The Symbolic Frame Understanding Culture

Assumptions of the Symbolic Frame Most of organizational life is ambiguous and uncertain; people create and use symbols to resolve the confusion. Activity and meaning are loosely coupled; events have multiple meanings because people interpret experience differently. What is important is not what happened but its meaning. People create symbols and use metaphor to resolve confusion, increase predictability, provide direction and anchor hope and faith. Myths, rituals, ceremonies and stories help people find meaning, purpose and passion Culture is the glue that holds an organization together and unites people around shared values and beliefs

Symbolic Frame Metaphor Central concepts Image of leadership Theater Central concepts Culture, meaning, metaphor, ritual, ceremony, stories Image of leadership Inspiration Basic leadership challenge Create faith, beauty and meaning

Culture and Change in Organizations Problem: the challenge for leaders of organizations to guide successfully the growth or change processes in their organizations. Must understand culture Change Unfreezing: 1.too often structural only, also HR/informal systems; a political system sometimes influenced by external forces; a cultural system often deep rich thick and by its natures resistant to change2. human systems tend toward homeostasis and like biological systems to survive, stabilize 3. entropy energy that can't be turned into work; according to general systems theory/2nd law of thermo dynamics, all systems spontaneously move to state of increasing entropy4. Example: Things Fall Apart. 1958 Chinua Achebe 5. open systems import 6. To understand and organization try to change it.

Organizational Culture Why Is It Important? Why Try to Understand It?

Successful organizations have a distinctive, readily identifiable, organizational culture which effective leaders of the organization understand and promote. Both had Changes in structure, processes and procedures are successful only in the context of an organizational culture that supports and facilitates these changes Neither owner understood

The Bottom Line Culture is Deep Culture is Broad Culture is Stable 1. Deep a)If you treat it as superficial phenomenon, if you assume you can manipulate it and change it at will, you are sure to fail. b)Culture controls you more than you control the culture.c) Culture is what gives meaning and predictability to daily life 2. Broad a)We learn all aspects of an organization life: how to get along with the boss, the nature of career, how hard to work, what are the sacred cows, how to get ahead Deb noble and how many articles for tenure?b) Deciphering culture is an endless task 3. Stable a) We hold on to it b/c it gives us meaning and makes life predictable. Business executive don’t understand u-life b) nature of: time and space; reality; truth; human nature; human relationships; 4. Helps us “normalize” things Greater the uncertainty more we look for others to tell us what to do. We look for comparisons; we seek simpler explanations; Nazis: It’s the Jews stupid 5. To change you are tacking the most stable and most permanent part of your organization

So What Is It? A distinctive pattern of beliefs, values, practices, and artifacts, developed overtime, which defines for organization members who they are and how they do things It is the most stable and the most difficult to change. Sum total of all the shared, taken-for-grant assumptions that a group has learned throughout its history

Why Try To Understand It? It’s the way folks in organizations go about doing things Successful organizations have a distinctive, readily identifiable , organizational culture which effective leaders of the organization understand and promote. Changes in structure, processes and procedures are successful only in the context of an organizational culture that supports and facilitates these changes. Build on what is working not obsess about what is not working. “Easier to evolve the cultured than try to change it.”

Evidence from Research Evidence of Faulty Change Strategies During last 10 yrs, 46% of Fortune 500 dropped off the list. Studies show: most frequently cited reason that change efforts in organizations failed was incomplete understanding by leaders of their organization. They did not know how to look at them, to make sense of the woefully misunderstood systems of human relationships, patterns of influence, norms of behavior, values, and beliefs 3/4s of all reengineering, total quality management (TQM), strategic planning, and downsizing efforts have failed entirely or have created problems serious enough that survival of the organizations was threatened. Studies in more than 100 companies that had engaged in Total Quality Management (TQM) Programs and downsizing as strategies for enhancing effectiveness are unequivocal: READ When TQM and downsizing were implemented independent of a cultural change, they were unsuccessful. The successful implementation of both TQM and downsizing programs, as well as the resulting effectiveness of the organization’s performance, depended upon having the improvement strategies embedded in efforts to promote a cultural change as well. Efforts to improve productivity directed only at procedures and strategies are largely unsuccessful unless simultaneously, there are efforts directed at important other aspects of the organization such as the critical role culture plays in organizational change efforts. When values, orientations, beliefs, norms stay constant--despite efforts to change the structure, processes and procedures--organizations return quickly to the status quo.

More Evidence of Faulty Change Strategies... As many as three quarters of all reengineering, total quality management (TQM), strategic planning, and downsizing efforts have failed entirely or have created problems serious enough that survival of the organizations was threatened. 100 companies studied, engaged in Total Quality Management (TQM) Programs and Downsizing as strategies to enhance effectiveness: Success as well as the resulting effectiveness of the organization’s performance, depended upon having the improvement strategies embedded in efforts to promote a cultural change as well. When TQM and downsizing were implemented independent of a cultural change, they were unsuccessful. Cameron and Quinn (1999). Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture

Why?... Most frequently cited reasons Incomplete understanding by leaders of their organization . They did not know how to look at them, to make sense of the woefully misunderstood systems of human relationships, patterns of influence, norms of behavior, values, and beliefs. In short, they did not understand the culture of their organizations Efforts to improve productivity directed only at procedures and strategies are largely unsuccessful unless simultaneously, there are efforts directed at important other aspects of the organization such as the critical role culture plays in organizational change efforts. When values, orientations, beliefs, norms stay constant--despite efforts to change the structure, processes and procedures--organizations return quickly to the status quo.

Symbolic Frame Organizational Symbols Rituals and ceremonies An organization’s character is shown and communicated most clearly through its symbols. Central function of symbols: express meaning and feelings, create order, clarity, predictability, handling paradox, protect from uncertainty Myths and stories They provide clarity and direction in the presence of confusion and mystery. Rituals and ceremonies They provide ways to take action in the face of confusion, unpredictability and threat.

Levels of Culture Artifacts Espoused Values Visible organizational structures and processes (sometimes hard to decipher) Artifacts Strategies, goals, philosophies mostly (espoused theories and justifications) Three level typology Underlying /Tacit Assumption To understand this deeper level,you have to think historically Throughout the history what were the values beliefs and assumptions of founders and key leaders that explains how things are done around here Shared Taken for grated Learned Two weeks indoctrination at Cerner Result from: Patterns of Behaviors and Behavioral Norms Reflected in Expressed Values integrity teamwork customer orientation product quality development people (unleashing human potential) Found in Observable Artifacts Culture derives from an underlying pattern of assumptions that members of an organization come to share as result of common experiences in their working life. These tacit assumptions are reflected in an give meaning to expressed values and observable artifacts and patterns of behavior Artifacts object material or nonmaterial and patterns that intentionally or unintentionally communicate information about an organizations way of doing things easiest level to observe different orgs do things differently: tour schools: law more interaction/bloch more individual Tom Miller and Org charts Myra: lunch ice chest It is a property of groups Derived from social interaction;observed in social interaction 2. Espoused values Children's Mercy Espoused Values Unconscious, taken-for-granted beliefs, perceptions,thoughts, and feelings (theories-in-use; ultimate source of values and behavior) Basic (Tacit) Underlying Assumptions Schein, 1985

We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time. T.S. Eliot "Little Gidding" Four Quartets