OD Interventions at TCS

1.1 OD Intervention - Introduction

“To intervene is to enter into an ongoing system of relationships, to come between or

among persons, groups, or objects for the purpose of helping them” - (Chris Argyris (1970)
Intervention theory and method. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley)

“Intervention is any event, directed toward improving organizational effectiveness, that

disrupts an organization’s normal way of operating” (Smither, R. et al. (1970) Organization
Development: Strategies for Changing Environment. New York, NY: HarperCollins)

Interventions sometimes involve a consultant from outside the organization, but many times
management itself intervenes to make organizational changes.

OD interventions are plans or programs comprised of specific activities designed to effect

change in some facet of an organization. Numerous interventions have been developed over
the years to address different problems or create various results.

However, they all are geared toward the goal of improving the entire organization through
change. OD interventions can be categorized in a number of ways, including function, the
type of group for which they are intended, or the industry to which they apply. In fact, W.L.
French identified 13 major "families" of interventions based on the type of activities that they
included—activity groups included teambuilding, survey feedback, structural change, and
career-planning.

The techniques that OD practitioners use to bring about change. Specific activities, resulting
from the process of diagnosis and feedback that OD practitioners use to bring about change.

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1.2 The Founder of Intervention Theory:

1.3 Different Types of Interventions in Organizations

1.3.1 Human Process Interventions:

 Coaching
 Training & Development
 Process Consultation
 Team Building.
1.3.2 Techno-structural Interventions
 Restructuring Organization.
 Employee Involvement.
 Work Design.
1.3.3 Human resource management interventions
 Goal setting.
 Performance appraisal.
 Reward systems.
1.3.4 Strategic Change Interventions:
 Mergers & Acquisitions.
 Alliances
 Networks
1.3.5 Individual Interventions
 Third Party Interventions
 Laboratory Group Training
 Career/ Life planning.
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1.3.6 Group Interventions
 Family Group Team Building
 Diagnostic Team Building
 Intergroup
 Organisational Mirror
 Process Consultation
1.3.7 Organisation Interventions
 Confrontation Meeting
 Survey Feedback
 Environmental Scanning

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2. Pre – OD Scenario of TCS

2.1 Strengths

TCS had grown a lot in the past decades. During the year 1998-99, TCS had grown into the
largest Indian software company. It raced towards achieving its vision of being global top ten.
The one of the strengths of the company was its on time delivery. Due to its strengths
company generated good revenues and took Premier position in the industry in terms of
revenues. The company had good focus on training programs and also encouraged quality
initiatives. The other strengths were that it used good technical tools and procedures. The
individual excellence in performance was also encouraged at the company.

2.2 Diagnosed problem

As the company was growing by generating high year on year revenue, it mounted the
pressure on the company to provide the high revenues in the future too. The next issue was
the selectivity in projects by the company. Due to its selective approach of projects it was
difficult to get more projects. The company was focused on specialization. The efforts on
experimentation & innovation were lacking in the company. The company needed lacked the
environment of risk taking and innovation. As the company, the employees expected better
rewards and recognitions. So the need of designing better rewards and recognitions policies
was needed. The company needed to have higher Inter group co-ordination & knowledge
sharing. TCS needed to establish itself as a brand and PR activities for the same were
required.

2.3 Alignment and Attunement

The diagnosis of TCS depicted various issues that were emerging in the organisation as it was
progressing. So the issues were needed to be dealt conveniently to have sustainable growth.
The interventions were required to address the diagnosed issues. In TCS, these solutions
needed to be in sync with the four major voices. The four voices were:

 Voice of Shareholders
 Voice of Employee
 Voice of Customer
 Voice of Technology

To do so, the integration and balancing out these four voices was needed. The stakeholders
needed to be kept in focus before taking any steps. The employees and customers were also
required to be taken in confidence. The technology was very dynamic so it also needed to
kept in mind while designing the interventions.

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3. Organisational Development Interventions at TCS
The organisational development interventions at TCS were on focused on various factors.
The first factor was strategizing the OD inventions well. Further, it was required that the
values of the company should be kept in focus too. The serving and energizing the
environment of the organization was required. The investment in the organisational
interventions to have desired results was also taken into account. Lastly, it focused upon how
much improvement will it bring in the organization through these OD interventions.

Some of the OD Interventions at TCS have been discussed below:

3. 1. Human Process Interventions

With today's strong emphasis on humanistic values, the following interventions are getting a
great deal of attention and emphasis during efforts for change. They focus on helping
members of the organization to enhance themselves, each other and the ways in which they
work together in order to enhance their overall organization. Although the types of
interventions selected for a project depend on a variety of considerations and the
interventions in a project often are highly integrated with each other, the following human
process interventions might be particularly helpful during change projects in organizations
where there is some combination of the following: many new employees, different cultures
working together, many complaints among organizational members, many conflicts, low
morale, high turnover, ineffective teams, etc.

