Marvin Weisbord
Business literature is now loaded with models and frameworks designed to help organizations identify, analyze, and fix their problems — whether related to performance, efficiency, workplace climate, or other issues. But it wasn’t always this way, and in fact a half century ago there were few general-purpose models available that were well-suited for the task.
Enter Marvin Weisbord who in the 1970s developed and promoted a deceptively simple framework and associated suite of tools designed for anyone to investigate what was going wrong. In this episode, we discuss one of his articles — “Organizational Diagnosis: Six Places to Look for Trouble With or Without a Theory,” published in 1976 in the journal Group and Organization Studies — that introduced his Six-Box Model of organizational diagnosis. Building on theoretical works such as open systems, socio-technical systems, and concepts of formal and informal systems, the Six-Box model was well grounded in theory. Yet Weisbord wrote the article using plain language, making the tool accessible to anyone with or without education in organization theory or management science.
And yet, the tool is rich. Weisbord’s article describes each of the six boxes — purpose, structure, rewards, relationships, leadership, and helpful mechanisms — in enough detail to show both what information needs to be collected and how the factors uncovered in each box interrelate with each other. The goal is to find root causes, of course, that the leaders can address through some sort of intervention. But Weisbord also shows that such interventions have to be thoughtful — the interrelationships among the boxes contribute to problems with systemic qualities, and that targeting one factor in hopes of a quick fix would not succeed.
During the episode, we also discuss implications for consultancy, particularly internal to the organization. Many of the models and framework that followed Weisbord became more complicated — owing to desires for greater accuracy and commensurate improvement of results. Does one hire an external consultant with their proprietary approach at greater cost but who can provide a degree of independence and objectivity? Or employ an internal consultant empowered with access to company information but who may be subject to organizational politics or being ostracized by other members? Tough questions, regardless of what model one uses.
Part 1. A simple model with many hidden complexities (released 12 January 2021)
Part 2. The model as an educational tool and the challenges of external and internal consulting (released 19 January 2021)
Read With Us:
Weisbord, M. R. (1976). Organizational diagnosis: Six places to look for trouble with or without a theory. Group & Organization Management, 1(4), 430-447.
To Know More:
Deming, W. E. (2012). The Essential Deming: Leadership Principles from the Father of Quality. McGraw Hill Professional.
Harrison, M., & Shirom, A. (1998). Organizational diagnosis and assessment: Bridging theory and practice. Sage Publications.
Mintzberg, H. (1989). Mintzberg on management: Inside our strange world of organizations. Simon and Schuster.
Related Talking About Organizations Episodes:
Episode 14: Simply Managing — Henry Mintzberg
Episode 57: Reward Systems — Steven Kerr
Episode 61: Power & Influence in Organizations — Dan Brass
