In his first blog, Chris Warren explained how differently people can respond to change depending on their DISC type and he compared DISC to the Competing Values Framework and organizational culture. In part 2, Chris shows the Change Cycle from danger to opportunity. Depending on your primary DISC style, you experience different blockages when moving through change. Chris argues that 4 factors, one of them being organizational culture, can help people move through the change.

Chris Warren is managing partner at Personal and Organisational Development Services (PODS). In this first blog out of three, he explains how differently people can respond to change… depending on their type according to the DISC methodology. We also take a brief look at what the Competing Values Framework and organizational culture change have to do with this.

by Jan den Breejen

Five fundaments matter to become a High Performance Organization (HPO): quality of management, openness, readiness to take action, long-term focus and continuous improvement of employees. In a HPO employees must be High Performing Individuals (HPI): focused on customers, quality and continuous improvement, inspiring each other to collaborate to achieve excellent results. HPI-employees like to be accountable for their results and take ownership.

In recent years, the most successful companies have focused less on perks and more on offering their employees something better: a connection to the company. Three prominent start-ups - Groupon, Zynga and Dropbox - are each cultivating lasting company cultures, and Kyle Lagunas took a look to see what's working and what's not. Kyle Lagunas is the HR Analyst at Software Advice.

Having looked at Quinn’s management roles, based on the Competing Values Framework it’s time to take a look at "LIFT". Robert Quinn and his son Ryan Quinn wrote this book to show people (and managers) how they can become a positive force in every situation.

The Competing Values Framework (CVF) that is the basis of the OCAI tool, can be related to personality traits from the MBTI. Dyah Ayu Paramitha and four other graduate students from the University of Indonesia, writing their Master theses on Organizational Psychology, proved it again (next to the researchers Basen & Frank).

As we discussed before, Jung discerned some basic types of human personality, based on polarities:

After the organizational culture assessment, people wonder how they personally fit into current and preferred culture. Especially people in a leading position make a big difference when it comes to culture change. They are the catalysts who lead the change initially, they pull that "chariot of change". If they don't, sustainable change is not going to happen.

"Sell new technology or sell problems..."

Would you expect consultants who improve processes in software companies care about corporate culture? Maybe not. However, Jorge Boria and his company do because he found that it works best to start any change with respect for the current culture...

After the assessment, people sometimes wonder how they personally fit into the current and preferred organizational culture types. Should they change their work style or leadership style to facilitate the desired culture change? The ultimate answer is yes: organizational culture change requires the personal change of a critical mass of organization members.

Interesting enough, the Competing Values Framework (CVF) that's at the basis of the OCAI tool, can be related to the "Big Five" personality traits and to MBTI and the four psychological types discovered by Carl Gustav Jung. The eight leadership roles that Robert Quinn defines in each quadrant of the CVF (see his book "Becoming a Master Manager") also correspond with these four/five traits. Let's take a look!

Ericsson is working on establishing a "High Performance Culture". This doesn't mean blindly chasing ambitious targets and handling the whip, but establishing the right mix of elements to optimize the organization's performance. Riquard Van der Vliet, an executive at Ericsson's R&D department in the Netherlands, shares their story using the OCAI.