Exploring your workplace personality.
What Is Organizational
Culture?Organizational culture has been
described as the personality of an organization, or
simply as ìhow things are done around here.î
Itís what guides how your employees think, act, and
feel in the workplace.
What Is Corporate
Culture?Corporate culture is a broad term
used to define the unique personality or character
of a particular company or organization, and
includes such elements as core values and
beliefs, corporate ethics, and rules of
behavior.
Culture is the environment that
surrounds you at work all of the time. Culture is a
powerful element that shapes your work enjoyment,
your work relationships, and your work processes.
But, culture is something that you cannot actually
see, except through its physical manifestations in
your work place.
Culture Is Like
Personality.In a person, the personality is
made up of the values, beliefs, underlying
assumptions, interests, experiences, upbringing, and
habits that form that personís behavior.
Culture is made up of the values, beliefs,
underlying assumptions, attitudes, and behaviors
shared by a group of people. Culture is the
behavior that results when a group arrives at a set
ofógenerally unspoken and unwrittenórules for
working together.
An organizationís culture is made up of all of the
life experiences each employee brings to the
organization.
Cultureógenerally created
unconsciouslyóis especially influenced by the
organizationís founder, executives, and other
managerial staff because of their roles in
decision-making and strategic
direction.
Culture is represented in a
groupís:
-
Language
- Decision-making
- Symbols
- Stories
and legends
- Daily work
practices
Something as simple as the
objects chosen to grace a desk tell you a lot about
how employees view and participate in your
organizationís culture. Your bulletin board
content, the company newsletter, the interaction of
employees in meetings, and the way in which people
collaborate, speak volumes about your organizational
culture.
Central Concepts About
Culture
Professors Ken Thompson (DePaul
University) and Fred Luthans (University of
Nebraska) highlight the following seven
characteristics of culture.
1. Culture =
Behavior. Culture is a word used to describe
the behaviors that represent the general operating
norms in your environment. Culture is not usually
defined as good or bad, although aspects of your
culture likely support your progress and success and
other aspects impede your progress.
A norm of
accountability will help make your organization
successful. A norm of spectacular customer service
will sell your products and engage your employees.
Tolerating poor performance or exhibiting a lack of
discipline to maintain established processes and
systems will impede your success.
2. Culture
Is Learned. People learn to perform certain
behaviors through either the rewards or negative
consequences that follow their behavior. When a
behavior is rewarded, it is repeated and the
association eventually becomes part of the culture.
A simple thank you from an executive for work
performed in a particular manner, molds the
culture.
3. Culture Is Learned Through
Interaction. Associates learn culture by
interacting with other associates. Most behaviors
and rewards in organizations involve other
employees. An applicant experiences a sense of your
culture, and his or her fit within your culture,
during the interview process. Initial opinions of
your culture can be formed as early as the first
phone call from the hiring executive or
representative from human resources.
4.
Sub-cultures Form Through Rewards. Employees
have many different wants and needs. Sometimes
workers value rewards that are not associated with
the behaviors desired by managers for the overall
company. This is often how sub-cultures are formed,
as people get social rewards from co-workers or have
their most important needs met in their departments
or project teams.
5. People Shape The
Culture. Personalities and experiences of
staffers create the culture of an organization. For
example, if most of the people in your organization
are very outgoing, the culture is likely to be open
and sociable. If many artifacts depicting the
companyís history and values are in evidence
throughout the company, people value their history
and culture. If doors are open, and few closed-door
meetings are held, the culture is unguarded. If
negativity about supervision and the company is
widespread and complained about by employees, a
culture of negativity, that is difficult to
overcome, will take hold.
6. Culture Is
Negotiated. One person cannot create a culture
alone. Employees must try to change the direction,
the work environment, the way work is performed, or
the manner in which decisions are made within the
general norms of the workplace.
Culture
change is a process of give and take by all members
of an organization. Formalizing strategic direction,
systems development, and establishing measurements
must be owned by the group responsible for them.
Otherwise, your people will not own them.
7. Culture Is Difficult To
Change. Culture change requires people to change
their behaviors. It is often difficult for people
to unlearn their old way of doing things, and to
start performing the new behaviors consistently.
Persistence, discipline, employee involvement,
kindness and understanding, organization development
work, and training can assist you to change a
culture.
More Characteristics Of
Culture
It is often interpreted
differently by diverse employees. Other events
in peopleís lives affect how they act and interact
at work too. Although an organization has a common
culture, each person may see that culture from a
different perspective. Whatís more, your employeesí
individual work experiences, departments, and teams
may view the culture differently.
Your
culture may be strong or weak. When your work
culture is strong, most people in the group agree on
the culture. When your work culture is weak, people
do not agree on the culture. Sometimes a weak
organizational culture can be the result of many
subcultures, or the shared values, assumptions, and
behaviors of a subset of the organization.
For
example, the culture of your company as a whole
might be weak and very difficult to characterize
because there are so many sub-cultures. Each
department or work cell may have its own culture.
Within departments, the staff and managers may each
have their own culture.
Ideally,
organizational culture supports a positive,
productive, environment. Happy employees are
not necessarily productive employees. Productive
employees are not necessarily happy employees. It
is important to find aspects of the culture that
will nurture, support, and help grow each of these
qualities for your team.
Now that you can
better visualize your organizational culture, you
may want to explore additional aspects of
organizational culture and cultural change. It
could mean greater success and profitability for
your organization.
Executive Search International