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ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE
With the passage of time, the concept of organizational culture has gained wide acceptance as
a way to understand human systems. The examination of organizational culture is also a
valuable analytical tool in its own right.

I would define Organisational culture as a pattern of shared basic assumptions that the group
solved as it solved it’s problems of external adaptation and internal integration that has
worked well enough to be considered valid and therefore to be taught to new members as the
correct way to perceive, think and feel relating to these problems.

As groups evolve over time, they face two basic challenges: integrating individuals into an
effective whole, and adapting effectively to the external environment in order to survive. As
groups find solutions to these problems over time, they engage in a kind of collective learning
that creates the set of shared assumptions and beliefs we call "culture."

We can also characterize culture as consisting of three levels. The most visible level is
behavior and artifacts. This is the observable level of culture, and consists of behavior
patterns and outward manifestations of culture: perquisites provided to executives, dress
codes, level of technology utilized (and where it is utilized), and the physical layout of work
spaces. All may be visible indicators of culture, but difficult to interpret. Artifacts and
behavior also may tell us what a group is doing, but not why.

At the next level of culture are values. Values underlie and to a large extent determine
behavior, but they are not directly observable, as behaviors are. There may be a difference
between stated and operating values. People will attribute their behavior to stated values.

To really understand culture, we have to get to the deepest level, the level of assumptions
and beliefs. The underlying assumptions grow out of values, until they become taken for
granted and drop out of awareness.

The four essential strengths of the organizational culture approach:

 It focuses attention on the human side of organizational life, and finds significance
and learning in even its most mundane aspects (for example, the setup in an empty
meeting room).
 It makes clear the importance of creating appropriate systems of shared meaning to
help people work together toward desired outcomes.
 It requires members—especially leaders—to acknowledge the impact of their
behavior on the organization’s culture.It proposes that people should ask themselves:
"What impact am I having on the social construction of reality in my organization?"
"What can I do to have a different and more positive impact?"
 It encourages the view that the perceived relationship between an organization and its
environment is also affected by the organization’s basic assumptions.

There have been reports where organisational culture change program focused on improving
the further productivity. The findings suggest that systematic and structured programs that
include specific organizational goals, performance measures, performance feedback
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mechanisms, and incentives yield enhancements of targeted organizational performances

which leads to an overall change in the organisational culture. On the basis of my
understanding Organizational culture can be defined as a set of processes that binds together
members of an organization based upon "the shared and relatively enduring pattern of basic
values, beliefs, and assumptions in an organization". Organizational culture allows an
organization to address ever changing problems and situations of adaptation to the external
environment and the internal integration of organizational resources, personnel, and policies
to support external adaptation. This is a basic pattern of assumptions which include
permutations and combinations devolped by the organisational group to learn and cope up
with the various situations that an organisation goes through in their day to day activities.
This gives an idea to other members of the organisation on how to think and act to various
situations and problems. The most poignant awareness of organizational culture usually arises
when we perhaps inadvertently transgress some cultural code, norm, or belief even though
culture is conveyed to us on an almost daily basis by organizational policies, standard
operating procedures, organizational stories, and organizational ceremonies. Cultural
awareness can be enhanced by systematic study of the culture and the organizational learning
processes supporting the formation, maintenance, and modifications of the culture. Such an
awareness can facilitate systematic changes of organizational behavior which can lead to
enhancements of a variety of organizational performances such as group productivity,
collective efficiencies, and a sense of belonging and community. To change systematically
organization-wide behaviors, values, and beliefs shared by many diverse members of the
organization, the focus needs to be upon systemic dynamics, that is, organizational culture. In
general, a cultural change program is most likely appropriate if the problems confronting an
organization are widespread, chronic, and have resisted prior focused interventions aimed at
one or two units within the organization. Without first understanding and then changing
organizational culture and learning strategies, organizations can remain stuck despite the use
of focused and unrelated rather than shared interventions which span organizational units and
key individuals. There is growing evidence that changing an organizational culture involves
changing organizational learning strategies.

Organizations consist of subgroups that have specific characteristics and a sense of

identification. Within organizations, people can easily classify themselves and others into
various social categories or groups based on identification with their primary work group,
occupational or professional skills, union membership, or age cohort. (Ouchi 1980, and
Ashforth and Mael 1989). Subgroups in organizations can and do create subcultures that
comprise specific networks of meaning; yet, at the same time, they remain associated with the
ideologies and values of the organization's leadership. For example, at a macro level the
culture that is attributed to the Department of Defense comprises the distinct cultures of the
different military services and the corps of civil servants assigned to each service agency
(Builder 1989). A closer examination of each service culture reveals still greater cultural
differentiation among occupational specialties, specific units within the service, and between
line and staff personnel. Yet all of these subcultures adhere to the core ideologies, values and
norms of the DOD.

