To What Extent Do You Think It Is Possible for Leaders to Manipulate Organisational Culture to Achieve Improved Performance?

Organisational culture can be acknowledged as the organisations personality; which is also referred to as corporate culture. Organisational culture is defined as the process of how things are dealt with within an organisation on a daily basis, affecting the employees and how they work, how they are relating to each other, to the customers and also their managers. Deal and Kennedy defined organisational culture as ‘the way we do things around here’ and Hofstede said it is ‘how people behave when no one is watching’ and ‘the collective programming of the mind’ (Deal and Kennedy 1982, Hofstede 2001).

Culture can be defined as “a set of basic tacit assumptions about how the world is and ought to be that a group of people share and that determines their perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and, to some degree, their overt behaviour” (Schein, 1996). Organizational culture is depend on differences in norms and shared values which are learned in workplace and to direct behaviour of members in the particular organisation. (Cabrera, Cabrera& Barajas 2001) Organisational culture was built on its shared beliefs and values which was the guidance to solve problems.

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,

Organisational culture describes the values, beliefs and behaviours which provide norms for the environment of an organisation (Anon., 2012). The culture of an organisation sets out to provide structure for employees within a business and often culture shows to be a strong factor in certain organisations. Edgar Schein, a culture theorist explains that the definition of organizational culture must be general otherwise factors may be eliminated which may contribute to culture within a business. (Anon., 2007). Culture impacts on the working procedures in which a business performs and effects the way in which the organisation is run on a daily basis.

Within organizations, large and small, there exists a sense of identity among its members that separates it from other organizations. This sense of identity is known as organizational culture. All over, managers seek to influence and change this into something that can be beneficial for the organization. In his article, “The Six Levers for Managing Organizational Culture”, Professor David W. Young defines the different elements that can influence and change the culture within the organization and how the reader can use these “levers” to their advantage. While the author does present a decent explanation for changing the culture of an organization, he leaves many questions unanswered that leaves his argument incomplete.

There are many definitions of organisational culture available in the literature, many of which are based on the fact that culture consists of values, beliefs, and assumptions shared by the majority of members of an organisation. These characteristics and shared views are then translated into common and repeated patterns of behaviour. Although it is difficult to come up with a single definition that would cover

Within the field of management, the success and failure of the modern business organisation has been largely depicted by the intricate concept of culture. Organisational culture, a concept borrowed from borrowed mostly from anthropology typically is defined as a complex set of values, beliefs, assumptions and symbols that define the way in which an organisation conducts and manages its business (Barney 1986). Management is not just an act of change, but the responsibility for and control of a company or similar organisation (Willmott 1983). It is the management of organisational culture that merely drives the

Organisational culture refers to ‘the shared beliefs and values guiding the thinking and behavioural styles of members’ (Cooke and Rousseau, 1988, in Bratton 2010: 334), indicating that employees who accept the common values of an organisation and put great effort on commitments are likely to build up a strong culture to an organisation.

It is clear that the actions or inaction by management can have a great impact on organizational culture. Managers need to learn to be effective leaders so that they can share their vision, and motivate their workers to enhance

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.

The business dictionary (Business Dictionary 2014) defines organisational culture as the ‘values and behaviours that contribute to the unique social and psychological environment of an organization’. An organisation's culture is important in ensuring that the performance of the business meets or exceeds the expectations of all aspects of their business, from management to the wider community as a whole. The culture dictates the ways employees interact and brings all the employees on a common platform to extract the best of each member. An organisations culture should be in line with the predefined goals, visions and values outlined in the mission statement.

Organisational culture has been widely researched over the years because of the important benefits that arise from a strong culture in aiding organisations to succeed and grow. Understanding how to ‘build, maintain or modify an organisation 's culture ' (McAleese, D & Hargie, O. 2004 p.155) is essential to achieving a competitive advantage as organisations can have a direct influence on attitudes and behaviours of the employees within an organisation. (Robbins, Millett, Cacioppe & Waters-Marsh, 2001)

Just like people do, every organisation has its own personality; we refer to it as its culture. Even if it’s not visible, organisational culture is what shapes the behaviour of the people working in a company. Tichy (1982) said that organizational culture

Culture is widely understood to be made up of a collection of fundamental values and belief systems which give meaning to organisations (Pettigrew, 1979;Schein, 1985; Sackmann, 1991; Hatch, 1993) The theory of organizational culture maintains that individual behaviour within an organization. Organizational culture can be found at every level of an organization, and since

1b) Organisational culture is its personality. Or ‘Culture is a popular explanatory concept frequently used to describe a company, a rationale for people’s behaviour, a guideline for action, a cause for condemnation or praise, or a quality that mistakes a company ‘what it is’ (Kunda, 1992).’ (Wilson F. M., 2010). Each organisation has unique culture that impact in that way organisation operates. Types of culture: Power culture – centralisation of power is the key function and there is a central power source and influence spread out from centre. ‘Ford’ organisation was regarded to be the most representative of power culture. Role culture – typical bureaucratic organisation, which is divided onto layers of offices and officials. This type organisation can be arranged following to functions of marketing, human relations, finance, etc. Task culture – is job or project oriented and is placed for completing a specific task. Team culture very well determines in the task way in which the work is organised. Bringing 2