While reading an article on HR audit, I came across the term ‘OCTAPACE’. The fact that I had not heard of it before, made me dig for more information on it. Here’s OCTAPACE in a nutshell.
OCTAPACE:
You can find out more about the organization culture with the help of the instrument OCTAPACE. Each alphabet stands for a particular dimension or value. (http://www.citehr.com/1-vt5421.html?start=0)
Another explanation to the term: An optimum level of “Development Climate” is essential for facilitating HRD. Such a climate is characterized as consisting of the following characteristics i.e. known as OCTAPACE. A brief explanation to each characteristic/ dimension is as follows:
Openness & Risk Taking: Employees feel free to express their ideas & the organization is willing to take risks & experiment with new ideas & new ways of doing things. The degree of openness of the organization is an important factor in determining the nature of various dimensions of HRD being designed.
Confrontation: Employees face the problems & work jointly with others concerned to find its solution. They face the issues squarely without hiding them or avoiding them for fear of hurting each other.
Trust: A minimum level of trust may be deemed necessary for the introduction of the performance appraisal system and other elements of HRD. Employees department & groups trust each other & can be relied upon to ‘do’ whatever they say they will.
Authenticity: It is the value underlying trust. It is the willingness of a person to acknowledge the feelings he/she has, and accept himself/herself as well as others who relate to him/her as persons.
Pro-activity: Employees are action – oriented, willing to take initiative & show a high degree of proactivity. They anticipate issues and act or respond to the needs of the future.
Autonomy: It is the willingness to use power without fear, and helping others to do the same. Employees have some freedom to act independently within the boundaries imposed by their role/job.
Collaboration: Collaboration involves working together and using one another’s strength for a common cause. Individuals, instead of solving their problems by themselves, share their concerns with one another and prepare strategies, work out plans of action, and implement them together.
Experimenting:Experimenting as a value emphasizes the importance given to innovation and trying out new ways of dealing with problems in the organization. (http://www.citehr.com/2-vt5421.html?start=10).
A detailed explanation to each of them is given in the document attached.
OCTAPACE also represents eight HRD values; ‘The eight HRD values, viz. OCTAPACE values (Openness, Trust, Pro-action, Confrontation, Collaboration, Authenticity, Autonomy, and Experimentation), give a sense of direction to the HRD function.’
(http://www1.ximb.ac.in/users/web/fpm.nsf/pages/HRD)
OCTAPACE Instrument:
The OCTAPACE profile is a 40-item instrument that gives the profile of an organization’s ethos in eight values, look at attachment below. (http://www.citehr.com/1-vt5421.html?start=0)
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