I just finished reading an article in Harvard Business Review (April 2006) by Ram Charam about changing cultures in large organizations. The article, "Home Depot's Blueprint for Culture Change" has many great points that are applicable in both small and large business environments. Specifically, Home Depot employed several tools to change culture:
- Created common metrics
- Upgraded processes to integrate the new culture into the organization
- Added programs (i.e. training) to support the culture change
- Changed the organization (or structure) to meet the needs of new culture
I am particularly interested in the method that Home Depot used to analyze their processes. This method of analysis focuses on each task and how they measured up to five criteria: "world class design, a focus on process, the use of quantifiable metrics, systems capability, and simplicity." If a task didn't meet a certain criteria, they identified steps necessary to meet the criteria.
The article illustrated this by showing the task of Selecting Candidates within the Staffing Process. Home Depot concluded the capabilities of the systems that support Selecting Candidates needed work, so they identified ways to change several areas of the Selection Task including the systems associated with applications and interviews, candidate profiles, and affirmative action.
SO?
I will use this approach for identifying tasks within Program Management so that I can identify all aspects that need improvement.
