Literature Review On Organizational Culture

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.

The organizational culture can encourage or discourage effectiveness, depending on the nature of the values, beliefs, and norms” (Ivancevich, Konopaske, & Matteson, 2011). Organizational culture can be very friendly, very task oriented, competitive or driven to be highly productive or it can be disorganized and unproductive. The culture is based on the history of the company and the atmosphere that is created and nurtured over time. This culture guides the language the employees use their loyalty and many more areas. Organizational culture is an important social characteristic that influences organizations, group, and individual behavior with in a company (Hartnell, Ou, & Kinicki, 2011). The Culture of an organization affects the way people behave, how they address customers, the atmosphere, perception, values, and beliefs. Employee’s performance and effectiveness can also be determined by an organization’s culture. Every organization has its own culture based on shared expectations, values and attitudes and its influence on individuals and groups (Ivancevich et al., 2011). People inside of an organization have a big effect on the culture because of their values, beliefs, and ideology. Companies try to hire people who have the same values as the company so that they will fit into the organization. People stay with organizations that have a

According to Robbins and Judge, organizational culture is, “a system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organizations” (Robbins 249). A strong organizational culture is one whose organization’s core values are both intensely held and widely shared. After viewing Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, it is obvious that Enron had not only an organizational culture that was strong, but one that was extreme and aggressive. This aggressive and strong organizational culture discouraged both teamwork and ethical behavior and in the end it only plagued Enron until it eventually collapsed under its downfall.

Organizational culture comprises the fundamental values, assumptions, and beliefs held in common by members of an organization (O’Hagan, & Persaud, 2009). What is known is that employees often impart the organizational culture to their colleagues whereupon the culture effects how employees relate to one another and their work environment. What can be said is that the development of an organization’s culture is dependent on elements such as structure, change and policies (Urrabazo, 2006). Furthermore, according to Griffin, Moorhead and Gregory (2009), it is recognized that employee’s behaviours and attitudes can be influenced in a

Background Organizational Culture Organizational culture is a way to describe the collective behavior within an organization, the values, norms, language, symbols, status, and beliefs and habits. We can also view organizational behavior as the collection of behaviors within an organization that cause those members to perceive their organization and others. In fact, organizational culture affects the way individuals and groups interact with each other, clients, stakeholders and the public Because people are so individualistic, it would stand to reason that each organization would have a unique culture, or even group of cultures based on location or department/focus (Tatum, 2010).

Culture effects performance! Each structural culture operates differently; in order for them to properly function they must combine their processes. These processes would include management styles, pay structures, capacity to communicate, compromise, understanding and accepting different cultures, conforming to meet planned goals, the ability to maintain and meet a new combined culture and working structures. An organizational culture’s effectiveness is determined by: coherence, persuasive and depth, and adaptability to

These subcultures provide a method of informal socialization “that no reasonable amount of formal training can provide.” (Volti, 2008) In most cases, these subcultures “mesh quite well with the dominant organizational culture because their goals and values parallel those of management.” (Volti, 2008) However, as stated, this is an organization in transition and there is the potential for countercultures to arise due to the ambiguity of what the behaviors, values, and norms of the new leadership’s culture will be. “Schein contends that many of the problems confronting leaders can be traced to their inability to analyze and evaluate organizational cultures.” (National Defense University, Undated) As this new group of leaders begins to set strategic direction for the next generation of this organization, they must acknowledge, “Difficulties with organizational transformations arise from failures to analyze an organization’s existing culture.” (National Defense University, Undated) For this organization to be successful, leaders will need to “correctly analyze the organization’s existing culture, and evaluate it against the cultural attributes needed to achieve strategic objectives.” (National Defense University, Undated)

In addition to having implications for organizational performance, organizational culture is an effective control mechanism for dictating employee behavior. Culture is in fact a more powerful way of controlling and managing employee behaviors than organizational rules and regulations. When the company’s environment. To the extent shared values are proper for the company in question, company performance may benefit from culture.[5]

Depending upon the strengths of the organization, the culture followed in the organization can have a pervasive impact on the effectiveness of the organization. Employees belonging

In order for an organization to be most effect they have to look internally at their organizational behavior and assess what is most important to them and creates a culture surrounded by the value and beliefs of the leadership employees and customers. In order to better do that one must look at the importance of its employees and how they feel about the company directly affects the productivity and performance therefore becoming human capital. In addition to including the employees into decision making regarding events that affect them and the company. Furthermore, the structure of the culture set by management dictates directly the success of implementing the values the company and its employees hold. At time organizations find they fall of the path of direction in which they want to set the culture so changes have to be made throughout the organization in order to improve and restructure to meet the new values of the company.

A strong organizational culture provides both the company and its employees with direction and stability. The culture within an organization can be powerful enough to effect employee attitude and behavior as well as performance and turnover ratio. According to many scientific studies, there are seven primary characteristics used to define the culture of an organization: innovation and risk taking, outcome orientation, people orientation, team orientation, aggressiveness and stability.

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.

The term “Organization Culture” refers to the value and behaviors that contribute to the unique social and psychological environment of an organization. Organization culture that includes the organization expectation, experiences and values that hold together and expressed its self-image, working, interaction with the other country and future expectation. Based on shared attitudes, beliefs, customs and written and unwritten the rules that have been develop over time and are considered valid. It also called corporate culture and it’s shown in the ways the organization conduct its business, treat the employees and wider the community. Other than that, freedom is allowed in decision making that develop the new ideas

An example of positive corporate culture increasing performance is Southwest Airlines. Sadri & Lee (2001:857) provides this statement “CEO and co-founder Herb Kelleher...encourages employees to be very informal and have fun at their jobs...Kelleher fosters this type of culture by engaging in unusual acts, such as arriving at shareholder meetings on a motorcycle wearing jeans and a t-shirt, or holding a 2a.m. barbeque for the company’s mechanics who work the night shift (Donlon, 1999)...Kelleher also strives to value Southwest’s employees, acknowledging births, deaths, marriages, and other events in their lives by a note or card. Employees are encouraged to pitch in where needed, a fact that is evident in airports where pilots are often seen checking passengers, for example. This