus on
or result in the change of some aspect of the organizational system; (2) there must be learning or the transfer of knowl-
edge or skill to the organization; and (3) there must be evidence of improvement in or an intention to improve the
effectiveness of the organization.2 The following definition incorporates most of these views and is used in this book:
Organization development is a system-wide application and transfer of behavioural science knowledge to the
planned development, improvement, and reinforcement of the strategies, structures, and processes that lead to
organization effectiveness.
Table 1.1 Definitions of organization development

Organization development (OD) is the work of facilitating organizational success, by aligning structural, cultural and strategic reali-
ties of work to respond to the needs of an ever evolving business climate. This involves facilitating a deep connection between the
best business processes and structures on the one hand, and the people working within the organization on the other. In short, it is
to create great organizations! (Kenward)3
OD is a long-term effort whose aim is to improve an organization’s processes of renewing itself through envisioning its future, struc-
turing itself appropriately and being able to solve problems. (Coghlan and Brydon-Miller)4
Organization development is a planned process of change in an organization’s culture through the utilization of behavioral science
technology, research, and theory. (Warner Burke)5
Organization development refers to a long-range effort to improve an organization’s problem solving capabilities and its ability
to cope with changes in its external environment with the help of external or internal behavioral-scientist consultants, or change
agents, as they are sometimes called. (Wendell French)6
Organization development is an effort (1) planned, (2) organization wide, and (3) managed from the top, to (4) increase organization
effectiveness and health through (5) planned interventions in the organization’s “processes,” using behavioral science knowledge.
(Richard Beckhard)7
Organization development is a system-wide process of data collection, diagnosis, action planning, intervention, and evaluation
aimed at (1) enhancing congruence among organizational structure, process, strategy, people, and culture; (2) developing new and
creative organizational solutions; and (3) developing the organization’s self-renewing capacity. It occurs through the collaboration of
organizational members working with a change agent using behavioural science theory, research, and technology. (Michael Beer)8
Chapter 1 General introduction to organization development 3
This definition emphasizes several features that differentiate OD from other approaches to organizational change
and improvement, such as management consulting, project management and operations management. The defini-
tion also helps to distinguish OD from two related subjects, change management and organization change, that are
also addressed in this book.
First, OD applies to changes in the strategy, structure and/or processes of an entire system, such as an organization, a
single plant of a multi plant firm, a department or work group, or individual role or job. A change programme aimed at
modifying an organization’s strategy, for example, might focus on how the organization relates to a wider environment
and on how those relationships can be improved. It might include changes both in the grouping of people to perform
tasks (structure) and in methods of communicating and solving problems (process) to support the changes in strategy.
Similarly, an OD programme directed at helping a top management team become more effective might focus on social
processes and task coordination within the group. This focus might result in the improved ability of top management
to solve company problems in strategy and structure. This contrasts with approaches focusing on one or only a few
aspects of a system, such as technological innovation or quality control. In these approaches, attention is narrowed
to improvement of particular products or processes, or to development of production or service delivery functions.
Second, OD is based on the application and transfer of behavioural science knowledge and practice, including
microconcepts, such as leadership, group dynamics, and work design and macro approaches, such as strategy, organi-
zation design and culture change. These subjects distinguish OD from such applications as management consulting,
technological innovation or operations management that emphasize the economic, financial and technical aspects
of organizations. These approaches tend to neglect the personal and social characteristics of a system. Moreover, OD
is distinguished by its intent to transfer behavioural science knowledge and skill so that the organizational system is
more capable of carrying out planned change in the future.
Third, OD is concerned with managing planned change, but not in the formal sense typically associated with man-
agement consulting or project management, which tends to comprise programmatic and expert-driven approaches
to change. Rather, OD is more an adaptive process for planning and implementing change than a blueprint for how
things should be done. It involves planning to diagnose and solve organizational problems, but such plans are flexible
and often revised as new information is gathered as the change process progresses. If, for example, there was concern
about the performance of a set of international subsidiaries, a reorganization process might begin with plans to
assess the current relationships between the international divisions and the corporate headquarters and to redesign
them if necessary. These plans would be modified if the assessment discovered that most of the senior management
teams in the subsidiaries were not given adequate cross cultural training prior to their international assignments.
Fourth, OD involves the design, implementation and subsequent reinforcement of change. It moves beyond the
initial efforts to implement a change programme to a longer-term concern for making sure the new activities are
sustained within the organization. For example, implementing self-managed work teams might focus on ways in
which supervisors could give workers more control over work methods. After workers had more control, attention
would shift to ensuring that supervisors continued to provide that freedom. That assurance might include rewarding
supervisors for managing in a participative style. This attention to reinforcement is similar to training and develop-
ment approaches that address maintenance of new skills or behaviours, but it differs from other change perspectives
that do not address how a change can be sustained over time.
Finally, OD is oriented to improving organizational effectiveness. Effectiveness is best measured along three dimen-
sions. First, OD affirms that an effective organization is able to solve its own problems and to continually improve
itself. OD helps organization members gain the skills and knowledge necessary to conduct these activities by involving
them in the change process. Second, an effective organization has high financial and technical performance, including
sales growth, acceptable profits, quality products and services, and high productivity. OD helps organizations achieve
these ends by leveraging social science practices to lower costs, improve products and services and increase productiv-
ity. Finally, an effective organization has an engaged, satisfied and learning workforce as well as satisfied and loyal cus-
tomers or other external stakeholders. The organization’s performance responds to the needs of external groups, such
as stockholders, customers, suppliers and government agencies, which provide the organization with resources and
legitimacy. Moreover, it is able to attract and motivate effective employees, who then perform at higher levels. Other
forms of organizational change clearly differ from OD in their focus. Management consulting, for example, primarily
addresses financial performance, whereas operations management or industrial engineering focuses on productivity.
OD can be distinguished from change management and organizational change. OD and change management both
address the effective implementation of planned change. They are both concerned with the sequence of activities, the
processes and the leadership that produce organization improvements. They differ, however, in their underlying value
orientation. OD’s behavioural science foundation supports values of human potential, participation and development
in addition to performance and competitive advantage. Change management focuses more narrowly on values of cost,
quality and schedule.9 As a result, OD’s distinguishing feature is its concern with the transfer of knowledge and skill so
that the organization is more able to manage change in the future. Change management does not necessarily require
the transfer of these skills. In short, all OD involves change management, but change management may not involve OD.
Similarly, organizational change is a broader concept than OD. As discussed above, OD can be applied to
managing organizational change. However, it is primarily concerned with managing change in such a way that
knowledge and skills are transferred to build the organization’s capability to achieve goals and solve problems. It
is intended to change the organization in a particular direction, toward improved problem solving, responsiveness
and effectiveness. Organizational change, in contrast, is more broadly focused and can apply to any kind of change,
including technical and managerial innovations, organization decline or the evolution of a system over time. These
changes may or may not be directed at making the organization more developed in the sense implied by OD.
The behavioural sciences have developed useful concepts and methods for helping organizations to deal with
changing environments, competitor initiatives, technological innovation, globalization or restructuring. They help
managers and administrators to manage the change process. Many of these concepts and techniques are described
in this book, particularly in relation to managing change.
1-2 Trends Shaping the Role and Relevance

