Master Thesis Organization Studies
On our way to
Evidence Based
Consulting?
An explorative multiple case study research of the use of evidence to
justify the consulting of management consultants.
Faculty of Social Science
Department of Organization Studies
Date: august 2010
Author:
Ka Kin Pang
Key words:
Evidence based consulting, Evidence based management, Evidence based, Argumentation
theory, Justification, Sources of evidence, Type of evidence.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Details of student:
- Name: Ka Kin Pang
- ANR: 832069
- Telephone: +31 6 41047027
- Email: [email protected]
Name of the Supervisors:
-
Name supervisor: Drs. R. Pranger
-
Name second reader: Dr. J. de Jong
-
Name of MTO evaluator: Drs. F. Tekle
Title of the Master Thesis Circle:
Organizational development and the role of the consultant in particular
Title of the thesis:
“On our way to evidence based consulting?”
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Preface
After months of hard work this thesis is finally finished! The beginning of this instructive period
started in September of 2009 by looking for a topic. My own demand was that it has to be a
topic that useful for my future carrier. After weeks of search, I finally found what I was looking
for, ‘evidence based consulting’. Although it was a rather difficult topic, because the lack of
literature on this topic, I was determined to writing about this topic and I’m still convinced that
this topic is very useful for my future carrier. Besides, there was also a personal reason why I
was determined to write about this topic.
I started my educational carrier with an ‘economic intermediate vocational study (MBO), where
I have learned much about businesses and entrepreneurship in general. After, I continue with an
‘economic higher vocational study (HBO), where I have acquired more knowledge about
business administration and general management. After some time I asked myself the question:
“what can I do with all of these knowledge?” During that time, I already figured out that I was
more a generalist than rather a specialist. Through my former lecturer I came acquainted with
the consulting. So I decided to focus my carrier in the consulting. I spent my internship in
consulting firms and I even started a consulting firm with a few fellow students and my former
lecturer during my study. After some time, I was really convinced that consultants are just doing
something, as we earned a lot of money with our little consulting firm.
After graduation, I raise again a question: “what is my specialism and where am I good at?” I
couldn’t really answer this question. Although I already had a rather good knowledge base, but I
still couldn’t place this knowledge in a broader perspective e.g. underlying reasons and
mechanisms of applied science, theories and models. Therefore, I have decided to continue a
new study at the University of Tilburg, Organization Studies. This study really opened my eyes
and my insight knowledge about organizations and its phenomena’s. This study teaches my how
to apply these knowledge, subject and test it in practice using scientific methods. This study
basically gave my knowledge hands and feet’s, and useful tools to use utilize this knowledge in
scientific research and practice. Through this study I became very interested in scientific
research as I already saw a gap between science and consulting. But I couldn’t place it in any
ways.
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So back to beginning, I came across the concept of ‘evidence based consulting’ and I was
convinced that this is what I was looking for. This really reflects on what I had in mind and this
was the solutions to apply all of my acquired knowledge about organizations. So I was
determined to focus on this topic, resulting in this thesis “On our way to evidence based
consulting”. Evidence based consulting does change my way of thinking and the way of examine
organizations. I have learned very much about this topic and how I can utilize this concept in my
future carrier. And here is my thesis, a closing chapter to my educational carrier, but also a start
to explore organizations in practice.
In the end, I really want to thank some people during this period. First, I would like to thank all
of the management consultants who have participated in my research and their precious time.
Second, I would like to thank my fellow students in our thesis circle group for their supportive
feedback. Further I would like to thank Dr. Jeroen de Jong and Dr. Fetene Tekle, the two second
readers for their very harsh critique and feedback which really helped me to keep the focus and
direction in my thesis. Last but not at least, I want to thank Drs. Rob Pranger as my supervisor. I
really want to thank him for his patient approach, his feedback and instruction in the whole
processes. He has really helped me a lot in guidance and motivation so I can keep going on.
Without his supervision, I couldn’t finish this thesis in time.
Writing this thesis has really changed my future perspective. ……
On my way to evidence based consulting!
Ka Kin Pang
August 2010
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Abstract
The consulting sector already exists since the late 19th century. The consulting sector
had evolved during that time from a very small niche segment into a billion euro business. This
industry already made an enormous progress in consulting services. This also inspires the
growing interest of science in this industry. The need for new scientific knowledge and insight in
the field of management consulting seems to be increasing considering to the amount of
popularizing books and articles on this topic. The next step is therefore necessary to become
‘mature’ in this field with theory forming by means of management insights, models, theories
and interventions that can be tested empirically. This calling seems to be inspired by the
‘evidence based’ movement, and it is starting to make its move. This therefore triggers the
management and organization science literature to utilize a new organizational approach:
evidence based consulting’:
“A new formation of service innovation in the consultancy in which interventions are
supported by empirical and scientific evidence, to improve the effectiveness of
organizations” (Meeus et al., 2009, p. 79).
However, ‘evidence based consulting’ is still hypothetical: if and to what extent
consultants operate on the basis of this concept is not yet examined empirically. It is simply
unknown how management consultants justify their consulting in practice, because no empirical
research is done on this topic. How far we are from evidence based consulting? The goal of this
research is to find out how consultants justify claims about the expected effectiveness of
consulting by proving evidence to support these justifications and which factors determine the
use of certain types of evidence. This research therefore wants to examine empirically this gap
in the management consultancy and evidence based literature. The following research question
can be formulated:
“How do consultants justify their claim about the expected effectiveness of their
consulting, what type(s) of evidence are used in that justification and which factors
determine the use of certain type(s) of evidence?”
This research can be characterized as an explorative research, as the theoretical basics are still
indefinite in order to formulate hypotheses to determine relationships (‘t Hart et al, 1996). In
5
order to answer the research question, there has been chosen for a cross-sectional, qualitative
and comparative design because the topic is examined through 16 semi-structured interviews in
which data will be gathered at one moment in time. Each management consultant will be seen
as one case and compared with other management consultants. Therefore, this research can
also be characterized as a multiple case design in which multiple cases are compared in order to
explore specific factors that determine the use of certain type(s) of evidence. Furthermore, this
multiple case studies design allows us to conduct an in-depth investigation of multiple
consulting cases in which interventions are used in certain organizational context, how
consultants justify claims about the expected effectiveness of their consulting using types of
evidence to support those claim.
Out of the results, it can be concluded that consultants justify their claim about the
expected effectiveness of their consulting from different sources of evidence. These sources of
evidence together can form the basis of effective consulting in which consultants can draw data,
information and knowledge out of these sources to justify their consulting. The empirical results
show that consultants justify their consulting based on mainly on their own professional
experience, the clients experience and preferences, and data and information from the local
context and environment, and lesser from scientific knowledge. Although, the usage of these
sources is determined, the role of these sources and how this is used is much more important in
the justification.
After knowing that consultants justify their effective consulting based on the four
sources of evidence, it still doesn’t say anything about the credibility of their consulting. The
results show that most of the consultants justify their consulting based on anecdotal and
testimonial evidence. That is based on what they have seen, their understanding and
interpretation of the organizational problem (anecdotal evidence) and what is in their eyes the
best solutions (testimonial evidence). Despite the fact that consultants can face a new problem
and in fact doesn’t know how to deal with it, then conclude that intuition and feeling will play a
major role, determined as hypothetical evidence. Next to it, there are consultants who use
statistical and analogical evidence which is pointing more directed to the principles of evidence
based consulting. These consultants are making the combination between science and practice.
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The use of statistical and analogical evidence is more credible because theories and model are
derived from systematic review of the reality and practice.
The use of certain types of evidence can be determined by many factors. Out of the
results the following factors are derived: attitude of the consultant, shared knowledge base,
abstraction level, clients support, scientific skills and time, which can have either positive as
negative influence on the use of certain types of evidence. These factors can either facilitate or
impede the adoption of evidence based consulting, thus also facilitation of the use of certain
types of evidence.
“Are we on our way to evidence based consulting?”, the answer is, it depends. Due to
the mentioned factors, there is still a long way to evidence based consulting. However, there is a
little development in the consulting sector which tents to the concepts of evidence based
consulting, is that there are more and more researchers, scholars and professors who make the
switch to the consulting. Although, most of the consultants don’t use statistical and analogical
evidence to proof their consulting, it doesn’t imply that the current way of working is not
effective. The effective consulting may not be explicitly examined, but it can be assumed that
the current way of working is establish through endless discussions by experts or even
professors in consultancy firms. On the other hand, it is noticeable that evidence based is much
more developed in the United States of America, where universities and consultancy firms are
embedded in large multinationals. “Is evidence based then in anyways feasible in the
consultancy sector?” Yes, it is. There is still a large market undiscovered where social science
and consultancy can contribute to the understanding and development of organizations.
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Contents
Preface ..................................................................................................................................3
Abstract .................................................................................................................................5
1.
2.
3.
4.
Introduction ................................................................................................................. 10
1.1.
Introduction ................................................................................................................... 10
1.2.
Research problem .......................................................................................................... 12
1.3.
Research goal and question ........................................................................................... 13
1.4.
Relevance of the research.............................................................................................. 14
1.5.
Construction of the thesis .............................................................................................. 14
Theoretical background ................................................................................................ 15
2.1.
Argumentation theory ................................................................................................... 15
2.2.
Evidence based consulting ............................................................................................. 17
2.3.
Sources of evidence ....................................................................................................... 19
2.4.
Types of Evidence .......................................................................................................... 22
2.5.
The organizational problems and interventions ............................................................ 24
Methodological section ................................................................................................ 27
3.1.
Research design ............................................................................................................. 27
3.2.
Sample strategy ............................................................................................................. 27
3.3.
Data collection ............................................................................................................... 28
3.4.
Data analysis .................................................................................................................. 29
3.5.
Quality indicators ........................................................................................................... 30
Results and Analysis ..................................................................................................... 31
4.1.
The characteristics of the consultants ........................................................................... 31
4.2.
The characteristics of the consulting cases.................................................................... 32
8
4.3.
The Justification of interventions................................................................................... 35
4.4.
The advantage and disadvantage of evidence based consulting................................... 41
4.5.
Impression of the interviews ......................................................................................... 46
5.
Conclusions .................................................................................................................. 48
5.1.
How do consultants justify their claim about the expected effectiveness of their
consulting? ..................................................................................................................... 48
5.2.
What type(s) of evidence do consultants use in their justification? ............................. 51
5.3.
What factors determine the use of certain type(s) of evidence? .................................. 53
5.4.
Discussions ..................................................................................................................... 57
5.5.
Limitations and future research..................................................................................... 59
6.
References ................................................................................................................... 62
Appendix ............................................................................................................................. 67
A.
Semi-structured topic list ............................................................................................... 67
B.
Interventielijst ................................................................................................................ 71
C.
Results tables ................................................................................................................. 76
D.
Quotes tables ................................................................................................................. 79
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1.
Introduction
1.1.
Introduction
The consulting sector already exists since the late 19th century. The consulting sector
had evolved during that time from a very small niche segment into a billion euro business. The
first consulting firm was Arthur D. Little, which only focused on efficiency and technical issues in
manufacturing, like most of the consulting firms before 1950. Most of leading consulting firms
arise during this period like McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group, Roland Berger, Price
Waterhouse Coopers, but also Dutch consulting firms like: Berenschot and Twijnstra Gudde. In
the first half of the 20th century most of the consulting firms started to offer specific
specialization and business opportunities, now focusing more on designing, improving and
systematizing the internal functioning of organizations and the marketing of products. Till the
1990’s, consulting firms were constantly developing new consulting services from strategic
issues to IT infrastructures.
However, until today, how far are we? This industry has already made an enormous
progress in consulting services. This also inspires the growing interest of science in this industry.
The need for new knowledge and insight in the field of management consulting seems to be
increasing considering to the amount of popularizing books and articles on this topic. Is there for
example progress in the form of systematic research and evaluation of interventions? The next
step is therefore necessary to become ‘mature’ in this field with theory forming by means of
management insights, models, theories and interventions that are tested empirically. Within the
field of management and organization science the need for scientific support of theories and
models are significantly increasing (Pfeffer & Sutton, 2006). This calling seems to be inspired by
the ‘evidence based’ movement, and it is starting to make its move.
‘Evidence’ is one of the trendy words that are used in society nowadays. People are
searching for relevant, concrete and objective information and are looking for supportive
‘evidence’ which can proof their right. The concise Oxford English dictionary (1984) gives a
number of definitions:
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“Clearness, obviousness, indication, sign, facts making for a conclusion, in support of,
information (personally or drawn from documents) tending to establish fact, serve to
indicate, attest.”
‘Evidence based’ seems to be the way of structural development and improvement of the
consulting services. ‘Evidence based’ proofs itself more and more in other professions like
evidence- based medicine, evidence-based decision-making, evidence-based education. The
roots of ‘Evidence based’ stem from medical research; ‘evidence based medicine’. Dr. David
Sackett of the University of Ontario defines ‘evidence based medicine’ as:
“The conscientious, explicit and judicious use of current best evidence in making
decisions about the care of individual patients.” (1997, p. 2.)
This also triggers the management and organization science literature to utilize a new
organizational approach: ‘evidence based management’ (Rousseau, Manning, Denyer, 2008;
Rousseau, 2006; Learmonth en Harding 2006; Pfeffer en Sutton, 2006; Rousseau en McCarthy
2007). Responding to this development, it remains to be seen to what extent ‘Evidence Based’ is
feasible in the consulting sector. Prof. Meeus of the University of Tilburg did an explorative
study of the feasibility of ‘Evidence Based Consulting’ and argued that it is also possible to apply
evidence based management in the consultancy sector for structural improvement of the
services defined as ‘evidence based consulting’:
“A new formation of service innovation in the consultancy in which interventions are
supported by empirical and scientific evidence, to improve the effectiveness of
organizations” (Meeus et al., 2009, p. 79).
‘Evidence based consulting’ could generate an impulse of innovation and renewal within the
consultancy services, by using empirical and scientific founded knowledge, e.g. choosing
interventions that have been proven effective. So basically, the central claim of evidence based
consulting is that consultants should apply and use scientific knowledge to support their
consulting in order to improve the legitimacy, quality and added value of their services (Meeus
et al., 2009).
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“Evidence based management … derives principles from research evidence and
translates them into practices that solve organizational problems” (Rousseau, 2006,
p.265).
1.2.
Research problem
However, ‘evidence based consulting’ is still hypothetical: if and to what extent
consultants operate on the basis of this concept is not yet examined empirically. Consultancy
practice shows that interventions are not always supported or based on scientific knowledge
(Meeus et al., 2009), i.e. knowledge that meets the standards of scientific research. The
commonly perceived image of management consultants is that they justify their interventions
by reference to their own experiences or the experiences of someone else (Pfeffer & Sutton,
2006a; Rousseau, 2006). Clients often cannot criticize the effectiveness of an intervention, but
accept it due to the reputation of the consulting firm (Barends & ten Have, 2008). This image is
aroused that management consultants are just doing ‘something’, while this image not empirical
founded.
Practical issues also play a major role. Providing scientific evidence requires more time
than quick intervention and ‘cut and dried’ solutions. Clients often don’t need extensive
scientific founded advice, but demands in simple, manageable and implementable knowledge
without too much analysis and details. This brings us to the following research problem; on the
one hand the ideal of ‘evidence based’ and on the other hand the difference image people have
about how management consultants justify their intervention e.g. they are just doing
‘something’, intuition, experiential knowledge. It is simply unknown how management
consultants justify their consulting in practice, because no empirical research is done on this
topic. How far we are from evidence based consulting?
In sum, there is much literature concerning ‘evidence based management’ (Cascio, 2007;
Learmonth and Harding, 2006; Molier, 2007; Pfeffer and Sutton, 2006; Rousseau, 2006, 2007).
However, there has not been written much about ‘evidence based consulting’. Actually the
literature evokes the suggestion that there is still a long way to go before we reach the ideal
‘evidence based consulting’, but that is still a proposition. How consultants justify their
consulting is not yet thoroughly examined empirically. What type of evidence do consultants
use to support their consulting and what is the credibility of their justification? All in all, these
12
are issues which have to be taken into considerarion. Ultimately, within the approach of
evidence based consulting, effective consulting have to fit in the strategy of the consultant and
the client. On the other hand, consultants have to find evidence to support practical hypotheses,
research problems and interventions, and to test and put into practice (Meeus et al., 2009).
1.3.
Research goal and question
The goal of this research is to find out how consultants justify claims about the expected
effectiveness of consulting by proving evidence to support these justifications and which factors
determine the use of certain types of evidence. The basic assumption is that consultants claim
that certain interventions are effective and need to be implemented in certain organizational
problem situation. Consultants have to justify this claim by either implicit or explicit evidence
and have it proved with evidence. There is no or hardly empirical research done on the nature of
this justification and what type of evidence consultants use. This research therefore wants to
examine empirically this gap in the management consultancy and evidence based literature.
The following research question can be formulated:
“How do consultants justify their claim about the expected effectiveness of their
consulting, what type(s) of evidence are used in that justification and which factors
determine the use of certain type(s) of evidence?”
Base on the above research question, the following conceptual model could be represented.
Interventions
Organizational
context
Justification of
consulting
Factors
Figure 1: conceptual model
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1.4.
Relevance of the research
From a scientific perspective, this research wants to find empirical evidence, which
support and declares how consultants justify their claims about the effectiveness of their
consulting. The theoretical relevance of this research explicates how consultants rely on
different sources in their daily operations to draw certain evidence e.g. knowledge, experience,
data or information, to support their justification and the factors that is related to the use of
certain evidence. These results could be a starting point of further theorizing and
conceptualizing ‘evidence based’ in future research. This research provides more insight in this
innovative approach of ‘evidence based consulting’ and how this concept can be improve and
developed in the consultancy sector.
From a practical perspective, this research gives more insight and understanding in the
justification of management consultants and the credibility of their consulting. Further, it could
lead to the adoption of the concept ‘evidence based consulting’. This could be useful for
consultancy firm that want to change their way of founding consulting to improve their
legitimacy, quality and added values in the consultancy sector. Furthermore, consultancy firms
could use the concept ‘evidence based’ to benchmark other management consultants in order
to compare and set the standard. Finally, proponents of evidence based management believe
that evidence based management could lead to competitive advantage, valid learning and
continuous improvements, and gives the organization legitimacy because of the high standard
of consulting (Pfeffer & Sutton, 2006B; Molier, 2001; Rousseau, 2006).
