Learning Series on

Assessing Vertical
Organizational Development

Growing interest in adult development models has led to theories about how they apply to teams and organizations. Do collectives really evolve through stages towards greater complexity? How would we know? In this in-depth learning series, Jimmy Parker, PhD, will share the ground breaking research he has been conducting into vertical organizational development and how it might be measured.

There is still time to join!

Even though the program has started, you can catch up with recordings, transcripts, slides and resources from the missed sessions.

“I am absolutely blown away by this work. It made me question almost everything I have thought about organizational development.”
— John Austin, P.D. Merrill Endowed Chair of Business, University of New England

who is this for?

This series is for consultants, researchers, theorists, and students of the following disciplines:

  • Human/Adult Development - including ego development, cognitive development, transformative learning, constructive-developmental, and hierarchical complexity.

  • Integral theory - including how complex adaptive systems theory or complexity theory may play out among human collectives and social systems.

  • Organizational Development - including mainstream OD, dialogic OD, vertical OD, team development, collective transformation.

Who is this not for?

This series is not about

  • How to make vertical development happen for groups. It’s about knowing whether or not it has happened among groups (e.g., teams, organizations, nations).

  • It requires at least an introductory understanding of adult vertical development stages. Need a friendly overview? Try flipping through this deck.

Program Structure

  • Eight 1-hour weekly Zoom sessions, Wednesdays 9am Pacific Time from Feb 15 to Apr 5

  • Asia-Pacific callers and others that find the regular call time challenging can join two Q&A calls, Tuesdays 4pm Pacific Time on Mar 14 and April 11

  • Choose your own adventure - attend only the sessions that interest you, or start with session 1 to help you decide

  • Each session includes presentation of key concepts, research and learning, plus time for discussion, questions and answers

  • Call recordings posted weekly

  • Learning site with additional resources to deepen the learning

  • Catch up on missed sessions if you start late, with recordings, transcripts, slides, and resources online.

“Fantastic... extraordinary... full of creativity and re-thinking.”
— William R. Torbert, Leadership Professor Emeritus Boston College, Founding Board Global Leadership Associates

Your Presenter & Host

“Ingenious... challenges the assumptions that social science itself is based on today.”
— John McGuire, Honorary Senior Fellow, Center for Creative Leadership

Sessions

(click on session time to convert to your time zone.)

  1. Overview of 8-Part Series - Wed Feb 15, 9-10am Pacific Time
    A high-level flyover to help you decide which sessions to attend.

    • Overview of series and basic summary of all sessions

    • Basic assumptions beneath this work

    • Early feedback - what would you like to get out of these sessions?

  2. Defining the Field -  Wed Feb 22, 9-10am Pacific Time
    Why Vertical OD is a poorly defined field. And some recommendations.

    • Why better definitions are needed

    • A new complexity-based definition of vertical & horizontal development

    • A new definition of vertical OD - one of many “lines” of group development

  3. There is no D in OD - Wed Mar 1, 9-10am Pacific Time
    Mainstream OD lacks a model of how organizations actually develop.

    • Mainstream OD is all about change, not development

    • Mainstream OD has explicitly rejected the concept of vertical complexity

    • Vertical OD, the alternative to mainstream OD, cannot adequately measure whether vertical OD has happened.

  4. Current State of Vertical OD Assessments - Wed Mar 8, 9-10am Pacific Time
    Why all vertical OD measures are inadequate today.

    • Review of all known vertical OD assessments in research and in practice

    • The most problematic, most published, most practiced, and most promising ways

    • Assessing the assessments: the debilitating tradeoff between reliability and efficiency

  5. Reviewing What Works - Wed Mar 15, 9-10am Pacific Time
    How researchers accurately measure vertical development today

    • Content matching approach: Most ego development assessments

    • Pattern matching approach: Most cognitive development assessments

    • The STAGES model and its unique fit for groups

  6. A New Method and Research Results - Wed Mar 22, 9-10am Pacific Time
    How I tried to measure vertical OD. And what happened.

    • A new fixed-choice survey that generated 12 different measures of vertical OD

    • Finding #1: Respondents didn’t know which survey options were earlier or later

    • Finding #2: Respondents’ own stage bled through in their responses anyway

  7. Contamination in the Models - Wed Mar 29, 9-10am Pacific Time
    Some unsettling conclusions for those in the vertical OD field.

    • Models versus methods versus metrics

    • Horizontal & vertical contamination

    • Vertical AD & vertical OD contamination

  8. Promising Paths - Wed Apr 5, 9-10am Pacific Time
    Uncharted territory that’s worthy of future research.

    • New assessment methods: triangulation of validated OD measures, group SCT, group task sequence 

    • New data collection methods: sociometers, smart wearables, collaboration tools

    • New data analysis methods: social / organizational network analysis, artificial intelligence, machine learning

Optional Q&A Calls

Asia-Pacific callers and those who can’t make the regular times, bring your questions.

  1. Q&A Call 1 - Tue Mar 14, 4-5pm Pacific Time

  2. Q&A Call 2- Tue Apr 11, 4-5pm Pacific Time

Optional Introduction to Adult Developmental Theory

For those less familiar with Adult Development, join us for an introductory overview and Q&A session.

Registration Closed

The program is now complete. We plan to relaunch the program in the future as a self-paced study course. Stay tuned for announcements from us by joining our mailing list.

Questions? Contact us at support@pacificintegral.com