of Organization Development
Many books and articles on organizational change establish claims that change is an ever-present phenomenon, or
that the pace of change today has never been equalled throughout history. As we stand on the eve of a new industrial
revolution, perhaps, we could make a similar claim today. In Future of the Professions, Susskind and Susskind explain
how artificial intelligence (AI) will “place the work even of the finest specialists at the fingertips of everyone, often
at no or low cost and without face-to-face interaction.”10 If true, this prophecy signals a change that will be more
pervasive than other disruptions of the past in that fewer groups of employees and managers will be able to seek
immunity from it. According to some observers however, technology is not the cause of change today – Church and
Burke note major drivers that are shaping the future of change and OD in organizations: the “changing nature of
work, the changing nature of data, and the changing dynamics of the workforce itself.”11
First, “changing nature of work” is a driver comprising the myriad of ways that organizations are redesigning and
reshaping themselves away from traditional hierarchical and product-based structures and toward platform designs
including redefining how individuals do their jobs and connect with each other.12 Second, “changing nature of data” is a
driver comprising the multifaceted nature of big data and the requirements of organizations to be agile to cope with the
amount, speed and variety of data.13 Third, “changing dynamics of the workforce itself ”, the ever-changing generational
and ethnic components, demographics, values and expectations of today’s workforce.14 These drivers, in themselves
quite powerful, are also responsible for four consequential trends, according to Church and Burke, shown in Figure 1.1,
that impact on the way organizations operate and on the way OD work is carried out there. The trends are as follows:
Trend 1 – A shift to platforms over products
Trend 2 – A shift to digital over mechanical
Trend 3 – A shift to insights over data
Trend 4 – A shift to talent over employees
Figure 1.1 Four trends shaping the future of organization development
Platforms
over
Products
Three Key
Drivers
Talent over Ways of Work Digital over
Employees Mechanical
Big Data
Workforce
Insights
over Data
Trend 1 – A shift to platforms over products

Ryanair, Europe’s largest airline, is becoming a platform company. Colin O’Brien, head of quality assurance (QA)
and change control at Ryanair Labs is responsible for making this happen by assuring the quality of all of Ryanair’s
software solutions. His division of the firm, Ryanair Labs, is the technology arm of Ryanair. He asserts that Ryanair’s
ambition is ultimately to become a technology company with an airline attached. There is a large, ambitious pro-
gramme going on at Ryanair in servicing all of the functions of innovation in the company. Probably the most rec-
ognizable would be the mobile apps and the website but they do service some of the other functions as well, from
the commercial side to the organizational side, including finance, HR, inflight, ground ops, operations and more. A
transformation is taking place at Ryanair, but it is happening elsewhere also.
Many have made the journey already. Some organizations, such as eBay, PayPal and Uber provide platforms for
their customers to engage, to market and to make money. They are intrinsically different operations from the tra-
ditional product and service-based firms where OD first took root and flourished. Can OD find a natural home in
these cyberspace firms? The conflicts inherent in these platform organizations, where business takes place outside of
the borders of the company, suggest that OD is well placed to serve them. The sellers, buyers and other stakeholders
in platform organizations may have very different goals e.g. taxi drivers and Uber. OD’s advantage is that it brings
a systems approach to its clients, one that can emphasize common ground between stakeholders. Nevertheless, the
stakeholders will not be found under the one roof as in traditional type organizations. OD practitioners must develop
new ways to reach them and communicate with them.
Trend 2 – A shift to digital over mechanical

The pervasiveness of technology in our daily lives signals the transformation that is taking place in organizations from
mechanical or mechanistic systems to digital ones.15 In the latter part of the last century, the futurist Alvin Toffler
heralded the arrival of the digital age. He prophesied the decentralization of media, and a move away from mass
production and mass consumption toward customization of products and services. At the human level, he predicted
deregulated and flexible modes of employment. Toffler’s work correctly foretold the digitization of the workplace
in transformation. This transformation comprises the intersection between flows of information online (internet of
things, cloud, big data), and devices (sensors, chips) that communicate along the entire value chain. We witness the
creation of global networks that incorporate firms’ machinery, warehousing systems and production facilities in the
form of cyber physical systems (CPS).
This data revolution invites OD to play a role in enhancing organizational effectiveness. This major change has
positive potentials in a new cycle of innovation, a cycle that evokes previous waves of change that have occurred
between Fordism and Post-Fordism. To date, these transformations have not delivered on their promises. Technology
alone cannot deliver improvements in terms of work conditions, work performance and work relationships as techni-
cal innovation in itself, always has a social dimension. It is the interface between the social and the technical where
OD can play its key role. The digitization of organizations may be innovative, but OD has been at the forefront of
technological change in the past and will be into the future.
Trend 3 – A shift to insights over data