3.1.1 Scenario Building Workshops

Internal organization workshop was conducted with top management for scenario building.
An internal organization workshop was conducted with top management for scenario
building. This program focused at a larger level, on the ―The TCS that can be ―. The idea was
to challenge the conventional ways of thinking and to give shape to the key drivers of change
through realistic listening and dialoguing. These workshops were followed by dissemination
and communication of the scenario with teams in order to develop a new language in the
organisation, consistent with the envisaged future scenario. As a fallout of this workshop,
several representatives of senior management worked on building scenarios as for e.g.
on TCS tools and approach to high end consulting. These looked at ‗what we were and what
we wished to be, our competition, changes and challenges with regard to our business
models, technologies, products and support functions‘. Further, the factors that would
facilitate the desired change and focuses that needed to be redefined were clearly laid down.

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The workshop focused at a larger level, on the ―The TCS that can be‖:

Aim:

 To challenge the conventional ways of thinking and to give shape to the key drivers of
change .
 Realistic listening and dialoguing.
 Dissemination and communication of the scenarios with teams.
 To develop a new language for the organization, consistent with the envisaged future
scenario.

Participants: Representatives of senior management.

Theme of Scenarios: The nature of the struggle the organization would go through and
etched out realistic possibilities based on present factors.

Factors:
 Wealth creation
 Enhanced productivity factors
 Feeling of being valued
 Resource allocation and team-work
 Membership criteria and norms of the group
 Learning opportunities for individuals and teams

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3.1.2 Team Alignment Initiative – PROPEL

PROPEL was introduced as a revolutionary intervention with the dual objectives of

facilitating the exchange of ideas and helping in immediate problem solving, while also
encouraging bonding and self-development among and within teams. Propel covers all
employees across TCS. Camps and confluences are conducted for problem solving, discovery
of new ideas, dialogue, reflection and fun. Through these sessions, the employees are
provided a platform for learning, interacting and problem solving. It was a team alignment
initiative.

Aim:

To set up a dialogue among associates to reflect, build and channel potent restlessness into a
convergent blueprint of responsiveness by redefining desirable role behaviours.

Features:

Stages of PROPEL:

 Initiation
 Conducting Awareness Sessions
 Workshop to share the findings
 Implementing Improvement Plan
 Evaluation/Feedback

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3.2 Techno-Structural Interventions

These interventions deal with an organization‘s technology (for examples its task methods
and job design) and structure (for example, division of labour and hierarchy). These
interventions are rooted in the disciplines of engineering, sociology, and psychology and in
the applied fields of socio-technical systems and organization design. Practitioners place
emphasis both on productivity and human fulfillment.

3.2.1 Value Cards at the Large Relationship

Value Cards at the Large Relationship Value card for the relationship was fallout of the
analysis of tensions existing in the four dimensions as represented by Voice of Customer,
Strategy, Employee and Technology. A tool called ―Value Card‖ was used to analyze the
problems faced by the relationship in relation to these tensions and to arrive at workable
solutions to the identified problems, within designated timeframes. The Value Card helped to
effectively capture and track.

Helped to effectively capture and track this through the following steps:

 The situation summary was charted out.

 Improvement goals, action plans and owners of each plan were identified.
 Success measures were identified against the dimensions of Valuing, Strategizing,
Improving, for each actionable, along with timeframe for closure.
 Impact was analyzed in terms of short term and long-term actions.

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3.2.2 AEP programme : Improvements through Measurements/ Initiatives

The Account Excellence Program (AEP) at the large relationship was modelled on the lines
of the Malcom Baldrige National Quality Award/Tata Business Excellence Model, which
touches upon seven key categories viz Leadership, Strategic planning, Customer and market
focus, Measurement, Analysis and Knowledge management, HR focus, Process management,
Business results. This was aimed to help the relationship to evolve towards meeting changing
business needs with agility.

7 Key Categories:

Strategic
Planning

Customer &
Leadership Market
Focus

Process
Management
AEP
Measurement
& Business
Results

Analysis &
HR Focus Business
Model

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3.3 Human Resource Management Interventions

It aims to enhance overall organisational performance by improving the performance by

improving the performance of individual and groups with in the organisation.

3.3.1 Goal Alignment

In the interest of better alignment, a need was felt to re-look at a few organisational processes
and systems, as for instance, the performance management and appraisal system at TCS.

A Teach-Train-Transfer workshop on Goal alignment was conducted, with help from expert
OD consultants:

 To build the context.

 To think through goal setting at TCS with a systems perspective to goal alignment.
 To explore means of institutionalizing goal-oriented performance management within
the organization.

