The Organizational Underground: Organizational Coaching and Organization Development Outside the Formal Organization

For example, if Larry had been involved in a community non-profit while working in his mortgage career that continued after he lost his job, might his immobilization period have been reduced or perhaps prevented? A skilled coach can help him identify those non-workplace activities and experiences that bring a high level of satisfaction, assess alignment with his values, and help him make new choices that will result in a greater sense of satisfaction and self-fulfillment.

Organizational/Community Level of Coaching

While many professional coaches have addressed the challenges associated with the organizational underground primarily by working with the individual who is alienated in some manner from the formal workplace, other strategies can also be deployed. An organizational coach who is also versed (as an organization development consultant) in the nature and structure of productive and innovative organizations, can address these challenges by working with clients to create new organizations, initiate community-based engagements, influence public policy, or examine the underlying ethical issues associated with this widespread alienation.

There are organizations that are providing inplacement coaching for their employees (Best Buy, for example) and there are firms that offer inplacement coaching as a service to organizations. While the premise of inplacement coaching services offered today is to retain critical talent, not all talent will be retained. We propose that the organizational underground will create a demand for redefining inplacement coaching and possibly a new industry, much like the outplacement industry was created as a result of recessionary economic factors and the need to assist many displaced workers. As the outplacement industry matures, we propose that inplacement could be the new market niche that teaches organizations to meet this need by coaching through their own organization development or internal coaching programs, or outsourcing this service if the organization does not have the capacity. Bottom line, we see a dire need for organizations to be accountable for providing coaching to all talent, not just the critical talent. While inplacement coaching would not have prevented our current unemployment and underemployment crisis, it may have lessened the emotional impact on people like Larry and Susan. By lessening the emotional impact, the ripple of effect of family and societal implications are also reduced.

Creating a new organization

We find in many coaching communities an emphasis being placed on cooperation and networking. This call for innovative collaboration is particularly appropriate when directed toward the organizational underground. Many organizational structures have been created in recent years that assist those competent citizens who have patched together part-time careers. Hollow organizations have been formed in which independent and part-time employees work together to take on a complex, time-limited project. These organizations are called “hollow” because they have little or no formal administrative structure and are highly flexible with regard to membership and market. Obvious examples include the weekly farmer’s markets that feature locally grown produce, and the monthly street fairs that feature the work of artists and craftspeople. We can also offered more technologically sophisticated examples, including many sources of knowledge (such as Wikipedia) and venues for purchasing and selling various products and services (such as buying groups and expos) – one could even offer the Internet itself as a hollow organization without central administrative control.