نوع مقاله : مقاله پژوهشی

نویسندگان

• سجاد فارسی ¹
• علیرضا ولیان ²
• وحید خاشعی ورنامخواستی ¹

¹ گروه مدیریت بازرگانی، دانشکده مدیریت و حسابداری، دانشگاه علامه طباطبائی، تهران، ایران

² گروه مدیریت بازرگانی، دانشکده مدیریت و حسابداری، دانشگاه شهید بهشتی، تهران، ایران

چکیده

در پروژه‌های تحول سازمانی، مستندات نقش حیاتی در هدایت و پشتیبانی از اقدامات تحولی ایفا می‌کنند. با این حال، ابزارهای جامع و منسجمی برای ارزیابی کیفیت و میزان تناسب این مستندات وجود ندارد. این مقاله به ارائه و توسعه یک ابزار ارزیابی مبتنی بر ۱۳ معیار کلیدی می‌پردازد که از طریق مرور گسترده ادبیات استخراج شده‌اند. با به‌کارگیری تکنیک دیمتل فازی، تعاملات و میزان تأثیرگذاری این معیارها مورد تحلیل قرار گرفت و بر این اساس، وزن‌های متناسب برای هر یک از آن‌ها تعیین شد. این ابزار در قالب یک مطالعه پایلوت و با ارزیابی مستندات سازمانی در یک پروژه تحول سازمانی مورد آزمون قرار گرفت و نتایج حاکی از کسب نمرات عموماً پایین بود که نشان‌دهنده شکاف قابل توجه میان وضعیت فعلی مستندات و الزامات مورد نیاز برای تحقق تحول است. دسته‌بندی معیارها در سه بُعد غنای نظری، کاربردپذیری تجربی و ظرفیت تحول‌آفرینی امکان انجام یک تحلیل چندبعدی از کیفیت مستندات را فراهم ساخت. این ابزار علاوه بر ارائه بنیانی نظری، راهنمایی‌های عملی ارزشمندی را برای سازمان‌ها در هر دو بخش دولتی و خصوصی فراهم می‌کند تا بتوانند مستندات خود را به‌گونه‌ای بهبود دهند که پشتیبانی مؤثرتری از اقدامات تحول سازمانی داشته باشند. در پایان، این مطالعه به بیان پیامدهای نظری و کاربردی پرداخته و پیشنهادهایی برای پژوهش‌های آتی در این حوزه ارائه می‌دهد.

عنوان مقاله [English]

Developing an Assessment Tool for Evaluating Organizational Documents in Transformation Initiatives: A Fuzzy DEMATEL Approach

نویسندگان [English]

• Sajad Farsi ¹
• Alireza Valyan ²
• Vahid Khashei Varnamkhasti ¹

¹ Business Management Department, Faculty of Management & Accounting, Allameh Tabataba'i University, Tehran, Iran

² Business Management Department, Faculty of Management and Accounting, Shahid Behesti University, Tehran, Iran

چکیده [English]

1. Introduction
The implementation of organizational transformation plans in the context of Iranian organizations faces unique complexities. Therefore, understanding the organization, as the first step in implementing a transformation plan, is of great importance. In this stage, the study and evaluation of organizational documents play a crucial role in understanding the organizational context. However, a review of the existing literature, as well as the experience of practitioners in implementing organizational transformation plans, shows that the lack of a framework for evaluating organizational documents can create numerous challenges in executing these plans. Additionally, the existing indicators are primarily intended for assessing the quality of documents and may not provide an accurate evaluation of organizational documents, especially in transformation projects. Therefore, this study aims to address the practical and theoretical challenges in this field by providing a framework for evaluating organizational documents in transformation projects.