Numerous studies of organizational culture have highlighted that the formation and
maintenance of culture requires interpersonal interaction within subgroups. For example,
research led by Meryl Louis (Louis, Posner, and Powell 1983) demonstrated the benefits of
subgroup interaction to newcomers "learning the ropes" of the jobs. Survey respondents in
their first job experience reported that the three most important socialization aids were:
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 Interaction with peers

 Interaction with their supervisor
 Interaction with senior co-workers.

The organisational culture is divided into four types actually.The properties and framework
for each are very much different. The different types are:-

Clan Culture:- This is a culture which is employee focussed. This Culture has an internal
focus and it give more value to flexibity rather than stability and control. This type gives high
importance to job satisfaction and commitment through employee involvement. They give
very high importance for inplant training and devolpment of their employees.

Adhocracy Culture:- This type of culture has an external focus and values flexibity. It gives
encouragement to the employees for innovation and experimentation. These are the type of
employees which goes through constant change. Research and devolpment form a major
component of their organisation.

Market Culture:- Market Culture has a strong external focus and gives lot of value to
flexibility rather than stability and control. In this type of organisation turnover and profits
are of big priority rather than employee satisfaction and employee devolpment. Such kind of
organisations are driven by their goals and to dliver results.

Hierarchy Culture:- It has an internal focus and values stability and control over flexibility.
These are very strict organisations which are driven by set rules and principles. The
Effectivness in such kind of Company is measured by efficiency, timeliness and reliability of
delivering goods and services.

Because culture is so deeply rooted in an organization’s history and collective experience,

working to change it requires a major investment of time and resources. Help from a change
agent outside the system is often advisable. Without such help, it is difficult for insiders to
view their "reality" as something they’ve constructed, and to see meaning in things they
normally take for granted.

An understanding of culture, and how to transform it, is a crucial skill for leaders trying to
achieve strategic outcomes. Strategic leaders have the best perspective, because of their
position in the organization, to see the dynamics of the culture, what should remain, and what
needs transformation. This is the essence of strategic success.
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SOCIALIZATION
Organizational socialization refers to the process by which an individual acquires the
attitudes, behavior and knowledge needed to participate as an organizational member.
Examining the socialization process that is conducive to effective socialization has important
theoretical and practical implications for organizations to reduce newcomer turnovers, and for
both individuals and organizations to adapt to the increasing mobility of the workplace.
Based on the interactionist perspective of both organizational and newcomer influence, a
great deal of research has been conducted to understand the socialization process in three
ways. First, researchers take an organizational perspective to examine the influence of
organizational structures and processes (e.g. organizational socialization tactics and job
characteristics). Second, researchers take an individualistic perspective to examine newcomer
attributes (e.g., work experience andpersonality) and newcomer proactivity (e.g., information
seeking). Third, a few researchers also take the traditional person-by-situation interaction
perspective to examine the interaction of organizational and newcomer factors . An implicit
assumption underlying the interactionist perspective is that both organizational and
newcomer factors enable newcomers to make social interactions and build relationships with
organizational insiders (e.g., supervisors and peers), which, in turn, are conducive to effective
newcomer socialization in the socialization process. Two socialization factors in particular –
organizational tactics and newcomer proactivity – have been identified as playing a
significant role in the newcomer socialization process

REFERENCES

BOOKS

1. ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR BY ROBERT KREITNER AND ANGELO KINCIKI

2. ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR BY
 STEPHEN P. ROBBINS
 TIMOTHY A. JUDGE
 SEEMA SANGHI
3. UNDERSTANDING ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR BY UDAI PAREEK
4. CHANGING ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE: CULTURE CHANGE IN WORK
PROGRESS- BY MATS ALVESSON STEFAN SEVINGSSON

JOURNALS
1. MENTORING AT WORK: DEVOLPMENT RELATIONSHIPS IN
ORGANIZATIONAL LIFE
2. THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
Vol. 20, No. 3, March 2009, 654–675
3. MCCULLUM ,PASSING THE BATON, KENYASOURCE : OFFICEPRO;
JUL2010, VOL.70 ,ISSUE 4, P16-19
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4. NEW TURNS IN ORGANIZATIONAL SOCIALIZATION : HAVARD BUSINESS

REVIEW
5. RESPONDING TO ORGANIZATIONAL IDENTITY THREATS: EXPLORING
THE ROLE OF ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE, ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT
JOURNAL, 2006, VOL. 49, NO. 3, P 433–458.