CMI Unit 707 Organisational Design and Development (J/617/6867) Assignment Brief 2026

CMI Unit 707 Assignment Brief

Assignment Aim

The aim of this unit is to enable leaders to understand the relationship between organisational design and development and the achievement of strategic objectives. Leaders will understand the impact of current and emerging factors which influence the need for agile and adaptive organisations. On successful completion of this unit, leaders will be able to develop a proposal for sustainable organisational design and development to respond to current and emerging needs.

Learning Outcomes and Assessment Criteria

LO1 – Understand organisational design and development

Assessment criteria

1.1 Critically assess the factors which influence organisational design and development

1.2 Critically appraise approaches to organisational design and development

Indicative content

1.1 Factors (Current and emerging):

• Organisational contexts: Purpose, governance (for example, public, private, third sector). Legal status of the organisation. Organisational structure (for example, mechanistic, bureaucratic, organic, virtual, hub, spoke). Organisational culture. Type (for example, operational, local, international, global,

project/programme based, departmental and strategic business unit). International factors (for example, ethno-centric, geo-centric). Size of the organisation (including the impact of increasing/decreasing workforce). Levels of organisational maturity (Carnegie Mellon Maturity Index (CMMI), 1990). External environment (Political, economic, social, technological).

• Strategic objectives: Relationship between the organisation’s vision, mission, strategy, assets/resources, corporate social responsibility and sustainability, people and environment and strategic objectives (for example, to improve efficiency and effectiveness).
• Legal and organisational frameworks (UK/international): for example, Equality Act (2010), Modern Slavery Act (2015). Customs and practices relevant to industry sector. (for example, HSE requirements, working time directives, age requirements).
• Assets management/organisational assets: Physical infrastructure (for example, premises types, internal layout). Manufacturing equipment. Transport and logistics. IT systems. Intellectual property. Brand and reputational value.
• Human resourcing: Human capital. Talent management. Workforce structure and planning (for example, hierarchy, matrix, partnership, professional practice, flexible and unstructured ‘boundaryless’). Demographics of workforce. Succession/pipeline planning. Employment contracts (for example, Full time, part-time, precariat working, contractors, subcontractors, consultants, partners, apprentices, interns, seasonal contractors). Flexible Firm model (Atkinson, 1984). The Shamrock Organisation (Handy, 1989).

1.2 Approaches: Development/change to organisation structure. Business processes. Activities/workflows. Roles, responsibilities and accountabilities. Span of control (for example, number and levels of management, level of constraint/freedom awarded to specific roles). Centralisation/decentralisation of task/activities (for example, decision-making, levels of autonomy). Organisation of workforce (divisions, departments, team structures, projects). Relationships among individuals, groups, departments (for example, team dynamics, cross-functional teams). Allocation and deployment of resources. Organisational Development and Design (Cheung-Judge, Holbeche, 2015; Galbraith, 2014; Stanford, 2018). McKinsey’s 7S Model (Peters and Waterman, 1982). Six Box Model (Weisbord, 1976). Galbraith’s Star Model (Galbraith, 1977). Organisation as Complex Adaptive Systems (Kaufman et al, 2000). Learning and development (for example, formal, informal, coaching, mentoring) (Anderson, 2017). Learning organisations (Checkland, 1981; Senge, 1990). Knowledge management (Max Boisot, 2000). Change Readiness: A Multi-Level Review (Rafferty et al, 2013).

LO2 – Understand how to apply the principles of organisational design and development

Assessment criteria

2.1 Develop a proposal using the principles of organisational design and development to enable the achievement of strategic objectives

2.2 Recommend approaches to ensure sustainable organisational design and development are embedded within organisational strategy

Indicative content

2.1 Proposal:

• Type of proposal: Business plan, strategic plan or report.
• Scope of proposal: Whole organisation or significant part of an organisation.
• Content of proposal:
  • Rationale for organisational design and development: Response to market need (local, international), financial imperative, rationalisation of services, opportunity, merger, legal/regulatory requirements.
  • Analysis of existing circumstances, structure and processes of the organisation: Analysis of external/internal environment. Strategic issues and objectives. Business activities. Organisational structure. Assets (i.e. people, equipment, infrastructure, IT, physical, virtual). Culture. Social systems.
  • Organisation diagnosis: Sensemaking to establish causes and possible solutions to structural problems/requirements for organisational development. Organisations as complex adaptive systems. (Kaufmann et al, 2000). System in Focus and Organisations as viable systems (Beer, 1970). Chaos

Theory (Cheung-Judge, Holbeche, 2015). Application of Co Evolutionary Theory Collective Strategy

(Stacey, 2011). Organisation as an Autopoietic Systems (Maturana and Varela, 1990). Cultural Web (Johnson and Scholes, 2008)

• Objectives: Measures (KPIs). Critical success factors. Critical assumptions. Critical decisions.
• Timescales (milestones) if applicable.
• Resource needs: People, real and virtual assets, costs/budgets, cost benefit analysis (net social cost benefit), return on investment.
• Implementation strategy.
• Barriers and challenges, risk, opportunities, legal and regulatory requirements, corporate social responsibility and sustainability.
• Governance of the proposal.
• Stakeholder considerations.
• Communication strategy (internal and external).

2.2 Approaches to ensure sustained organisational development and design:

Strategic planning. (for example, Reflective, central, cyclical). Development of clear goals and objectives.

Ethos, ethics, values, sense of purpose (Mendonca and Kanungo, 2007). Continuous improvement (Hines and Butterworth, 2019). Change management (for example, Anderson, 2017). Radical Change within Traditional Structures (Oswick, 2015). Design and assessment of new models or structures (Stanford, 2017).

Organisational culture and leadership (Schein, E. and Schein, P. (2017)). Organisational behaviours (McShane and Glinow, 2017). Leadership approach (for example, Value-driven Leadership (Gentile, 2014); Leadership Styles (Goleman, 1995); Authentic Leadership (Goffee and Jones, 2011); Entrepreneurial Leadership

(Roebuck, 2014); Cross Cultural Leadership (Hofstede, 1991); Transformational Leadership (Bass and Riggio, 2006)). Collaboration (Frost, 2005). The CSR Pyramid (Carroll, 1979).

Application of decision-making models (for example, Ethical decision making, the rational model/model of bounded rationality (Simon, 1979). The organisational procedures view (March 1988)). Taking a holistic ‘Helicopter view’ (Morgan, 1985).  Sustaining organisation change (Wallin and Von Krogh, 2010).

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