Volume 3 Issue 1.indd - Parsons Brinckerhoff

Leveraging Organizational Development for Sustained
Client Performance
By Erick Roecks and Alan Lubliner
Economists forecast the financial environment for
government operations, providing invaluable insight into
an agency’s fiscal solvency. Another arm of management
consulting—strategic planning and organizational
development—assesses how ready the client is to face
the future that economists have forecast. PB Consult’s
organizational development practice provides this
additional expertise.
Organizational Development and PB’s
Practice Defined
At its heart, organizational development is a collection of
services that help clients improve the way they strategically
manage their people and programs. It largely focuses
on setting direction, assessing business processes and
resources, reporting performance, developing skills, and
reviewing management and reporting structures.
PB Consult has assembled a group of industry experts
uniquely qualified to provide such organizational
development assistance to infrastructure clients. Specific
OD services it provides include:
• Organizational Assessment
• Business Process Improvement
• Organizational Structuring
• Change Management
• Strategic Planning
• Asset Management
• IT Business Process Advisory Services
• Procurement Advisory
• Capital Program Management
• Capital Program Prioritization
• Performance Measurement
• Capacity Building & Skills Development
• Management Review/Auditing
• Coaching
• Communications Strategies
The PB organizational development team often finds
itself working in tandem with PB’s financial/economic
consultants in providing “front end” consulting to clients
as they embark upon or revamp key programs. The
practice’s transportation clients include/have included
Orange County Transportation Authority, Transport for
London, San Francisco “Muni,” BART, Washington State
Department of Transportation, New York City Department
of Transportation, and Toronto MetroLinx, among others,
and organizational development services have also been
provided for water (e.g., The Metropolitan District, Hartford)
and buildings (e.g., New York City School Construction
Authority) clients.
PB’s approach to organizational development assignments
is distinguished by three factors:
1. As part of the larger PB corporate family, PB
Consult uniquely knows its clients’ needs and
challenges and can apply its state-of-the-art
management consulting methodologies to an
industry about which it is already knowledgeable.
2. For each assignment, PB Consult provides
project managers and senior team members
who themselves have managed public agencies
and understand the perspectives of clients from
having been in their shoes.
3. PB Consult is particularly committed to
assisting clients in realizing their objectives and
implementing recommended management
improvements.
Organizational Assessment as an
Organizational Development Service
One of the most common organizational development
services provided by PB is the organizational assessment.
An organizational assessment is a broad-based, structured
look at a client’s operations. While steeped in detailed
documentation and analysis, it stops short of a formal
audit. Although an organizational assessment commonly
21 Vol. 3 • Issue 1 |