Assessing and Addressing the Fit of Planned Interventions to the Organizational Context

Although organizational interventions are generally recommended, there has been criticism of the lack of effectiveness of such interventions. This has led to researchers recommending the evaluation of processes of such interventions to understand what works for whom, why, how and in which circumstances. Process evaluation research has highlighted a number of factors that may go wrong during the intervention process. In this chapter we argue that organizational interventions may fail because researchers do not assess and address the fi t of the intervention to the organizational context and the individuals within the organization. To address these issues we present and discuss a model for C-I (context-intervention) and P-I (person- intervention) fi t and we suggest supportive initiatives that researchers may consider implementing at the early stages of intervention.