2. Literature Review
Knowledge and its development have become one of the key topics in contemporary business literature. One of the essential tools for knowledge sharing within an organization is documentation capability (Zamani, 2015). A review of other studies, along with the experience of practitioners in organizational transformation projects, reveals that organizational documents hold significant importance and can play a crucial role in facilitating knowledge sharing within an organization. Strategic planning documents, business models, documentation for the design and implementation of organizational processes, documents related to the establishment of management systems (such as ISO standards), customer segmentation and marketing documents, and more, are all vital organizational documents. These documents are crucial in understanding the current situation and gaining a true insight into the organization’s conditions during the diagnostic phase of organizational transformation projects. Therefore, assessing the quality of these documents should be considered an essential part of the organizational transformation process.
The importance of the quality of organizational documents has led to numerous studies in various fields to develop guidelines for addressing this issue. A significant portion of this research has focused on identifying the indicators and determining factors for information and documentation. For example, Grudzień & Hamrol (2016) identified the quality indicators of information in documents as follows: Comprehensiveness, Accuracy, Clarity, Applicability, Conciseness, Consistency, Correctness, Currency.
In addition, some organizational researchers have proposed other indicators for evaluating organizational documents in transformation projects. Some believe that one of the characteristics that should be considered in the evaluation of organizational documents is the problem-oriented nature of the document (Hollenstein, Thurnheer, & Vogt, 2022). On the other hand, an organizational document should have a theoretical framework and a scientific methodology (Ershova, Hohlov, & Shaposhnik, 2018). Another important feature of organizational documents is their data-driven nature (Duan, Edwards, & Dwivedi, 2019).
Despite the efforts made, it can be observed that most of the existing indicators in the literature have been developed for assessing the quality of documents, and few studies have focused on identifying the evaluation indicators for organizational documents, especially in the context of transformation projects, as well as exploring the relationships between these indicators. This issue has led to challenges for researchers in the diagnostic phase of organizational transformation projects, as well as for organizational managers in decision-making. In other words, due to the lack of a coherent framework for evaluating organizational documents and the absence of connections between the existing indicators for evaluating their quality, researchers are unable to make full use of these documents in the organizational diagnosis phase. As a result, they develop an incomplete understanding of the organization's information and the actions taken within it.

3. Methodology
This research is applied in terms of its objectives and descriptive-survey in terms of data collection methods, falling under the category of qualitative studies. The research was conducted in three main steps: In the first step, the existing literature was reviewed and analyzed to identify and extract the evaluation criteria for organizational documents, and the relevant indicators were extracted and categorized. In the next step, the opinions of experts were used to identify the dependency and influence of the identified components using the fuzzy DEMATEL approach. A questionnaire was distributed among 15 experts, including faculty members, implementers of organizational transformation plans, and organizational specialists. In the final step, the identified indicators were applied to evaluate organizational documents in one of the organizational transformation projects within a financial institution in Iran as a case study. In this context, and to develop a practical evaluation tool, weights were assigned to each identified indicator based on their placement in the DEMATEL analysis. Each document in the organization under study was evaluated in accordance with the indicators and their weighting, and the results were presented.

4. Results
The findings of the present study indicated that 13 indicators can be considered for evaluating organizational documents in transformation projects. These indicators include: the scientific nature of the problem identification process, the scientific nature of the theoretical framework, the scientific nature of the methodology/tools, adherence to formal and aesthetic standards, document up-to-date-ness, content validity of the document, reliability and credibility of the document, data-driven nature of the document creation process, consistency with other organizational documents, participatory nature of the document creation process, capacity for engaging organizational members, capacity for stimulating organizational changes, and alignment with higher-level documents. Additionally, the results from the fuzzy DEMATEL analysis showed that the scientific nature of the methodology/tools and the scientific nature of the problem identification process have the greatest impact, while the reliability and credibility of the document and the capacity for stimulating organizational changes are most influenced among all the indicators. Finally, the results from the weighting process and the application of this evaluation tool in a sample organizational transformation project in one of the financial institutions in Iran demonstrated that this tool can serve as an appropriate criterion for evaluating organizational documents in transformation projects. Specifically, some documents, such as the strategic planning document, showed better alignment with the indicators, while key documents, such as the comprehensive IT plan, did not score well on any of the evaluated indicators.

5. Discussion
The results of this study indicate that the evaluation indicators for organizational documents in transformation projects can be categorized into three dimensions: theoretical richness, practical application, and transformational capacity. Additionally, the indicators related to the scientific nature of the methodology/tools, the scientific nature of the problem identification process, the data-driven nature of the document creation process, the up-to-date-ness of the document, the participatory nature of the creation process, and the scientific nature of the theoretical framework—primarily considered in the early stages of document creation or evaluation—have a significant impact on the other indicators. This means that if these indicators score highly, they can influence the other evaluation indicators as well.

6. Conclusion
These findings can serve as a useful guide for experts in organizational transformation projects and even for organizational staff involved in the creation of documents within their organizations. one can understand which characteristics each document should possess. Accordingly, document creators should pay special attention to the aforementioned indicators to ultimately produce documents that are credible and impactful on other employees. Adhering to these indicators in the creation of organizational documents can equip the organization with valid and influential documents, laying the foundation for internal transformation.