I came to action research and, indeed, my academic career in
organization behavior, due in part to “imprinting” experiences near the beginning
of my first full-time job. These experiences taught me two things: 1) Organization
Development was powerful, and 2) there had to be a better way to conduct OD
interventions than the ones I was experiencing.
In the fall of 1969 I was a new high school teacher. The school where I
was teaching had hired three Organization Development consultants to work with
our faculty at faculty meetings that August. The aim was to foster enhanced
faculty participation in school decision-making, especially using consensus
methods, and in general to lessen hierarchical structures in the school. We
participated in a several day OD workshop in August, in short sessions in the fall,
and a day-long workshop in January.