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| The Client Perspective |
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Denison Has High Value for Leader Onboarding New leaders often are charged with forging new directions, influencing change, and creating new opportunities for the organizations they oversee. But how can a new leader gain quick access to valid information – the right “grist for the mill” - to understand what’s really going on and make sound decisions for the organization?
Increasingly, organizations have relied on the Denison Organizational Culture Survey as a tool for effective leader onboarding. Leb Tannenbaum, founder and CEO of Portland, Oregon-based New Legends Consulting, says the Denison survey has been a useful tool in recent onboarding efforts for his company’s clients. “Good decision-making is based on good data,” he says. “In many cases, a new leader may have access to subjective information that may be incomplete, biased and inaccurate. If your major source of information is the board of directors or the existing senior leadership team, your chances of getting a realistic picture of the situation you’re confronting are low.”
Tannenbaum and his colleagues have used the Denison culture survey in leader onboarding for both publicly and privately held companies. “It has real value, because it can be implemented quickly, yields rich data from every level of the organization that is easy to understand, and has legitimate links to desired business outcomes,” Tannenbaum says. “The data is timely and clear, and typically is less threatening, and much more actionable than other kinds of information, such as individual opinions and insights.”
Having valid data in hand helps take the emotions and anguish out of the process of collecting, reviewing and acting on information, according to Tannenbaum.
In one recent instance, New Legends used the Denison Organizational Culture Survey to support the onboarding of a new executive vice president for a publically held technology company. His key focus initially was mobilizing an effective turnaround – a goal that was achieved within the first nine months of his arrival.
“Thanks to the Denison Organizational Culture Survey, this leader had reliable, broad-based information in hand within 60 days after joining the business. They hadn’t been profitable for over 12 quarters. Under the new CEO’s direction, they hit breakeven in his 3rd as the new leader,” said Tannenbaum.
In another instance in a privately held company, with the Denison Organizational Culture Survey in hand, the new CEO empowered his organization to take charge of their areas of responsibility following the departure of their founder. Having shared data has truly enabled the functional leaders in the decision making process. The Denison data has also helped them to remain customer focused as they bridge the “founders gap.”
New Legends Consulting specializes in creating and supporting high-performance cultures; leadership development and executive coaching; and leveraging the “voice of the customer” for organizations.
Additional information about New Legends Consulting is available at: www.newlegendsconsultng.com. You can also view bios of Leb Tannenbaum and his partner Frank Binnendyk on the Denison website. |
| If you have a best practice story to tell, we may be able to feature it in an upcoming Denison Newsletter. Contact Karen Luce for details. |
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| Denison Consulting Network |
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Denison to Offer Workshops in Link with Linkage 
Denison Consulting has formed a new business link with Linkage Incorporated, in a move that should expose more people to the Denison Model and diagnostic tools. Linkage is a highly regarded organizational development company that delivers a wide range of services globally, including conferences, institutes, public workshops, and distance-learning programs on leading-edge topics in leadership, management, HR and OD. In collaboration with Linkage, Denison will present four, two-day workshops in 2008 focusing on organizational culture and the application of the Denison Organizational Culture Survey. The workshop called “Organizational Culture and Diagnosis: A Workshop for Leveraging Change,” will benefit practitioners by helping them expand their knowledge of organizational factors that affect performance, diagnosing an organization’s strengths and weaknesses, and improving their ability influence effective change. The series kicks off on May 15 and 16 in Chicago, with a workshop that is being held in conjunction Linkage’s 2008 Best of Organizational Development Summit, which runs from May 12 through May 15.
Additional Denison-Linkage workshops are scheduled for July 15 and 16 in Ann Arbor; October 2 and 3 in Chicago; and November 12 and 13 in Boston.
At the 2008 Best of Organizational Development Summit, the Denison Model also will be highlighted in two presentations:
- “Impacting Bottom-Line Performance: Translating Data Into Action,” presented on May 13 by Chris Cancialosi and Brian Glaser, partners at GOTHAMculture.
- “Employee Surveys – Bridging the Gap Between Implementation and Action,” presented on May 14 by Caroline Fisher, president of the Fisher Consulting Group.
Linkage, with headquarters in Massachusetts, specializes in leadership development. It offers a variety of conferences, workshops and other learning programs on key topics about leadership, management, human resources and organizational development.
