Our Serivces
Strategy Development
Toba’s strategy development empowers organizations with a roadmap for success, enabling them to adapt to changing environments, optimize resources, make informed decisions, and ultimately achieve their long-term objectives. We take an informed approach by scaling up or down with you depending on what your short-term and long-term needs are.
It’s crucial to develop a well-defined strategy that provides a clear direction and purpose for your organization. It outlines where the organization is headed, its goals, and the path to achieve them. A clear strategy enables our clients to prioritize their initiatives and allocate resources effectively avoiding distractions and misaligned efforts.
Toba’s approach is simple. First, we start by assessing the organizational strength and weaknesses while considering all relevant factors. We lean-in with you to craft a clear vision and mission that reflects your organizations goals and values.Read More
Toba believes that “strategy without execution is hallucination” and that an effective execution plan will include setting specific, achievable goals followed by formulating strategies to reach them considering all of the various options available. These strategies are then broken down into practical plans, with clear responsibilities assigned, that are able to be communicated across all levels of the organization. As we execute our plans, we continuously monitor progress using key indicators and gather feedback for any necessary adjustments. Regular evaluations help us measure how well our strategy is working and prompt us to make improvements based on the results we achieve. By engaging employees, involving leadership, and maintaining adaptability to changes, we ensure our strategy becomes a tool that guides your growth and success effectively.
“Toba has provided outstanding facilitation services to our leadership teams helping us navigate through strategy, evaluate our organizational design and develop improvements, and address employee satisfaction needs through leadership coaching and team development.”
–Clay Norris, Power Management Officer, Tacoma Power
Organizational Change Management
Toba believes that projects and initiatives succeed most when change is managed effectively. Positive change experiences develop strong change histories which give organizations the confidence to implement subsequent change initiatives.
Our planning and approach are underpinned by known methods and practices, though we shape them to fit the unique needs of every client. PROSCI is one of the methodologies we leverage to manage change but will use the methodology that’s preferred by our clients. We understand that where we place our attention and relative change management priorities is driven largely by where our clients are along the change spectrum. By doing so, we also gain a clear understanding of organizational culture before we decide what would work best within any given cultural context.
We take into consideration change saturation, or the overall volume of change that our clients are undergoing. This informs how we phase work and structure deployments across competing priorities – to avoid the risk of burnout. We also believe strongly in reinforcing strategies, whether it’s coaching leaders on reinforcing project goals through a variety of communication channels or making sure that the training and development programs enable implementation. We excel at bringing people along, coaching them through change, and developing leaders along the way.
“Toba was instrumental in our successful entry in the Western Energy Imbalance Market. The team has a great mix of program management and organizational change management capabilities that kept everyone engaged and on task throughout the initiative.”
-Chris Robinson, Superintendent, Tacoma Power
Organizational Development
Toba is a full-service organizational development consultancy. We use proven, evidence-based methods to build organizational capabilities within our clients to help them align their culture, people, systems, and structure to support strategic goals and drive positive change. The “Diagnose” phase involves analyzing the collected anecdotal, qualitative, and quantitative data and insights from the discovery phase. This includes identifying patterns, trends, and root causes of organizational issues or opportunities. Through careful examination, you aim to pinpoint specific areas where interventions are needed to drive positive change. In the “Design” phase, based on the insights gained from discovery and diagnosis, Toba projectizes a plan of action using program and organizational change management capabilities. This plan outlines strategies, initiatives, and interventions to address the identified challenges or leverage the opportunities. The design phase involves creating a clear roadmap that aligns with the organization’s objectives and resources. Deliver: The “Deliver” phase is where the planned strategies and interventions are put into action. This involves implementing the designed solutions, initiatives, and programs. It often includes training, communication, process changes, and other activities aimed at improving various aspects of the organization. Monitoring progress and making necessary adjustments are key components of this phase. Solutions may come in the form of new strategies and initiatives, re-organizations, team or individual interventions, leadership development and professional development programs, recruitment strategies, or process design projects. Whatever the case, Toba takes a customized approach with each of their clients to create a solution specific and tailored to their needs.
