Comparison of Google and Apple corporate culture

“Culture consists of the symbols, rituals, language, and social dramas that highlight organizational life, including myths, stories, and jargon. It includes the shared meanings associated with the symbols, rituals, and language. Culture combines the philosophy of the firm with beliefs, expectations, and values shared by members. It contains the stories and myths about the company's founder and its current leading figures. Organizational culture consists of a set of shared meanings and values held by a set of members in an organization that distinguish the organization from other organizations. An organization's culture determines how it perceives and reacts to the larger environment (Becker, 1982; Schein, 1996). Culture determines the nature

In this essay about managing culture in the post-bureaucratic era, I am going to argue how the practices of managing culture have changed in this era and how they differentiate oneself from the bureaucratic era. Furthermore I describe the cultural influences especially in organizations and how the importance of those influences changed over the time. In the first section I am going to explain the content of managing organization culture to get a first insight in the topic and to express the knowledge about the influences of the culture in an organization. In the next chapter I separate between two perspectives of the cultural organizations and explain which of the both are relevant for the assignment question. The next step of my

The organization culture as a leadership concept has been identified as one of the many components that leaders can use to grow a dynamic organization. Leadership in organizations starts the culture formation process by imposing their assumptions and expectations on their followers. Once culture is established and accepted, they become a strong leadership tool to communicate the leader 's beliefs and values to organizational members, and especially new comers. When leaders promote ethical culture, they become successful in maintaining organizational growth, the good services demanded by the society, the ability to address problems before they become disasters and consequently are competitive against rivals. The leader 's success will depend to a large extent, on his knowledge and understanding of the organizational culture. The leader who understands his organizational culture and takes it seriously is capable of predicting the outcome of his decisions in preventing any anticipated consequences. What then is organizational culture? The concept of organizational culture has been defined from many perspectives in the literature. There is no one single definition for organizational culture. The topic of organizational culture has been studied from many perspectives and disciplines, such as anthropology, sociology, organizational behavior, and organizational leadership to name a few. Deal defines organizational culture as values,

Cultural organization is unique and configures their norms, beliefs, values, and behavioral characteristics into the individual and groups that unite to get things accomplished. Patterns begin to evolve and become a rule of basic assumption; whether it is a new idea, one recently discovered or under development by a certain group as they learn to cope with internal integration and external adaptation problems. Cultural characteristics are hard to define because culture is multi-dimensional with integrated components that intertwine at different levels and ever-changing which takes time to establish and therefore time to change it also. Culture becomes the fabric or social glue that unites its participants, this will counteract any processes that are different becomes an unavoidable side-effect of life in an organization. Mutual understandings and a shared system of meanings becomes the basis of communication in a cultural organization. Functions of a society need to be fulfilled with a certain amount of satisfaction or culture can impede the efficiency of that organization. Problems with this concept arise when trying to categorize culture or when, why, or how corporate culture should be changed or finding the best, healthiest or most desirable one.

In the 1980’s business experts began to realize the root to organizational success or failure is through its culture. The culture of an organization is the belief that guides each employee in knowing what to do and what not to do and it also affect the public perception of the organization’s brand. Therefore culture is the shared social knowledge within an organization regarding the rules, norms and values (Colquitt, Lepine, & Wesson, 2012). Although, no two cultures are alike, there are components and characteristics that help business experts to define an organization’s culture.

This is an analysis of the culture at IBM and the impact that it has had on their success. Corporate culture is significant in that it “influences the behavior of everyone within an organization and, if carefully crafted, can have a significant positive effect on organizational success” (Certo and Certo, 2006, p. 423). Louis Gerstner proved this at IBM during his tenure from 1993 to 2002 when he revived IBM by refocusing on their culture.

