Chapter
Fourteen
Culture, Change,
And
Organization Development
Thomson South-Western
Wagner & Hollenbeck 5e
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Chapter Overview
 This chapter examines the following topics:
– Organization Culture
• Elements of Organization Culture
• Managing Organization Culture
– Change and Organization Development
• Resistance to Change
• Action Research
– Organization Development Interventions
•
•
•
•
Interpersonal Interventions
Group Interventions
Intergroup Interventions
Organizational Interventions
– Evaluating Change and Development
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Chapter Introduction
 Managing an
organization, as an
organization, is an
extremely complex task
 Managers must consider
and actively shape the
culture of norms, values,
and ways of thinking
that influence behavior
throughout the firm
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Organization Culture
 Every formal organization of prescribed
jobs and structural relationships includes
an informal organization characterized by
unofficial rules, procedures, and
interconnections
 An organization’s culture is an informal,
shared way of perceiving life and
membership in the organization that binds
members together and influences what
they think about themselves and their
work
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Organization Culture
 Organizational culture
fulfills four basic
functions:
– Gives members an
organizational identity
– Facilitates collective
commitment
– Promotes organizational
stability
– Helps members make sense
of their surroundings
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Elements of Organization
Culture
 Deep within the culture of every organization
is a collection of fundamental norms and
values that shapes members’ behaviors and
helps them understand the surrounding
organization
 Such fundamental norms and values serve as
the ultimate source of the shared perceptions,
thoughts, and feelings constituting the culture
of an organization
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Elements of Organization
Culture
 The fundamental norms – Rites: ceremonial activities
meant to send particular
and values are
messages or accomplish
expressed and passed
specific purposes
from one person to
• Rites of passage
another through surface
• Rites of degradation
elements such as:
• Rites of enhancement
– Ceremonies: special
• Rites of integration
events in which
– Rituals: ceremonial events
members of a company
that continually reinforces
key norms and values
celebrate the myths,
heroes, and symbols of – Stories: accounts of past
events with which all
their culture
employees are familiar and
that serve as reminders of
cultural values
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Elements of Organization
Culture
 Other surface elements
include:
– Myths: special type of story
that provides a fictional but
plausible explanation for an
event or thing that might
otherwise seem puzzling or
mysterious
– Heroes: people who
embody the values of an
organization and its culture
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Elements of Organization
Culture
 The final two surface
elements include:
– Symbols: objects, actions,
or events to which people
have assigned special
meanings
– Language: another means
of sharing cultural ideas
and understandings
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Managing Organization Culture
 Organizational culture grows out of informal,
unofficial ways of doing things
 Cultural norms and values provide social information,
which helps employees determine the meaning of their
work and the organization around them
 Many experts argue that organizational cultures can
be managed by using either of two approaches:
– Symbolic management: managers attempt to influence
deep cultural norms and values by shaping the surface
cultural elements that people use
– Organization development (OD) interventions:
contributes to cultural management by helping the
members of an organization progress through a series
of steps
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Change and Organization
Development
 Besides stimulating and
 OD is characterized by five
solidifying cultural
important features:
change, organization
– Emphasizes planned
development (OD) entails
change
the more general process
– Has a pronounced socialof planning,
psychological orientation
implementing, and
– Focuses primary attention
stabilizing the results of
on comprehensive change
any type of organizational
change
– Characterized by a longrange time orientation
 The OD field of research
specializes in developing
– Guided by a change agent
and assessing specific
or individual who serves as
interventions or change
both a catalyst for change
techniques
and a source of information
about the OD process
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Resistance to Change
 Change means to alter, vary, or
modify existing ways of thinking or
behaving
 Setting change in motion requires
identifying and overcoming sources
of resistance and encouraging and
strengthening sources of support
 Force field analysis is a diagnostic
method that diagrams the array of
forces acting for and against a
particular change in a graphic
analysis
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Resistance to Change
 There is no universal, fail-safe way to
overcome the resistant factors identified
in a force field analysis, but there are six,
