Richard Beckhard: The formulator of organizational change

Abstract

Richard Beckhard is recognized as one of the founders of the field of organization development and as a pioneer in the study and teaching of a systemic approach to planned change in complex organizations. As an educator, Beckhard was an adjunct professor at MIT's Sloan School of Management where he teamed with Douglas McGregor, Warren Bennis, and Edgar Schein in the early development of MIT's Department of Organization Studies. A practitioner at heart, he applied behavioral sciences to translate his international consulting experiences into many useful change management models and tools that still influence practice of change leadership today including the Formula for Change, Open Systems Planning, Responsibility Charting, Confrontation Meeting, and Task-Oriented Team Development. As an institution builder, he helped found the Organization Development Network, the International Organization Development Association, and the Family Firm Institute.