The digitization of organizations mentioned above has produced vast amounts of data and top management has
expectations for how this data is going to be harnessed and used. Management wants insights to inform decisions,
drive action and set future directions.16 Vast amounts of data require processing and analysis and this requires a set
of skills including statistical modelling and other data analysis techniques. This presents an opportunity for OD
practitioners to supply data analysis services into this gap. However, it is not clear that these practitioners are well
versed in these skills. If OD does not deliver in this space, others may step into the breech from disciplines such as
economics, finance and IT.
Trend 4 – A shift to talent over employees

The fourth trend, a shift to talent over employees, is the most controversial of them all as it signals a dark side of
talent management (TM), a concept that is often seen as good in and of itself.17 However, TM may be associated
with the privileging of the few over the many. An essential element of the management of talent is the husbanding
of precious resources for investment in the talent that will produce the greatest return on investment. By definition,
other employees may be left without the same investment in their development. This does not sit well with the values
of OD. Practitioners may find themselves with difficult choices to make, including walking away from clients who
demand such discrimination. Church also believes that OD practitioners should acknowledge that pragmatism may
be called for and that they may be better placed to stay involved in the intervention, given that others will take their
place if they stand on principle and refuse to participate in the exercise.18
The origins of OD, detailed later in this chapter, stretch back into the early part of the last century. Since then,
there have been extraordinary changes in and around organizations, and indeed society. What then is the relevance
of OD today? These drivers and trends, described by Church and Burke, suggest that OD still remains relevant in
organizations today and will remain so for many years to come.
1-3 A Short History of Organization Development

A brief history of OD will help to clarify the evolution of the term as well as some of the problems and confusion
that have surrounded it. As currently practised, OD emerged from five major backgrounds or stems, as shown in
Figure 1.2. The first was the growth of the National Training Laboratories (NTL) and the development of training
groups, otherwise known as sensitivity training or T-groups. The second stem of OD was the classic work on action
research conducted by social scientists interested in applying research to managing change. An important feature of
action research was a technique known as survey feedback. Kurt Lewin, a prolific theorist, researcher and practitio-
ner in group dynamics and social change, was instrumental in the development of T-groups, survey feedback and
action research. His work led to the creation of OD and still serves as a major source of its concepts and methods.
The third stem reflects a normative view of OD. Rensis Likert’s participative management framework and Blake
and Mouton’s Grid® OD suggest a “one best way” to design and operate organizations. The fourth background is the
approach focusing on productivity and the quality of work life. The fifth stem of OD, and the most recent influence
on current practice, involves strategic change and organization transformation.
Figure 1.2 The five stems of OD practice
Laboratory Training
CURRENT OD PRACTICE
Action Research/Survey Feedback
Normative Approaches
Quality of Work Life
Strategic Change
1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Today
1-3a Laboratory Training Background