1.5.
Construction of the thesis
The structure of this thesis is as follows. In chapter 2, a theoretical framework is
developed in order to define the main concepts of this research. In chapter 3, the
methodological framework is developed in order to construct the procedure of the research
design, data collection and data analysis. In chapter 4, the results of the data will be presented
and analyzed. Finally, this thesis is completed by the conclusion, discussion and
recommendation for future search in chapter 5.
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2. Theoretical background
In this chapter the relevant literature will be reviewed to construct the theoretical framework in
order to interpret the empirical results. Successively we will describe the literature about
argumentation theory in chapter 2.1., evidence based consulting in chapter 2.2., the sources of
evidence in chapter 2.3., type of evidence in chapter 2.4., and organizational problems and
interventions in chapter 2.5. These theoretical concepts will form the framework and the
leading theme of this research.
2.1.
Argumentation theory
Drawing from the principle of the argumentation theory of Toulmin (1958), the intent is
to focus on the justificatory function of argumentation, which means that if one has a certain
claim of interest; he should then provide justification for it. Toulmin believed that reasoning is
not so much about reaching a conclusion based on initial sets of propositions or involving the
discovering of new ideas, but more a process of testing and sifting already existing ideas and an
act achievable through the process of justification (1958).
The central goal of argumentation theory is to increase the insight of an argumentation
as verbal convincement, an attempt to solve a difference of opinion by putting statements
forward to justify or to bust a certain conception (Van Eemeren and Grootendorst, 1987).
Drawing deeper from the argumentation theory, Toulmin propose an analysis model which
consists of certain components that construct the argumentation.
In below figure the analysis model is presented.
Data
Claim
Warrant
Reservat
Backing
Qualifier
Figure 2: analysis model of Toulmine (1987)
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The three main components in argumentation theory include the data, warrant and
claim. Data refers to the facts or opinions of a fact. The claim refers to the conclusion of a fact.
The warrant is the connection which advances the data to a claim. The second set of
components may not be always necessary in the justification, but may be present. The
additional three components include backing, rebuttal and qualifier. Backing refers to the
evidence or support for assumptions in the warrant. Rebuttal recognizes the conditions under
which the claim will not be true. Qualifier is the probability or level of confidence of the claim.
Note that the function of the warrant and backing is basically the same, as both components
support the relation between the data and claim. However, if the warrant is not convincing
enough, one should use the backing to show that it is true. The difference is that both
components are associated on a different level of justification / on equivalent levels.
The argumentation theory is an important concept within the scope of this research, as
the justification by consultants also consists of argumentations and statements which proof
their effective consulting. The components of this theory are mainly data, claim, warrant and
backing. The basic idea is as follows: the data refers to the information that flows from a certain
situation or organizational problem. Whereas the consultant will claim that certain interventions
will be effective in that specific organizational problem situation. Based on experience, intuition,
explicit data or any kind of knowledge or information, the consultant will try to justify the claim
by connecting the data (warrant). Still, some would argue that warrant is not enough to
convince the client or to justify the claim. Followed by the backing, the consultant is able to
support assumptions in the warrant by providing evidence that proof the claim right en credible.
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2.2.
Evidence based consulting
An inspection of the official website of council consultancy firms (Ooa and Roa)
indicates that explicit reference to evidence based consultancy among the Dutch consultancy
firms is lacking (Meeus et al., 2009). This simple observation raises the questions whether
Evidence Based Consultancy is in any way feasible within the consultancy sector. However, to
which extent consultancy firms operates based on this concept is not yet tested empirically.
Proponents (Meeus et al, 2009; Barends and Ten Have, 2008) argue that applying evidence
based consulting is a way to improve the quality of a consultants’ intervention and to contribute
to the professionalization of the sector. Furthermore, evidence based consulting forces both
consultant and client to explicate consideration and motivation toward a problem statement,
which make it possible to gain control and guarantee of one decision. Broesskamp Stone and
Ackerman (2007) indicate that evidence based in the health care sector is based on three
criteria’s.
1. Decisions and interventions must base on professional norms; expert, reliable, cautious,
independent and good fellowship (Professional norms).
2. Decisions and interventions must base on recent scientific-oriented expert- and practical
knowledge, and the emphasis on empirical results and scientific theories and models
(Knowledge infrastructure).
3. Applicability of evidence based consulting within a context that put the emphasis on the
procedure and characteristics of a specific circumstance (context sensitivity).
Meeus et al., (2009) are convinced that this approach in the health care sector is also suitable
for evidence based consulting. Implementing evidence based consulting means that
management consultants have to consider the basic values, knowledge and context. These
criteria’s are consistently connected to each other and forms together a framework to apply
evidence based consultancy.
Unfortunately, implementing Evidence based consultancy is not that easy as it sounds.
Considering the criteria which consultants have to take into account, some argue that
professional norms (code of conduct) of consultants could only be verified with members of the
Dutch council of consultancy firms, not for the whole consultant’s population. The same goes for
17
the knowledge infrastructure. This means that consultants have to share their knowledge and
communicate this openly among all consultants in order to work thoroughly evidence based.
Context sensitivity means that consultants have to take the environment and specific situation
into consideration. In this case, the consultant could examine the boundary conditions in which
the intervention have to take place. While best practice is also a suitable method to examine
the boundary conditions, although not formalized and systematic knowledge. We could expect
that consultants and their clients will work in a pragmatic way, even when they don’t know why
it is effective, they will probably use it.
Although these criteria’s could not be fully realized in practice, we could still assume
that these points are applicable in this research to some extent. The use of knowledge that is
related to specific context and that are based on specific basis elements makes evidence based
consulting not only feasible, but also useful (Meeuw et al., 2009).
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2.3.
Sources of evidence
Still, there is no conformity of what ‘evidence based’ really is. In this context, there was
a common assumption that evidence was research evidence and more specifically, research
evidence from the quantitative traditions (Sackett et al. 1997). Through the application of a
randomized controlled trail (RCT), systematic reviews and meta-analyses, evidence would reach
the top of evidence hierarchy, which counts as the golden standard (Rycroft-Malone, 2003).
Nevertheless, the differences between physic science and social science are already known. It is
not always possible to apply a RCT, due to fundamental limitations. Social behaviour and its
factors are more difficult to capture and to remain constant compare to physical science.
Although the usage of fact and statistics has made it progress in the social science in the last 15
years. According to Rycroft-Malone (2003) the role of scientific evidence is suggesting that the
nature of evidence is broader than evidence derived from research. In this research, ‘evidence’
is proposed as:
“Knowledge derived from a variety of sources that has been subjected to testing and has
found to be credible (Higgs & Jones, 2000, p. 311).)”
Based on this definition, two basic questions can be asked. Where does knowledge come from
and what is the credibility of this knowledge? These two questions need to be answered in order
to identify the variety of sources in which consultants acquire their evidence and to what extent
these sources has been subjected to testing and had found credible. The literature distinguishes
several typologies of evidence. The most relevant concepts of evidence will be discussed.
According to Rycroft-Malone et al., (2004) ‘evidence based’ generated from four
different sources of evidence in which medical practitioners use in clinical practice. These
sources of evidence are also appropriate in this research as the same sources can be found and
used in the consulting process.
Scientific research
Research evidence has assumed priority over other sources of evidence in the delivery
of evidence based health care (Rycroft-Malone et al., 2004). However, such evidence rarely
attains absolute certainty and may be changed as new research emerges. Research evidence is
socially and historically constructed (Wood et al. 1998a, 1998b; Higgs & Titchen 1995). It is not
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certain, contextual and static, but dynamic and eclectic (Rycroft-Malone et al., 2004). Although,
research evidence is able to proof the effectiveness of interventions, it is less certain and less
value free as it is accepted because of multiple interpretations of research by different
stakeholders exist. This could imply that it is necessary to translate and specify evidence in order
to make sense in certain context of the organization. Finally, all these factors highlight that
research evidence, although crucial to improving patient care, may not on their own inform
practitioners’ decision-making (Thompson et al. 2001a, Bucknall 2003).
Professional experience
Knowledge that is acquired through professional practice and life experiences is also a
type of evidence according to Rycroft-Malone et al., (2004). This type of evidence is called:
‘practical knowledge’, ‘professional craft knowledge’ or ‘practical know-how’ (Eraut, 1985;
Oakeshott, 1962; Titchen, 2000). This knowledge is expressed and embedded in practice and is
often tacit and intuitive (Rycroft-Malone et al., 2004). Rycroft-Malone et al., (2004) argue that
evidence based not only required professional craft knowledge and reasoning, but requires such
knowledge and reasoning to integrate the four different types of knowledge. Tacit, experiential
forms of knowledge are persuasive and have a reciprocal, reinforcing relationship with
‘scientific’ evidence or research (e.g. Dopson et al. 1999). Research evidence is more powerful
when it matches professional experience; conversely, when research and professional
experience do not match, its use in practice can be variable (Ferlie et al. 1999). This suggests
that improving practice requires more than accessing new knowledge; it requires skills in
reasoning to integrate that knowledge into practitioners’ existing knowledge frameworks (Higgs
& Jones 2000).
Clients experience and preference
The third source of evidence that contributes to clinical practice is the personal
knowledge and experience of patients and clients (Rycroft-Malone et al., 2004). Here are two
types of evidence available and need to be accessed by consultants: evidence from clients’
previous experiences of care, and evidence derived from clients’ knowledge of themselves, their
organization and processes, i.e. client’s previous experience of consulting and evidence derived
from client’s knowledge of their organizational problem.
20
Local context and environment
In the course of improving the organization and processes, consultants may draw on:
audit and performance data; client’s stories and narratives; knowledge about the culture of the
organization and individuals within it; social and professional networks; information from 360
feedback, i.e. feedback from the fullest possible constituency of stakeholders; local and national
policy (Rycroft-Malone et al. 2003, McCormack et al. 2002, Stetler et al. 1999). Stetler (2003) has
described this evidence source as ‘internal evidence’. She suggests that it comes primarily from
systematically but locally obtained information, including data from local performance, planning,
quality, outcome and evaluation activity (Stetler, 2003).
The relatively meaning of each of these four sources may vary in each decision. The size
of the circle – thus, the impact, differs from each situation. ‘Evidence based’ reside on the
cutting surface of the circles. Below figure illustrates how different sources of evidence come
together and form the basis to justify decisions.
Figure 3: sources of evidence
21
2.4.
Types of Evidence
Based on the sources of evidence alone it cannot be concluded what the credibility is of
these evidences. In the review of the literature on evidence, it can be concluded that for
evidence to enhance the acceptance of a claim, the evidence has to be recognized, cognitively
processed, and judged as legitimate (Reynolds and Reynolds, 2002). There was a common
assumption that evidence was research evidence and more specifically, research evidence from
the quantitative tradition (Sackett et al., 1997). However, credibility refers to the objective and
subjective components of the believability of a source or message, meaning that subjective
components also play a role in the nature of evidence. In addition, evidence plays an important
role in many academic disciplines like the health care, law, psychology, science and
argumentation in which all of these discipline have made their own classification of evidence.
After reviewing the different literature of these disciplines it can be concluded that the types of
evidence used are common like and that there is a certain hierarchical credibility of the evidence.
In below classification of evidence the following scholars has been included; Seech (1997);
Sackett (1997); Hoeken (2001); Koballa (1986); Allen & Preiss (1997); Baesler & Burgoon (1994);
Reynolds & Reynolds (2002); Reinard (1998).
Hypothetical evidence
Hypothetical evidence is a convincing but fictional event with enough detail to feel real.
A consultant use a hypothetical situation to illustrate what will happen, to whom it happen,
where and when it happen. Most of the time consultants use hypothetical evidence based on
their intuition. Hypothetical evidence is considered as very weak positive evidence, because this
is not based on facts, but based on hypothesized and logical situations.
Anecdotal Evidence
Anecdotal evidence generates for a description of one, of small number of specific case.
This type of evidence is based on a consultant’s observation of the specific organizational
situation whereas he describes what happened, who was involved, where and when it
happened. Anecdotal evidence is usually based on facts and figures that are systematically
derived from the specific organizational situation. Anecdotal evidence is considered as weak
supportive evidence because it does not proof a claim.
22
Testimonial / expert evidence
Testimonial or expert evidence refers to an established or trustworthy authority such as
educational degree, publication and work experience of professional that is demonstrate his
expertise on the topic. Although, testimonial of credible persons could strengthen an argument,
most of people accept it without question and without their own understanding of it.
Testimonial/ expert evidence is considered as moderate strong supportive evidence, because
this is based on previous experiences of the consultants which are based on factual events.
Statistical evidence
Statistical evidence refers to an empirical analysis or to the results of a methodological
or scientific experiments or investigations. Consultants may use a well developed
methodological way to examine a practical problem or refer to an empirical analysis by others in
order to proof certain effectiveness. Evidence from well designed non-experimental study e.g.
cohort, case control or cross-sectional studies including qualitative methods are classified as
statistical evidence. Statistical evidence is considered as fairly strong supportive evidence,
because this evidence is based on systematic collection of factual data.
Analogical evidence
The last type of evidence is analogical evidence. Analogical evidence is an explanatory or
modeling of the phenomenon by means of a comparison with an already understood
phenomenon. Analogical evidence must refer to a quantitative research which supports the
consultant’s data which demonstrates measured effectiveness and benefits and which can be
applied generally e.g. long term randomized controlled trial, systematic review, and metaanalysis of randomized controlled trials. Analogical evidence is considered as strong supportive
evidence as the relationship between certain variables is determined and seen significant.
23
Type of evidence
Definition
Credibility
Hypothetical
Reference to a believable but fictional situation with enough detail
Very weak positive
situation
to feel real.
evidence
Anecdotal evidence
Reference to a description of one, of small number of specific case
Weak supportive evidence
Testimonial
Reference to an established or trustworthy authority or credible
Moderate strong
evidence
source
supportive evidence
Statistical evidence
Reference to an empirical analysis or to the results of a
Fairly strong supportive
methodological or scientific experiments or investigations.
evidence
Reference to an explanatory or modeling of the phenomenon by
Strong supportive evidence
Analogical evidence
means of a comparison with an already understood phenomenon
Table 1: types of evidence
2.5.
The organizational problems and interventions
There are many literatures on the subject of interventions. However, no literature is
complete and their way of structuring interventions are different, and it is most dependent on
the scholars’ conviction. Interventions could be defined as:
“Interventions are the conscious activities in which one of more change agents takes in
order to achieve a change process” (Cummings and Worley, 2009; De Caluwe and Vermaak,
2004; French and Bell, 1999).
The most important characteristic of interventions is that interventions are based on underlying
goals and that big differences between interventions are more of less about its active principles,
its approach, its human image and the norms, values and conviction that lies behind (Caluwe
and Vermaak, 2004). Going from this perspective, it is necessary to distinguish types of
interventions and how this is used in specific organizational problems/ situations.
According to the empirical research of de Caluwe and Reitsma (2006) on ‘the
competence of consultants in organizational change projects’, there is a significant relationship
between the goal of the change, the organizational context in which the change occurs and the
intervention that is used in that specific case. So basically, the claim that certain interventions
works better when it fits the organizational context and the goal of change is already examine
24
empirically. The active principle of interventions and the effectiveness criteria of an
intervention assume that an intervention has a certain goal: the consultant utilizes a certain
activity (intervention) in order to reach a specific goal or to solve a specific problem. The active
principle of interventions is helpful to choose for the best change plan for a certain problem
within a certain organization (Caluwe and Vermaak, 2004)
“It makes it easier to communicate changes with each other, in order to recognize and to
typify interventions” (Twijnstra and Gudde, 2007).
To give a brief and clear overview of the leading literature of intervention, this research will
further elaborate on the active principle and the classification of interventions composed by de
Caluwe and Reitsma (2006) in their empirical research on “the competence of consultants in
organizational change projects”. In their research, an extensive literature study has been
conducted in order to classify types of interventions and to use certain intervention within
specific organizational context. In this list of classification, the work of the following scholars has
been included; Cummings en Worley (2005); Schein (1969); Kubr (2002); Keuning en Eppink
(2004);Boonstra (2004). This typology is used because this is the most well-known, extensive
intervention model in the Netherlands and still has great influences on interventions until today.
In the table on the next page, an overview of the composed classification of types of
organizational problems is presented. See appendix B for the complete classification of
interventions and matching interventions methods.
25
Organizational problem
Active principle
The focus on diagnose and problem solving
To get a hold on the nature and cause of an organizational problem
and to make people aware of the necessity of organizational change.
The focus on strategic issues
To stimulate the future direction of the organization, to form this
future image and to share this vision.
The focus on short term adaptation of organizational
structure or cooperation’s
To assemble facilitation and situation to make the organizational
change possible.
The focus on improving the business performance
To assemble measures of organizational processes in order to
improve the results.
The focus on the motivation of employees
To stimulate the motivation of the employees in order to improve the
flexibility of the organizational and organizational performance.
The focus on internal control
To provide comprehensible progress of the quantity and quality of
tasks.
The focus on training and development
To acquire and learn concepts and skills in order to increase the
insight of employees.
The focus on processes between people
To improve social processes in the organization e.g. interpersonal
relationships, functioning of the team or relations between teams.
The focus on sustainable learning and change
To improve social processes in organization and maintain the process
of interaction and communication.
Table 2: classification of organizational problems
26
3.
Methodological
section
In this chapter the research methods will be discussed which we have used to examine the
research question. Within the social science, the bridge between theory and empiric is build
using the methodological framework. Successively, we will describe the research design in
chapter 3.1., sample strategy in chapter 3.2., data collection in chapter 3.3., data analysis in
chapter 3.4., and the quality indicators in chapter 3.5.
3.1.
