I propose to consider organizational development as a set of tasks for the development of the organization, taking into account the current place of the organization in the general life cycle of development according to Adizes (the Adizes model of the life cycle of the organization). In my opinion, the most optimal return from the organizational development department is for organizations at the stage from maturity to bureaucracy. The tasks of organizational development are cross-cutting tasks affecting all departments of the company in the following areas:
- Development/optimization of organizational structure
- Development/updating of regulations, provisions
- Development/ description/ optimization of business processes
- Development of key performance indicators/efficiency indicators/KPI
- Initiation/ management/conduct of internal development projects
Some tasks may also fall under the scope of organizational development:
- Optimization of personnel numbers
- Development/implementation of motivational schemes
What I focus on are processes, indicators, projects. In presenting my vision of tasks in the field of organizational development, it is important for me to identify the “allies” of organizational development – these are 2 areas – the area of HR management and the area of information technology management. In my opinion, without strong constructive allied relations between these areas, the tasks of organizational development cannot be objectively realized. In other words, the head of organizational development should be friends with the head of HR and the IT manager.
When working with processes, it is necessary to work through a number of tasks: create a map of the company’s processes, create a register of regulations in their current state, evaluate the current regulatory base, correlate it with the process map, prioritize what is most in demand in the company, and outline your own action plan.
When working with business processes, it is important to select an adequate notation for the graphical description of business processes so that everyone in the company understands it, or to come up with your own simple notation from a combination of the properties of existing notations (IDEF0, eEPC, procedure/algorithm, BPMN). It is useful to use some case tool for more systematic work on describing company processes with unified reference books and roles.
In order to work systematically with regulations, it is important to have a good electronic document management system and maintain a register of regulations directly in the ECM (electronic document management system). If the company does not have a good ECM, then this is the first internal development project – to implement a good corporate ECM.
It is necessary to understand that the ECM is one of the IT pillars for solving organizational development tasks. In the ECM, we coordinate all documents, not only contracts. Also, in the ECM, we coordinate regulations.
I have dealt with such ECM as Directum, WSS Docs, Docs Vision, 1C.Document Management. I held tenders for the selection of ECM solutions. And I must say that the correct choice of ECM is important for the success of its implementation and for the company as a whole. More serious tools (for example, Directum) simply will not work 
in companies with immature processes, poorly allocated office work and document management functions.
Why does org. development need allied relations with HR and IT? If the answer is simple, then in order to solve one well-known, global task – to create conditions under which non-compliance with corporate rules and regulations will be minimal. The task of implementing developed regulations/processes can be successfully solved if regular training, briefings, assessments, and testing are carried out. And here we must be friends with HR, since it is in the HR arsenal that there are the necessary tools for the assimilation of the developed target rules of behavior by the body of the organization.
The solution to this global problem is to create conditions under which non-compliance with corporate rules and regulations will be minimal, possibly also on the part of IT. The approach is well known: we automate the business process and embed the requirements and rules described in the company’s regulations into the system (software, business application). In this case, through automatically generated reports from the system, we can control the quality of the business process execution, and through the system settings set new requirements for the process implementation.
From observations, we can say where the organizational development units arise, options:
- In the HR department
- In the IT department
- Independently, as a separate division of the development organization
- There is another option – in the department of strategic development