This stem of OD pioneered laboratory training, or the T-group: a small, unstructured group in which participants
learn from their own interactions and evolving group processes about such issues as interpersonal relations, per-
sonal growth, leadership and group dynamics. Essentially, laboratory training began in the summer of 1946, when
Kurt Lewin and his staff at the Research Center for Group Dynamics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) were asked by the Connecticut Interracial Commission and the Committee on Community Interrelations of
the American Jewish Congress for help in research on training community leaders. A workshop was developed, and
the community leaders were brought together to learn about leadership and to discuss problems. At the end of each
day, the researchers discussed privately what behaviours and group dynamics they had observed. The community
leaders asked permission to sit in on these feedback sessions. Reluctant at first, the researchers finally agreed. Thus
the first T-group was formed in which people reacted to data about their own behaviour. The researchers drew
two conclusions about this first T-group experiment: (1) feedback about group interaction was a rich learning experi-
ence and (2) the process of group building had potential for learning that could be transferred to situations at home. 19
As a result of this experience, the Office of Naval Research and the National Education Association provided
financial backing to form the National Training Laboratories, and Gould Academy in Bethel, Maine, was selected as
a site for further work (since then, Bethel has played an important part in NTL). The first Basic Skill Groups were
offered in the summer of 1947. The programme was so successful that the Carnegie Foundation provided support
for programmes in 1948 and 1949. This led to a permanent programme for NTL within the National Education
Association.
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him with an expression of no earthly sweetness, so the child
shivered and stood awe-struck, rather than affrighted, while
the Old Maid passed on. Perhaps her Character
garment might have been polluted even by delineation by
an infant’s touch; perhaps her kiss would suggestion.
have been death to the sweet boy within a
year.
21. “She is but a shadow,” whispered the Tone of story
superstitious. “The child put forth his arms summarized.
and could not grasp her robe!”
22. The wonder was increased when the Crisis approaches.
Old Maid passed beneath the porch of the
deserted mansion, ascended the moss-covered steps, lifted
the iron knocker, and gave three raps. The people could only
conjecture that some old remembrance, troubling her
bewildered brain, had impelled the poor woman hither to visit
the friends of her youth; all gone from their The house
home long since and forever, unless their mentioned in
ghosts still haunted it—fit company for the paragraphs 1, 12
“Old Maid in the Winding Sheet.” An elderly and 14.
man approached the steps, and, reverently uncovering his
gray locks, essayed to explain the matter.
23. “None, Madam,” said he, “have dwelt in Note “None—have.”
this house these fifteen years agone—no, Contributory
not since the death of old Colonel Fenwicke, incident.
whose funeral you may remember to have First mention of
followed. His heirs, being ill agreed among name.
themselves, have let the mansion-house go
to ruin.”
24. The Old Maid looked slowly round with a slight gesture of
one hand, and a finger of the other upon her lip, appearing
more shadow-like than ever in the obscurity of the porch. But
again she lifted the hammer, and gave, this time, a single rap.
Could it be that a footstep was now heard Note atmosphere of
coming down the staircase of the old vagueness.
mansion, which all conceived to have been so long
untenanted? Slowly, feebly, yet heavily, like the pace of an
aged and infirm person, the step approached, more distinct
on every downward stair, till it reached the portal. The bar fell
on the inside; the door opened. One upward glance towards
the church spire, whence the sunshine had just faded, was
the last that the people saw of the “Old Maid in the Winding
Sheet.”
25. “Who undid the door?” asked many. Tone of mystery.
26. This question, owing to the depth of
shadow beneath the porch, no one could satisfactorily
answer. Two or three aged men, while protesting against an
inference which might be drawn, affirmed See ¶12.
that the person within was a negro, and bore
a singular resemblance to old Cæsar, formerly a slave in the
house, but freed by death some thirty years before.
27. “Her summons has waked up a servant of the old family,”
said one, half seriously.
28. “Let us wait here,” replied another. “More guests will
knock at the door, anon. But the gate of the graveyard should
be thrown open!”
29. Twilight had overspread the town before the crowd began
to separate, or the comments on this incident were
exhausted. One after another was wending Preparation for
his way homeward, when a coach—no climax.
common spectacle in those days—drove
slowly into the street. It was an old-fashioned equipage,
hanging close to the ground, with arms on the panels, a
footman behind, and a grave, corpulent No indication
coachman seated high in front—the whole whence it came.
giving an idea of solemn state and dignity.
There was something awful in the heavy rumbling of the
wheels. The coach rolled down the street, till, coming to the
gateway of the deserted mansion, it drew Setting.
up, and the footman sprang to the ground.
30. “Whose grand coach is this?” asked a very inquisitive
body.
31. The footman made no reply, but ascended the steps of
the old house, gave three raps with the iron hammer, and
returned to open the coach door. An old Three raps signify a
man, possessed of the heraldic lore so formal demand for
common in that day, examined the shield of entrance.
arms on the panel.
32. “Azure, a lion’s head erased, between three flower-de-
luces,” said he; then whispered the name of the family to
whom these bearings belonged. The last Setting.
inheritor of his honors was recently dead,
after a long residence amid the splendor of the British court,
where his birth and wealth had given him no mean station.
“He left no child,” continued the herald, “and these arms,
being in a lozenge, betoken that the coach appertains to his
widow.”
33. Further disclosures, perhaps, might Second Main
have been made had not the speaker Character.
suddenly been struck dumb by the stern eye
of an ancient lady who thrust forth her head from the coach,
preparing to descend. As she emerged, the people saw that
her dress was magnificent, and her figure dignified, in spite of
age and infirmity—a stately ruin but with a look, at once, of
pride and wretchedness. Her strong and rigid features had an
awe about them, unlike that of the white Old Maid, but as of
something evil. She passed up the steps, Contributory
leaning on a gold-headed cane; the door incident.
swung open as she ascended—and the light
of a torch glittered on the embroidery of her dress, and
gleamed on the pillars of the porch. After a momentary pause
—a glance backwards—and then a desperate effort—she
went in. The decipherer of the coat of arms had ventured up
the lowest step, and shrinking back immediately, pale and
tremulous, affirmed that the torch was held by the very image
of old Cæsar.
34. “But such a hideous grin,” added he,
Subordinate
“was never seen on the face of mortal man, character of central
black or white! It will haunt me till my dying action.
day.” Compare ¶12.
35. Meanwhile, the coach had wheeled Note the use of