Research design
Scientific research can be distinguished into categories based on the principles of
researchers and the problem that is examined. This research can be characterized as an
explorative research, as the theoretical basics are still indefinite in order to formulate
hypotheses to determine relationships (‘t Hart et al, 1996). Furthermore, there has been chosen
for a cross-sectional, qualitative and comparative design because the topic is examined through
semi-structured interviews in which data are gathered at one moment in time. Each
management consultant will be seen as one case and compared with other management
consultants. Therefore, this research can also be characterized as a multiple case design in
which multiple cases are compared in order to explore specific factors that determine the use of
certain type(s) of evidence. Furthermore, this multiple case studies design allows us to conduct
an in-depth investigation of multiple consulting cases in which interventions are used in certain
organizational context, how consultants justify claims about the expected effectiveness of their
consulting using types of evidence to support those claim. Finally, this study could provide more
insight in the concept ‘evidence based’ and how this concept can be improve and developed in
the consultancy sector.
3.2.
Sample strategy
The unit of analysis will be the consulting process and the units of observation are
management consultants. The research samples are selected by randomly, snowball sampling
strategy which means that an individual consultant make his business network ‘public’ in order
to find more consultants. Consultants were asked to suggest another expert that they may know
who could offer more information. This process will be repeated until the number of consultant
is contented. The data will be collected among Dutch consultants in the Netherlands, including
27
employees, freelancers and independent consultants. There are in total 16 management
consultants that participated in this research. The following expertises are seen as management
consultants with refers generally to the provision of business consulting services: strategy,
operations, supply chain, finance, outsourcing, human resource and information technology.
3.3.
Data collection
Literature study
This research has started with an in-depth literature study in order to find out what the
state of art is of the relevant concepts of this research. This literature study has to be done in
order to construct our theoretical framework and data collection methods e.g. constructing the
semi-structured topic list. The relevant literature is selected via Web of Science, Google Scholar,
the database of Tilburg’s University and Management Executive Base. The keywords to find
literature in the search engines were: evidence based consulting, evidence based management,
evidence based, argumentation theory, justification, sources of evidence, type of evidence, type
of interventions. Furthermore, the reference lists were used to find more related articles. The
aim of this literature study is to construct a theoretical framework in order to interpret the
empirical results.
Interviews
Subsequently, interviews were used to collect data among the respondents in order to
acquire more ‘rich texture’ information. There has been chosen for a semi-structured interview,
in order to measure certain concepts by means of open questions. Besides, it leaves the
respondents some space to bring in their own opinion and ideas within the framework. In total
there were 16 interviews conducted among management consultants with different
backgrounds and expertise.
Construction of the semi-structured topic list
The semi-structured topic list is based on the theoretical framework which was used as
a guideline derived from the literature study. The semi-structured topic list consists of four parts.
In the first part, some questions were asked about the background of the consultants. In the
second part, the consultants were asked to reflect on a recent consulting case whereupon
28
questions were asked to describe the client, problem(s) and goal(s), the approach of the case
and interventions used in the consulting case. In this part, a diagram of specific goals and
intervention methods was presented in which the consultants can easily recognize and fill in.
This diagram based on an existing intervention list composed by Caluwe and Reitsma (2006) in
their empirical research on “the competence of consultants in organizational change projects”.
This interventions list is derived from the work of multiple scholars; Cummings en Worley (2005);
Schein (1969); Kubr (2002); Keuning en Eppink (2004);Boonstra (2004). In the third part, the
consultants were asked to indicate the sources which they have used in their consulting case
and provide justification for it. In the last part, the consultants were asked to give their opinion
about the ‘evidence based’ concept’ and indicate the advantage and disadvantage of this
concept. See appendix A for the semi-structured topic list. All the interviews are recorded and
transcribed using an audio transcription program F4.
3.4.
Data analysis
The data derived from the interview sessions are analyzed by means of two methods.
The first method is a typical qualitative method to analyze qualitative data like interviews by
means of the coding method. The coding method consists of three steps. The first step is open
coding which is the process of breaking down, examining, comparing, conceptualizing and
categorizing (Straus & Corbin, 1998). In the first step, the data is read carefully and fragmentize.
After, the relevant fragments are labeled. The second step is axial coding whereby the data /
fragments are put back together according to the code book which is constructed out of the
theoretical framework. The last step is selective coding in which the core categories are
indentified and systematically related it to other categories. The main purpose is to determine
and explore relationships between categories in order to answer the research question.
The second method is a rather subjective way of interpreting the data. During the
interview and data analysis, some notes are made of remarkable conclusions given by the
respondents. These subjective conclusions will be discussed in chapter 4.5. Impressions of the
interviews.
29
3.5.
Quality indicators
Credibility – The credibility of on research is to determine causal relationships between concepts
or variables (Yin, 1989). A causal relationship is determined when there is a correlation between
variables and when there are not other intervening variables (Baker, 1994). In this case study, it
is hard to determine relationships between the variables in qualitative research because there is
no clear separation of the cases and the context in which it is examined. However, the causal
relationships between the variables are determined by means of proper description of the
context and the phenomena’s that occurred in the cases. So therefore, the causal relationship
can be determined to some extent. Besides some possible relationships and conclusion are
given that are derived from the empirical results. This allows the researcher to interpret the
data in both objective and subjective way. This will increase the validity and reliability of the
results.
Transferability - The transferability of the results is moderate, because this research focuses on
management consultant and within the scope of ‘evidence based’ to some extent. However, the
main research question could also be put forward in other professions, because this questions is
mainly focus on the justification of arguments, statements, claim, the use of types of evidence is
the justification and it the credibility of the justification. The frameworks of this research could
therefore also be used for other professions like, managers, researchers, teachers etcetera.
Dependability – The dependability of this research will be achieved by accurate description and
documenting all the steps and procedure that has been taken to conduct this research. This
allows others to replicate this research or even improve the results. Some limitations are
described in this research and some recommendations are given for future researches.
Conformability – This research is characterized as an explorative, qualitative research. The
conformability of this research is determined as moderate. Within a qualitative research it is
hard to determine relationships between variables. However, by means of accurate data
collection and data analysis, it is possible to draw conclusions and relationships to some extent,
which allows the researcher to interpret in both objective and subjective way. Moreover, there
is always a possibility of misinterpretation of the data. Therefore every step of data analysis is
registered in a code book.
30
4. Results and Analysis
In this chapter the analysis of the qualitative results will be presented. Subsequently, we will examine the step by step
the consulting process, starting from the background characteristics of the consultants in chapter 4.1., the
characteristics of the consulting cases in chapter 4.2., the justification of the consulting by consultants in chapter 4.3.
Finally, in chapter 4.5. the advantages and disadvantages of evidence based consulting.
4.1.
The characteristics of the consultants
In the first part of the interview, consultants were asked to indicate their characteristics as a management
consultant. The following characteristics are included: gender, education, experience and specialisms in order to
determine the background of the consultants. Further, the consultants were asked whether they operate as
independent consultant, whether they are certified consultants and associate with a branch organization. The results
present a diversity of consultants within the sample.
The total sample consists of 16 consultants, of which 6 female and 9 male consultants. The consultants are in
general all high educated. In the sample, there are 3 consultants who have a Bachelor degree (Hoger beroepsonderwijs).
The greater number of consultants has a Master degree (Wetenschappelijk onderwijs), which 4 of the consultants
already have or taking their PhD. (Doctoraal) and 2 consultants have their MBA degree (Master of Business
Administration). The average consulting experience of the consultants is 14 years, varying from 1 to 30 years. With
regard to the specialism of the consultants, 7 consultants have indicated one specific specialism, 4 consultants indicate
to have two specialisms and 5 consultants indicate to have multiple specialisms. Besides the six core specialism of
consulting, other specialism’s are mentioned: project management, IT management, research in health care, logistics in
health care, organization design, change processes / large scale interventions, learning and development, law and
subsidiary. There are in total 11 consultants in the sample that operate as independent consultants and 4 consultants
operated with in a consulting firm. 3 consultants are certified, which means that they have followed a certain
educational program which legitimated them as specialized consultants in their expertise. In total there are 9
consultants who are also member of a particular branch association in their specific specialism. The following branch
associations are mentioned: Roa (Raad van Organisatie van Adviesbureaus), Ooa (Orde van Organisatieadviseurs), ITSMF
(Nederland, de bedrijfsvereniging voor IT-(service)management en –strategie), VLM (vereniging voor logistiek
management), NVO2 (Nederlandse verenigng voor HRD-professionals in ontwikkelen en opleiden), NVAS (Nederlandse
Vereniging van Adviseurs inzake subsidies en andere Overheidsstimuleringsregelingen) and VLO (vereniging voor logistiek
ontwerpers). The results indicate that the total sample of consultants are all unique based on their backgrounds. In
below table, an overview of the characteristics of the consultants is presented.
Cases
Gender
Education
1
F
2
M
3
M
4
F
X
X
X
6
M
7
M
8
F
9
M
10
M
11
M
X
X
12
F
13
F
14
M
15
F
16
M
X
X
X
X
20
22
X
X
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
MBO
HBO
WO
The characteristics of the consulting cases
5
M
PhD
X
X
X
Other:
Experience in Years
Specialism
Strategy
X
X
X
X
MBA
20
X
12
10
Operations
X
X
Supply Chain
X
X
Finance
10
MBA
13
5
1
30
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Outsourcing
7
X
X
6
8
X
20
8
X
X
X
X
HRM
X
Other:
Independent consultant
Certified consultant
Member of branch
association
28
Yes
Yes
Yes
X
X
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
X
X
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
X
X
X
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
X
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
yes
No
No
No
Table 3: the characteristics of the consultants
4.2.
The characteristics of the consulting cases
In the second part of the interview, consultants were asked to prepare a recently accomplished consulting case
and describe the characteristics of the consulting case. First, the consultants were asked to indicate the generally the
consulting case which includes: type of client organization and the organizational problem. After, the consultants were
asked how they approach the organizational problem and indicate which of the interventions they have used in order to
solve the organizational problem(s). By means of an existing diagram, the consultants can easily select out the
organizational problem(s), which are divided in 9 general organizational problems and the corresponding interventions
of these organizational problems. This diagram is derived from multiple sources of theories (the complete diagram with
details can be found in the appendix).
There are in total 16 consulting cases mapped in this research. 4 of the consulting cases were done in a health
care organization, 2 consulting cases were in a distribution/logistic organization and the other 10 consulting cases were
done in diverse organizations. 4 consultants have indicated one specific organizational problem within the client
organization. The other 12 consultants have recognized and indicated multiple organization problems in the client
organizations. An overview of the case characteristics is presented in below table 4.3.
32
Cases
1
2
Private organization
Type of client
organization
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
12
13
14
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Distribution organization
X
Industrial organization
X
X
Construction organization
X
Consulting organization
a. Focus on diagnose and
problem solving
b. Focus on strategic issue
X
X
X
c. Focus on short term
adaptation of organizational
structure or cooperation’s
d. Focus on improving the
business performance
e. Focus on the motivation of
employees
f. Focus on internal control
Approach of
consultant
X
Mix approach
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
g. Focus on training and
development
h. Focus on processes between
people
i. Focus on sustainable learning
and change
Expert approach
Process approach
16
X
Agricultural organization
Type of
organizational
problem
15
X
X
Non-profit organization
The characteristics of the consultants
11
X
Governmental organization
Health care organization
3
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Table 4: the characteristics of the consulting cases
Further, the consultants were asked how they approach the consulting case. Approach is described as the generic
methods of moving towards the organizational problem(s). 9 of the consultants have indicated to use a process/
bottom-up approach, in which they involve and let the client and employees participate in the consulting process. 5 of
the consultants have indicated to use an expert/ top-down approach, in which they operate individually or within a small
project group and 2 consultants have indicated to use a mix approach in which they combine both an expert approach
and process approach.
Subsequently, the consultants were asked what interventions they have utilized to solve the organizational problem(s).
The results show that consultants have utilized multiple interventions to solve the problem(s). Although the
interventions are corresponded with the organizational problem(s), the utilized interventions do not completely
correspond with the chosen organizational problem(s) in the consulting cases. The most commonly used interventions
33
are: feedback (9 times), redesign of processes (9 times), workshops (8 times), Project organization (7 times), pilot project
(7 times) and process management (7 times). An overview of the used interventions is presented in below table 4.3.
Cases
a. Focus on diagnose and
problem solving
1
2
3
4
5
SWOT analysis
X
X
Benchmarking
X
X
X
Balanced Score Card
6
7
X
8
9
10
11
X
Causal Loop diagram
b. Focus on strategic issue
Strategic Change Plan
Strategic culture change
X
X
X
Pilot project
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Used interventions by consultant
New organization units
Structure change
X
Outsourcing
e. Focus on the motivation
of employees
Earnings systems
X
X
Integral quality management
Selection
X
X
Carrier development
Task widening
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Task enrichment
f. Focus on internal control
Control
Report
Logbooks
g. Focus on training and
development
Training
Workshops
Feedback
Coaching
X
X
X
X
X
Teambuilding
Search conference
X
X
i. Focus on sustainable
learning and change
X
X
X
X
X
X
16
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Third party
Process management
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Gaming
h. Focus on processes
between people
15
X
Temporary groups
Redesign of processes
14
X
Project organization
d. Focus on improving the
business performance
13
X
X
Search conference
c. Focus on short term
adaptation of
organizational structure
or cooperation’s
12
X
X
X
X
X
Action learning
Explorative research
X
X
Dialogue
*the indicated organizational problems are marked grey.
Table 5: used interventions by the management consultants
34
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
4.3.
The Justification of interventions
In the third part of the interviews, the consultants were asked how they justify their choice of the utilized
interventions and its effectiveness in their specific case. Consultants were asked to indicate from what sources of
evidence they have draw their justification by means on a diagram. In this diagram consultants can easily select the
source of evidence which they have used in their consulting case. According to the Rycroft-Malone et al., (2004)
‘evidence based’ generated from four different sources of evidence which consultants can use in consulting practice.
The results indicated that consultants draw from multiple sources of evidence. Professional experience, the client’s
experience and preferences and the data from local context and environment are the most used sources of evidence
and selected by every consultants. However, only 10 consultants have indicated to use scientific knowledge as source of
evidence as justification. An overview of the used sources of evidence is presented below in table: 4.3.
Source of Evidence
Cases
Scientific knowledge
1
X
2
3
4
5
X
6
X
7
8
X
9
10
11
X
12
X
13
X
14
X
15
X
16
X
Professional Experience
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Clients experiences and preferences
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Local context and environment
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Table 6: used source of evidence by the management consultants
Although the consultants have indicated to use multiple source of evidence to draw their knowledge and
understanding about a certain organizational problem, these sources of evidence are used differently in their
justification and argumentation in order to proof the effectiveness and the credibility towards the client. Some
consultants give some explanation of how these sources of evidence are used:
Scientific knowledge
“I do rely strongly on scientific knowledge of what is smart changing or stupid changing”
“Scientific knowledge? Minimally……. But, it is good for inspiration!”
“My research methodology is based on scientific research”
Above quotes indicate that some consultants use scientific knowledge as background information of what is best
practice and take that into consideration or either use scientific knowledge, theories or model to apply that in their
consulting practice. The interviews clearly indicate that these scientific knowledge stern from a consultants educational
period or whether from their interest in keeping their own knowledge up to date and from practical development of
35
scientific theories and model. The basis issue is then, do they use it in practice or do they let the knowledge as it is.
Some consultants do and some don’t.
Professional experience
“Professional experience is the expertise of the consultant. A consultant understand the situation of his client and
he can make the translation into practice”
“Experience, that is what you have seen and what you have done wrong, you won’t do that again!”
“Professional experience is that what you think you have to do and that is based in intuition”
Professional experience is what every consultant rely on in their daily practice. Clients often take advice as it is, because
they fully trust on the expertise of the consultant. “We are going to do this. Ok, is the answer most of the time.” I would
rather say why, but that question is never put forward most of the time”. Either consulting advices is based on previous
experience or based on intuition, it do have some truth in it. Most of the time, it is like a kind of ‘cognitive systemization
of experiences’. It is embedded in the head of the consultant that is based on what the consultant have done many
times or what the consultant see at that moment and think of a logical action.
Client’s experiences and preferences
“Client has a very important role in what the direction is and what going to happen eventually”
“Eventually, the step that need to be taken, have to be reported to the client and the client has to agree with it”
“Advertisement’ alone is not enough to convince the client. It is all about money. Clients are focus on efficiency
and effectiveness.”
As stated in the quotes, the role of the client seems to be an important factor in the consulting practice. Clients pay a lot
of money to get the problem solved. Eventually, it has to save the client a lot of money. “The customer is the king”, it is
all about the client. The clients know best and the consultants are very aware of that. That is also the reason why
consultants often use a process approach. To let the clients and its employees involve and participate in the consulting
process. This way, the consultants also take the client’s perspective into consideration and let the client’s employees
experience that they are part of the consulting process.
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Local context and environment
“It is important to collect your data from the participants (…) I have talk with those people in order to get a clear
picture of the history of the organization”.
“I have used a research about employee satisfaction that is conducted by a research institute. I have read that
report and took all the important elements”.
“We just sit there and watch. Using observations and interviews, and analyze the data”.
“The data comes from the respondents. I always work with a large sample and make sure I use take good
samples”.
Another important source of evidence is the information of the local context en environment of the organizational
problem. Most of the time, consultants use this source to get a better understanding about the organization itself and
the organizational problem(s). Although every consultants use this source of evidence, the results clearly indicate that
the way of collecting data is different. Some of the consultants collect their data by means of informal interactions e.g.
participate in daily operations. The larger part of the consultants uses often a more qualitative method to collect their
data by means of workshops and feedback which is a form of observations and structured interaction. Only one
consultant in this research uses a quantitative method to collect his data by means of questionnaires and large samples.
After, the consultants indicate from what sources of evidence they draw their knowledge from, the consultant
were ask to provide arguments of how they justify their claims about the expected effectiveness of their consulting. The
arguments and justifications are fragmentize and coded according to the categories which are derived from the
literature. The arguments are coded according to the types of evidence as presented in table 7. Although the consultants
all indicate to use the same sources of evidence, the type of evidence used in their argumentation and justification is
more diverse. The results show that anecdotal and testimonial evidence is used by every consultant in their
argumentation. 6 consultants have used hypothetical evidence in their argumentation. 8 consultants have used
statistical evidence in their arguments and only 3 consultants have used analogical evidence in their argumentation. An
overview of the type of evidence used by consultants in their arguments is presented in below table 7.
