# Presentation: 062458

## What is a force-field analysis?

- Force-field analysis is a problem-solving tool that is used to identify the reasons (“forces”) that support two positions to a question and the strength of each force.  For example, force-field analysis could be sued by a team to answer the question, “Should ABC Inc. establish an office in Singapore?”

**How is a force-field analysis conducted?**
- The following steps are followed to conduct a force-field analysis:
- State the question that is to be answered.  Make sure that all participants agree on how the question is posed.  It needs to be worded so that there are only two acceptable responses.
- Use a flip chart or a blackboard and label one side of the paper or board as one of the acceptable responses, in this case “Yes,” and label the other side as the other acceptable response, in this case “No.”  See sample chart.
- Should ABC establish an office in Singapore?

- 3.	Following the rules of brainstorming, have the team provide as many reasons as possible for *each* of the responses.  As with any brainstorming session, no answer should be ignored and no critique is permitted during the brainstorming session.  After this session, the team’s force field might look like the following chart:

| Yes | No |
| --- | --- |
|  |  |

- Adapted from *Practicing Organization Development*

**Exhibit 6-5: Conducting a Force-Field Analysis**

## Should ABC establish an office in Singapore?

| Yes | No |
| --- | --- |
| High demand
Too far from Japan
Stable economy
Lack of competition
College graduates available to work for ABC
Business plan shows high potential profit | No existing customers
Travel costs too great
Too much investment
No employees are culturally aware
Japan can cover
Dictatorship |

- Once the team can provide no new information to the brainstorming session, the items provided should be reviewed for clarification, duplication, and so on.  Items should be reworded, if necessary, for clarification.
- The next step is to identify how strong a force each item is.  There are many ways to do this.  One simple way is to treat each item with a five-point Likert scale.  The facilitator may handle this process in the following manner:
- “if you believe that the statement I read is a very strong argument for establishing an office in Singapore, hold up five fingers.  If you believe that is a very weak argument for the position, hold up only one finger.  How strong an argument do you think ‘High demand’ is?”

- The facilitator will then do a quick scan of the group and count the participants’ responses.  This number is then written on the chart.  See sample chart on the following page.

**Exhibit 6-5: Conducting a Force-Field Analysis (continued)**

## 6.	Items that are perceived to be low in interest should be eliminated from the chart.  In the sample chart above, items with a 1 or 2 would be removed.  See sample chart below.

| Yes | No |
| --- | --- |
| 5 High demand
3 Too far from Japan
4 Stable economy
2 Lack of competition
2 College graduates available to work for ABC
5 Business plan shows high potential profit | 1 No existing customers
2 Travel costs too great
5 Too much investment
2 No employees are culturally aware
5 Japan can cover
3 Dictatorship |

- 6.	Items that are perceived to be low in interest should be eliminated from the chart.  In the sample chart above, items with a 1 or 2 would be removed.  See sample chart below.

- Should ABC establish an office in Singapore?

| Yes | No |
| --- | --- |
| 5 High demand
3 Too far from Japan
4 Stable economy
5 Business plan shows high potential profit | 5 Too much investment
5 Japan can cover
3 Dictatorship |

- 7.	Given the arguments that remain, participants would try to decide the question.

**Exhibit 6-5: Conducting a Force-Field Analysis** **(continued)**