Internal Consultancy, Team and Institutional Development (Report No. 91).

This paper presents examples from 10 internal consultancies provided by the author within the Open University (United Kingdom) that reveal how teams develop and are integrated into the systems of a complex institution. These consultancies included: providing consulting services to a course team; counseling with a course team chair; serving as a participant-observer with staff in summer schools; interviewing learners in summer schools; evaluating the impact of new technology on staff; conducting a workshop for staff on group dynamics; providing consulting services to the Centre for Mathematics Education team; analyzing group dynamics in a video about learning and teaching mathematics; confidential counseling of team members; and providing consulting services to a course team on child development. The paper concludes that consultancy for organizational learning depends on an awareness of the mental models in use. The consultancies enabled the consultants to realize that transitions to higher levels of integration--individual, team and institution--is a social expression of mental development. The impact of a distance environment on staff and learners is noted and the provision of some face to face contact is urged. An appendix is included. (Contains 16 references.) (Author/CK)