“We welcome the opportunity to work in Linkage as a knowledge-sharing and training partner,” said Bryan Adkins, Denison’s president.
For additional information about upcoming workshops, access Denison Consulting Events. |
GOTHAMculture launches GOTHAMspeak 
GOTHAMculture, a organizational development consulting firm based in New York City, recently announced the launch of their periodical GOTHAMspeak. Founding partners, Brian Glaser and Chris Cancialosi, created this concept as a forum to share dialogue on common organizational issues with clients and colleagues.
The first installment of GOTHAMspeak describes what happens when senior leaders have competing agendas, the possible root cause of this issue, and how individuals within organizations can begin to generate healthy dialogue when they experience these types of conflicts. “GOTHAMculture is striving to increase knowledge sharing by promoting the exchange of best practices and lessons learned with our colleagues and clients as they work to create high-performing individuals, teams, and organizations. GOTHAMspeak is a virtual space that serves as one way for us to accomplish this,” says Glaser and Cancialosi. 
GOTHAMculture is dedicated to helping organizations worldwide navigate change by identifying the root cause of business obstacles and assisting leaders in developing and executing comprehensive solutions aimed at reaching their goals. To learn more, visit them at www.gothamculture.com.
| Do you have a story you'd like to share? We may be able to feature it in an upcoming Denison Newsletter. Contact Karen Luce for details. |
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| Research & Publications |
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Culture Survey Equivalent Across Language Translations Bowling Green State University’s department of Psychology recently partnered with the Denison Research team to investigate the extent to which the language translations of the Denison Organizational Culture Survey were equivalent to the English (US) version. In total 28 different language adaptations were compared, including, traditional and simplified Chinese, French, German, Portuguese, Croatian, Hungarian, Thai, and Vietnamese. Using sophisticated statistical techniques, such as item response theory and confirmatory factor analysis, the BGSU researchers generally found the Culture Survey translations to be psychometrically equivalent to the US English language version. A summary of this research project will be presented at the 23rd annual meeting of the Society of Industrial-Organizational Psychologists in April in San Francisco, CA this April.
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SIOP Annual Event Features Six Denison Presentations Over the years, Denison Consulting has had a major presence at the annual conference sponsored by the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP). This year is no exception, as Denison is involved in six key presentations at SIOP. This year’s slate of presentations showcase the active research collaborations that the Research department has established with some of the leading programs in I/O Psychology, including Bowling Green State University, Michigan State University, Central Michigan University, and the University of Akron.One of the highlights this year is a presentation on the Denison Action Planner – a tool that can be used to help organizations in the culture change management process. Denison will also be presenting research exploring 1) the role of organizational culture in workforce diversity management, 2) the relationship between culture and customer satisfaction over time, and 3) the translation equivalence of the DOCS into 28 different languages.
“The SIOP conference always has been a great networking, outreach and learning opportunity for us,” said Dan Denison, founding partner of Denison Consulting. As one example, Scott Nier approached Dan and Bill at a conference several years ago and has since become a great long-term client and colleague. We have been working closely with him on his dissertation which aims to test the link between organizational culture and customer satisfaction in a large government agency. “We’re looking forward to reconnecting with many of our friends and colleagues at the 2008 event,” comments Denison.
The SIOP 23rd Annual Conference will be held from April 9 to April 12 in San Francisco. Denison representatives can also be found in the exhibit hall and at a reception sponsored in partnership with Mobley Group Pacific on Friday evening, April 11th. For details on all the Denison-related events at SIOP 2008 visit Denison Consulting Events. |
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| Denison News & Notes |
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New Team Member Joins Denison  Denison welcomes the addition of a new Researcher, Ashley Guidroz at the company’s Ann Arbor, Michigan headquarters. We are thrilled to announce that a third full-time Ph.D. researcher has joined the Denison Team. Ashley Guidroz recently received her Ph.D. in I/O Psychology from Bowling Green State University. She has been working with us as an intern for the past year and a half and we are so excited to have her on board with us full-time. Ashley will be working to better understand and meet the research needs of our clients and will be conducting and packaging research to communicate the impact that culture and leadership have on bottom-line performance. Visit the “Meet Our Staff” page of the Denison Web site to meet the rest of the Denison team. |
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As always, we welcome your comments and suggestions. If you have a
comment or question about this newsletter, or would like to suggest a story for a
future newsletter, please contact Karen Luce.
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The team will compete in five races:
