Went Black: The WordPress side of the Organizational Clarity blog

Recently the WordPress side of the organizational clarity blog went down, basically all of the sudden, without notice without clarity on the reasons why (pun intended). What happened as I ascertained from the help desk representative was the blog for some reason caught in WordPress' automatic filtering system flagging the blog for terms of service violation without a clear reason why. After I had contacted the help desk the account was turned back on, due to this was a mistake committed by the program. In truth this type of snafus happens when you work with third party entities that do not have your interests at heart, in mind or just do not care. 

Either way, the other "truth" illustrated by this situation is the importance of not relying on technology ha! To combat issues like this, I have the organizational clarity blog in WordPress and blogger.com. I am now starting to add a copy of the blog and its posts upon weebly/wix. The reason for creating the blog was to create a resource for students and professionals while completing a school project. To simply let the blog to stay deleted at this point would make no sense. Also as a cautionary measure, I have saved every post in a Microsoft Word document to my computer to backup all the work that has so far been completed. 

Therefore, the WordPress snafu on their part was a major inconvenience but nothing that will stop the progress of the blog. Another issue that arose that I questioned was the lack of communication between us, WordPress did not contact via email or the site to the specifics of what they termed as terms of service violations. I had to search my emails thoroughly and press a bunch of buttons on the WordPress account to come up with contacting the help desk on my own.  

Only through that interaction through email was I able to find out the answer why but only then and it was very vague. Lucky for me I only do this blog for academic reasons and not for money, as part of an affiliate program. Or if I were a small organization or business that depended on this website to drive customers to my business I would be more than upset. However, as anyone can theorize, that as  an organization WordPress could use a good OD professional at once.

Organizational Clarity: "Don’t Fall into the Capability Trap: Does your organization work harder or smarter?" article

During my studies at Roosevelt University, I had the chance to look at their Training and Development blog site, which has a lot of great articles done by Staff, Faculty and Students that are themed along the lines of Organization Development. In this article by (Professor) Kathleen Iverson called: “Don’t Fall into the Capability Trap: Does your organization work harder or smarter?” the author discusses how organizations deal with hard times or competition in a violate market. The article gives some great tips that as a professional you can deliver or repeat to any organizational head and sound like a genius or a “go to” person during times like these.

Give the reader five principles to learn by and follow:

• Don’t expect a quick turnaround
• Metrics are important
• Avoid silos of improvement
• Invest in capabilities, even when times are tough
• Invest in capabilities, even when times are good

Here is the link for the article I am talking about:

https://rutraining.org/2016/05/02/dont-fall-into-the-capability-trap-does-your-organization-work-harder-or-smarter/

It has been my experience in the organizations that I have worked for those organizations usually work harder and they simply ignore these principles discussed in the article. The major of the time organizations lay off employees, experienced employees ruining their overall productivity and their Return on Investment (ROI) in the long run. Following these simple principles would allow any organization to bypass such an action and keep the majority of the seasoned employees while investing in the future during these tough, lean times.

Happy reading!

A favorite in my playlist called Organizational Development?

Easy question to answer, I think this is a really fun video and straight to the point, discussing “What is Organizational Change?” from Mavim B.V. I love the engaging interaction, smooth animation, and great quick delivery. I believe in trying to get management and employees in a resistant organization, you need to have small baby steps to gain these groups’ trust and cooperation.   

This video easily puts into perspective the fact that change is constant, and that change is needed for a business to remain competitive. Add with that the advent of social media customers have a larger voice than ever before so communicating with them has changed and an organization must be able to change to communicate with those customers properly.

You can find all of this information in the video, “What is Organizational Change?” just click on the hyperlink below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xsPLr-q_Nk&index=7&list=PLl128ljkxUxp5-MqyB_uGXEDCK4cVwGKw

When Responding to Consumer Complaints through an Organizational Development perspective

There is a way to respond to customer's complaints and one way to blaming the customer on social media, especially when it is well documented that there are problems with aspects of the organization. When you are offering a service or product it is up to the business to calmly correct the issue that the customer is having either if the item is out of stock or long wait times when calling in to reach a representative.

One such example is with Kylie Cosmetics, it has recently made the news due to the business receiving a "F" grade on the Better Business Bureau site, being the face of the company Kylie Jenner (yes of Kardashian fame) responded is what gave it more attention. Now before chuckling yourself to the point you pee on yourself, please note she is only 18 and therefore does not have the experience nor degree to run a business efficiently.

As shown by her response, "people coming for my business.." shows a lack of business acumen that her age belies, she is obviously not in charge of the company and most likely those around helped put the company together for her (Lodi, 2016). So saying she is responsible for the "F" grade is entirely is unwarranted, even I cannot believe I am saying it, but the blame lies on those around her and running the daily operations. They should have been the ones giving her a script or prepping her response to the failing grade with the BBB.

However, we have seen others who have been in business longer, who are so called "wiser" and way older than Ms. Jenner, do similar type mistakes. Take for example Microsoft's push of the Windows 10 operating system, Bill Gate's company is steadily pushing out the OP regardless of the fact that many businesses and private owners of PCs worldwide do not want the system in this case, the message is clear and worse than anything Ms. Jenner could say about "people coming" for her business. The average Microsoft OP like Windows 7 or Windows 8 is constantly alerting the operator to upgrade to Windows 10, is in some cases even sneaking in the upload in their update alerts (Williams, 2016).

Meaning that the business knows that its customers do not want the new OP, as many have sounded off on the web about it, and it needs to use shady tactics to push its product upon those who do not submit. As one of these customers I have thought about moving all my files to an Apple device plus I am keeping my old PCs that run Windows 7 and Vista as a result. I do not plan to update to Windows 10 not because the OP is not as user-friendly as I would like but because of Microsoft's response. That response to its customers like myself is that they do not care to make a product that I am comfortable using they want me to merely submit to compliance something that as a consumer and a student of Organization Development is not acceptable.

Please note that I actually did buy and returned it to the manufacturer Hewlett Packard it was because there were issues with the sound so I contacted the manufacturer and they said it was the operating system and to contact Microsoft. I contacted Microsoft and they stated it was the manufacturer however a google search shows that Microsoft knows about the issue and has solutions to fix the problem on its site. Therefore, yes it is a problem with Windows 10 again there was a way to respond yet the company totally sent me off. Now you add this to Microsoft's continuous push of Windows 10 there is obviously a better way to respond to its customers wishes to maintain their loyalty and even cultivate their business for the future.

In both instances, these responses do not endear either company to its customers nor its "haters" and could be an additional reason for any loss in its business that may occur. All organizations must be wary of how they respond to customer issues and complaints otherwise not only will their business will suffer their reputation will as well, which is worse? Only time will tell.

Lodi, Marie (2016)  "Kylie Jenner has responded to her business’ failing grade" Hello Giggles July 7, 2016

https://www.yahoo.com/style/kylie-jenner-responded-her-business-200747149.html

Williams, Wayne (2016) "Microsoft hits a new low -- sneaks Windows 10 advertising into an Internet Explorer security patch" Betanews.com March 3, 2016 http://betanews.com/2016/03/09/windows-10-advertising-in-ie-security-patch/