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Types of Evidence
Cases
Hypothetical Evidence
1
Anecdotal Evidence
X
Testimonial / Expert Evidence
X
Statistical Evidence
X
2
3
4
5
X
X
X
6
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Analogical Evidence
7
8
9
10
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
11
12
13
14
15
16
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Table 7: used types of evidence
The most important aspects are the credibility and the supportive elements in each of the type of evidence.
There is a certain hierarchical of the evidence which determine the credibility of the consulting of a consultant. Some
quotes are stated below:
Hypothetical evidence
“You can provide objective and qualitative services in any case, but that is more in the method that is used. The
approach is eventually based on 100% feeling and intuition. At a certain moment you have to estimate the
direction which is the best”.
“In some case intuition works best and in other cases don’t, but it very based on intuition”
“In advance you have no clue. Just try, trial and error, look if it works. If it doesn’t works, then you try something
else”.
“I think that is it based on a lot of intuition and experience. I have done something 10 times and 9 times it went
good, so it works probably”.
Hypothetical evidence is at the lowest level in the hierarchy of evidence, which is a very weak, positive type of evidence.
The quotes illustrates that arguments are based on a fictional event in which consultants hypothesize a logical action.
Intuition is a typical type of hypothetical evidence in which consultants think what is best in that situation.
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Anecdotal evidence
“First, I inventorise what the situation is and try to get a clear picture of the situation. Try to get an objective
picture as much as possible. But above all, don’t make to quick conclusions”
“By means of mapping the nature and content of the conflicts, and the original basic principles”.
“I have collected a lot of information out of the organization. I have used benchmark as the standard.
Benchmarking is to collect a lot of information and compare it with others.
Anecdotal evidence is typical kind of evidence in which consultants describe the problem situation and use that as
starting point of their consulting. Anecdotal evidence can be related to the extent in which consultant’s use the local
context en environment as their source of collecting data from the organization and it people in order to get a clear
picture about the organizational problem. The use of type of evidence in particular is found weak supportive credible.
Testimonial/ expert evidence
“Big part of the consulting in this case is to tell what is in my eyes the best solutions in this process”
“I use my professional experience to interpret the data. Based on the data, I make my conclusion and
recommendation. The recommendation I do come up by myself. So it is based on my own professional experience
which is based on my data in turn.
“I think that the focus lies on professional experience. By working in team, we try to get knowledge and
experience as much as possible into the project, so we won’t forget something and make mistakes”.
Again, the results show that every consultant relies and trust their own experience and expertise about a certain
organizational problem. Also the clients will trust the consultant as an expert and won’t question about his expertise.
The more a consultant works in a specific field of consulting, the more the client will trust his abilities and skills. In
general this type of evidence is found moderate strong supportive credible.
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Statistical evidence
“It is based on researches about the success and failures of change processes. Besides I have used a lot of
theories about group dynamics during guidance of the group”.
“We have a theoretical basis which called LEAN which is examined and applied thoroughly in the health care in
practice”.
“What we use in the supply chain management is the balance score card. The balance score card is a model that
corresponds with the supply chain. The Quin-model is a model that examines the culture and EFM-model is a
model which can be used to analyze organizations”.
Statistical evidence is a typical kind of evidence which is heading closer to evidence based. The bases of this type of
evidence, is that it is based on scientific theories and models. Consultants use this type of evidence as a ‘mirror’ to
reflect the reality, models that are found credible as a reflector of an organizational problem or organizational context.
Although this type of evidence doesn’t say in specific cases, it is found fairy strong supportive credible.
Analogical evidence
“I have a concept, a variable ‘satisfaction’. I try to determine what the relationship is between satisfaction and
the referring behaviour. I collect data about different variables and try to determine correlations. If there is a
relation, then that will lead to the conclusion for example: if doctors are more satisfied, it leads to more reference
or if doctors are less satisfied it lead to less reference”.
“In America is it proven that 67% of all accident is caused by bad sight. In other words, we have used scientific
knowledge to prove the surplus value of the concept. Together with the University of Erasmus, we will try to
examine the effectiveness of this financial concept. After 2 year we could say that is saves you a lot of money, so
it is proven”.
Analogical evidence is the most credible type of evidence. It uses scientific validated methods and conclusions to
determine certain relationships or prove that a certain concept will be effective in specific cases. Out of the results only
3 consultants uses this kind of arguments. This type of evidence is found strong supportive credible.
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4.4.
The advantage and disadvantage of evidence based consulting
In the final part of the interview, the consultants were asked to give their opinion regarding the advantage and
disadvantage of evidence based consulting. After the fragmentation and coding procedure of all transcriptions, some
categories are found and labeled as advantages and disadvantages of evidence based consulting. The following
categories are labeled as advantages: attitude, research, communication and objectivity. The disadvantages are:
abstraction, authority and attitude, skills and resources, client support and time. Further, similar categories are put back
together and the frequency of these categories was counted. In below table, an overview of the advantage and
disadvantage is presented.
Advantages
Categories
Frequency
Attitude of consultants
5
Shared knowledge base
8
Objectivity of advice
3
Table 8: advantages of evidence based consulting
Attitude of consultant
“I see so many advantages in things that are proven effective in practice. I am so scientifically focused, that I
want many things proved”.
“It makes you aware that intuition is a way to analyze a situation. But it is also makes you aware that there are
many ways to do that”.
“It is well thought-out. If applied, it is conscientious at the least and that is important. It applied broadly, every
related aspects and factors are take into consideration”.
The category attitude implies that consultants first have to be aware of the benefits of evidence based consulting in
their consulting practice. This category is defined as positive attitude of the consultants or the client toward the
recognition of the importance and benefits of research in practice. The consultant should therefore first enlarge his
knowledge and interest of evidence based consulting and change the ways of founding their consulting practice.
Shared knowledge base
“The advantage is that we all work together in order to make all those unique projects comparable”.
“You have to contribute to the knowledge base and that means you have to make that knowledge public”
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“If you apply evidence based practice, that cooperation’s are very important. It is all about working together. If
you do something, then you also shared it with others. This way knowledge can grow”.
One of the advantages of evidence based consulting is that there is a shared knowledge base of best practice. The
category is defined as the accessibility and availability to realistic and relevant research findings. However, it also implies
that this is not an individual, but a collective issue. It is necessary that this knowledge based is shared by many parties.
This means accurate communication and partnerships between practioners, researchers and consultants about research
outcomes and practical solutions.
Objectivity of advice
“It is more objective, so you can say that conclusions are more certain to some extent”.
“I see only advantages. You are more aware of the facts”.
“A good consultant uses a lot more data out of local context and environment”.
Practicing evidence based means also that consultants are more aware of the objectiveness of their consulting practice.
This means that consultants have to use an objective way to derive conclusions out of the organizational problems by
using more facts-based data and information. This category is refers to the way conclusions and advice are derive in an
objective way, based on facts without taking ones preference into consideration.
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Frequency
Disadvantage
Categories
Abstraction level
11
Client’s attitude and support
14
Shared knowledge base
4
Scientific skills
3
Time
6
Table 9: disadvantages of evidence based consulting
Abstraction level
“You try to catch it too much in an abstractive way that you don’t look what is special and unique about a case”.
“It is all about the abstraction level in which you talk with the clients. The abstraction level which I speak with the
client was on the level of “concrete proposals”.
“You can do really nice scientific research. But the gap between scientific research and the practical solutions is
often too large. The distance of the applicability of scientific knowledge in practice is too big”.
One of the disadvantages of evidence based consulting is the abstraction level in which scientific knowledge is used in
practice. Some consultants indicate that it is hard to translate scientific knowledge into practical solutions. This is often
because the organizational problems are about practical problems and solved on the level of ‘concrete’ practical
solutions. The abstraction level is defined as a simplified representation of the organizational problem leaving out the
concrete details.
Client’s attitude and support
“You can have a really good team and the best scientific methods. But if you cannot explain it to the
management, then you don’t speak in the same language. Your advice will never be accepted”.
“Charisma and conviction. There are a few people who can sell total nonsense which is not evidence based, but
still be accepted. That is an important factor. There is a lot in personal approach”.
“I use a very pragmatic approach because the management was a very authoritarian person. Then you will pick
an approach that appeals to him the most”.
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“For one problem there are 17 solutions. Clients are not waiting for this. You are the professional. This is my
problem, so pick the right solution, one or two. Best practice”.
“Clients don’t want to be compared with others, because they are unique”.
“Science has some bad image. What do you mean with science? That is too complicated. I tried to say that the
method is maybe complicated, but the results are clear and you can do a lot with it”.
Consultants need support by different parties in order to adapt evidence based in consulting practice. The client attitude
and support is seen as the biggest disadvantage and the main obstacle of adopting evidence based consulting. The
problem is that some parties lack the attitude of accepting evidence based. Clients either don’t like scientific research or
doesn’t understand scientific research. This will result in lack of support and willingness to adopt evidence based
consulting. The client’s attitude and support refers to the lack of attitude towards research activity, lack of motivation
and the way clients see scientific research.
Shared Knowledge base
“Some others could say: we are a commercial firm and we should not give too much away”.
“The health care is a sector where you can do a lot of scientific research and a place where is a lot of knowledge
sharing. Our sector is basically the same. You have to share solutions en by making this available to other. Then
knowledge can grow”.
“This is only possible when everyone share his knowledge and experiences. That will take a lot of time”.
Knowledge based is determined as advantage but as well as disadvantage. One could say that evince based consulting
could enhance the knowledge based about effective consulting. However, it is not easy to find relevant research.
Practical research outcomes often are held within the consulting firm or by an individual consultant. Consultants are
afraid of giving to much knowledge and information away in order to protect their own effective consulting. Shared
knowledge base in this perspective refers to availability of research finding and best practice.
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Scientific skills
“We who have come from the university know how to do research”.
“It is useful because we are scientific oriented consultants. I have my PhD and my colleague is taking this PhD. It
does help a lot in the foundation of the consulting”.
Another disadvantage of evidence based consulting is that consultants have to less scientific knowledge in general.
Consultants are using to less of scientific methods in their consulting or have to less up to date scientific state of
research. Scientific skills refers to the lack of scientific education or training to conduct research in a scientific way and
little understanding of scientific methods and the leading scientific knowledge on certain topics.
Time
“It is not like I’m reading a book for a certain problems. The time is just too short”.
“The runtime of the project will be longer and in the consulting where you are paid in hours is not attractive in
the eye of the clients. So it is cheaper to do best practice”.
“The disadvantage is that it takes a lot of time. You can apply all kind of knowledge, but it will take a lot of time.
But if you are crazy about it, then it doesn’t matter. But it does take a lot of time before you can apply”.
The results show that time is one of the biggest issues to adopt evidence based consulting. Using scientific methods is
consulting do takes more time than using best practice. Clients often don’t want to pay for the extra hours in which
consultants spend to find relevant scientific theories or models, executions of scientific research methods and writing
scientific reports.
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4.5.
Impression of the interviews
In previous chapter, the qualitative results are presented and interpreted. However,
some impression out of the interviews is developed during the data collection and data analysis.
Although these impressions are subjective obviously, it cannot be left behind because it does
show some line of thought of the view of consultants. Some remarkable issue were note down
and some other categories were derived which do supports the results.
Paperwork and reports
All most none of the consultants indicated to write a report of the consulting process in
the end. Instead, a lot of consultants use presentations and short notes to present the outcomes.
Consultants do use multiple combinations of interventions and solutions, but does not report
why and how they did. This may implies that most of the consultants are practice-oriented,
which means they do like implementation and execution of interventions, but don’t like writing
reports during or in the end of the consulting process.
Networks
Although, the Ooa (Orde van organisatieadviseurs) and Roa (Raad van
organisatieadviesbureaus) are the two official branches association of consultancy firms in the
Netherlands. Only few consultants indicated to are members of these associations. Membership
means that consultants have to follow the code of conducts formulated by the two associations.
One of the criteria of the code of conduct is good fellowship, which means that consultants have
to keep professional contact with fellow consultants. Instead, most of the consultants have
indicated to be in other branch associations within specific specialism where their can keep their
contacts as well as acquiring specific knowledge in that specialism. Further, a lot of consultants
have indicated to have a small network which consists of only a few consultants. Some
consultants describe these networks as study groups in which consultants come together a few
times per year. These networks usually function as social bridges or knowledge bank in which
consultants can expand their contacts and knowledge sharing about experiences.
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Effective consulting
The meaning of effective consulting is ambiguous. During the interview, some questions
were asked about effective consulting and how consultants know this is effective. Some notable
answers were given by consultants like “if the clients agree” or “the clients were satisfied about
the outcome”. This way, consultants presume their methods are effective in that specific case.
By means of evaluations in the end, consultants can estimate how satisfied their clients are and
will probably keep their way of working. Most of the consultants have indicated to evaluate with
their clients in the end.
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5. Conclusions
In the previous chapter the results are presented and discussed. In this chapter the research
question will be answered and the conclusions of this research will be given. The first part of the
question will be answered in chapter 5.1. The middle part of the question in chapter 5.2. The
last part of the question in chapter 5.3. Following the discussion in chapter 5.4. In the final
chapter 5.5. the limitations and recommendations. The main research question of this research
was:
“How do consultants justify their claim about the expected effectiveness of their
intervention, what type(s) evidence are used in that justification and which factors
determine the use of specific type(s) of evidence?”
5.1.
How do consultants justify their claim about the expected effectiveness of their
consulting?
The conclusion will start with answering of the first part of the research question. Out of
the results, it can be concluded that consultants justify their claim about the expected
effectiveness of their consulting from different sources of evidence. These sources of evidence
together can form the basis of effective consulting in which consultants can draw data,
information and knowledge out of these sources to justify their consulting. The empirical results
show that consultants justify their consulting based on mainly on their own professional
experience, the clients experience and preferences, and data and information from the local
context and environment, and lesser from scientific knowledge. Although, the usage of these
sources is determined, the role of these sources and how this is used is much more important in
the justification.
Client’s experiences and preference
Consultants are mainly driven by the consulting question, the desire and demands, and
the culture which is part of the client’s experience and preference. Consultants often look at the
level of consulting question and the nature of the organizational problem e.g. strategic issues;
tactical redesign of processes; operational implementation of systems. The fact that consultants
emphasize that the clients experience and preference is an important source of evidence, is
clearly noticeable in the way consultants involve the participation of employees in the
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consulting process. Most of the consultants use a bottom-up/ process approach in order to
involve the client and it employees and to let them think along about the nature of the problem
and their own perception of the problem. This suggests that the involvement of the clients is
part of the consulting process which is to advance the relationship during the process. The
nature and quality of the relation and process is therefore partly determined for the
effectiveness and quality of the consulting. These aspects are factors that consultants have take
into consideration in order to fit the demands of the client and to create more supports from
the client. Ultimately, it is the client who decides whether the consulting has reached its goal
and determined whether it was effective.
Data and information from local context and environment
Subsequently, consultants will intent to understand the organizational problem by using
most of the available knowledge and information from the local context and environment.
These knowledge and information about the organizational problem comes mainly from local
systematic obtained information from either the clients itself, the employees or other data from
internal documents. Along with the bottom-up/ process approach, most of the consultants use
this way to find the underlying problem(s) experienced by the employees. Using participative
approaches consultants try to collect data from individuals, groups and processes of the actual
organizational situation/problem. This way of collecting data is also a way to create the feeling
of involvement among the employees and to minimalize the resistance of the change process.
This is done by interactive workshops, formal or informal dialogue with clients and consultants,
and other methods like observations or interviews. The justification is partly determined by the
way consultants recognize the main problem and the way clients, employees, processes react on
the change or interventions. By constantly monitoring the beginning, the intervention and the
outcome of the consulting processes, the consultant can verify whether this was effective or not.
This also partly determines how consultants justify their expected effectiveness of their
consulting.
Professional experiences
After, consultants have a good impression about the organization and determine the
scope of the problem; most of the consultants use their own knowledge and experience to
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interpret the situation. This knowledge usually is expressed and embedded in practice and it
often tacit and intuitive. This is usually based on their own fundamental ideas, models or
methods in which they have used often in similar practical situation. Although, every consultant
has their own professional experience and their way of consulting, it can be assumed that most
of the knowledge stern from education or training consultants has done. Consultants usually use
important elements of a theory or model either consciously or unconsciously. Consultants who
have a rich base of practical experiences will probably possess over a variously and deeply tacit
knowledge source. Although some consultants only rely on their own professional experiences,
other consultants are well aware about the necessity to keep up the leading literature and
keeping their knowledge up to date. Whereas some consultants only read scientific literature
and popularizing books as inspiration, others use more scientific articles to utilize important
elements of theories and models and some other thoroughly use scientific theories and model
to develop their own consulting methods and use it in practice. The most important aspect of
the professional experience is how the consultant interprets the main problem and the
communication to the client. The reasoning is most likely done based on what the consultant
has seen before or what the consultant knows in practice.
Scientific knowledge
Still, scientific research is used less among the consultants and the way how this
knowledge is used differs for each consultant. The way in which research can contribute to the
effectiveness of consulting practice is largely ignored by many consultants. Using scientific
research can prevent consultants ‘inventing the wheel again’. Scientific knowledge can for
example determine relations between certain organizational variables and relational variables,
or scientific knowledge can proof that certain interventions or methods are effective. However,
such scientific knowledge may not be always applicable directly. But it does contribute to the
consultants understanding of the problem and which interventions could possibly be the most
effective one. Science and practice are basically two different worlds. Therefore, professional
experience plays an important role in the interpretation of theories and models and the
transition into practice solutions. Thus, scientific knowledge can form an extra foundation of the
consultant’s justification.
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In other words, these sources are necessary to come to a decision. Thus, clients have a
certain organizational problem which is the ‘data’. Consultants presume that certain
interventions or solutions are effective which is the ‘claim’ and the way consultants uses
different source to justify their claim is called the ‘warrant’. Concluding, consultants will have to
justify their effective consulting using different sources to support their consulting practice.
