ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE AND
CLIMATE
George Mwika Kayange
What is Organizational Culture?
• A system of meaning shared by the
organization’s members
• Cultural values are collective beliefs,
assumptions, and feelings about what
things are good, normal, rational, valuable,
etc.
Culture’s Overall Function
• Culture is the social glue that
helps hold an organization
together
by
providing
appropriate standards for
what employees should say
or do.
Elements of Organizational Culture
Artifacts
•
•
•
•
Stories/legends
Rituals/ceremonies
Organizational language
Physical structures/décor
Visible
Shared values
• Conscious beliefs
• Evaluate what is good or bad, right or
wrong
Invisible
(below the surface)
Shared assumptions
• Unconscious, taken-for-granted
perceptions or beliefs
• Mental models of ideals
Stories
Rituals
How Employees
Learn Culture/
How it is “reinforced”
Language
Material
Symbols
How Organizational
Cultures Form
Top
Management
Philosophy
of the
Organization’s
Founders
Organizational
Culture
Selection
Socialization
The Culture Iceberg: 90% hidden
Observable symbols,
ceremonies, slogans,
stories, dress,
physical settings,
decoration, etc.
Values, beliefs,
norms, customs,
nonverbal behavior,
etc.
Shorter,
easier to
change
Level of
conscious
awareness
Long term,
difficult to
change
Do Organizations Have Uniform
Cultures
Dominant
Culture
Subcultures
Core
Values
Benefits of Strong Corporate Cultures
Social
Control
Strong
Organizational
Culture
Social
Glue
Improves
Sense-Making
Contingencies of Org Culture &
Performance
Strong organizational cultures do not always result in
higher organizational performance because:
1.
Culture content might be misaligned with the
organization’s environment.
2.
Strong cultures may focus on mental models that could
be limiting
3.
Strong cultures suppress dissenting values from
subcultures.
Adaptive Organizational Cultures
• External focus -- firm’s success depends on
continuous change
• Focus on processes more than goals
• Employees assume responsibility for org
performance
– They seek out opportunities
• Proactive and responsive
Strengthening Organizational Culture
Bicultural Audit
• Part of due diligence in merger
• Minimizes risk of cultural collision by diagnosing
companies before merger
• Three steps in bicultural audit:
1. Examine artifacts
2. Analyze data for cultural conflict/compatibility
3. Identify strategies and action plans to bridge cultures
Merging Organizational Cultures
Assimilation
Acquired company embraces acquiring
firm’s cultural values
Deculturation
Acquiring firm imposes its culture on
unwilling acquired firm
Integration
Cultures combined into a new composite
culture
Separation
Merging companies remain separate with
their own culture
Org. Culture Vs Org. Climate
• Culture refers to ideologies, values and norms
as reflected in stories and symbols. We would
look for clues to the culture, for example, in
accounts of the organizations founding.
• Climate, on the other hand, refers to the
psychological environment as reflected in
attitudes and perceptions.
Climate Debate
Organizational Climate is a relatively enduring quality of the
internal environment of an organization that
a- is experienced by its members
b- influences their behavior
c- can be described in terms of the values of a particular set
of characteristics of the organization
Elements of Climate
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Quality of Leadership
Amount of Trust
Communication, upward and downward
Feeling of useful work
Responsibility
Fair rewards
Reasonable job pressure
Opportunity
Reasonable controls, structure, and bureaucracy
Employee involvement, participation.
Climate Influences
Motivation
Performance
Satisfaction
Thank You