round, with a prodigious clatter on the shadows and
pavement, and rumbled up the street, twilights as
disappearing in the twilight, while the ear still accessories.
tracked its course. Scarcely was it gone, when the people
began to question whether the coach and attendants, the
ancient lady, the spectre of old Cæsar, and the Old Maid
herself, were not all a strangely combined Key.
delusion, with some dark purport in its
mystery. The whole town was astir, so that, Atmosphere—a
instead of dispersing, the crowd continually sense of something
increased, and stood gazing up at the about to occur.
windows of the mansion, now silvered by
the brightening moon. The elders, glad to indulge the
narrative propensity of age, told of the long-faded splendor of
the family, the entertainments they had given, and the guests,
the greatest of the land, and even titled and noble ones from
abroad, who had passed beneath that portal. These graphic
reminiscences seemed to call up the ghosts of those to whom
they referred. So strong was the impression on some of the
more imaginative hearers, that two or three were seized with
trembling fits, at one and the same moment, protesting that
they had distinctly heard three other raps of the iron knocker.
36. “Impossible!” exclaimed others. “See! Contributory
The moon shines beneath the porch, and material.
shows every part of it, except in the narrow
shade of that pillar. There is no one there!”
37. “Did not the door open?” whispered one of these fanciful
persons.
38. “Didst thou see it, too?” said his companion, in a startled
tone.
39. But the general sentiment was opposed Vagueness.
to the idea that a third visitant had made
application at the door of the deserted house. A few, however,
adhered to this new marvel, and even declared that a red
gleam like that of a torch had shone through the great front
window, as if the negro were lighting a guest up the staircase.
This, too, was pronounced a mere fantasy. Tone.
But at once the whole multitude started, and
each man beheld his own terror painted in the faces of all the
rest.
40. “What an awful thing is this!” cried they.
41. A shriek too fearfully distinct for doubt Minor climax—
had been heard within the mansion, preparation for main
breaking forth suddenly, and succeeded by climax.
a deep stillness, as if a heart had burst in
giving it utterance. The people knew not whether to fly from
the very sight of the house, or to rush trembling in, and search
out the strange mystery. Amid their confusion and affright,
they are somewhat reassured by the Note shifting of
appearance of their clergyman, a venerable tenses.
patriarch, and equally a saint, who had
taught them and their fathers the way to heaven for more than
the space of an ordinary life-time. He was a Contributory
reverend figure, with long, white hair upon incident.
his shoulders, a white beard upon his
breast, and a back so bent over his staff that he seemed to be
looking downward continually, as if to choose a proper grave
for his weary frame. It was some time before the good old
man, being deaf and of impaired intellect, could be made to
comprehend such portions of the affair as were
comprehensible at all. But, when possessed of the facts, his
energies assumed unexpected vigor.
42. “Verily,” said the old gentleman, “it will be fitting that I
enter the mansion-house of the worthy Colonel Fenwicke, lest
any harm should have befallen that true Christian woman
whom ye call the ‘Old Maid in the Winding Sheet.’”
43. Behold, then, the venerable clergyman
ascending the steps of the mansion, with a Again a shift in the
manner of narration.
torch-bearer behind him. It was the elderly
man who had spoken to the Old Maid, and the same who had
afterwards explained the shield of arms and recognized the
features of the negro. Like their predecessors, they gave
three raps with the iron hammer.
44. “Old Cæsar cometh not,” observed the priest. “Well I wot
he no longer doth service in this mansion.”
45. “Assuredly, then, it was something worse, in old Cæsar’s
likeness!” said the other adventurer.
46. “Be it as God wills,” answered the One who ventures.
clergyman. “See! my strength, though it be
much decayed, hath sufficed to open this heavy door. Let us
enter and pass up the staircase.”
47. Here occurred a singular exemplification Key to tone further
of the dreamy state of a very old man’s developed.
mind. As they ascended the wide flight of
stairs, the aged clergyman appeared to move with caution,
occasionally standing aside, and oftener bending his head, as
it were in salutation, thus practising all the gestures of one
who makes his way through a throng. Reaching the head of
the staircase, he looked around with sad and solemn
benignity, laid aside his staff, bared his hoary locks, and was
evidently on the point of commencing a prayer.
48. “Reverend Sir,” said his attendant, who conceived this a
very suitable prelude to their further search, “would it not be
well that the people join with us in prayer?”
49. “Welladay!” cried the old clergyman, Confusion between
staring strangely around him. “Art thou here real and unreal
with me, and none other? Verily, past times further illustrated by
were present to me, and I deemed that I contributory
material.
was to make a funeral prayer, as many a
time heretofore, from the head of this staircase. Of a truth, I
saw the shades of many that are gone. Yea, Deft introduction of
I have prayed at their burials, one after central character.
another, and the ‘Old Maid in the Winding
Sheet’ hath seen them to their graves!”
50. Being now more thoroughly awake to their present
purpose, he took his staff and struck forcibly on the floor, till
there came an echo from each deserted chamber, but no
menial to answer their summons. They Tone.
therefore walked along the passage, and
again paused, opposite to the great front window through
which was seen the crowd, in the shadow and partial
moonlight of the street beneath. On their Key.
right hand was the open door of a chamber,
and a closed one on their left. The clergyman pointed his
cane to the carved oak panel of the latter.
51. “Within that chamber,” observed he, “a Foundation
whole life-time since, did I sit by the death- situation.
bed of a goodly young man, who, being now
at the last gasp”—
52. Apparently there was some powerful Atmosphere.
excitement in the ideas which had now
flashed across his mind. He snatched the torch from his
companion’s hand, and threw open the door with such
sudden violence that the flame was extinguished, leaving
them no other light than the moonbeams, which fell through
two windows into the spacious chamber. It Note author’s
was sufficient to discover all that could be device.
known. In a high-backed oaken armchair,
upright, with her hands clasped across her heart, and her
head thrown back, sat the “Old Maid in the Winding Sheet.”
The stately dame had fallen on her knees, with her forehead
on the holy knees of the Old Maid, one hand upon the floor
and the other pressed convulsively against her heart. It
clutched a lock of hair, once sable, now The decision must
discolored with a greenish mould. As the be inferred.
priest and layman advanced into the
chamber, the Old Maid’s features assumed such a semblance
of shifting expression that they trusted to hear the whole
mystery explained by a single word. But it Tone of vagueness
was only the shadow of a tattered curtain to the end.
waving betwixt the dead face and the
moonlight.
53. “Both dead!” said the venerable man. Climax.
“Then who shall divulge the secret? Vague denouement.
Methinks it glimmers to and fro in my mind,
like the light and shadow across the Old Maid’s face. And now
’tis gone!”
FOR ANALYSIS
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

BY EDGAR ALLAN POE
Son cœur est un luth suspendu;

Sitôt qu’on le touche il résonne.
Beranger.
During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the

autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in
the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback,
through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length
found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within
view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it
was, but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of
insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for
the feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable,
because poetic, sentiment with which the mind usually
receives even the sternest natural images of the desolate or
terrible. I looked upon the scene before me—upon the mere
house, and the simple landscape features of the domain,
upon the bleak walls, upon the vacant eye-like windows, upon
a few rank sedges, and upon a few white trunks of decayed
trees—with an utter depression of soul which I can compare
to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream
of the reveler upon opium: the bitter lapse into everyday life,
the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was an iciness, a
sinking, a sickening of the heart, an unredeemed dreariness
of thought, which no goading of the imagination could torture
into aught of the sublime. What was it—I paused to think—
what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation of the
House of Usher? It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I
grapple with the shadow fancies that crowded upon me as I
pondered. I was forced to fall back upon the unsatisfactory
conclusion that while, beyond doubt, there are combinations
of very simple natural objects which have the power of thus
affecting us, still the analysis of this power lies among
considerations beyond our depth. It was possible, I reflected,
that a mere different arrangement of the particulars of the
scene, of the details of the picture, would be sufficient to
modify, or perhaps to annihilate, its capacity for sorrowful
impression, and, acting upon this idea, I reined my horse to
the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in
unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down—but with a
shudder even more thrilling than before—upon the remodeled
and inverted images of the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-
stems, and the vacant and eye-like windows.
2. Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to
myself a sojourn of some weeks. Its proprietor, Roderick
Usher, had been one of my boon companions in boyhood; but
many years had elapsed since our last meeting. A letter,
however, had lately reached me in a distant part of the
country—a letter from him—which in its wildly importunate
nature had admitted of no other than a personal reply. The
MS. gave evidence of nervous agitation. The writer spoke of
acute bodily illness, of a mental disorder which oppressed
him, and of an earnest desire to see me, as his best and
indeed his only personal friend, with a view of attempting, by
the cheerfulness of my society, some alleviation of his malady.
It was the manner in which all this, and much more, was said
—it was the apparent heart that went with his request—which
allowed me no room for hesitation; and I accordingly obeyed
forthwith what I still considered a very singular summons.
3. Although as boys we had been even intimate associates,
yet I really knew little of my friend. His reserve had been
always excessive and habitual. I was aware, however, that his
very ancient family had been noted, time out of mind, for a
peculiar sensibility of temperament, displaying itself, through
long ages, in many works of exalted art, and manifested of
late in repeated deeds of munificent yet unobtrusive charity,
as well as in a passionate devotion to the intricacies, perhaps
even more than to the orthodox and easily recognizable
beauties, of musical science. I had learned, too, the very
remarkable fact that the stem of the Usher race, all time-
honored as it was, had put forth at no period any enduring
branch; in other words, that the entire family lay in the direct
line of descent, and had always, with a very trifling and very
temporary variation, so lain. It was this deficiency, I
considered, while running over in thought the perfect keeping
of the character of the premises with the accredited character
of the people, and while speculating upon the possible
influence which the one, in the long lapse of centuries, might
have exercised upon the other,—it was this deficiency,
perhaps, of collateral issue, and the consequent undeviating
transmission from sire to son of the patrimony with the name,
which had at length so identified the two as to merge the
original title of the estate in the quaint and equivocal
appellation of the “House of Usher,”—an appellation which
seemed to include, in the minds of the peasantry who used it,
both the family and the family mansion.
4. I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childish
experiment, that of looking down within the tarn, had been to
deepen the first singular impression. There can be no doubt
that the consciousness of the rapid increase of my
superstition—for why should I not so term it?—served mainly
to accelerate the increase itself. Such, I have long known, is
the paradoxical law of all sentiments having terror as a basis.
And it might have been for this reason only, that, when I again
uplifted my eyes to the house itself from its image in the pool,
there grew in my mind a strange fancy,—a fancy so
ridiculous, indeed, that I but mention it to show the vivid force
of the sensations which oppressed me. I had so worked upon
my imagination as really to believe that about the whole
mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiar to
themselves and their immediate vicinity: an atmosphere which
had no affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up
from the decayed trees, and the gray wall, and the silent tarn;
a pestilent and mystic vapor, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible,
and leaden-hued.
5. Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I
scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its
principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity.
The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute fungi
overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-
work from the eaves. Yet all this was apart from any
extraordinary dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had
fallen; and there appeared to be a wild inconsistency between
its still perfect adaptation of parts and the crumbling condition
of the individual stones. In this there was much that reminded
me of the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted
for long years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance
from the breath of the external air. Beyond this indication of
extensive decay, however, the fabric gave little token of
instability. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might
have discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which,
extending from the roof of the building in front, made its way
down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in the
sullen waters of the tarn.
6. Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the
house. A servant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the
Gothic archway of the hall. A valet, of stealthy step, thence
conducted me in silence through many dark and intricate
passages in my progress to the studio of his master. Much
that I encountered on the way contributed, I know not how, to
heighten the vague sentiments of which I have already
spoken. While the objects around me—while the carvings of
the ceiling, the sombre tapestries of the walls, the ebon
blackness of the floors, and the phantasmagoric armorial
trophies which rattled as I strode, were but matters of which,
or to such as which, I had been accustomed from my infancy,
—while I hesitated not to acknowledge how familiar was all
this, I still wondered to find how unfamiliar were the fancies
which ordinary images were stirring up. On one of the
staircases I met the physician of the family. His countenance,
I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning and
perplexity. He accosted me with trepidation and passed on.
The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into the
presence of his master.
7. The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty.
The windows were long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a
distance from the black oaken floor as to be altogether
inaccessible from within. Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light
made their way through the trellised panes, and served to
render sufficiently distinct the more prominent objects around;
the eye, however, struggled in vain to reach the remoter
angles of the chamber, or the recesses of the vaulted and
fretted ceiling. Dark draperies hung upon the walls. The
general furniture was profuse, comfortless, antique, and
tattered. Many books and musical instruments lay scattered
about, but failed to give any vitality to the scene. I felt that I
breathed an atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, and
irredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all.
8. Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he
had been lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious
warmth which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone
cordiality,—of the constrained effort of the ennuyé man of the
world. A glance, however, at his countenance, convinced me
of his perfect sincerity. We sat down; and for some moments,
while he spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of
pity, half of awe. Surely man had never before so terribly
altered, in so brief a period, as had Roderick Usher! It was
with difficulty that I could bring myself to admit the identity of
the wan being before me with the companion of my early
boyhood. Yet the character of his face had been at all times
remarkable. A cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large,
liquid, and luminous beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin
and very pallid, but of a surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose
of a delicate Hebrew model, but with a breadth of nostril
unusual in similar formations; a finely-moulded chin,
speaking, in its want of prominence, of a want of moral
energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuity,—
these features, with an inordinate expansion above the
regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance not
easily to be forgotten. And now in the mere exaggeration of
the prevailing character of these features, and of the
expression they were wont to convey, lay so much of change
that I doubted to whom I spoke. The now ghastly pallor of the
skin, and the now miraculous lustre of the eye, above all
things startled and even awed me. The silken hair, too, had
been suffered to grow all unheeded, and as, in its wild
gossamer texture, it floated rather than fell about the face, I
could not, even with effort, connect its arabesque expression
with any idea of simple humanity.
9. In the manner of my friend I was at once struck with an
incoherence, an inconsistency; and I soon found this to arise
from a series of feeble and futile struggles to overcome an
habitual trepidancy, an excessive nervous agitation. For
something of this nature I had indeed been prepared, no less
by his letter than by reminiscences of certain boyish traits,
and by conclusions deduced from his peculiar physical
conformation and temperament. His action was alternately
vivacious and sullen. His voice varied rapidly from a
tremulous indecision (when the animal spirits seemed utterly
in abeyance) to that species of energetic concision—that
abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding enunciation,
that leaden, self-balanced, and perfectly modulated guttural
utterance—which may be observed in the lost drunkard, or
the irreclaimable eater of opium, during the periods of his
most intense excitement.
10. It was thus that he spoke of the object of my visit, of his
earnest desire to see me, and of the solace he expected me
to afford him. He entered at some length into what he
conceived to be the nature of his malady. It was, he said, a
constitutional and a family evil, and one for which he
despaired to find a remedy,—a mere nervous affection, he
immediately added, which would undoubtedly soon pass off. It
displayed itself in a host of unnatural sensations. Some of
these, as he detailed them, interested and bewildered me;
although, perhaps, the terms and the general manner of the
narration had their weight. He suffered much from a morbid
acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food was alone
endurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture; the
odors of all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured
by even a faint light; and there were but peculiar sounds, and
these from stringed instruments, which did not inspire him
with horror.
11. To an anomalous species of terror I found him a bounden
slave. “I shall perish,” said he, “I must perish in this deplorable
folly. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost. I dread the
events of the future, not in themselves, but in their results. I
shudder at the thought of any, even the most trivial, incident,
which may operate upon this intolerable agitation of soul. I
have, indeed, no abhorrence of danger, except in its absolute
effect,—in terror. In this unnerved, in this pitiable condition, I
feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I must
abandon life and reason together in some struggle with the
grim phantasm, Fear.”
12. I learned moreover at intervals, and through broken and
equivocal hints, another singular feature of his mental
condition. He was enchained by certain superstitious
impressions in regard to the dwelling which he tenanted, and
whence for many years he had never ventured forth, in regard
to an influence whose supposititious force was conveyed in
terms too shadowy here to be restated,—an influence which
some peculiarities in the mere form and substance of his
family mansion had, by dint of long sufferance, he said,
obtained over his spirit; an effect which the physique of the
gray walls and turrets, and of the dim tarn into which they all
looked down, had at length brought about upon the morale of
his existence.
13. He admitted, however, although with hesitation, that much
of the peculiar gloom which thus afflicted him could be traced
to a more natural and far more palpable origin,—to the severe
and long-continued illness, indeed to the evidently
approaching dissolution, of a tenderly beloved sister, his sole
companion for long years, his last and only relative on earth.
“Her decease,” he said, with a bitterness which I can never
forget, “would leave him (him, the hopeless and the frail) the
last of the ancient race of the Ushers.” While he spoke, the
lady Madeline (for so was she called) passed slowly through a
remote portion of the apartment, and, without having noticed
my presence, disappeared. I regarded her with an utter
astonishment not unmingled with dread, and yet I found it
impossible to account for such feelings. A sensation of stupor
oppressed me, as my eyes followed her retreating steps.
When a door, at length, closed upon her, my glance sought
instinctively and eagerly the countenance of the brother; but
he had buried his face in his hands, and I could only perceive
that a far more than ordinary wanness had overspread the
emaciated fingers through which trickled many passionate
tears.
14. The disease of the lady Madeline had long baffled the skill
of her physicians. A settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of
the person, and frequent although transient affections of a
partially cataleptical character, were the unusual diagnosis.
Hitherto she had steadily borne up against the pressure of her
malady, and had not betaken herself finally to bed: but, on the
closing-in of the evening of my arrival at the house, she
succumbed (as her brother told me at night with inexpressible
agitation) to the prostrating power of the destroyer; and I
learned that the glimpse I had obtained of her person would
thus probably be the last I should obtain,—that the lady, at
least while living, would be seen by me no more.
15. For several days ensuing, her name was unmentioned by
either Usher or myself; and during this period I was busied in
earnest endeavors to alleviate the melancholy of my friend.
We painted and read together; or I listened, as if in a dream,
to the wild improvisation of his speaking guitar. And thus, as a
closer and still closer intimacy admitted me more
unreservedly into the recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly
did I perceive the futility of all attempt at cheering a mind from
which darkness, as if an inherent positive quality, poured forth
upon all objects of the moral and physical universe, in one
unceasing radiation of gloom.
16. I shall ever bear about me a memory of the many solemn
hours I thus spent alone with the master of the House of
Usher. Yet I should fail in any attempt to convey an idea of the
exact character of the studies, or of the occupations, in which
he involved me, or led me the way. An excited and highly
distempered ideality threw a sulphureous lustre over all. His
long, improvised dirges will ring forever in my ears. Among
other things, I hold painfully in mind a certain singular
perversion and amplification of the wild air of the last waltz of
Von Weber. From the paintings over which his elaborate fancy
brooded, and which grew, touch by touch, into vaguenesses
at which I shuddered the more thrillingly because I shuddered
knowing not why,—from these paintings (vivid as their images
now are before me) I would in vain endeavor to educe more
than a small portion which should lie within the compass of
merely written words. By the utter simplicity, by the
nakedness of his designs, he arrested and overawed
attention. If ever mortal painted an idea, that mortal was
Roderick Usher. For me at least, in the circumstances then
surrounding me, there arose, out of the pure abstractions
which the hypochondriac contrived to throw upon his canvas,
an intensity of intolerable awe, no shadow of which felt I ever
yet in the contemplation of the certainly glowing yet too
concrete reveries of Fuseli.
17. One of the phantasmagoric conceptions of my friend,
partaking not so rigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may be
shadowed forth, although feebly, in words. A small picture
presented the interior of an immensely long and rectangular
vault or tunnel, with low walls, smooth, white, and without
interruption or device. Certain accessory points of the design
served well to convey the idea that this excavation lay at an
exceeding depth below the surface of the earth. No outlet was
observed in any portion of its vast extent, and no torch, or
other artificial source of light, was discernible; yet a flood of
intense rays rolled throughout, and bathed the whole in a
ghastly and inappropriate splendor.
18. I have just spoken of that morbid condition of the auditory
nerve which rendered all music intolerable to the sufferer, with
the exception of certain effects of stringed instruments. It was,
perhaps, the narrow limits to which he thus confined himself
upon the guitar, which gave birth, in great measure, to the
fantastic character of his performances. But the fervid facility
of his impromptus could not be so accounted for. They must
have been, and were, in the notes as well as in the words of
his wild fantasias (for he not unfrequently accompanied
himself with rhymed verbal improvisations), the result of that
intense mental collectedness and concentration to which I
have previously alluded as observable only in particular
moments of the highest artificial excitement. The words of one
of these rhapsodies I have easily remembered. I was,
perhaps, the more forcibly impressed with it as he gave it,
because, in the under or mystic current of its meaning, I
fancied that I perceived, and for the first time, a full
consciousness, on the part of Usher, of the tottering of his
lofty reason upon her throne. The verses, which were entitled
“The Haunted Palace,” ran very nearly, if not accurately, thus:
—
I.
In the greenest of our valleys
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace—
Radiant palace—reared its head.
In the monarch Thought’s dominion,
It stood there;
Never seraph spread a pinion
Over fabric half so fair.
II.
Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
On its roof did float and flow
(This—all this—was in the olden
Time long ago),
And every gentle air that dallied,
In that sweet day,
Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
A winged odor went away.
III.
Wanderers in that happy valley
Through two luminous windows saw
Spirits moving musically
To a lute’s well-tunèd law,
Round about a throne, where sitting,
Porphyrogene,
In state his glory well befitting,
The ruler of the realm was seen.
IV.
And all with pearl and ruby glowing
Was the fair palace door,
Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,
And sparkling evermore,
A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty
Was but to sing,
In voices of surpassing beauty,
The wit and wisdom of their king.
V.
But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch’s high estate;
(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)
And, round about his home, the glory
That blushed and bloomed
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.
VI.
And travellers now within that valley
Through the red-litten windows see
Vast forms that move fantastically
To a discordant melody;
While, like a ghastly rapid river,
Through the pale door,
A hideous throng rush out forever,
And laugh—but smile no more.
19. I well remember that suggestions arising from this ballad

