preview

Defining Organizational Culture : An Organization

Better Essays
Open Document
Defining Organizational Culture
With numerous meanings given to organizational culture, scholars claim that the field is grounded in the shared assumptions, attitudes, and behaviors accepted and enacted by employees within an organization, which affect its performance and overall welfare (Belias & Koustelios, 2014). Another widespread definition of organizational communication often used by organizational scholars states that: “Organizational culture is the pattern of basic assumptions that a group has invented, or discovered in learning to cope with its problems of external adaptation and internal integration, and that have worked well enough to be considered valid and, therefore, to be taught to new members as the correct way to perceive, think, and feel in relation to those problems” (Schein, 2004, p.3). A simpler definition of organizational culture claims that the culture of an organization is the study of specific systems of meaning within an organizational setting (Gabriel, 2010).
Tharp (2009) explains how most definitions of organizational culture include the concept of shared meaning, which shows that organizational culture can only be developed within groups. Secondly, organizational culture is socially constructed according to the location of the organization, its history, the working environment, and certain events that surround it (Tharp, 2009). Finally, most definitions claim that organizational culture is multidimensional and involves both cognitive and
Get Access
Related
Get Access