Case Study 4(Proposing a Data Gathering Strategy At TLG Solutions) in Organization
Development. pg 171)
“I’m glad you’re here, and I have something important to discuss with you. Have a seat.”
Seth Burke had been called to Michelle Greenfield’s office. Just 18 months ago, Michelle had
accepted the role of chief learning officer at TLG Solutions, a fast-growing provider of global
human resources software for Fortune 1000 companies. Seth and Michelle had worked together
in a previous company, and now that Seth was working as an independent external organization
development consultant, Michelle was anxious to make use of his skills.
“Hey, I was really glad to get your call. It’s been too long,” Seth exclaimed as he took a seat at a
round table in Michelle’s office while Michelle closed the door. TLG Solutions headquarters was
located in a six-story building just outside of downtown in a suburban area for expanding
technology companies. Michelle’s office had a panoramic view of the lake. “What great
scenery,” Seth added. “How long has the company been in this location?”
“Just 6 months,” Michelle admitted. “We’ve been expanding so rapidly we outgrew the small
office space that we had rented on the east side of town. Now that we are among the tech
companies in this hub area on this side of town, we have a solid presence in the community and
are showing that we are here to stay.”
“And how have things been going in your new role?” Seth asked, transitioning to the reason for
his visit.
“It’s been crazy. The rapid growth means great things, but it’s also stressful sometimes. It’s
really different from what we knew back with our old company. You and I were part of a very
hierarchical, controlled, consistent, static company in a pretty stable industry. Everyone followed
the process and the plan. A big change was when they replaced the carpet in the lobby. But here
it feels like it’s just the opposite. It’s all about visionary innovation, constant change,
reinvention. No 2 days are the same, and you get used to feeling like you’re on a roller coaster.
Just yesterday our CEO announced publicly that we would use our expertise in HR to create new
products for marketers. And our product groups didn’t even know that announcement was
coming,” Michelle pointed out.
“Yes, that does sound very different from the experience we shared a few years back,” Seth
laughed.
“The thing is, from my perspective we have changed things so fast, I don’t think we have created
the ideal organization to help launch us into the next phase. I’ve definitely learned a lot
managing this department, and I think there may be some opportunities for improvement,”
Michelle said. “Basically, this training organization is a mess, and our chief HR officer,
Vivienne, has told me that if I can’t get it cleaned up soon she’ll find someone who will. We are
, spending a ton of money on training and yet it’s not getting us the improvement we need. But I
should back up. I’m getting ahead of myself.”
“Yes, maybe start at the beginning. Tell me a little more about TLG Solutions,” Seth asked.
“Well, the company was essentially founded on our flagship product, NewHireScan, a software
program that can scan thousands of résumés for key indicators and predict whether the new hire
will be successful in the job. Our proprietary big data approach means that we can save
companies tons of money by hiring the best person for the job the first time, which we can tell by
a number of data points. In the last few years, we have added or expanded products every few
months so that we now have hundreds of products and variations on them for different industries.
Since I’ve been here, revenue has almost doubled, if that tells you anything, and we are growing
at a rate that is easily twice that of our nearest competitors. We just got a fantastic write-up in an
industry-leading publication, and our CEO was just on the front page of the Wall Street Journal,”
Michelle stated.
“I saw that article,” Seth added. “That was really impressive and had a lot of people talking. I bet
that did a lot for employee morale as well.”
“It sure did. People around here are very motivated, driven, and work a ton of hours. It’s a
competitive environment, and they pour themselves into their work,” Michelle said. “We are
adding a lot of products to our portfolio over the next year since our goal is to expand into other
areas of HR technology beyond hiring, and apparently we have this new marketing focus
coming. Everyone seems to feel the urgency, and we all want to see it succeed. But the clouds
are forming in our sunny skies. It’s like the theme from Jaws is always playing in the
background. We have competitors that are ready to take us out, and we can all see that our cost
models are not sustainable. Investors are getting nervous. We are looking to the next year or two
and we know that we must be successful getting our new products to market quickly. We
probably need to reduce costs as well. It’s not a crisis, but the leadership team is paying careful
attention to the financials, as you would expect.”
“Sure, that makes sense in your industry,” Seth said. “Tell me more about where you think
problems might exist on the horizon.”
“I’ll give you a list from my point of view, because there are a lot of them,” Michelle said. “We
have many loyal customers and excellent customer relationships. Some of them have been with
us since the beginning. But lately we are starting to hear customer complaints, even from our
loyal base. Products aren’t working as promised. Salespeople are promising one thing and not
delivering. I’ve even heard situations where salespeople have promised features outright that we
never intended to put in the product just to make a sale. I’ve heard that sales reps can’t even
demo the products accurately. The service department is getting complaints because they can’t
accurately pinpoint the root cause of the problems the customer is experiencing. Those are
common problems in many organizations, but we’ve done some investigating and it seems that
time and time again the problem is training. Our salespeople and service reps don’t know enough
Development. pg 171)
“I’m glad you’re here, and I have something important to discuss with you. Have a seat.”
