Organizational culture assessment

As you know, everything hinges on your organizational culture.  We are in a human services business and the way we interact – staff, our stakeholders and inmates – determines the success or failure of the agency.  GAR, Inc. offers a cultural assessment for your agency with two key components.

The first step is to assess agency culture and understand the opinions, needs and concerns that exist today.  While many organizational concerns are similar across agencies, we believe it is a mistake to assume all agencies have the same problems.  It is critical to ask people what they think in order to elicit their input and get their personal buy-in for change.  GAR, Inc. will spend whatever time is necessary on-site, getting to know your agency’s needs and goals. We will also spend time with your line staff to understand the concerns and barriers that may be in the way of success.

The second component is an employee survey with questions that research has proven to be good predictors of culture combined with topics customized for your agency.   Our state-of-the art software will deliver meaningful and reliable results about the perceptions and opinions of your employees.  It will bring an even broader voice forward by giving every employee the opportunity to be heard and establish a baseline so that future surveys can accurately measure the effectiveness of your change management efforts.  We recommend an identical follow-up survey nine to twelve months later, and potentially consider making it an annual event for several years to come.

In the end, we will provide a comprehensive report that combines both the verbal employee input and the broader survey data.  It will summarize a reliable set of data about your agency’s culture, prioritize your staff’s concerns, and help you identify opportunities to create the culture and working environment you hope to have in the future. 

Note:  Some agencies have also chosen to have inmates surveyed as well. While this is more logistically challenging than surveying employees, we can do it!