Organizational Culture

Culture as Organizational Personality

Organizational culture has been referred to as an organization's psychological assets. It can be viewed as holistic (or more than the sum of its parts), historically determined (a collection of rituals and symbols), socially constructed (or created and preserved by the group who form it), and difficult to change. A culture contains patterns of assumptions that lead to behaviors that work for the organization. Many of these assumptions are underlying, unquestioned, forgotten, and may, for the most part, be unconscious to organization members. Even so, these collective beliefs shape organizational behavior. Therefore, people's actions and preferences may not always be their own, but, rather, are largely influenced by socialization processes based in the culture or subcultures of the organization to which they belong. Behaviors are controlled by the beliefs, norms, values, and assumptions rather than being restrained by formal rules, authority, and the norms of rational behavior. As a result, an organization's “personality” may be more important to performance and motivation than the exercise of rewards and sanctions.

Constructing Organizational Culture

An integrative framework for understanding organizational culture is often constructed to depict three layers of organizational interaction. The outermost layer, and the most visible, consists of cultural symbols and artifacts, such as the language used (jargon), ceremonies, stories, rewards, symbols displayed, heroes remembered, and history recalled. Heroes, real or imagined, [Page 641]alive or dead, often serve as models for behavior. Also included are the visible organization structures and processes. The middle layer consists of values and beliefs, or what members believe “ought to be” in the work of an organization. These values may be unconscious to those who hold them, often are automatically assumed, seldom discussed, and can only be inferred by the way people act in various circumstances. Ideologies, attitudes, and philosophies are found in this layer as well. Finally, the innermost and deepest level of culture consists of basic assumptions that capture the fundamental notions of how members are to relate to the environment and to each other. They are often taken for granted and are below the level of consciousness for most members of the organization. These basic assumptions, usually invisible to the outsider and taken for granted by the insider, can only be made known through interpretation, which is often imperfect and incomplete. It is thought that at this level the unconscious, taken-for-granted beliefs, perceptions, thoughts, and feelings are the ultimate sources of values and what motivates behavior.

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