Mapping the business landscape

Enter the keywords "climate survey" into an overseas Internet search engine and it will bring up any number of links to company Web sites selling their services. As with many things in the digital age, it is even possible to complete such a survey and receive results online. Interestingly, a similar search via a South African search engine produced significantly fewer links.

The best and most thorough climate survey will be tailor-made to the company`s specifications.

Jill Hamlyn is MD of People Business

Although these surveys would appear to be more popular overseas than they are locally, the notion of climate surveys is not a new one in South African business. As we move through the current business cycle characteristic of the South African economy, climate surveys are becoming a powerful and valuable tool in assisting companies to achieve something envied in the decidedly arid business environment of the moment - longevity.

Climate surveys deal with precise and in-depth information, and being informed allows management to make educated decisions. It is the difference between taking a stab in the dark at an ill-defined target and missing, and seeing the target, being able to analyse it and then reaching it with the help of clear and relevant knowledge. This knowledge is achieved through the climate survey functioning as a conduit for feeding necessary information to decision-makers in the most neutral way possible.

In order for a climate survey to be most optimally utilised, two key factors need to be present:

1.       Management has to be open to new ideas and willing to change.

2.       The people involved in the survey must be willing to answer the questions honestly.

Neutral external facilitators allow for complete candour as the level of trust between parties is high. Any sentiment expressed during this process is kept confidential, eradicating fear of reprisals for any particularly negative feelings.

Without these two criteria, especially the first, a climate survey could well be an expensive exercise in futility. However, utilised with an open mind and a willingness to change if change is recommended, the climate survey has a peak payoff in increased levels of management and company maturity, leadership skills, and previously undiscovered growth opportunities and maturity levels.

At its simplest level, a well-executed climate survey provides a neutral forum to hear out the baggage that many employees carry as part of their daily working lives and to nip any incipient rot in the bud. This is facilitated by the neutral stance of the observer facilitator who, in the face of honest discourse, is acknowledged as being in an extremely delicate and privileged position in which trust is paramount.

At another level, the climate survey ties in with skills development, and the Skills Development Plan that all organisations are compelled by legislation to have. A climate survey is an elevated adult approach that extracts the appropriate information at the appropriate levels. Once this information has been drawn out, needs can be more easily established, and relevant and strategic development plans can be put into place.

At its most complete level, the climate survey is a process that determines the current functioning of a company, the internal and external business environment, managerial effectiveness, sources of stress, corporate culture and maturity levels, and employee value-add, to name a few categories that may be investigated during the implementation of a climate survey. The feedback report will take all these into consideration in identifying possible risk factors and opportunities for growth and development.

The bottom line for companies can be viewed in the form of a needs analysis which determines, along the overall spectrum presented in the climate survey, precisely what a company needs in areas such as training or skills and people development. Reasons for training and skills development add to the return on investment in the form of justification for a particular course of action and a measurable outcome that results from this.

As with many corporate endeavours, certain factors need to be taken into account regarding climate surveys. The best and most thorough climate survey will be tailor-made to the company`s specifications. The process of individualising the survey to suit a particular organisation is of the utmost importance and should be one of the hallmarks of a good climate survey. To this end, a standardised survey should be regarded with suspicion.

It is also prudent to be wary of companies that make extravagant promises or which appear inherently untrustworthy. By its very nature, the climate survey is a sensitive entity that needs to be conducted with the utmost discretion, trust and with a serious commitment to confidentiality. The process needs to be contained by experience, and the best people for the job are most likely to be those who have been in the business environment long enough to have lived and worked through the inevitable highs and lows of the economic cycle.

To pick up on the points I made at the beginning of the column, in the information age, the right kind of knowledge is significantly more powerful than simply knowledge for the sake of it. However, the right kind of knowledge is only as powerful as people will allow it to be and the knowledge available from a climate survey is useless, and dangerous, if neglected.

Effort has to come from both sides. When the commitment is there, the climate survey can be so much more than a process or a feedback report incorporating information about a company and its people. It gives companies the opportunity to fly while being firmly grounded in the security of knowing that they have what it takes to remain a force to be reckoned with.