Intercultural Organisational Development

This paper traces the journey that a major, mainstream non-government organisation working with disadvantaged children, young people and families in Australia-has taken with local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. The shared journey has been travelled using an inter-cultural organisational development approach which recognised the desire of all travelers to attain Social Justice for, and strengthen the accessibility, relevance and delivery of services to, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The paper explores the approaches the organisation used to: (1) improve the recruitment and retention processes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff and the accessibility of existing services; and (2) design new services which better match local community needs and cultural issues. The research examined, on a Meta level, the: existing structures, process and tasks-providing a description of what was the case from the point of view of the organisation and those at the receiving end of the services and then discussing what ought to be the case from the point of both the organisation and those at the receiving end of the services. The paper also explores the impact at an organisational level of changes to Australian public policy settings which effect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and the challenge of developing genuinely inclusive and consultative relationships in an increasingly 'top down', non-participatory public policy environment. Qualitative research methods were used including participatory action learning, autoethnography and the critical analysis of secondary data.