3.3.2 BALANCE SCORECARD

The Balance Score Card has been implemented at TCS.

Outcomes:

 Lead to the formulation of career paths in TCS global services, consulting and
products, supported by HR processes, tools and support staff.
 This structure was designed to enable a fair degree of flexibility in rotating at
appropriate levels, provides avenues for individual growth.
 Besides, there was an exercise to bring out new role definitions in Human Resources
(HR), focusing on alignment, energizing and task facilitation through HR.
 Business leaders dialogued to evolve the mission and expectations and further, to
design enablers for continuous change, team work, and individual growth.

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3.3.3 DARPAN - Reflect and Improve

DARPAN – Associate Satisfaction Survey for large relationship.

With aggressive expansion and dispersion of ever-growing associate strength in the

relationship, communication or the lack of it, had emerged as one of the biggest bottlenecks
in employee motivation and managerial decision-making. In this context, an associate
satisfaction survey at relationship level christened Darpan was initiated, with the objective to
―Reflect and Improve ―at the relationship level through a better understanding of the explicit
and implicit expectations of associates.

Outcomes From DARPAN : The Cultural Perspective

 91 % of the team felt proud of being part of the relationship.

 90% of the team felt that they can see the big picture - how their contributions add
value to customer.
 90% of the team felt that their supervisors are approachable & enable them to do their
job better.

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3.4 Other OD Interventions at TCS

Initiatives Deployed Summary

 Reward and Recognition initiative

within the relationship.
 Awarded to encourage star
performers for each month within
Nakshaktra Award each Business Unit of the
relationship.
 The unique feature of this initiative
is that even team members can
nominate their peers.

 An interaction / mentorship initiative

with the lead of the relationship.
 Any employee can walk in to meet
In Touch
the lead and discuss out any
problems/ suggestions for
improvement in the relationship.

 To enhance
personality/communication ability of
associates in the relationship.
Toast Master Club/Lets Talk
 To help them gain confidence
through sessions by certified
facilitators.

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  Initiated to bring in a spirit of team.
 To act as a stress buster.
Fun@ Relationship level
 There are champions within each
unit who drive these fun activities in
the relationship.

 The objective was to encourage

strategic communication,
 To discuss the larger vision and
achievements at relationship level
Open House/ Town halls with all employees across the
Business Units.
 Serves as a platform for recognizing
good performers and celebrating
milestone achievements.
 A senior associate within the
relationship takes any new joinee to
the relationship, on a tour of the
facility.
Walk the talk  The aim of this initiative is to make
the new entrant feel valued.
 This is followed by a simple quiz to
check the effectiveness
 of this initiative.

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4. Post – OD scenario of TCS (Culture Perspective)
a) Organizational Development interventions have been instrumental in terms of
enhancing value to the customer & employee at Tata Consultancy Services.

b) PROPEL - encouraged sharing of ownership and empowerment to change, as also

the sharing of success stories and best practices across the organization.

c) Valuing of employees was institutionalized through establishing processes that

enable and enhance individual performance, and lead to empowered project teams.

d) Issue based mentoring was facilitated, with camps and confluences as enabling
frameworks.

e) Confluences invested in personal transformation for the employee, camps invested

in improving the workspace.

f) Through Scenario building, a collective transformation of dreams and concerns

into response capabilities was envisaged.

g) Continuous scanning of environment for opportunities and threats was proactively

looked at.

h) Goal alignment through cascading of Balanced Score Card concept could be

achieved organization wide.

i) There was continuous investment in learning, and an active sharing of knowledge

with the aim to convert learning into action.

j) The focus shifted to adding knowledge through delighting every customer.

k) The earlier tendency of self-sacrificing hard work was replaced by a shift of focus
to teamwork and valuing of the employee.

l) Helped push self imposed boundaries and limitations through challenging

organizational boundaries and limitations constantly.

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5. Conclusion
a) OD interventions at TCS have helped build a culture of fostering systems
thinking.

b) Creating forums for dialogue.

c) Encouraging leadership at all levels.

d) For the organization at large, OD helped to reiterate the merits of valuing enquiry,
expressing differences, and constantly generating new knowledge.

6. References

Case Studies. (n.d.). Retrieved October 10, 2014, from Tata Consultancy Services (TCS):
http://www.tcs.com/resources/case_studies/Pages/default.aspx

Change Designs. (n.d.). Retrieved October 10, 2014, from Team Interventions:
http://www.changedesigns.net/public/team/team_strategy/Team-intervention.html

OD Interventions. (n.d.). Retrieved October 10, 2014, from Organisational Development:

http://organisationdevelopment.org/the-od-cycle/the-intervention-phase/od-
interventions- intervention-categories-new/

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