What may require is the interaction of different sources, drawing from scientific insight, taking
the clients experiences into consideration, the available data and information of local context
and environment and the rich professional experiences of the consultants. The challenge is to
ensure that each source of evidence is used accurately, while keeping the organizational
problem in the middle.
5.2.
What type(s) of evidence do consultants use in their justification?
After knowing that consultants justify their effective consulting based on the four
sources of evidence, it still doesn’t say anything about the credibility of their consulting. One
consultant could say that he has a rich base of experience and expertise on a problem, but
justify and based his arguments on intuition or feeling it sounds not credible. As another
consultants justify and based his arguments on fact, figures and scientific knowledge, it is more
credible that intuition and feeling alone. This isn’t only a problem of the consultant, but also the
clients. Clients often trust the consultants experience and expertise in order to solve their
organizational problem. But it doesn’t have to be the case. Clients often rely and trust the
consultants to much that he doesn’t even question it. So, it is time to examine the credibility of
the consultants.
Anecdotal and testimonial evidence
The results show that most of the consultants justify their consulting based on
anecdotal and testimonial evidence. That is based on what they have seen, their understanding
and interpretation of the organizational problem (anecdotal evidence) and what is in their eyes
the best solutions (testimonial evidence). This claim can stern from either intuition or from
previous experience in which consultants have face similar problems and reflect this on the data
what they have seen and understand based on anecdotal evidence out of the local context and
environment.
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Hypothetical evidence
Despite the fact that consultants can face a new problem and in fact doesn’t know how
to deal with it, then conclude that intuition and feeling will play a major role, determined as
hypothetical evidence. Consultants often won’t say it and don’t know if it would work. The client
in this case wouldn’t even notice, which is quite logical. Consultants who justify their consulting
based on hypothetical, anecdotal and testimonial evidence vary from very weak to moderate
supportive credibility. Although, it doesn’t mean that their consulting is not effective, only the
likelihood of effective consulting is less certain in theory.
Statistical evidence
Next to it, there are consultants who use statistical and analogical evidence which is
pointing more directed the principles of evidence based consulting. These consultants are
making the combination between science and practice. These types of evidence are more
credible because theories and model are derived from systematic review of the reality and
practice. However, the results show that the extent in which consultants uses these types of
evidence is different. Some consultants only use scientific theories and model to draw
inspiration and some take important elements of these theories to use in practice. In other
words, if consultants only read popularizing books or scientific article and he don’t use it, than
he is no wiser than before. Consultants who justify their consulting with statistical evidence will
based their consulting on important elements and underlying principles of theories and models.
Analogical evidence
The most reliable and credible evidence is analogical evidence. This evidence is derived
from knowledge, theories and models that have been examine and test by means of valid
scientific methods. One disadvantage of this type of evidence is that it has to be translated and
adapted into other context and situation. The question rise to what extent theories or models
are also applicable and useful in other situation. Therefore, consultants still have to understand
the underlying mechanisms of certain theories and model, and use their own interpretation of
the applicability of certain theories or models to make it work in practice. Consultants who
justify their consulting based on statistical and analogical evidence vary from fairly strong to
strong credibility.
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Concluding, the combination of the types of evidence only makes the consulting
stronger and credible. The most credible consulting is when consultants use a combination of
types of evidence to proof the effectiveness of their consulting. Effective consulting means that
intuition is necessary to take risks and follow you own heart, but use the fact and figures out of
the local context and environment as bases of the decision. Consultants should trust their own
professional experience and expertise to interpret the data and information, and their own
understanding about the organizational problem. But take underlying mechanisms of relevant
theories and models into consideration. Strive for the highest and most credible quality of
consulting by means of reliable, credible and valid scientific knowledge and methods that are
proven effective to support and as founding of the consulting process. In addition, hypothetical,
anecdotal and testimonial evidence are sees as non-scientific evidence. Statistical and analogical
evidence clearly move toward the principles of evidence based consulting.
5.3.
What factors determine the use of certain type(s) of evidence?
The use of certain types of evidence can be determined by many factors. Out of the
result in which the advantage and disadvantage of evidence based consulting are mentioned by
the consultants can be related to these factors to some extent. To answer this question, the
factors will be discussed on how these factors can determine the use of certain types of
evidence. Out of the results the following factors are derived: attitude of the consultant, shared
knowledge base, abstraction level, clients support, scientific skills and time.
Attitude of consultant
According to the results, there are certain attitude which can determine the use of
certain types of evidence and especially statistical and analogical evidence. The fact that
scientific research can enhance the effectiveness of consulting is recognized by many
consultants, but also ignored. The results show that most of the consultants indicate this factors
as advantage as well as disadvantage of evidence based consulting. So the attitude of curiosity,
sympathy attitude towards research, interesting attitude, attitude of wisdom e.g. knowledge
that they don’t know all, could facilitate the use of scientific evidence. Thus, consultants will
likely use more scientific knowledge to proof their effective consulting and the mechanism
behind the effective interventions, and also the way consultants use more objective ways to
examine the organizational problem, if they are aware of the contribution of scientific
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knowledge. In turn, without these attitudes, consultants ignore the benefits of research and act
on the best of their knowledge while questioning what they know, thus will continuing using
their traditional way of consulting, meaning hypothetical, anecdotal and testimonial evidences.
Shared knowledge based
One of the factors that are mentioned by consultants as advantage, is that evidence
based consulting could enhance a shared knowledge base. The concept of evidence based
consulting presume that consultants will use best practice, methods and intervention that are
scientifically and empirically examined, tested and proven effective in practice. Through a
accurate shared knowledge base consultants and researchers can examine which or what
interventions and methods are effective in certain situation in scientific way. Through this way,
consultants are able to use more statistical and analogical evidence of best practice that are
proven effective. However, this is only possible in the most optimal situation of evidence based
consulting. The shared knowledge base in the consulting sector is still inaccurate and limited.
Unlike the health care sector, where there is an accurate shared knowledge base, a rich
knowledge flow of best practice, medical protocols and treatments methods is available
throughout the whole medical professions. This means that the consultancy sectors still lacks on
this issue. This kind of knowledge has to be explicit and objectified as much as possible by
means of for example evaluation studies of interventions or consulting processes. The
impression of the interviews clearly indicates that consultants do evaluate their consulting
process with their clients in the end. But don’t share this knowledge throughout the whole
consulting profession, only to their own colleagues or own network at the very most. Thus, the
availability of empirical results of findings or best practice is not for granted. Until then
consultants must use what is available at the moment of scientific article, popularizing articles of
theories and models, try to use as much as possible of the available resources of proven
theories, concepts or models. Once there is a shared knowledge base of best consulting practice,
effective interventions and methods available, this will lead to a more evidence based
consulting in practice, thus to more credible evidence of effective consulting. However, with a
limited amount of shared knowledge, the use of more credible evidence is also limited. This
factor is strongly related to the consultant’s attitude toward the use of scientific evidence,
because proven effective consulting is still hard to find at this moment.
54
Abstraction level
The important factor that stops consultants using more scientific evidence is the
abstraction level of consulting questions. This issue is mentioned 11 times in the interview and is
seen as the biggest obstacle of practicing evidence based consulting. Many consultants see
scientific knowledge as an abstractive form of knowledge and claim that it doesn’t fit in concrete
consulting practice. To some extent it is true, the distance between science and practice is a well
known issue. Based on this assumption, consultants rather don’t use scientific research in their
consulting practice. However, some consultants argue that it is not the abstraction level of
consulting questions, but the problem of interpreting scientific research and the transition of
science into practical solutions. Also due to the fact that most of the consultants don’t have
much scientific skills to do so which is also determined as a factor. In consulting questions
whereas clients demand concrete proposals, keeps consultants using more hypothetical,
anecdotal or testimonial evidence. This issue is in turn is related to the shared knowledge base.
If there is more shared knowledge about concrete best practice situations where practical
solutions is proven effective, it will likely remove the gap between science and practical, thus
lead to more statistical and analogical evidence.
Attitude of clients
The next factor is also an important factor that determines the use of certain types of
evidence. The fact that clients rather want simple and clear solutions is mentioned 8 times
during the interviews. This indicated that the attitude of clients towards scientific research is
also a big obstacle for consultants to practice evidence based consulting. Out of the results it
comes clear that clients lack the understanding of scientific research and its contribution to
more credible evidence which support the consulting. Most of the consultants are very aware of
this issue and rather choose for a simple and practical approach of practicing their consulting.
Thus, this issue keeps the consultants on using hypothetical, anecdotal and testimonial evidence
to justify their consulting toward the clients. This issue can simply be solved by clear
communication with the clients and clarify the needs and benefits of scientific knowledge. This
issue is raised by a few consultants who indicate that personal approach of the consultant could
determine the acceptance of research evidence, and it all about talking in the same ‘language’.
Thus, the presentation of scientific outcomes and the interpretation results into practical
55
solutions would enlarge the acceptance of client and ultimately enhance the use of more
statistical and analogical evidence.
Scientific skills
Although this factor is only mentioned 3 times, it can be assumed that this is the most
important factor that could determine the adoption of evidence based consulting. According to
some consultants, practicing evidence based consulting is determined by the way consultants
can deal with scientific knowledge. That is the lack of scientific skills, the knowledge in using
scientific methods and the skills of searching appropriate and relevant scientific literature. This
issues it most obvious due to the fact that only the consultants that have a research background
with a PhD are using more statistical and analogical evidence to justify their effective consulting.
These consultants are able to use scientific methods to examine the organizational problem, the
skills of finding relevant literature and interpretation of scientific outcomes into practical
situations. The ability and skills of doing research on the university is already embedded in their
way of working, thus it is much easier for those consultants to combine research with the
consulting practice. These consultants are more likely to use more statistical and analogical
evidence to justify their consulting.
Time
The final factor that could determine the use of certain types of evidence is the amount
of time this is available for consultants to collect their data, knowledge and information. The
biggest issue of using scientific knowledge or methods is that it is very time consuming. In the
consultancy sector where consultants are paid in hours it is hard to spend more time in
systematic review of data and information and the search of relevant literature. Consultants
rather spend more time on practical issues that finding evidence to proof their effective
consulting. Consultants in sum want to sell as much as time and the clients want more
performance in less time. This could be a barrier of using more statistical and analogical
evidence in their consulting. However, some consultant indicates that is related to the scientific
skills of a consultant. In the beginning it is hard to use more scientific methods scientific
knowledge, but if these skills are mastered it will become much easier and take less time to do
so.
56
5.4.
Discussions
Concluding, these factors may determine the use of certain types of evidence. These
factors can have either positive as negative influence on the use of certain types of evidence. In
optimal situation as describe in each of the factors, these aspects can facilitate the adoption of
evidence based consulting, thus also the use of more statistical and analogical evidence. Right at
this moment, the shared knowledge base of effective interventions, best practice and other
proven concepts is limited. The available scientific knowledge is in most cases to raw in order to
apply directly in practical situations. Also the large collection and extensive scientific literature
consist of too much information to consume and too hard for consultants to find relevant
theories and models to apply. The acceptance of scientific research by clients and the limited of
time in the consulting practice make it even harder for consultants to use scientific knowledge.
The only way to bridge these aspects is to improve the individual attitude of consultants,
thus a more positive attitude towards scientific knowledge and evidence. In other words,
consultants have to criticize their own consulting process and the credibility of it. By using as
much as possible of the objective facts and figures and, the available and logical evidence to
support decisions, interventions, methods and consulting process. Enlarge their scientific skills in
order to build on more scientific oriented methods in their consulting practice. Adopting
evidence based consulting means to use more scientific oriented knowledge, empirical findings
of best practice and to work more in a scientific way. This doesn’t mean that consultants are
now the same as researchers, but on the contrary consultants have to use empirical or scientific
knowledge that is related to an organizational problem situation, use their own professional
experience to interpret and judge the organizational context and client experiences and
preferences, and more important is to evaluate empirical finding of interventions, methods or
best practice and share it throughout the consulting professions. This way the combination of
science and practical application will lead to a new formation of service innovation in the
consultancy known as evidence based consulting.
In contract, this research uses many examples of the health care sectors in which many
scholars see similarities. The main difference is that the health care sector is already seen as a
profession and the management consultancy sectors still have to become one. The health care
sector is mainly influence by governmental organizations with policies and responsibilities.
57
Whereas the consultancy sectors don’t have to deal with governmental pressures, many
consulting firms don’t see the emergence to change their way of working. It profit is made and if
clients don’t ask for empirical evidence, then there is no need to change their way of working.
“Are we on our way to evidence based consulting?”, the answer is, it depends. Due to
the mentioned factors, there is still a long way to evidence based consulting. However, there is a
little development in the consulting sector which tents to the concepts of evidence based
consulting, is that there are more and more researchers, scholars and professors who make the
switch to the consulting. Although, most of the consultants don’t use statistical and analogical
evidence to proof their consulting, it doesn’t imply that the current way of working is not
effective. The effective consulting may not be explicitly examined, but it can be assumed that
the current way of working is establish through endless discussions by experts or even
professors in consultancy firms. On the other hand, it is noticeable that evidence based is much
more developed in the United States of America, where universities and consultancy firms are
embedded in large multinationals. “Is evidence based then in anyways feasible in the
consultancy sector?” Yes, it is. There is still a large market undiscovered where social science
and consultancy are contribute to the understanding and development of organizations.
58
5.5.
Limitations and future research
After finishing this research, there are some limitations encountered that may influence
the results and the conclusions of this research. The following limitations will be discussed. The
first limitation is that this research measures the effectiveness of interventions in first instance.
This was measured by means of indicating the problem situation / problem focus and the used
interventions. After the data collection and analysis it has turn out that consultants indicated
multiple problem situations and used multiple interventions. Due to this is not possible to draw
conclusions what the effectiveness is of specific interventions and how this is used, because
there is no clear cause or consequence to point out. Future research should focus on one
specific problem situation per case and indicate the interventions that are used to solve this
particular problem situation. With this it is possible to draw relations between the mechanism
of specific interventions that solve a particular problem situation and therefore also the
effectiveness of an intervention.
The second limitation is that this research should make a better classification of
specialism. In this research, consultants have indicated multiple specialisms. Due to this it is not
possible to determine the relation between the specialism of a consultants and the problem
situation. Future research should make a better classification of specialisms and let the
consultants indicate only one specialism that characterize his expertise. This way it is possible to
determine the specialism of a consultants and the relationship between the expertise of an
consultants and the problem situation.
The third limitation of this research is that the empirical results are only based on 16
interviews. This limited amount interview is not sufficient to generalize conclusions. However, it
does determine some factors which are important in these specific case studies. This research is
therefore characterized as an explorative research. So, future research should elaborate on this
research and test the factors by means on quantitative data collection in order to draw
generalizable conclusions.
The previous described limitations are caused due to the construction of the
measurements and semi-structured topic list and the interview itself. The researcher should ask
better and more specific questions about certain topics. Also the extent in which the researcher
should have interrogated at certain answers did not happen. So, one major limitation lies with
59
the research himself. The reasons are the limited interview and research experience of the
researcher which had a major impact on the quality of this research.
Although there are some limitations in this research, there are also some positive
aspects in this research. That is namely the transferability of this research. The procedure of this
research is described well, so other researchers should able to conduct this research again and
better. Due to this, the limitations and the missteps of the researcher are also clear, but luckily,
these mistakes can be used as wise lessons.
This research attempting to measure the effectiveness of interventions in the first place
and became the effectiveness of consulting at a higher level. The justification is measured well
to my opinion. By means of indicating the sources which consultants use to draw their
knowledge, experience, data or information, this determines the justification of consultant’s
effective consulting e.g. experience-oriented, client-oriented, theory-oriented or data-oriented.
Besides, the use of certain types of evidence in this justification is determined well. The types of
evidence is measured by means of analyzing the answers and arguments of the consultants why
their use certain methods and how they know it will work. A classification of the types of
evidence is with this determined well, because the nature of each type of evidence is defined
and the hierarchy of the types of evidence is determined, from the lowest credible type of
evidence to the golden standard of evidence. With this, makes it possible to use it as the level of
evidence, from the lowest credible evidence to the most reliable evidence.
In the final part of this research, some factors have been explored that could possibly
determine the use of certain types of evidence. However, there are possible other factors that
may determine the types of evidence. One other limitation is that this research did not
determine what the possible relationships are of these factors e.g. direct, indirect, moderating
or mediating effect of the use of evidence.
All in all, this research has examined what it has supposed to examine, that is how
consultants justify their claim of expected effectiveness of consulting, what types of evidence
consultants use and what factors determine the use of certain types of evidence. Future
research therefore could build on this research by means of a quantitative research. A possible
research could be the relationship between the factors and the level of evidence in order to
60
determine specific correlations between factors and the effect on the level of evidence. Hereby
it is possible to draw conclusions about the quality and the credibility of maybe the consulting
process or specific interventions by management consultants.
61
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Appendix
A. Semi-structured topic list
Dit onderzoek wordt uitgevoerd in het kader van een afstudeeronderzoek voor de studie
Organisatiewetenschappen aan de Universiteit van Tilburg.
In dit onderzoek staat de volgende vraag centraal:
“Hoe rechtvaardigen consultants hun interventie keuze en welke bewijsvoering gebruiken
consultants om de effectiviteit aan te tonen?”
Het doel van dit onderzoek is om te achterhalen hoe consultants hun keuze voor een bepaalde
interventie rechtvaardigen en welke bewijsvoering zij daarbij gebruiken om de effectiviteit aan
te tonen. Evidence Based Consulting is gericht op structurele verbetering van de dienstverlening
door gefundeerde adviezen. EBC in deze betekenis kan daarom een impuls zijn voor innovatie
en vernieuwing binnen bepaalde vormen van zakelijke dienstverlening door de combinatie van
wetenschap en toepassing.
Instructies
De interview bestaat uit 8 hoofdvragen en bijbehorende subvragen en duurt maximaal 1 uur.
