Organizational Assessment

An organizational assessment is a systematic process for obtaining valid information about the performance of an organization and the factors that affect performance. It differs from other types of evaluations because the assessment focuses on the organization as the primary unit of analysis.

Organizational Assessment Considerations
But, before you conduct an organizational assessment, there are important considerations you need to examine.

• What type of approach should you have?: When doing an organizational assessment, should you do a self-assessment or commission an external one? This is one of the key decisions you need to make before you move forward. Organization self-assessment is a cyclic, participatory process. This allows you to have ownership of the assessment, which increases the acceptance of and commitment to the results. On the other hand, commissioning someone else to conduct it for you will lessen your work. Their expertise in this area also assures you that they know what they’re doing and reduces the chances of mistakes. Both approaches have good and bad points. You could also use a combination. What you have to keep in mind when determining what type of approach you should have is what works best for your organization.
• What do you want to assess?: Now that you’ve determined what type of approach you should have, it’s time to determine what parts of your organization do you want to assess. Measuring something within an organization can increase its importance. Because of this, putting emphasis on the wrong thing may cause you to shift your objectives and affect your performance. At the same time, you should also know which indicators should go alone, which can be combined, and how these indicators will be interpreted by different stakeholders.
• Which issues should you prioritize?: Why do you do an organizational assessment? It’s to improve. Because of this desire, you may be tempted to measure everything to know more. But, as the popular saying goes, “the more you see, the less you know”. To avoid this, you have to know which issues you should prioritize. You can measure and study innumerable things in your organization. For an organizational assessment to be effective, it should focus on the things with the greatest impact on the organization’s functions.
• How will you use the results?: Organizational assessment results have a wide variety of uses. Such as the following:
  • Help build the organization’s capacity.
  • Help the organization validate its work.
  • Diagnose problems and propose interventions.
  • Improve the engagement and experience of your employees.
  • As a communication tool to dialogue with the organization’s stakeholders, both internal and external.
  • Help with the strategic planning of the organization.

Conducting an organizational assessment is important to ensure that your organization is reaching its highest potential. It could also help you in your agile transformation.

Organizational Assessment Products
Primary outputs from the organizational assessments include:

• Organizational Impact Assessment (OIA): Provides information on the status of the organizational entities and personnel to adopt the transformation. The OIA will identify direct and indirect impacts on the workforce, direct and indirect stakeholders and how the transformation will impact the accomplishment of the sponsor's mission.
• Organizational Risk Assessment (ORA): Provides sponsor executives with business intelligence on the type and severity of transformation risks and issues and potential mitigation solutions. The ORA may be integrated into one overall organizational impact assessment.

NOTE: The organizational change strategy output from the OIA and ORA provide sponsor executives with the business intelligence to develop the organizational change management (OCM) direction.

• Optional Deliverable-Workforce Transformation Strategy & Plan: Explains the transformation plan ensuring integration with the sponsor's technical and deployment teams, integrates organization preparation, communication, and training activities into one transformation plan, and explains how the transformation program management team will manage daily OCM activities and briefings.
• Communications Planning: Systems engineers also need to be cognizant that a system science approach includes communications planning and outreach strategies to initiate and sustain communications to affected organizational entities and key transformation participants (e.g., internal and external stakeholders). Communications planning requires the development of near-term communications and subsequent implementation of the plans. Further information on performing and developing communication strategies and plans is found in the SEG article "Effective Communication and Influence."