It is interesting to understand while organizations attempt to implement new ideas within them, it is discovered the critical role that culture and subcultures play in implementing them. According to Huczynski et al, 2007, the factors affecting company performance are many and varied; isolating the contribution of culture is difficult if not possible and it is in the interests of both management consultants and managers to maintain that “cultures makes a difference”. Thompson P & McHugh D (2002), are of the view that strong cultures not only exist but are also the reason for better or even excellent company performance.

Google is a publically owned company and the shares of Class A common stock are listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market LLC under the symbol GOOG (Yahoo Inc., 2012). Google’s Class B common stock is not publicly traded. Google’s initial public offering was on August 18, 2004 at a price of $85 per share. As of March 15, 2012, Google shares are

As years pass by and generation after generation of Americans age, each generation can look back to their time in this world and identify examples of true greatness, greatness that has left an indelible mark on their memory of days past. Whether that mark is made by a person, like Thomas Edison, an event like the Cuban Missile Crisis, or a moment in time like the celebration of a millennia’s end as another begins, each mark becomes an icon representing that generation’s impact on the world at large. In rare instances, however, will a generation look back on their time and identify a company as not just an iconic example of corporate success, but an example of a company that exemplifies that greatness of a generation. Although history has yet to be written, Google has ushered in a new way life for its employees, a new standard for corporate culture, and an organizational design that eliminates the term, “work” from its lexicon as it stands ready to become an icon for this generation (Airey, 2013).

Organisational culture shared among all the members, with its values, principles, traditions and methods of working. It determines how an organisation functions, from industry side to individually. It could be an important asset which, if not managed well, can be a critical liability for the organisation. While a healthy and positive organisational culture could increase relationship between employees and employer, and together achieve the maximum performance for the company, a deleterious culture would lead to the downfall of the organisation, and eventually collapse. It is an advantage that requires good management skill, coordination and communication in order for the organisation to utilize it well. Beaudan and Smith (2000) at Ivey Business Journal stated that corporate cultures are mature and complex organisms. One must carefully and smartly shape the culture, and it is wise to nurture corporate culture as an asset, rather than a risk and liability. This essay explains both beneficial and negative sides of organisational culture, along with case studies supported.

Organisations with strong cultures are often more effective because they are coherent, well-coordinated and integrated. Employee’s behaviour is based on values that have been well structured and clearly defined with the managers being able to have the skills to implement them. Culture also tends to bring out healthy competition within a workplace. An example of this would be Google (Google, 2014) who ‘strive to maintain the open culture often associated with start-up companies, in which everyone is a hands-on contributor and feels comfortable sharing ideas and opinions’. Their offices and work areas are designed to encourage interactions between the employees within and across teams, leading to open communication. They actively encourage direct communication with upper management and the CEO’s,

The main focus of this paper is to analyze the organizational culture of this company, by doing so, I will point out the different features, the rules and norms, beliefs and philosophies and the systems implemented by the management team through the processes of communication among employees, stockholders, providers, costumers, etc. and other processes like production and commercialization that are essential to produce the best products at a low cost, put them in the best market and obtain the best results for the company.

Reading the case study “Google’s HR Dilemma” by Mridu Verma, we have gained some knowledge about Google’s success story.

Apple’s organizational culture brings challenges because of the emphasis on secrecy and the moderate degree of combativeness. An atmosphere of secrecy limits rapport among workers. Also, the moderate combativeness that still exists in the firm today has the disadvantage of limiting the morale of some employees. These issues indicate that Apple’s organizational culture has room for major improvements to strengthen the firm’s human resource capabilities.

In the year 1976, it was a dream for most people to buy a computer for their homes. Back then the computer community added up to a few brainy hobbyists. So when Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs sold a van and two programmable calculators for thirteen hundred dollars and started Apple Computers, Inc., in Jobs garage, the reach for success seemed far. But these two young business men, Wozniak 26 years old and Jobs 21 years old, had a vision. Computers aren't for nerds anymore, they announced. Computers are going to be the bicycle of the mind. Low cost computers for everyone. From the first day on the founders of Apple kept their vision intact and they spoke it at every turn. They only hired people into the