Het is de bedoeling dat u een adviesopdracht in gedachte neemt die u recentelijk heeft
uitgevoerd. Het gaat hierbij om uw persoonlijke mening. Verkeerde of foute antwoorden zijn
dan ook niet mogelijk: het gaat om wat u ervan vindt. Neemt u rustig de tijd die u nodig vindt
om de vragen te beantwoorden. Voelt u zich vooral vrij om uit te weiden. Als er onderwerpen
zijn die voor u belangrijk zijn, maar die voor uw gevoel niet of onvoldoende aan bod zijn
gekomen, dan bent u van harte welkom om dat te vertellen. Het interview wordt verder strict
vertrouwelijk gehouden. Voor de verwerking van de resultaten wordt de interview opgenomen.
Indien u hierbij bezwaar tegen heeft kunt dit vooraf aangeven.
Voor meer informatie kunt u contact opnemen met:
K. Pang
Tel: 06-41047027
Email: [email protected]
67
1. Kunt u iets vertellen over uw werk als adviseur?
a.
b.
c.
d.
Hoeveel jaar ervaring?
Hoogst genoten opleiding?
Aangesloten bij branche vereniging (Ooa en Roa)?
Zelfstandig adviseur?
2. Wat is uw specialisatie?
Strategy
Operations
Supply chain
Finance
Outsourcing
HRM
Anders:
3. Kunt u iets vertellen over een adviesopdracht die u recentelijk heeft afgerond?
a. Aanleiding van opdracht
b. Welk doel vindt u passend in deze case en waarom?
A. gericht op diagnostiek en probleemoplossing
B. gericht op strategische vraagstukken
C. gericht op het al dan niet tijdelijk aanpassen van de
structuur in een organisatie of in
samenwerkingsverbanden
D. gericht op het verbeteren van de bedrijfsprestaties
(business performance)
E. gericht op de motivatie van werknemers
F. gericht op beheersing en controle
G. gericht op training en ontwikkeling
H. gericht op processen tussen mensen
I. gericht op duurzaam leren en veranderen
4. Hoe heeft u deze case benaderd en waarom?
Expertmatig Niet participatief, alleen of met collega
Procesmatig Volledig participatief, met grote groep
68
5. Welk aanpak, methode, interventie heeft u daarbij gebruikt en waarom?
A
B
SWOT-analyse
Benchmarking
Balanced Score Card
Causal loop diagram
C
Strategisch veranderplan
Search conference
Strategische cultuur verandering
D
Projectorganisatie
Tijdelijke groepen
Pilot project
Nieuwe organisatie eenheden
Structuuraanpassingen
Outsourcing
E
Herontwerp van bedrijfsprocessen
Integrale kwaliteitszorg
Het conference model
F
Beloningssysteem
Selectie
Carrièreontwikkeling
Taakverbreding
Taakverrijking
G
Controleren
Rapporteren
Tijdschrijven
H
Training
Workshops
Feedback
Coaching of counseling
Spelsituaties
Survey feedback
Proces Consultatie/ Teambuilding
Zoekconferentie
Derde partij
Procesmanagement
Actie leren
Actie onderzoek
Begrijpend onderzoek
Dialoog
Verhalen vertellen
I
6. Hoe weet u dat de door u gekozen aanpak, methode, interventie effectief zal zijn?
a. Welke aspecten of factoren bepalen de interventie keuze?
b. Hoe verantwoordt u uw keuze bij uw opdrachtgever?
c. Welke informatie heeft u opgezocht?
d. Wat is de rol van de opdrachtgever in de interventie keuze?
69
7. Welk onderstaande bewijsvoering heeft u gebruikt om de effectiviteit van uw keuze aan
te tonen en waarom?
a. Welke aspecten of factoren bepalen het gebruik van deze type bewijzen volgens
u en waarom?
Wetenschappelijke kennis
Professionele deskundigheid
Contexuele kennis en ervaring
Plaatselijke data en informatie
waarnemingen die een hypothese of theorie
bevestigd of ontkrachten, en wetenschappelijke
theorievorming die leidt tot werkbare modellen van
de waargenomen werkelijkheid
kennis, ervaringen, persoonlijke eigenschappen en
werkcapaciteiten van de adviseur of anderen in hun
specifieke expertise of specialisatie.
persoonlijke kennis en ervaringen van anderen in
een specifiek casus of probleemcontext.
interne en externe informatie dat systematische is
verkregen uit plaatselijk data en informatie.
Evidence Based Consulting:
“Het verantwoorden van interventies en beslissingen met empirische en wetenschappelijk
onderbouwde kennis, respectievelijk te kiezen voor die interventies die zich op herhaalbare en
overtuigende wijze bewezen hebben in de praktijk”.
8. In hoeverre past u ‘Evidence Based Consulting’ toe in uw dagelijkse werkzaamheden?
a. In hoeverre worden de resultaten gegeneraliseerd?
b. In hoeverre worden de resultaten gesystematiseerd?
c. Wat doet u met de opgebouwde ervaring of empirische materiaal om het toch
wetenschappelijke kennis te maken?
d. Wat zijn volgens u de voor- en nadelen van Evidence Based Consulting?
Zijn er nog zaken die niet aan de orde zijn geweest in dit interview, maar die wel van belang zijn
om te weten in het kader van mijn onderzoek? Zo ja, welke?
70
B. Interventielijst
Categorie interventies
Voorbeeld Interventies
1. Interventies gericht op
verkenning en
bewustwording
SWOT-analyse: het in kaart (laten) brengen van sterkten, zwakten, kansen
en bedreigingen om de eigen prestaties, die van de concurrenten en de
ontwikkelingen in de omgeving te kennen en op basis hiervan de
(organisatie)strategie te bepalen.
Het onderkennen van de
aard en oorzaak van een
probleem en mensen
bewustworden van de
noodzaak tot verandering
Benchmarking: het (laten) vergelijken van de eigen prestaties met die van
de beste concurrenten om te onderkennen op welke onderdelen de
organisatie beter kan presteren.
Balanced Score Card: het in kaart (laten) brengen/meten van prestatieindicatoren op het gebied van financiën, bedrijfsprocessen, innovatie en
klanten om te onderkennen op welke onderdelen de organisatie naar
verwachting presteert en op welke onderdelen verbetering is aan te
brengen.
Causal loop diagrams (causale kaarten): het in kaart (laten) brengen van
oorzaak – gevolg relaties waardoor terugkerende patronen zichtbaar
worden. De kaarten geven aanwijzingen over welke factoren relatief
gemakkelijk zijn te beïnvloeden en welke moeilijk.
Andere voorbeelden: het 5-krachtenmodel van Porter; Pesti-omgevingsanalyse
2. Interventies gericht op
strategische vraagstukken
en het vormen van
toekomstbeelden
Het bevorderen dat
toekomstbeelden over de
organisatie gevormd (en
gedeeld) worden
Strategisch veranderplan: het opstellen van een plan met doelen en
middelen om vanuit de huidige situatie de beoogde langere termijn
positionering van de organisatie in de omgeving te realiseren.
Search Conference: het gebruik maken van een conferentiemethode (large
scale intervention) om een wel omschreven, wenselijke en bereikbare
toekomst te creëren en een plan te maken om daar te komen.
Strategische cultuur verandering: het ontwikkelen van een sterke
gemeenschappelijke cultuur die fundamenteel afwijkt van de huidige
cultuur en van belang is voor het voortbestaan van de organisatie.
71
Categorie interventies
Voorbeeld Interventies
3. Interventies gericht op
het al dan niet tijdelijk
aanpassen van de
structuur in een
organisatie of in
samenwerkings-verbanden
Projectorganisatie: het benoemen van een persoon of eenheid die een
tijdelijke, afgebakende opdracht uitvoert, binnen de bestaande
organisatiestructuur en met eigen additionele middelen.
Het treffen van passende
voorzieningen en
omstandigheden om de
veranderingen mogelijk te
maken.
Tijdelijke groepen: het benoemen van taskforces (of andere benaming) die
in het veranderproces een helder gedefinieerd doel hebben, bijvoorbeeld
nieuwe ideeën ontwikkelen, prioriteiten stellen of het veranderproces
plannen en coördineren.
Pilot project: het op beperkte schaal laten uitproberen of de beoogde
verandering haalbaar is, alvorens deze breder wordt uitgezet
Nieuwe organisatie eenheden: het opzetten van een of meerdere nieuwe
organisatieonderdelen om bijvoorbeeld een nieuwe dienst aan te bieden,
veelal als oplossing om inertia in de staande organisatie te omzeilen.
Structuuraanpassingen: het verduidelijken en (mogelijk) aanpassen van de
verdeling van taken, bevoegdheden, verantwoordelijkheden en
coördinatiemechanismen.
Outsourcing: het buiten de organisatie onderbrengen van activiteiten die
voorheen door de organisatie zelf zijn uitgevoerd.
Andere voorbeelden: fusie en overname, joint ventures
4. Interventies gericht op
het verbeteren van de
bedrijfsprestaties via
bedrijfsprocessen (business
performance)
Het treffen van
maatregelen op het gebied
van de bedrijfsprocessen
om het resultaat te
verbeteren
Herontwerp van bedrijfsprocessen (BPR): het fundamenteel aanpassen
van de werkprocessen veelal met behulp van informatietechnologie.
Of: het in kaart brengen van werkprocessen en mogelijk het aanpassen
daarvan
Integrale kwaliteitszorg: een permanent proces waarin wordt gestreefd de
tevredenheid van de klant te vergroten door systematisch te werken aan
verbetering van producten of diensten
Het Conference model: het gebruik maken van een conferentiemethode
(large scale intervention) om processen te herontwerpen en klantleverancierrelaties te verbeteren waarbij wordt aangesloten op de strategie
van de organisatie.
72
Categorie interventies
Voorbeeld Interventies
5. Interventies gericht op
de motivatie van
werknemers met behulp
van HRM-instrumentarium
Beloningssysteem: het ontwerpen van een systeem dat zowel de prestaties
van de medewerkers en de werknemerstevredenheid bevordert als
ongewenst gedrag vermindert, zoals regels rond prestatiebeloning en
promotie.
Het bevorderen van
motivatie van betrokkenen
om de flexibiliteit van de
organisatie en de
organisatieprestaties te
vergroten
Selectie: het bevorderen dat de juiste man/vrouw op de juiste plaats komt.
Carrièreontwikkeling: het ondersteunen van mensen bij hun loopbaan in
de organisatie en bij het stellen van carrièredoelen.
Taakverbreding: het uitbreiden van een takenpakket met werkzaamheden
op hetzelfde niveau.
Taakverrijking: het toevoegen van ‘hogere’ taken aan een takenpakket,
inclusief de daarmee samenhangende verantwoordelijkheden en
bevoegdheden.
6. Interventies gericht op
beheersing en controle
Het inzichtelijk (laten)
maken van de voortgang of
de kwantiteit en de
kwaliteit van de
werkzaamheden
7. Interventies gericht op
training en ontwikkeling
Het aanleren en eigen
maken van concepten en
vaardigheden of het
vergroten van inzicht.
Controleren: het nagaan of taken naar behoren zijn uitgevoerd.
Rapporteren: het met een bepaalde frequentie laten opstellen van
rapportages over behaalde resultaten en/of voortgang van activiteiten.
Tijdschrijven: het met een bepaalde frequentie laten rapporteren hoeveel
tijd besteed is aan activiteiten.
Training: het aanleren van vaardigheden door managers, medewerkers of
staf.
Workshops: het gevoelig maken van mensen voor de noodzaak van
verandering, voor trends, voor verschillende opties voor hun organisatie of
henzelf of voor bepaalde methoden en concepten.
Feedback: het bevorderen dat het individu, de groep of de organisatie
inziet wat voor effect het eigen gedrag of de prestatie heeft op anderen.
Coaching of counseling: het geven van individuele feedback om de
effectiviteit van het individu te vergroten en het bevorderen van het
zelfvertrouwen en de kennis en vaardigheden om een verandering te
73
Categorie interventies
Voorbeeld Interventies
realiseren.
Spelsituaties: het via spelsituaties laten ervaren van de
(systeem)consequenties van het eigen gedrag
Survey feedback: het in een actief proces informatie en kennis (laten)
vergaren over problemen en oplossingen om vervolgens gerichte
activiteiten te formuleren en uit te voeren
Andere voorbeelden: 360 graden feedback
8. Interventies gericht op
processen tussen mensen
(sociale processen)
Proces Consultatie / Teambuilding: een groep in staat stellen om het eigen
functioneren als groep te analyseren en passende oplossingen te
formuleren voor disfunctionele groepsprocessen.
Het verbeteren van sociale
processen in organisaties
Zoekconferentie: het houden van een organisatiebrede bijeenkomst met
als doel belangrijke organisatiewaarden te verduidelijken en om een
(nieuwe) manier te ontwikkelen om problemen te benaderen
bv. de interpersoonlijke
relaties, het functioneren
van een team, de relatie
tussen teams of
organisaties.
Derde partij: als neutrale derde partij de interactie tussen partijen
begeleiden en probleemoplossing bevorderen om tot een door partijen
onderschreven resultaat te komen.
Procesmanagement: het faciliteren van besluitvormingsprocessen in
complexe situaties, waarin op voorhand geen oplossing voorhanden is en
de belangen van partijen uiteen lopen. Sturen op:
openheid/toegankelijkheid van stakeholders; het in acht nemen van de
kernwaarden van de stakeholders; de continuïteit en het tempo van het
proces; de inhoudelijke kwaliteit van de oplossing.
Andere voorbeelden: T-group; Organization confrontation meeting;
Intergroup relations; Agenda Setting.
9. Interventies gericht op
duurzaam leren en
veranderen door interactie
gaande te houden
Actie leren: het creëren van een context waarin ‘leren’ het met anderen
oplossen van echte problemen is en waarbij de uitwisseling van ervaringen
en reflectie essentiële onderdelen zijn.
Actie onderzoek: het creëren van een samenwerkingsverband tussen
onderzoeker en actoren (medewerkers) waarbij onderzoeken en leren
samen opgaan.
74
Categorie interventies
Voorbeeld Interventies
Het gaande houden van het
proces van interactie en
communicatie
Begrijpend onderzoek: het bevorderen te veranderen in sociaal
geconstrueerde realiteiten door: interactieve observatie en doorgronden
‘wat is’, daarna formuleren ‘wat zou kunnen’ en ‘wat zou moeten’ om
vervolgens te gaan starten met experimenteren met ‘wat kan’.
Dialoog: het bevorderen dat op basis van dialoog en interactie
verschillende ideeën over de werkelijkheid worden gedeeld en dat van
hieruit nieuwe realiteiten worden geconstrueerd.
Verhalen vertellen: het bevorderen dat via open interviews verhalen
worden vastgelegd en dat in deze verhalen naar tegenstellingen wordt
gezocht en ‘tussen de regels door wordt gelezen’ en dat vervolgens
samenvoeging tot nieuwe verhalen plaatsvindt.
75
C. Results tables
Cases
Gender
Education
1
F
3
M
4
F
5
M
X
X
X
6
M
7
M
8
F
9
M
10
M
11
M
X
X
12
F
13
F
14
M
15
F
16
M
X
X
X
X
20
22
X
X
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
15
16
MBO
HBO
The characteristics of the consulting cases
2
M
X
WO
X
PhD
X
X
X
Other:
X
X
MBA
Experience in Years
Specialism
Strategy
20
X
10
MBA
12
10
Operations
X
X
Supply Chain
X
X
Finance
13
5
7
X
1
30
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Outsourcing
6
8
X
20
8
X
28
X
X
X
HRM
X
Other:
Independent consultant
Certified consultant
Member of branch association
Yes
Yes
Yes
X
X
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
X
X
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
X
X
X
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
X
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
yes
No
No
No
Table 3: the characteristics of the consultants
Cases
1
2
Private organization
Type of client
organization
Governmental
organization
Health care organization
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
11
12
X
13
14
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Non-profit organization
The characteristics of the consultants
10
X
Agricultural organization
X
Distribution organization
X
Industrial organization
X
X
Construction organization
X
Consulting organization
Type of
organizational
problem
a. Focus on diagnose and
problem solving
b. Focus on strategic issue
c. Focus on short term
adaptation of
organizational structure
or cooperation’s
d. Focus on improving the
business performance
e. Focus on the motivation
of employees
f. Focus on internal
control
g. Focus on training and
development
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
76
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Approach of
consultant
h. Focus on processes
between people
i. Focus on sustainable
learning and change
Expert approach
Process approach
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Mix approach
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Table 4: the characteristics of the consulting cases
Cases
j. Focus on diagnose and
problem solving
1
2
3
4
5
SWOT analysis
X
X
Benchmarking
X
X
X
Balanced Score Card
6
7
X
8
9
10
11
X
Causal Loop diagram
k. Focus on strategic issue
Strategic Change Plan
Strategic culture change
X
X
X
Project organization
Temporary groups
Pilot project
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Used interventions by consultant
X
Outsourcing
Redesign of processes
X
X
Integral quality
management
Earnings systems
Selection
X
X
Carrier development
Task widening
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Task enrichment
o. Focus on internal
control
Control
Report
Logbooks
p. Focus on training and
development
Training
Workshops
Feedback
Coaching
X
X
X
X
X
Teambuilding
Search conference
X
X
r. Focus on sustainable
learning and change
X
X
X
X
16
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Third party
Process management
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Gaming
q. Focus on processes
between people
15
X
X
Structure change
n. Focus on the motivation
of employees
14
X
X
New organization units
m.
Focus on
improving the business
performance
13
X
X
Search conference
l. Focus on short term
adaptation of
organizational structure
or cooperation’s
12
X
X
X
X
Action learning
Explorative research
X
X
Dialogue
*the indicated organizational problems are marked grey.
