Managing Change

6‐2The Growth and Development of an Organization or Workplace

What Is Self‐organization?

By the final part of Story 6, the entire store had already been revitalized. All the employees are thinking about the branch. They suggest ideas (looking at the inspection procedure and engineers accompanying sales personnel in their meetings) and implement new plans on their own (see Figure 6‐3).

Organization Development aims to help the human side of organizations and workplaces function well and improve cooperative relationships. At the same time, it also aims to have the organization members move independently and by their own initiative, and if needed, change the hard side of their organization or workplace by themselves. At this stage, the employees don't need to be ordered by their superior. By their own initiative, the members related to the issue will hold a discussion (productive discussion level) to think through things and implement their plans in order to improve the situation all on their own. This is called self‐organization.

Self‐organization is a term in the field of complex systems that refers to the phenomenon by which various components in a bundle interact and spontaneously form a pattern. In the context of teams and organizations, this is when various members interact and through discussion, spontaneously cooperate and come up with plans and projects and implement these ...