William E. Smith Ph.D., is a Director of Organizing for Development an International Institute (ODII) and is also an Adjunct Associate Professor of Organizational Sciences at George Washington University. . (14B)
His professional experience began as an overseas manager for British Overseas Airways Corporation. An unexpected discovery of high performance created while working in Rome's Fiumicino Airport set him off on a life long search to uncover the principles behind such high levels of performance. (Almost by accident, he made Fiumicino the best performing of all the airline's stations in less than six months, at no cost and without management control). He obtained an MBA at Indiana University and then a Ph.D. at the Wharton Graduate School of Business where he studied under Drs. Russell Ackoff and Eric Trist. (14C)
While in the private sector he worked with the overseas subsidiaries of multinational companies to help them organize to cope with exceptionally rapid growth. It was the innovative nature of this practical work, an approach that integrated management development, with business planning and organization development, that drew the attention of the World Bank to his work. (14D)
The World Bank, in 1978, requested him to apply his thinking to the design of the organization and management of large scale, complex development projects. His consulting with the Bank produced the AIC process - a more holistic way of designing and organizing development programs and projects (Design of Organizations for Rural Development -1980). He trained more than 200 Bank staff in the process. The process as interpreted by the World Bank is reported in the Participation Sourcebook as an exemplar of an overarching framework for large systems change. (14E)
Since then, he has been perfecting the implementation of the AIC process ( appreciation, influence and control) through application in all major cultures and at every level of the organizational hierarchy, from village development to management and organization development through to the design of national systems for development. In 1988, he helped found Organizing for Development, an International Institute a not for profit company devoted to the AIC process. (14F)
Bill has found ways to reduce what is known about whole systems thinking, power relationships and organizing processes to their very simple, practical essentials. Knowledge and wisdom is built into the process itself. Following the process requires very little expertise or professional help. (14G)
He and his colleagues have found effective and dramatic ways to organize and train large groups of people in a short period of time to use the process to draw out the best of the human spirit and create conditions for committed action. (14H)
WEB: http://www.odii.com (16D)