The last few weeks have been full of action for all of us both at the professional level (with closing of appraisal cycles and preparing for the next year budgeting (Calendar Year)) and at the personal level (we have been glued to Televisions to know which way the movement of ‘ India Against Corruption’ is headed for.)

As seasoned social scientists many of us debated as to why many of the stakeholders were caught off guard and didn’t anticipate the movement to catch up the kind of momentum we witnessed . . .

The answer if translated in simplistic terms . . . we failed to read the mood. . . and as a country we have been building as a ‘Failed Pressure Cooker’ organization rather than a ‘Listening Organization’.

The question for us is, as organizations have we built mechanisms to read the mood of our employees? or are under the illusion that things are fine because the pressure is still building and employees haven’t reacted.

Listening Organizations as a concept believe in creating multi layer of mechanisms which will enable not only to communicate but also ensure to read the mood / under current.

At The Strategist we believe it’s time to ensure that our organizations move towards building a strong Listening Organizations. Listening Organizations are far more structured and robust and go beyond the traditional methods of Open Houses / Town Hall to read the pulse of the employees. They use cutting edge technology like social media as what ‘employees’ are talking about the organization, they involve alumni to help structure the organization, they look for inputs from stakeholders like vendors to failed aspirants who couldn’t get through the interview process and so on so forth. . .

Listening Organizations need a collaborative environment between various functions and enhance the organization longevity because of its ability to mould itself as the times change in a proactive fashion. . .