Toba understands how vital organizational development is for organizations looking to thrive in dynamic and competitive environments. It enhances employee well-being, productivity, and the organization’s ability to adapt, innovate, and achieve its strategic objectives. In order to ensure that our clients receive a well-informed, tailored, and effective solution to their specific needs and challenges, we follow a simple approach called the Four D’s:
Discover, Diagnose, Design, and Deliver.Read More
Program Management
Our program management approach is underpinned by a strong focus on governance, transparency, and a culture of trust. Early identification and escalation of issues is critical to protecting scope, schedule, and budget objectives. Having a regular forum for escalation and building a culture of trust facilitates the regular, free-sharing of information. This model is best positioned to keep initiatives on track, avoid surprises, and facilitate making timely decisions.
We also believe that major programs and initiatives are exciting opportunities to identify and develop future leaders and raise the visibility of subject matter experts and individual contributors – opportunities to build their profiles in the organizations and advance their careers.
Our team is well-versed in the Project Management Body of Knowledge and is equipped to manage initiatives using a variety of approaches, including both waterfall and agile methods. Our team also incorporates its organizational change management approach into program implementation with a strong focus early on stakeholder engagement planning and communication – bring people along and gaining the support required to achieve desired results.
“Toba helped us develop and deploy common definitions around project management roles and responsibilities, a critical step towards project management maturity at Tacoma. They excelled at engaging our stakeholders in the process and gaining alignment towards achieving our objectives.”
–Ryan McLaughlin, PMO, Tacoma Power
People Development
Trained, engaged, committed, and capable people are the engines in any great company. People need purpose and the confidence to do their jobs well. They also need to be in the best place to excel. Whether that means being the creator, the facilitator, the analyst, the leader, the listener or a combination of these roles.
Great leaders are those who see the potential in their people, provide the right avenues to explore that potential, and enable them to unleash that potential in whatever capacity is fit for any given individual. Great leaders put individuals in the best position within a team for the purposes of team achievement. Leadership is also about seeking out and developing talent, reflection and self-improvement, vertical and horizontal diplomacy, breaking down barriers, advocacy, and effective change management.
Toba Consulting has proven methods of developing leaders, namely the firm’s Build-a-Better-Boss program, in which it develops personalized leadership development plans through a series of assessments, team exercises, on-the-job training, and 1:1 coaching. Interwoven in Toba’s leadership development program is coaching on strategy and leading transformational change. Our consultants come from a place of leadership, both from having formal leadership roles in organizations and from having roles that required informal leadership and the soft-skills to compel people to engage without formal supervisory influence.
“Toba’s Build a Better Boss was both a team-building and leadership development exercise for us. As a team, we identified the most important attributes of a great leader and selected areas for focus and improvement for myself and my team.”
–Val Sherman, Safety and Environmental Compliance Manager and Senior Leadership Team member, Tacoma Power
Recruitment
Our Recruitment Services stand out in their commitment to identifying and vetting top-tier talent, ensuring a seamless fit for your staffing requirements. By fostering open communication and trust, we facilitate well-informed decisions and streamlined processes. This approach keeps your recruitment initiatives on target, minimizing disruptions and enabling timely placements.
Furthermore, we recognize the strategic value in each recruitment endeavor. Beyond fulfilling positions, we pinpoint emerging leaders and amplify the presence of subject matter experts within your organization. This approach showcases your organizational strengths and propels individual careers.
Our team is well-versed in the dynamic recruitment landscape, adept at managing searches across industries and roles. We employ a flexible range of traditional and innovative methodologies tailored to your unique needs. Additionally, our recruitment strategies integrate strategic communication and change management, ensuring engaged stakeholders and exceptional recruitment outcomes