1. Organizational Culture
In any organization,
there are the ropes
to skip and the ropes
to know.
-- R. Ritti and
G. Funkhouser
This material is found in the beginning of the chapter.

2. 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.
Material pertinent to this illustration is found on pages

3. 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.
Material pertinent to this illustration is found on pages

4. Organizational Culture
Functions
Liabilities
Controlling behavior
Defining boundaries
Conveying identity
Promoting commitment
Blocking mergers
Inhibiting diversity
Inhibiting change
Blocking acquisitions
Prentice Hall, 2001
Chapter 17

5. What Is Organizational Culture?
Innovation and risk taking (3M)
Outcome orientation (Bausch & Lomb)
People orientation (SWA)
Aggressiveness (Microsoft)
Family-friendly (SAS Institute)
Prentice Hall, 2001
Chapter 17

6. How Organizational Cultures Form
Top
Management
Philosophy
of the
Organization’s
Founders:
Ben & Jerry,
Herb Kelleher,
Bill Gates
Organizational
Culture
Selection
This slide summarizes how an organization’s culture is established and sustained. The original culture is derived from the founder’s philosophy. This strongly influences the criteria used in hiring. The actions of current top management set the general climate of what is and is not acceptable behavior. How employees are to be socialized will depend on the degree of success achieved in matching the values of new employees to those of the organization in the selection process and on the socialization methods that are preferred by top management.
Socialization
Prentice Hall, 2001
Chapter 17

7. Stories Rituals How Employees Learn Culture/ How it is “reinforced”
The stories which circulate through most organizations typically contain the following: a narrative of events about the organization’s founders, rule breaking, rags-to-riches successes, reductions in the work force, relocation of employees, reactions to past mistakes, and organizational coping. These stories anchor the present to the past and explain and legitimize current practices.
Repetitive sequences of activities (rituals) express the key values of the organization, reinforce the goals that are most important, and identify the people who are either important or expendable.
The following are examples of material symbols: an organization’s facilities, types of executive vehicles, the size of offices, the elegance of furnishings, executive perks, employee lounges, on-site dining facilities, and reserved parking spaces.
Organizational units use language as a way to identify members of a culture or a subculture. Organizations, over time, develop jargon, unique terms to describe equipment, offices, key personnel, suppliers, customers, or products related to their business. By learning this language, members attest to their acceptance of the culture and, in so doing, help to preserve it.
Language
Material
Symbols
Prentice Hall, 2001
Chapter 17

8. Do Organizations Have Uniform Cultures?
Dominant
Culture
Subcultures
Core
Values
Organizational culture is a system of meaning that members share and that distinguishes the organization from others. The dominant culture expresses the core values shared by a majority of the organization’s members. However, subcultures exist in any organization. Developing along departmental or geographical lines to reflect common problems, situations, or experiences faced by members, subcultures include core values of the dominant culture plus additional values unique to members of the department.
If organizations had no dominant culture and were composed, instead, of numerous subcultures, the value of organizational culture as an independent variable would be significantly lessened because there would be no uniform interpretation of what represented appropriate and inappropriate behavior. It is the “shared meaning” aspect of culture that makes it such a potent device for guiding and shaping behavior.
Prentice Hall, 2001
Chapter 17

9. Strong Versus Weak Cultures
Low Employee
Turnover
High Behavioral
Control
Strong Versus
Weak Cultures
Commitment to
Core Values
(widely shared)
Intensity of
It has become increasingly popular to differentiate between strong and weak cultures. A strong culture is characterized by the organization’s core values being both intensely held and widely shared. The more members who embrace and commit to these core values, the stronger the culture and the higher the internal climate of behavior control. One specific result of a strong culture should be low turnover because of cohesiveness, loyalty, and organizational commitment.
Because a strong culture increases behavioral consistency, it can substitute for formalization. However, formalization and culture are two different roads to a common destination. The stronger the organization’s culture, the less formal rules and regulations will be needed to guide behavior. Those guides will be internalized in employees when they accept the culture of the organization.
Research indicates that national culture has a stronger impact on employees than does their organization’s culture. However, this assertion must be qualified to reflect the self-selection that goes on at the hiring stage. We should expect, therefore, that the employee selection process will be used by multinationals to find and hire job applicants who are a good fit with their organization’s dominant culture, even if such applicants are somewhat atypical for members of their country.
Prentice Hall, 2001
Chapter 17