CHALLENGE & OPPORTUNITY

In 2013, every business area was in the process of or had planed to go through some form of organisation design / structural change. TAC’s expenditure on external consultants was high, and the capability of the HR Business Partners to support business leaders in the assess and design phases of an organisation design project was low. The need was identified to build the organisation design capability of HR Business Partners and Consultants, and realise up to a 40% saving on external consultants.

OUR APPROACH

As the Change and Organisation Design Consultant, I engaged a global expert in organisation design, Naomi Stanford to support the co-design of a TAC organisation design methodology and toolkit with the HR Business Partners and Consultants. Through 9 x 1 hour coaching sessions and a 5 day workshop, the team worked collaboratively to develop:

• 5 principles of engagement: 1) focus on the business outcome, 2) partner to make it happen, 3) keep it simple, 4) be transparent, 5) question, validate and challenge views. 
• An organisation design  methodology with 4 phases and 30 supporting tools
• An A3 quick reference guide of the TAC organisation design methodology and tools
• An online portal for central access to the organisation design methodology and tools. 

OUTCOME

The following benefits were realised from this piece of work:

• Project delivery – the work was delivered under budget and ahead of time.
• Organisation design artefacts – the methodology and tools were documented and stored centrally
• Capability – pre and post organisation design capability assessments showed a capability uplift, and the HR team were able to provide organisation design consulting to business stakeholders
• Financial – internal capability was utilised instead of external consultants for 3 organisation design projects in 2014.