led us into a train of thought, wherein there became manifest
an opinion of Usher’s which I mention, not so much on
account of its novelty (for other men have thought thus) as on
account of the pertinacity with which he maintained it. This
opinion, in its general form, was that of the sentience of all
vegetable things. But in his disordered fancy, the idea had
assumed a more daring character, and trespassed, under
certain conditions, upon the kingdom of inorganization. I lack
words to express the full extent or the earnest abandon of his
persuasion. The belief, however, was connected (as I have
previously hinted) with the gray stones of the home of his
forefathers. The conditions of the sentience had been here,
he imagined, fulfilled in the method of collocation of these
stones,—in the order of their arrangement, as well as in that
of the many fungi which overspread them, and of the decayed
trees which stood around; above all, in the long undisturbed
endurance of this arrangement, and in its reduplication in the
still waters of the tarn. Its evidence—the evidence of the
sentience—was to be seen, he said (and I here started as he
spoke), in the gradual yet certain condensation of an
atmosphere of their own about the waters and the walls. The
result was discoverable, he added, in that silent yet
importunate and terrible influence which for centuries had
moulded the destinies of his family, and which made him what
I now saw him,—what he was. Such opinions need no
comment, and I will make none.
20. Our books—the books which for years had formed no
small portion of the mental existence of the invalid—were, as
might be supposed, in strict keeping with this character of
phantasm. We pored together over such works as the Ververt
and Chartreuse of Gresset; the Belphegor of Machiavelli; the
Heaven and Hell of Swedenborg; the Subterranean Voyage of
Nicholas Klimm by Holberg; the Chiromancy of Robert Flud,
of Jean D’Indaginé, and of De la Chambre; the Journey into
the Blue Distance of Tieck; and the City of the Sun of
Campanella. One favorite volume was a small octavo edition
of the Directorium Inquisitorum, by the Dominican Eymeric de
Gironne; and there were passages in Pomponius Mela, about
the old African Satyrs and Ægipans, over which Usher would
sit dreaming for hours. His chief delight, however, was found
in the perusal of an exceedingly rare and curious book in
quarto Gothic,—the manual of a forgotten church,—the Vigilæ
Mortuorum secundum Chorum Ecclesiæ Maguntinæ.

