Assess Organisational Climate

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How NOT to assess organisational climate

On the surface, assessing organisational climate should be easy - use one the standard climate survey instruments and then collate the data.  In the case of government departments and agencies, they often have a standard instrument they can use to check current climate, compare climate against previous reports, and compare against benchmarks or ‘average’ reports.

If the organisation wants to receive regular reports that show certain numbers increasing or decreasing, and the numbers are reassuring and important for executives, then standard instruments will provide the numbers.  Furthermore, members will learn how to make the numbers look good.

However, there are many criticisms against such use of the climate construct.  Climate is a dynamic phenomenon and needs to be allowed to change in many ways as the organisation, its activities, and the business environment  changes.  There are better ways...

NOTE:  Deltapoint offers measurement services and using standard or specifically designed instruments .  Contact us

How to assess organisational climate

If the organisation actually wants to understand and use climate, it will recognise that climate is a dynamic thing - and is too huge for for any one climate survey instrument to manage.  When organisational climate is used correctly, only those attributes that are currently important, strategically and socially, need to be measured - and they may differ slightly each year.  The organisation needs to learn about the cause-effect nature of organisational climate and how to manipulate the ‘causes’ to have the desired impact on ‘effect’. 

Importantly, a climate survey must not be something ‘done to’ an organisation.  It must not be about HR or executives collecting data.  Instead, it should be about members reporting their climate.  The philosophical difference is huge, and will make a difference in how it is done - and the ‘feeling’ of the organisational members towards participating.

The sequence for a climate survey therefore becomes something like:

  • Assess the desired climate based on strategic goals (usually missed out)
  • Prepare members for survey (usually missed out)
  • Assess the desired climate based on social view (usually missed out)
  • Design survey (often missed out - opting for a ‘standard’ instrument)
  • Prepare members for data collection (climate ‘for’ data collection)  (usually missed out)
  • Collect data
  • Analyse
  • Interpret - with the aid of members (what does this mean?) (usually missed out)
  • Remedial action plan with non-exec. members (locally) and executives (globally)
  • Report - with the aid of members

 

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