Table 5: used interventions by the management consultants
77
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Source of Evidence
Cases
Scientific knowledge
1
X
2
3
4
5
X
6
X
7
8
X
9
10
11
X
12
X
13
X
14
X
15
X
16
X
Professional Experience
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Patients, Clients and careers
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Local context and environment
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
6
7
8
11
12
13
14
15
16
Table 6: used source of evidence by the management consultants
Types of Evidence
Cases
Hypothetical Evidence
1
Anecdotal Evidence
X
Testimonial / Expert Evidence
X
Statistical Evidence
X
2
3
4
5
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Analogical Evidence
X
9
10
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Table 7: used types of evidence
Advantages
Categories
Frequency
Attitude of consultants
5
Shared knowledge base
8
Objectivity of advice
3
Table 8: advantages of evidence based consulting
Frequency
Disadvantage
Categories
Abstraction level
11
Client’s attitude and support
14
Shared knowledge base
4
Scientific skills
3
Time
6
Table 9: disadvantages of evidence based consulting
78
D. Quotes tables
Scientific knowledge

(9X)






Source of evidence


Professional experience

(14X)













Ik leun wel heel erg op wetenschappelijke inzichten over wat slim veranderen is of wat stom
veranderen is.
Wetenschappelijk, maardus minimaal. Maar dat is meer... voor de inspiratie.
(Evidence based evaluation) Ik heb die evaluatie methode is gebaseerd op wetenschappelijke
onderzoeksliteratuur. Ook gezien mijn achtergrond en dat ik van de universiteit afkomt weet ik
welke literatuur ik daarvoor moet gebruiken. onze onderzoeksmethodiek is gebaseerd op
wetenschappelijke onderzoeken.
De basis is wetenschappelijke kennis.
Wetenschappelijke kennis. Wat je dus gebruikt is gewoon om bijvoorbeeld voor supply chain
management het scoremodel. Scoremodel is een model dat
bekijkt wat er bij supply chain management hoort. Quinn-model is een model dat naar de
cultuur van het bedrijf kijkt. Efm is een model die je kan gebruiken om te kijken naar
organisatie.
eigenlijk niet echt, maar heb voor me zelf wel de krachten model van porter gebruikt, Omdat ik
dat wel aardig vond. Waardoor onderscheidt dit bureau zich nou? Wat ik straks nog wilt
gebruiken is dat competing values van Quinn. Omdat het een handig model is om iets van een
cultuur in kaart te brengen.
Ik denk dat wetenschappelijk kennis dat het altijd een onderliggende is.
we hebben wetenschappelijk kennis gebruikt om dan op de meer waarde en de noodzaak van
de oogbus aan te kunnen tonen. De financiele effectiviteit van de oogbus gaan wij en Erasmus
gaat dat ook onderzoeken. Want na 2 jaar moet je zeggen kijk dit scheelt jullie.
Wetenschappelijk kennis op basis van een haalbaarheid is aan getoond. We zitten op de goed
weg en het is aangetoond.
Het groot stuk van het adviseren is in deze opdracht zat in het vertellen wat in mijn ogen het
beste aanpak was voor dit proces.
Professionele deskundigheid is de expertise van de consultant. Dat de consultant begrijp dat
wanneer een key-user zijn verhaal doet, dat hij die vertaalslag kan maken naar SAP.
Heel veel eerdere ervaring.
Uit ervaring. Wat heb je gezien, wat heb je ooit fout gedaan. Dat ga je in ieder geval niet meer
fout doen.
Bij mij vind ik professionele deskundigheid. Dat is dus ervaring.
Daarnaast legimiteer ik ook dat ik voor een universiteit werkt en dat ik op een unviseriteit heb
gewerkt. Dat ik bekend ben met de onderzoek methode. Dat is mij legitimatie.
Ik denk dat de nadruk ligt op professionele deskundigheid. Waarbij wij dat intern organiseren
door vooral teamgewijs te werken. om zoveel mogelijk ervaring en kunde op projecten in te
zetten en onszelf scherp te houden zodat we geen dingen vergeten of denk fouten maken.
professionele deskundigheid waarbij je ook gebruik maakt van plaatselijk data en informatie.
ervaringskwestie voor mij. Professionele deskundigheid zijn voor mijn segmenten heel erg
belangrijk. Om daarmee probeer je ook de vertrouwen naar de klant toe uit te stralen. De klant
ziet je in veel gevallen ook als deskundige.
Professionele deskundigheid voor een groot gedeelte.
Het is heel erg van de kant van expert en ervaring om daar dan te kijken in hoeverre dat
verschillende werkwijze van toepassing kan zijn voor de organisatie. Heel erg projecteren op
en luisteren naar wat daarop terugkomt en dan pas die aanpak kiest.
Het is vooral professionele deskundigheid. Mijn eigen ervaringen en ervaringen van anderen.
Daar zit je je ervaring in van alle jaren. Hoe werkt dat hier en wat zie ik hier. De kennis van
mensen, je kennis van hoe mensen reageren. Je kennis van op je gevoel leren vertrouwen ook.
Maar ook gewoon heel professionele aantal dingen. Een aantal technieken inzet om dingen te
doen.
De professionele deskundigheid om die oogbus verder te uit te kunnen rollen.
79
Clients experience and preferences

(20X)

















Local context and environment

(16X)



Mensen kennis laten nemen van elkaars gezichtpunten en te kijken naar
gemeenschappelijkheden, wat zijn verschillen en daar werkende weg via een dialoog uitkomen
Maar ik zorg ervoor dat de manager en key-users zeggen dat de blauwdruk goed is. Ik zorg
ervoor dat de key-users die afgevaardigd zijn van een afdeling, dat die zeggen dat het goed is.
De acceptatie van de organisatie. Om weerstand te voorkomen of te helpen overbruggen,
hebben wij een pilot project gedraaid met een select aantal mensen, die heel bewust is
gekozen op een bepaalde manier.
Vaak is er wel iemand in het bedrijf die je verder kan helpen. Als je iets niet weet, dan zoek je
vaak iemand binnen de organisatie die wel verstand van zaken heeft.
Zo zijn het stappen die afhankelijk wat de klant wilt en wat je goed acht.
Dan laat je de groep erover praten en meedenken en van daaruit een besluit te nemen. Ik
geloof heel erg in dat je het met mensen doet. Als de mensen niet weet te winnen en het te
betrekken in het proces, gaat de verandering nooit plaatsvinden
Het proces klopt het dan niet en dan legt je het terug bij het hogere management. Dan komen
er aanvullingen bij en we hebben een proces wat gedragen is en op voorgesproken door de
mens.
Het is ook zo dat de interactie met de klant om betrokkenheid te creeeren. Als jij niks van je
laat horen en je moet opeens een onnderzoek uitvoeren, dan moet je mensen meekrijgen.
anders is er geen draagvlak voor zo'n onderzoek. Dus daarom is het belangrijk dat je dit in
dialoog doet. Dat je genoeg rapporteert naar je opdrachtgever. Die keuze is gebaseerd om
draagvlak en betrokkenheid te creeeren.
Maar we onderbouwen dat door hun eigen cijfers en informatie. Daarmee krijgen zij dus ook
een bedrijfsplan waarin we voor een klein stukje eigen kennis in te verwerken. We geven zelf
geen eens de strategische richting aan. Dat weten ze zeker vaak zelf wel.
Het idee is dat men tijd en efficiency winst over en niet met het idee dat we met lean sparen
om ..... het is eigenlijk het slimmer werken, de klant als uitgangspunt nemen. Dan gaat het om
primaire processen daar omheen.
Workshops spreekt men altijd aan in zoverre dat je iedereen erbij betrekt en als je een afdeling
wilt laat verbeteren continue dan moet je iedereen erbij betrekken.
De rol van de opdrachtgever in dit geval niet heel nauw bij betrokken. wat heel belangrijk is
dat de opdrachtgever erachter staat. De leiding moet wel mee en 100% erachter staan.
Die moet toch ook wel overal zijn akkoord voor geven voor alle zaken die je doet. dat koppel ik
altijd terug. Ik doe niets zonder dat de opdrachtgevers akkoord geeft.
Contextuele kennis en ervaring: Ook natuurlijk hoe zij zich gedragen. Dit was een organisatie
waar mensen heel veel op papier zette en heel veel overlegde.
De rol van de opdrachtgever is belangrijk, want die bepaald mede de aanpak. Dus de
opdrachtgever heeft een hele belangrijke rol uiteindelijk en in wat wordt de weg en aanpak
van hoe het moet. Heel interactief met elkaar delen van wat gaat de interventies gaat doen.
ik gebruik de ervaring van de andere bureau om hun eigen ervaring in te zetten. ze weten ook
heel veel. Ik zie het ook mijn taak om hun te prikkelen om hun eigen inzicht te gebruiken.
Een eindsituatie is akkoord als het acceptabel is voor een opdrachtgever. Uiteindelijk moet ik
dat vertellen aan een opdrachtgever en dan moet de opdrachtgever daarmee akkoord gaan.
Ik weet dat het methotiek die wij nu willen gaan uit proberen dat dat de methode is om
ziektekostenverzekeraars over de streep te trekken. Alleen reclame dat zal een
ziektekostenverzekeraar niet van overtuigd zijn. Dat werkt misschien paar jaren, maar het geld
puur over geld. Dus ik weet gewoon dat die factor geldt die variabel dat dat gewoon voor
ziektekostenverzekeraars heel efficiente en effectieve aspecten zijn om dit project efficient
uit te voeren.
maakt ik heel erg gebruik van de informatie uit die organisatie en de mensen die daarin
werken. Het kan zijn dat ik jaarverslagen en rapporten lees. Mensen bevragen in interviews,
hoe zit je in de situatie? Ik maak gebruik van branche kennis. Abracte kennis over meer de
ziekenhuiswereld. De website daarover te lezen.
Ik heb de key-users en de consultants samengebacht. Een belangrijke key-user die alle
gedeeltes van productie tot HR en financieen beheerste vanuit de klantkant. Ik heb iedere keer
een key-users gekoppeld aan een consultant. Consultant heeft opdat moment de knoppen
bedient, maar de key-users heeft het verhaal verteld aan zo'n klankboordgroep. Ziet het maar
als mensen die niet in het projectgroep zitten, maar die wel verstand van zaken hebben.
door een onderzoeksbureau een klanttevredenheidsonderzoek was uitgevoerd. Die heb ik wel
doorgenomen en daar wat puntje uitgepakt.
Wat ik wel heb gebruik is het zoeken naar die richtlijnen. Welke artikelen in een ziekenhuis
zitten specifieke eisen aan. Zitten er gevaarlijke stoffen bij? Zitten er steriele goederen bij die
speciale opslag eisen hebben. De brandweer heeft altijd haar eigen eisen. Zoals die steriele
goederen zijn richtlijnen en geen wetten. Dus er staat ook duidelijk in wat wel mag of niet mag.
80
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Hoe zit je vragen in ontwikkelingen, Hoe zit je eigen aanbod en hoe ver zijn die in
overeenstemming En dan duiken we langzamerhand in het proces in. Dat is dus ook wat ik nu
bij één doe. Gewoon stap voor stap de verschillende processen in de intern doorlopen die het
product doorgaat.
Je moet natuurlijk eerst de mensen redelijk, goed en snel kunnen begrijpen. En als je dan ziet
hoe het eindelijk gaat, dan kan je het zelf verder gaan invullen. Het proces klopt het dan niet
en dan legt je het terug bij het hogere management. Dan komen er aanvullingen bij en we
hebben een proces wat gedragen is en op voorgesproken door de mens.
Die informatie komt van de verwijzers zelf. Ik werk altijd met grote steekproef en ik probeer
goede steekproef te trekken.
Je gebruik dat plaatselijke data en informatie voor het doorrekenen van de ambities van de
klant zelf.
We hebben daar met 2 adviserus gezeten en ook rondgekeken, observaties en interview en de
data die daar aanwezig was geanalyseerd.
De kennis die de mensen hebben van de interne organisatie. hangt er van af op welke manier
je die informatie naar boven. Dat is heel belangrijk om de juiste vragen te stellen om de
mensen te prikkelen tot nadenken over hun eigen handelingen en waarom doe ik dat? Hun
een speigel voor te houden en een stukje zelfreflectie. Dat hun je meenemen. Dat bepaald
toch voor een deel van je oplossingsrichting die je gaat aanbieden.
We zijn afhankelijk van de informatie voorziening die dan moet gaan spelen. Op welke manier
ga je dus die infomatie uitwisselen en wat ga je vastleggen en op welke manier ga je dat
vastleggen. Wie moet wat en wanneer weten.
Plaatselijk data en informatie: Dan zie ik rapporten van mensen die ook al hebben nagedacht
over de vraag. Alles wat er is en wat relevant is, heb ik meegenomen.
Kijken naar verschil in bedrijf. Wat voor bedrijf, wat zijn de producten, wat zijn de markt, wat
zijn de leveringscondities, heel de logistiek van zo'n bedrijf. Al die gegevens die gebruik je dus
voor data informatie. Dus het is een samenhang van al deze 4 dit mogelijk maakt om een
goede klus te doen.
met een workshop met adviseurs, stuurt mij alle stukken toe die de afgelopen jaren in dit
kader zijn geproduceerd. Ik wil mezelf een beeld kunnen vormen van de strategie. Puur voor
interne beeldvorming.
Een plaatselijke data aan informatie en dan zit je met van ''hoe werkt dat hier intern'' en ''hoe
lopen hazen''. Ja natuurlijk gebruik je die. Hoe raar dat ook lijkt, dat het vaak het langste duurt
om dat soort dingen boven tafel te krijgen.Uiteindelijk blijkt dat de invloed.. ging over een
team.. over een secretariaatteam en er kwamen steeds meer mensen die daar iets van
vonden. En uiteindelijk blijkt dan dat er verschillende mensen daar iets verschillends van
vonden. Zelfs de oplossing en het tevredenheid van de opdrachtgever in het feit dat ze
uiteindelijk met een aantal mensen het eens waren over de koers die ze moesten gaan varen
voor de komende tijd. Dus die gebruik je ook altijd.
Plaatselijke data en informatie van ziektekostenverzekeraars, want die moeten aantonen, we
hebben zoveel minder aanspraken en zoveel minder declaratie binnengekregen van
botbreuken van 65 plussers met name in die regio.
Quote table 1: sources of evidence
81
Anecdotal Evidence
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(12X)
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Types of evidence
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Hypothetical Evidence
(8X)
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Testimonial / Expert Evidence
(17X)
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Het is belangrijk om eerst wat informatie te verzamelen bij de verschillende deelnemers.
Mensen kennis laten namen van elkaars gezichtpunten en te kijken naar
gemeenschappelijkheden, wat zijn verschillen en daar werkende weg via een dialoog
uitkomen.
Ik heb deels met mensen uit de organisatie gesproken om de historie boven tafel te krijgen.
Consultant heeft opdat moment de knoppen bedient, maar de key-users heeft het verhaal
verteld aan zo'n klankboordgroep. Ziet het maar als mensen die niet in het projectgroep zitten,
maar die wel verstand van zaken hebben.
Informatie uit de organisatie en over de aanpakken. Ik heb heel veel informatie opgezocht. Dat
begon al met de benchmark die ik heb uitgevoerd. Ik heb de benchmark gebruik als nul meting.
Maar benchmark is eigenlijk heel veel informatie verzamelen en vervolgens vergelijken met
anderen.
Hoe zit je vragen in ontwikkelingen, Hoe zit je eigen aanbod en hoe ver zijn die in
overeenstemming En dan duiken we langzamerhand in het proces in. Dat is dus ook wat ik nu
bij één doe. Gewoon stap voor stap de verschillende processen in de intern doorlopen die het
product doorgaat.
Maar we onderbouwen dat door hun eigen cijfers en informatie. Daarmee krijgen zij dus ook
een bedrijfsplan waarin we voor een klein stukje eigen kennis in te verwerken.
We hebben daar met 2 adviserus gezeten en ook rondgekeken, observaties en interview en de
data die daar aanwezig was geanalyseerd.
Uitleggen wat ik signaleer en die is wat ik ga doen. Als je er niet mee eens ben, dan moet je het
gaan zeggen, op die manier.
door het in kaart brengen wat de aard en inhoud van conflicten zijn en de oorspronkelijke
uitgang posities zijn waarbij de partijen wel in konden vinden.
Ja, want het is altijd iets wat in een bepaalde context gebeurd. Dus je probeert altijd te kijken
van.. hoeveel invloed heeft de context en wat zou er gebeuren als dit in een andere context
zou zijn. In hoeverre is die context.. is die specifieke situatie hier afhankelijk.
Eindeloos onderzoeken. Eerst inventariseren wat de situatie is. Proberen zo goed te mogelijk
beeld te krijgen van de dingen die ik zeker weet die ik niet zeker. Proberen zo hoog mogelijk
zekerheid gfehalte in het beeld te krijgen. Door op allerlei manieren met alle actoren te praten.
Vooral niet te snel oordelen. Heel erg lang bij de principe blijven van mensen willen inprincipe
veranderen.
Wat ik doe is gebruik maken van een database. Dus elke dag komt er nieuwe regelingen en
verdwijnen oude regelingen, budget raakt op, macro-economische ontwikkelingen die
uiteindelijk mijn werk als subsidie-adviseur leidt.
Heel veel onderbuik.
Je neemt ergens bewust of onbewust toch mee en dat ga je gebruiken. Je maakt het je eigen
en heb je het niet meer in de gaten dat je dat ooit gelezen hebt.
Dan schets je wel ongeveer waar de organisatie naar toe moet.
We gaan het op die en die manier doen''. OK, dat is meestal de antwoord wat ik terug krijg. En
het liefst zeggen waarom. Die vragen worden bijna nooit gesteld.
In gevallen als ik dat zo aanpak werkt het in deze situatie gevoelsmatig het beste en in een
andere situatie ga je wat meer grotere stappen er door heen. Het is heel erg gevoelsmatig.
Maar van tevoren heb je dus geen idee. Dat is proberen, trail & error, kijken of het werkt. Als
het niet werkt, dan probeer je wat anders.
Het is altijd wel gebaseerd op wat je al een keer heb gedaan en toen goed ging en dat doe je
nog een keer.
Ik denk dat heel veel intuitie en ervaring. Ik heb iets 10 keer gedaan en 9 keer ging het goed.
dus kennelijk werkt het wel.
Omdat ik al zou lang dit werk doe zit er ook heel veel ingesloten kennis.
