Dr. ROGER GOODSON'S CONSULTING RESOURCES
This page has been prepared as a means for participants to share links to Web sites that provide information concerning the art of consulting, understanding, gaining, honing consulting skills, team/management coaching, and related areas. As we heard in the first session, participants have arrived in this group as a result many different life experiences, choosing different personal and professional paths. There are of course, as could be heard in that dialogue, points of contiguous experience where similar roles have been played in various organizational contexts, but even then engaged in from widely differing perspectives.
It seems next to impossible to attempt to find one way, model, theory, or tool that will fit the professional needs of all participants: we can present general ideas and theories that each participant can shape according to her/his own experience and professional desire. We can also choose to share ideas, experiences and thoughts regarding those things that we have found to be of use as either consultant or client. As Schein suggests, in Process Consultation, when working with an unknown group we start with attempting to understand and gain knowledge of the experiences of other(s) with whom we are engaged in dialogue. In that spirit, I offer you the opportunity to use and add to the annotated links below. (Please send annotated links to PROFGOOD@comcast.net)
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Consulting Skills and Talents. http://www.careers-in-business.com/consulting/mcskill.htm This site consists of very general information and observations concerning consulting. Not really anything in depth, but good general suggestions and ideas.)
HRTools: Grow Your Strategic Consulting Skills (Susan M. Heathfield): http://humanresources.about.com/library/weekly/aa071001a.htm Site presents general information on consulting requirements and skills. Lots of good references to books regarding different aspects of consulting from `entry’ to `exit.’
Coaching Organization Members: http://www.mapnp.org/library/guiding/coaching/coaching.htm
Offers several categories of related links that include `What is Coaching’, `Getting Coached’, `Coaching Others’, `Peer Coaching Groups’, related library links and live discussion groups.
Consulting Academy: http://www.consultingacademy.com/index.shtm Site of Dave Alev, billed as `developer, facilitator, coach’. Site has links to a number of useful free articles regarding different aspects of consulting. Generally, site is an advertisement for Alev’s business. In spite of that, good advice is offered.
Improving Your Consulting Skills, Naomi Karten (Speaker, Consultant, Author): http://www.nkarten.com/consk.html Another site advertising a consulting service. Good general advice concerning `Types of Questions’ and `Always Assume Your Assumptions are Wrong.’
Consultant Resource Center: http://www.consultant-center.com/index.html Free articles, digest, papers regarding consultancy and related activities available from this site. You will need to explore to find what you are looking for, but there is `good stuff' here.
Tavistock Institute: http://www.tavinstitute.org. The Tavistock Institute, based in Belsize Park, London, UK, is an important independent social science, research, advisory and training organization. Anna Freud was a founding member of the institute, which now does original research on organizations and training throughout the world. Tavistock Group Training forms the basis for the work of many consultants. Tavistock Training is available in SF and other USA cities.
National Training Laboratory: http://www.ntl.org NTL is a training organization based in Bethel, Maine. It originated `T-Group Sensitivity Training' in the 1960s. Training is offered the country. Many consultants take NTL training as it offers opportunities to gain deeper insight into one's potential and explores ways in which consultants and trainers can capitalize on their strengths and innate abilities.
Action Science/Chris Argyris/Models 1 & 2: http://www.actionscience.com Site useful in explaining Action Science, a method used by many consultants to analyze and work with client organizations and organizational actors. The foundations for this method were set by Chris Argyris and Donald Schon. Important aspects their work was the development of Model I and Model II, Theories of Action which are master programs organizational actors use in constructing, maintaining and changing their organizational worlds (realities).
Socialization/Indoctrination Case Study (Saturn): http://imvp.mit.edu/papers/96/Fine/fine1.pdf
This is a paper that deals with the socialization/indoctrination of individuals into organizations, (the Psychological Contract). It focuses on research that has been done in the field, and points out discrepancies between the development of loyalty and commitment to a strong corporate culture's values, and the adherence to differing values of some work teams that are at odds with the corporate values. Saturn Corp. provides the case material that fleshes out the paper.
Appropriate Leadership for the Learning Organization. http://www.xplanazine.com/archives/2005/05/appropriate_lea.php "Unless leadership issues are placed in real-world contexts, and the leadership challenges unique to a distributed environment are honestly depicted, studying and applying examples from other fields can have disastrous results. The pitfalls of uncritically applying popular leadership lessons and theories from other fields or times are briefly discussed.
Directory of Online Literacy. http://bulldogs.tlu.edu/mdibble/doril/about.html Given that the information age is in full swing, it is necessary that practitioners be literate in terms of what is available online.