A process-driven Socio-Technical approach to engineering high-performance organisations

Abstract

For organisations, achieving the transition from competence to high-performance can be an elusive goal. The transition requires a systematic, consistent improvement that is difficult to sustain over time. Process models are a recognized way to achieve consistent, repeatable results, yet such models have had limited success when applied to the so-called "soft" areas of organisational behavior. Recent work done in the Software Engineering process improvement discipline has seen a new category of process reference model come into existence, one which is designed to address soft areas of organisational performance. This paper introduces a Reference Model of Organisational Behavior for the leadership of complex virtual teams that has proved effective in industry trials. While it deals with leadership, the approach outlined can be generalized to other aspects of organisational behavior such as innovation and competencies / capabilities, creativity and resilience to adversity, to name a few.