Het groot stuk van het adviseren is in deze opdracht zat in het vertellen wat in mijn ogen het
beste aanpak was voor dit proces
In de buildfase komt de professionele deskundigheid. Op basis van wat er geschreven is, gaat
men het systeem bouwen.
Professionele deskundigheid is zeker het overgrote deel geweest.
Professionele deskundigheid: we hebben een eigen groepje van logistiek interimmers en
adviseurs. Als ik ergens mee zit, dan vraag je het bijelkaar.
Je kijkt naar de organisatie en kijkt naar je eigen kennis. Al dan niet met informatie of inzichten
die je erbij wilt hebben.
Het is wel zo dat ik in de opbouw, mijn professionele kennis meeneem. Het kan bij de
aanbevelingen komt het terug. Want ik heb data en op basis van mijn data maak ik mijn
conclusie. Dan moet ik aanbevelingen doen. Die aanbevelingen die bedenk ik dan wel zelf. Op
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Statistical Evidence
(8X)
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Analogical Evidence
(3X)
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basis van mijn professionele deskundigheid die weer gebaseert is op mijn gegevens.
Ik denk dat de nadruk ligt op professionele deskundigheid. Waarbij wij dat intern organiseren
door vooral teamgewijs te werken. om zoveel mogelijk ervaring en kunde op projecten in te
zetten en onszelf scherp te houden zodat we geen dingen vergeten of denk fouten maken.
Ook een inschatting van je professionele deskundigheid om dat te kunnen bepalen.
Ik maak gebruik van methode die ook door anderen zijn aangeleverd. Dat toets je in de
praktijk.
Professionele deskundigheid voor een groot gedeelte. Wat je doet, zeker in deze vraag is op
basis van wat je denk dat je moet doen. Dat is heel gevoelsmatig. Dat is heel sterk.
Dat is dus de ervaring om ervoor te zorgen welke modellen er toegepast moeten worden en
ook alleen toepassen dat past bij het bedrijf. Keuzes en hoe pak je het aan. Mijn rol is om
vanuit mijn professioneel deskundigheid dat juist te gaan doen.
Daar gaat het met name om redelijke professionele deskundigheid. Kun je de wetenschappelijk
kennis gebruiken. Als je dat in de goede context kunt plaatsen, dan zegt dat weer dan hoe je
het moet doen.
Wat hier evidence based is, is dat ik ervaring uit die 5 andere bureaus put en daar heb ik gezien
dat het wel werkt. Dat zou je evidence based kunnen noemen. Dat is niet keihard, maar wel
gebaseerd op eerdere ervaringen.
En je doet iets op basis van '' je hebt ervaring'' of ''kijk je maakt een plan'' en dan kies je een
bepaalde aanpak. Die aanpak evalueer je een op een gegeven moment. Soms borduur je
daarop verder en soms anders verzinnen. Daar doe je voor een deel op basis van ervaring en
voor een deel van wat werkt in de praktijk en wat niet.
Wat niet werkt, moet je het weer gaan aanpassen.
En daarop kan ik de gewonnen kennis gebruiken om dan ook het project waar ik subsidie op
aan gevraagd heb in de juiste perspectief kan plaatsen. En dat is wat een subsidioloog moet
doen. Er is een project en dit is de subsidieregelingen en die moet wel beetje matchen met
elkaar. Het moet innovatief zijn. Je moet dan dus al die elementen die moet je een beetje in
elkaar krijgen.
Wat daar onderzit is eigenlijk een empirische onderzoek naar het slagen van
veranderprocessen in organisaties waaruit blijkt dat blauwdrukachtige veranderprocessen
waarin je een klein groep apart gaat zetten in een kamer.
Het is gebaseerd op onderzoeken naar welke veranderprocessen slagen en welke processen
falen, Daarnaast heb ik naast het begeleiden van de groep heel veel gebruik gemaakt van
noties en theorieen uit groepsdynamicaleer.
Dus ik heb een aantal artikelen en met name boeken. Er zijn boeken geschreven door
autoriteiten in de zin van hoogleraren. Echt kennis op hun gebied. Die heb ik als leiddraad
genomen. Daar kan ik ook vanuit gaan dat dat valide, betrouwbaar en gegeneraliseerbaar
methodieken zijn om goede conclusies te kunnen trekken.
In dit geval ligt wetenschappelijk kennis als achtergrond waarom deze methode en waarom je
bepaalde instrumenten gebruikkt en hoe een proces benaderd.
Dus naar aanleiding van het theorie wat daar achter ligt. Daar proberen we naar de klant toe
niet te veel naar te refereren in zoverre dat lean gewoon heel weinig zegt, maar alle sterke
punten eruit te pakken. continue verbeterstand en heeft zich ook bewezen in achter sectoren.
We hebben een theoretische basis die heet LEAN. het komt oorspronkelijk uit een Mallorca
fabriek. het is nu al herhaaldelijke onderzocht en toegepast in de zorg en hoe dat precies
werkt.
Wat je dus gebruikt is gewoon om bijvoorbeeld voor supply chain management het
scoremodel. Scoremodel is een model dat bekijkt wat er bij supply chain management hoort.
Quinn-model is een model dat naar de cultuur van het bedrijf kijkt. Efm is een model die je kan
gebruiken om te kijken naar organisaties.
In dit soort situatie gebruik ik wetenschappelijk kennis om gewoon modellen op te zoeken. Die
modellen gebruiken om over die werkelijkheid heen te leggen. Dan probeer ik verschillende
modellen te gebruiken, want dat helpt mij een analyse te maken en daar realiseer ik me heel
goed dat dan de model van de werkelijkheid is. Dat helpt me dus om. Op een gegeven moment
zegt van.. als dit model op dat bedrijf legt, wat zie ik dan. Als dit model erop legt en wat voor
conclusie kan ik trekken. Dan doe ik met wetenschappelijke kennis en ik denk dat je met
wetenschappelijk kennis altijd onder je werk ligt. Tenminste bij mij wel en dat hou ik ook
redelijk bij.
Daarnaast door de inter rate reliability, dus als ik de data heb geanalyseerd dan gaat een
collega het nog een keer analyseren. Kijken of ik fouten heb gemaakt. Dus het verslag wordt
door 2 onafhandelijke collega's nagelezen. Daarin proberen wij ook een kwaliteitsslag te
maken.
83
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Ik heb een concept, een variable. Tevredenheid over iets. Daarnaast ben ik ook verbanden aan
het leggen. Ik ga kijken wat het verband is tussen tevredenheid en verwijsgedrag. Ik verzamel
data over verschillende variabelen en dan ga ik mijn correlaties trekken. Als er een correlatie/
verband vind, dan leidt dat tot als verwijzers meer tevreden zijn over noem maar wat, ze meer
doorverwijzen of wanneer ze ontevreden zijn, minder doorverwijzen. In die zin ben ik wel
zoveel mogelijk wetenschappelijk bezig.
Je moet dan een bewijs leveren aan die ziektekostenverzekeraars. Dat gaan we nu ook doen,
met een pilot project in het west van Nederland. Dan moeten we aan de hand van statistische
gegevens aantonen dat voorgaande jaren altijd 26 miljoen euro aan die doelgroep betaald zijn.
Quote table 2: types of evidence
Attitude
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(5X)
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Advantages
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Shared knowledge base
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(8X)
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Objectivity
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(3X)
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Disadvantage
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Abstraction level
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(11X)
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Ik zie veel voordelen in zaken die zich in de praktijk bewezen heeft. Ik ben zo wetenschappelijk
ingericht. Ik heb meer zo iets van bewijs het maar.
Het is evidence bases in die zin dat je daarbij gebruikt maakt van je ervaring en daarbij kijkt
wat deze oorzaak het beste bij deze opdracht het beste bij het pupliek zijn. Het is wel degelijk
evidence. Het is bewezen praktijk en het is onderbouwde kennis, dat je inderdaad herhaalbaar
overtuigende wijze bewezen.
minder snel fouten maakt, omdat je niet goed heb nagedacht of je denk dat je het ergens
anders heb gedaan, dus dat past hier ook wel.
maakt je bewust van dat de manier waarop jij intuitief naar een situatie kijkt ook maar een
manier is. Het is heel goed om je daart bewust van te zijn. Dat er mogelijk nog hele andere
manieren zijn.
Het is heel doordacht. Als je het goed toepast is het op zijn minst heel zorgvuldig en dat is
belangrijk. als je het breed toepast komen alle aspecten en factoren die er te doen aan orde
Voordeel is wel dat met elkaar werkt aan een taal om al die unieke projecten die unieken
consultants doen om die vergelijkbaar met elkaar te maken
Het voordeel van evidence based consulting dat we de kunde uitbouwen.
Maar dan wel op die kennisgebied heel veel uitwisselt.
Dat je een bijdrage moet leveren aan de kennis basis en dat je dus ook gewoon je kennis voor
een deel publiek moet maken.
Als je die evidence base practice doet, is de samenwerking heel belangrijk. Het gaat erom het
willen samen werken. Als je dan iets doet, het dan ook erover hebben met anderen. Op die
manier die kennis laten groeien. En of die samenwerkingsvorm geeft, is niet zo belangrijk.
Het gaat over de samenwerking en vooral over het besef dat kennis meer wordt als je het
deelt. (..) Samen heb je meer kennis. Niet alleen jou kennis en mijn kennis. Maar ook een
kennis die we samen maken. Dus dat je op verschillende manieren naar kennis moet kijken
om dit optimaal te doen. En dat door goed te respecteren op dat evidence based practice. Dat
het de juiste waar de mensen van leren en ook weet nieuwe kennisen van komt.
Of je moet in een kennis netwerk zitten die inprincipe allemaal dezelfde werk doen. Maar wel
met andere conculting. Maar dan wel op die kennisgebied heel veel uitwisselt.
voordeel is dat je het leerproces versneld op de vlak van professionele deskundigheid.
Je objectiveert het veel meer, dus je kan met grotere zekerheid zeggen dat de conclusies juist
zijn
Ik zie eigenlijk alleen maar voordelen, door wel je bewust van te zijn heb je de feiten wel op
een rijtje
Wat een goede adviseur doet, die haalt heel veel uit de plaatselijk data en informatie
Dat je het zo probeert te vangen in wat abstraties. Dat je geen recht doet wat er nou
daadwerkelijk bijzonder en unieke en apart was aan die casus.
Het gaat eigenlijk om het abstractie niveau waarmee je met je opdrachtgevers spreekt. De
abstract waarmee ik met de opdrachtgever sprak was op het niveau van concrete voorstellen.
Sommige vraagstukken zijn zo complex, kan je alleen doen met interviews. Dat kan niet zo
heel veel wetenschappelijk mee doen. anders dan je eigen interpretatie doe op basis van
interviews, maar dan moet je advies gewoon goed zijn.
Het nadeel is dat je denk dat het de werkelijkheid is.
Maar de nadeel zou kunnen zijn, dat je daarmee intuitie onderschat.
Dat is een belangrijk element wat je meest gebruikt. Wat je wel vaak ziet is dat
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Client’s attitude and support
(14X)
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Research
(4X)
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wetenschappelijk onderzoek voor veel klanten en voor mij toch een beetje te abstract is. Heel
veel wordt onderzocht, maar er is maar een aantal elementen die voor mij als subsioloog van
belang zijn.
Als ik TU-delft als klant zou hebben dan zou ik wel iets meer in de materie gaan zitten. Mijn
klanten zijn machinefabrieken. Die hebben minder met wetenschap te maken. Voor hun is het
heel abstract, maar wij leggen een aantal dingen die wij kunnen vertalen in concrete
projecten, in concrete producten, in concrete processen en dan is het wel zinvol.
Je kan heel mooi wetenschappelijk onderzoek doen. De afstand van veel wetenschappelijke
onderzoek tot de praktijk is vaak heel groot. Daarmee is de afstand tussen de toepasbaarheid
van die wetenschappelijk kennis in de praktijk vaak beperkt.
Als je op strategische niveau bekijkt, is het altijd op advisering. Wat ik doe, ik zit op soms ook
de taktische niveau.
Dat hangt ook van de probleem stelling en de vraagstelling.
Het zijn continue zoveel factoren waar je op moet letten dan het niet zo makkelijk is om het in
een lijst te vangen is. Je heb wel bepaalde strategieen, bijvoorbeeld als je tegen maken heb
met een juist een zeker of onzekere kant. Het is context bepalend.
De genoten onderwijs in het managment wat echt voor nederlandse begrippen echt heel laag
was. Daar maak je gebruik van. Dan bedoel ik het niet negatief. Dat betekent dat je je
boodschap moet aanpassen op wat daar speelt.
Je kan een hele goede team hebben. Die hebben de beste wetenschappelijke benodigheden.
Maar als je niet kan uitleggen aan de directie dan praat je niet in dezelfde taal. Dan wordt jou
advies nooit geaccepteerd. Vervolgens kan je een hele slechte powerpoint hebben, terwijl je
inhoudelijk zo goed bent, maar dan moet je je verhaal kunnen verkopen.
In de charisma en overtuigingskracht. Er zijn een aantal figuren die iets kunnen verkondigen
wat totaal niet evidence based is. Maar wat je aanneemt van iemand. Dat is wel een hele
belangrijke factor. Dat zit heel veel in de persoonlijke benadering
Je komt bij de raad van bestuur en zeg dit is evidence based. Maar dat ze toch zeggen: hij is
wel jong, dus ik vertrouw het niet helemaal. Maar misschien dat je wel helemaal gelijk heeft
Maar dat is de oplossing (methode of aanpak) die bij het minst tegenstand en het meest
draagvlak mee denk te genereren.
Een hele pragmatische aanpak omdat de directeur een authoritair leidinggevende is. Dan kies
je ook een aanpak die hem waarschijnlijk aanspreekt.
Dan is dat heel back to basic en dat heeft zeker invloed op hoe je je opdrachten doet. In plaats
van proberen iets te bewijzen en dan te doen. Het is Ad hocerig op een of andere manier.
Nadeel kan zijn dat je je eigen falen ook pijnlijk inzichtelijk maakt naar de klatn toe. dat heeft
ook met integriteit te maken. Je hebt wat minder middelen om je resultaten op te poetsen.
Je had voor een probleem 17 oplossingen. Daar zat je niet op te wachten. Precies wat je zelf,
ik zit niet te wachten op 17 oplossingen. Jij bent de professional, dit is mijn probleem, kies
voor mij die juiste oplossing. Een van die 17. Of hooguit 2 dat ik een keuze maak ui die 2. Best
practice.
Ingehuurd voor kant en klare oplossingen.
Maar het heeft veel meer met de context te maken dat zowel organisatiesook niet goed
snappen wat de meerwaarde daarvan kan zijn.
Aan de andere kant, wat je ziet bij opdrachtgevers is dat ze juist niet willen worden vergeleken
met anderen. want ze zijn uniek.
Dat heeft denk ik ook te maken met de cultuur bij logistieke dienstverleners. Er wordt over
het algemeen weinig geinvesteerd. Ik werk voor midden klein bedrijf, minder grote en die zijn
daar nog lang niet. Die zijn veel praktischer.
Je ziet dat sommige organisatie, ook het wetenschap een beetje last heeft van een bepaalde
imago.Wat versta u onder wetenschap? veel te ingewikkeld. Probeer ik het nogmaals uit te
leggen dat de methode is misschien ingewikkeld, maar de resultaten zijn heel helder wat eruit
komt. Dan kunt u ook veel meer mee doen.
Dat je de eerste paar criteria neerlegt en dan van bepaalde richting erft en dan ook evidence
based bezig. Maar dan moet je het dus wel allemaal kan vergelijken. Dat is voor mij niet bij te
houden.
De anderen zou ook kunnen zeggen ''wij zijn een commercieel bureau en moeten niet teveel
weg geven''.
Volgens mij is de zorg bij uitstek een sector waar je heel veel wetenschap kan onderzoeken.
Maar waar ook heel veel kennis komt. Gewoon omdat de situatie zo uniek is dat je ter plekke
een oplossing moet verzinnen. Iemand heeft een keer die oplossing verzonnen en die
oplossing gaat dan weer...en de zorg kan iedereen zich dat voorstellen. Maar is natuurlijk in
onze sector niet anders. Daar ga je ook een gewoon een probleem waar je accuut een
85

Scientific skills
(3X)



Time

(6X)





oplossing voor moet opzoeken. Juist door die oplossingen te delen en juist doordat
beschikbaar te maken die kennis, groeit die kennis dan.
Dat komt gewoon pas met het opbouwen van kennis en ervaringen en delen. Dat kost tijd en
is denk ik een nadeel.
heel veel adviseurs zich niet bewust zijn van het feit hoe ze werken. Dus heel veel van hun
kennis en ervaringen zijn niet gecodificeerd. vooral bij HR advisering, dat is niet een heel hard
vak.
Consultants over het algemeen weinig onderzoekskennis hebben. Wij die komen van een
universiteit en wij snappen hoe je onderzoek moet doen.
Het is ook nuttig dat wij tween wetenschappelijk onderlegde medewerkers zijn. Ik ben
gepromoveerd en Tim is bezig met zijn promotie. Dat helpt inderdaad wel met een stukje
onderbouwing voor al die adviezen.
Maar niet zozeer van een probleem en ik ga daar een boek voor lezen. Daar is de tijd te kort
voor
Het kan ook zijn dat de doorlooptijd van je maatregel langer wordt. Bij consulting waar je per
uur betaald wordt kan een opdrachtgever dat veel minder aantrekkelijk vinden dus is het
goedkoper om het maar best practice te blijven doen
Het nadeel is wel dat het tijdrovend is.
Wij hebben dit nu geadviseerd en dit hebben we bedacht, laten we daarvan de effectiviteit
meten. Ik denk dat bi veel opdrachten dat meer werk zal zijn dan het beantwoorden van de
oorspronkelijke vraag.
Nadeel is dat er heel wat tijd overheen komt, als het gaat om het kunnen toepassen allemaal.
Dat is echt het hele lang leren zeg maar. Als je het gek op bent, is het geen nadeel. Het duurt
wel dan een tijd voordat je het kunt toepass.
Ik moet wel mijn uurtjes draaien.
Quote table 3: advantage and disadvantage of evidence based consulting
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