Seth Burke had been called to Michelle Greenfield’s office. Just 18 months ago, Michelle had
accepted the role of chief learning officer at TLG Solutions, a fast-growing provider of global
human resources software for Fortune 1000 companies. Seth and Michelle had worked together
in a previous company, and now that Seth was working as an independent external organization
development consultant, Michelle was anxious to make use of his skills.
“Hey, I was really glad to get your call. It’s been too long,” Seth exclaimed as he took a seat at a
round table in Michelle’s office while Michelle closed the door. TLG Solutions headquarters was
located in a six-story building just outside of downtown in a suburban area for expanding
technology companies. Michelle’s office had a panoramic view of the lake. “What great
scenery,” Seth added. “How long has the company been in this location?”
“Just 6 months,” Michelle admitted. “We’ve been expanding so rapidly we outgrew the small
office space that we had rented on the east side of town. Now that we are among the tech
companies in this hub area on this side of town, we have a solid presence in the community and
are showing that we are here to stay.”
“And how have things been going in your new role?” Seth asked, transitioning to the reason for
his visit.
“It’s been crazy. The rapid growth means great things, but it’s also stressful sometimes. It’s
really different from what we knew back with our old company. You and I were part of a very
hierarchical, controlled, consistent, static company in a pretty stable industry. Everyone followed
the process and the plan. A big change was when they replaced the carpet in the lobby. But here
it feels like it’s just the opposite. It’s all about visionary innovation, constant change,
reinvention. No 2 days are the same, and you get used to feeling like you’re on a roller coaster.
Just yesterday our CEO announced publicly that we would use our expertise in HR to create new
products for marketers. And our product groups didn’t even know that announcement was
coming,” Michelle pointed out.
“Yes, that does sound very different from the experience we shared a few years back,” Seth
laughed.
“The thing is, from my perspective we have changed things so fast, I don’t think we have created
the ideal organization to help launch us into the next phase. I’ve definitely learned a lot
managing this department, and I think there may be some opportunities for improvement,”
Michelle said. “Basically, this training organization is a mess, and our chief HR officer,
Vivienne, has told me that if I can’t get it cleaned up soon she’ll find someone who will. We are
, spending a ton of money on training and yet it’s not getting us the improvement we need. But I
should back up. I’m getting ahead of myself.”
“Yes, maybe start at the beginning. Tell me a little more about TLG Solutions,” Seth asked.
“Well, the company was essentially founded on our flagship product, NewHireScan, a software
program that can scan thousands of résumés for key indicators and predict whether the new hire
will be successful in the job. Our proprietary big data approach means that we can save
companies tons of money by hiring the best person for the job the first time, which we can tell by
a number of data points. In the last few years, we have added or expanded products every few
months so that we now have hundreds of products and variations on them for different industries.
Since I’ve been here, revenue has almost doubled, if that tells you anything, and we are growing
at a rate that is easily twice that of our nearest competitors. We just got a fantastic write-up in an
industry-leading publication, and our CEO was just on the front page of the Wall Street Journal,”
Michelle stated.
“I saw that article,” Seth added. “That was really impressive and had a lot of people talking. I bet
that did a lot for employee morale as well.”
“It sure did. People around here are very motivated, driven, and work a ton of hours. It’s a
competitive environment, and they pour themselves into their work,” Michelle said. “We are
adding a lot of products to our portfolio over the next year since our goal is to expand into other
areas of HR technology beyond hiring, and apparently we have this new marketing focus
coming. Everyone seems to feel the urgency, and we all want to see it succeed. But the clouds
are forming in our sunny skies. It’s like the theme from Jaws is always playing in the
background. We have competitors that are ready to take us out, and we can all see that our cost
models are not sustainable. Investors are getting nervous. We are looking to the next year or two
and we know that we must be successful getting our new products to market quickly. We
probably need to reduce costs as well. It’s not a crisis, but the leadership team is paying careful
attention to the financials, as you would expect.”
“Sure, that makes sense in your industry,” Seth said. “Tell me more about where you think
problems might exist on the horizon.”
“I’ll give you a list from my point of view, because there are a lot of them,” Michelle said. “We
have many loyal customers and excellent customer relationships. Some of them have been with
us since the beginning. But lately we are starting to hear customer complaints, even from our
loyal base. Products aren’t working as promised. Salespeople are promising one thing and not
delivering. I’ve even heard situations where salespeople have promised features outright that we
never intended to put in the product just to make a sale. I’ve heard that sales reps can’t even
demo the products accurately. The service department is getting complaints because they can’t
accurately pinpoint the root cause of the problems the customer is experiencing. Those are
common problems in many organizations, but we’ve done some investigating and it seems that
time and time again the problem is training. Our salespeople and service reps don’t know enough