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Preface xiii Application 2.1 Planned change at Bord Na Mona – Irish

Discussion questions 61 5-5d Alignment 98

PART II 5-6d Alignment 103

7 Designing interventions 141 Summary 181

10-3 Third Party Interventions 221

Summary 259 13-2 Employee involvement interventions 311

Summary 352 16-1 Coaching and mentoring 394

20 Trans-organizational change 509 21-2b Application stages 562

21 Organization development Summary 594

for economic, ecological, Discussion questions 594

social and health outcomes 550 Notes 594

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●● Describe the history and relevance of OD.

●● Distinguish OD and planned change from other forms of organization change.

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1-1 Organization Development Defined

Table 1.1 Definitions of organization development

1-2 Trends Shaping the Role and Relevance

Figure 1.1 Four trends shaping the future of organization development

Trend 1 – A shift to platforms over products

Trend 2 – A shift to digital over mechanical

Trend 3 – A shift to insights over data

Trend 4 – A shift to talent over employees

1-3 A Short History of Organization Development

Figure 1.2 The five stems of OD practice

Quality of Work Life

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Today

1-3a Laboratory Training Background

35. Meanwhile, the coach had wheeled Note the use of

THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

Son cœur est un luth suspendu;

During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the

19. I well remember that suggestions arising from this ballad

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1-2 Trends Shaping the Role and Relevance