most often used options, available:
–
–
–
–
–
–
Education and communication
Participation and involvement
Facilitation and support
Bargaining and negotiation
Hidden persuasion
Explicit and implicit coercion
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Action Research
 Organization development
is a structured, multi-step
process
 The action research model
is a detailed variation of
this process that promotes
adherence to the scientific
method and places
particular emphasis on
postchange evaluation
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Action Research
 The action research model depicts seven
stages, with the latter four forming a
recurrent cycle
– Problem identification
– Consultation
– Data gathering and provisional diagnosis
– Feedback to the client organization
– Joint diagnosis and action planning
– Activating the plan
– Post-action data gathering and evaluation
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Organization Development
Interventions
 The target of an OD
intervention is the aspect on
which an intervention focuses
 An intervention’s depth reflects
the degree or intensity of
change that the intervention is
designed to stimulate
– Shallow
– Deep
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Interpersonal Interventions
 Interpersonal interventions
focus on solving problems
with interpersonal relations
 Depending on the particular
intervention, the organization
may attempt to redefine
personal roles, clarify social
expectations, or strengthen
sensitivity to others’ needs
and interests
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Role Negotiation Technique
Sensitivity Training
 The role negotiation  As a deep interpersonal
intervention, sensitivity
technique (RNT), an
training focuses on
interpersonal
developing greater
intervention of
sensitivity to oneself, to
moderately shallow
others, and to one’s
depth, is intended to
relations with others
help people form
 Designed to promote
and maintain
emotional growth and
effective working
development, it
relationships
typically takes place in
a closed session away
from work
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Group Interventions
 Group interventions are
designed to solve problems
with group or team
performance and leadership
 In general, these
interventions focus on helping
the members of a group learn
how to work together to fulfill
the group’s task and
maintenance requirements
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Process Consultation
Team Development
 Process consultation is a
relatively shallow,
group-level OD
intervention
 In a process
consultation
intervention, a change
agent meets with a work
group and helps its
members examine
group processes such as
communication,
leadership and
followership, problemsolving, and cooperation
 Team development is a
deep, group-level
extension of
interpersonal sensitivity
training
 In a team development
intervention, a group of
people who work
together on a daily basis
meet over an extended
period of time to assess
and modify group
processes
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Intergroup Interventions
 Intergroup interventions
focus on solving many
intergroup problems
 In general, these
problems concern
conflict and associated
breakdowns in
intergroup coordination
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Third-Party Peacemaking
Intergroup Team Building
 Third-party peace making  Intergroup team building is
is a relatively shallow
a deep intervention that has
intervention in which a
three primary aims:
change agent seeks to
– To improve communication
resolve intergroup
and interaction between
misunderstandings by
work-related groups
encouraging
– To decrease
communication between
counterproductive
or among groups
competition between the
 The change agent is not a
groups
member of any of the
– To replace group-centered
groups and is referred to
perspectives with an
as a third party who
orientation that recognizes
guides the meeting
the necessity for various
between the groups
groups to work together
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Organizational Interventions
 Organizational interventions
are intended to deal with
structural and cultural
problems
 Some of these interventions are
directed at improving
communication and
coordination within the
organization
 Others focus on diagnosing
and strengthening relations
between the organization and
its external environment
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Survey Feedback
Open System Planning
 The main purpose of

survey feedback is to
stimulate information
sharing throughout the
entire organization;
planning and
implementing change are
of secondary importance 
 This technique is a
relatively shallow
organization-level
intervention
 The survey feedback
normally proceeds in

four stages
Open system planning is a
fairly deep, organizationlevel intervention that is
distinguished by its focus
on the organization as a
system open to its
surrounding environment
The primary purpose of
open system planning is to
help the members of an
organization devise ways
to accomplish their firm’s
mission
The intervention involves
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five steps
Evaluating Change and
Development
 No matter what type of
organization development
intervention is used, the
concluding stage of the
OD process always
consists of an evaluation
of the technique’s
effectiveness
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