This month, has seen one of our founding Directors retire. She stepped down as a Director some time ago, but has continued to support organisations through Clarity and to create beautiful reports for us.
This has me reflecting on change within small organisations. Losing one person can be really challenging – they leave gaps in the skills and expertise of the organisation. In larger organisations changes in personnel can be covered by others in the team – there are many people with the relevant skills or approaches; and people can be moved around to make things work.
In small organisations (which we, and most of our clients are), this is more challenging. And it isn’t just the skill set, it can be someone’s way of looking at things or approaching their work. I’m reflecting on what we need to bring into the team, to fill the gap and to meet the needs of the organisation as it is now.
What skills gap or styles are there in your organisation? Do you need someone with a strategic brain? Or creative skills? – or someone to sort out the day-to-day admin. What would help your organisation to function better? Do you have people trying to do things that don’t really fit with their skills and expertise?
Change has given me the opportunity to reflect, but I think its worth all organisations reviewing their roles, and the skills and expertise they need. You can do this fairly informally, or use business tools such as those below, to assess if your team has all the elements and approaches it needs.
https://www.colour-profiling.com/
https://www.belbin.com/about/belbin-team-roles
NB there are other options available!