The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) has launched findings of a survey of Chief Executives and HR Directors which provides major evidence that many private and public sector reorganisations are failing to deliver sustained improvements.

The research, 'Organising for Success in the 21st century', which was undertaken by the University of Glasgow and Oxford University's Sa￯d Business School, reinforces the need for organisations to develop an embedded capability for organisational design. It also highlights that people management and development professionals will need to have a leading role in the implementation of reorganisation.

Dr Michael Mayer at the Department of Business and Management at the University of Glasgow, said:, 'It is clear that organising for success in the 21st century requires new ways of thinking about and managing reorganisations if they are to deliver sustained improvement for organisations.'

The survey's findings reveal that people issues often get left out of reorganisations, with the predictable ill-effects of falling morale and lost employees. The results come against a backdrop where large UK companies are now undergoing major change about every three years, while more localised changes are even more frequent.

Other key findings included:

Nearly a half of reorganisations fail to achieve hoped for improvements

Where there is no involvement of human resource professionals only a quarter of cases lead to improvement while the figure rises to around 40 percent when an HR professional is included on the steering group.

Those reorganisations that involve employees to a greater extent lead to better outcomes. Over 60% of respondents wish to see greater consultation with and training of employees in future reorganisations.

Improvement in employee related factors (e.g. employee morale, retention of key employees, knowledge sharing and organisational flexibility) is rarely 'very important'. In nearly two thirds of reorganisations employee related factors fail to be improved.

Employees only rarely have the opportunity to participate in decisions about the reorganisation.

About half of the chief executives indicated that employees participated in decisions about the new organisational design, while only a third of human resource professionals were of the same opinion.

The report shows that improving organisational design is not a one-off activity; rather, it is increasingly becoming an almost continuous process of adjustment and creation. It also explores how organisations move from one design to another, rather than which particular designs are adopted, the focus of most research.

Dr Mayer added, 'As the report demonstrates, the human resource profession is already playing an important role in the process. Nevertheless, there is considerable scope for strengthening its role.'

Richard Whittington, Professor of Strategy at Said Business School, commented, 'By getting involved in the initial design, rather than waiting to pick up the pieces afterwards, people management and development professionals can make a major contribution. In particular they can improve the outcomes in terms of those employee-related factors that are crucial to success.'

Media Relations Office (media@gla.ac.uk)

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development?s has embarked upon a three-year research project on Organising for Success in the Twenty First Century. The project involves case studies and surveys of organising practice within the private and public sectors. It also involves engagement with a steering group of leading people management and development practitioners. For further information, please contact Dr Michael Mayers on 0141 330 2658 or the Press Office on 0141 330 3535.

First published: 5 November 2002