Organizational Culture

Chapter 10
Organizational Culture
Chapter 10, Nancy Langton and Stephen P. Robbins, Organizational Behaviour, Fourth Canadian Edition 10-1
Copyright © 2007 Pearson Education Canada
• The pattern of shared values, beliefs, and

assumptions considered to be the appropriate
way to think and act within an organization.
– Culture is shared.
– Culture helps members solve problems.
– Culture is taught to newcomers.
– Culture strongly influences behaviour.
Exhibit 10-1 Layers of Culture
Artifacts of Material Symbols

Organizational Language
Culture Rituals
Stories
Organizational Beliefs
Culture Values
Assumptions
Levels of Culture
• Artifacts
– Aspects of an organization’s culture that you see, hear, and feel.
• Beliefs
– The understandings of how objects and ideas relate to each
other.
• Values
– The stable, long-lasting beliefs about what is important.
• Assumptions
– The taken-for-granted notions of how something should be in
an organization.
Characteristics of
• Innovation and risk-taking
– The degree to which employees are encouraged to be innovative and take
risks.
• Attention to detail
– The degree to which employees are expected to exhibit precision, analysis,
and attention to detail.
• Outcome orientation
– The degree to which management focuses on results or outcomes rather
than on technique and process.
• People orientation
– The degree to which management decisions take into consideration the
effect of outcomes on people within the organization.
Characteristics of Organizational
Culture
• Team orientation
– The degree to which work activities are organized around teams
rather than individuals.
• Aggressiveness
– The degree to which people are aggressive and competitive rather
than easygoing.
• Stability
– The degree to which organizational activities emphasize
maintaining the status quo in contrast to growth.
Exhibit 10-2 Contrasting
Organizational Cultures
Organization A Organization B
• Managers must fully document • Management encourages and

all decisions. rewards risk-taking and change.
• Creative decisions, change, and risks • Employees are encouraged to
are not encouraged. “ run with ” ideas, and failures are
treated as “ learning experiences.”
• Extensive rules and regulations exist • Employees have few rules and
for all employees. regulations to follow.
• Productivity is valued over employee • Productivity is balanced with treating
morale. its people right.
• Employees are encouraged to stay • Team members are encouraged to interact
within their own department. with people at all levels and functions.
• Individual effort is encouraged. • Many rewards are team based.
Culture’s Functions
• Social glue that helps hold an organization
together.
– Provides appropriate standards for what
employees should say or do.
• Boundary-defining.
• Conveys a sense of identity for organization
members.
Culture’s Functions
• Facilitates commitment to something larger

than one’s individual self-interest.
• Enhances social system stability.
• Serves as a “sense-making” and control
mechanism.
– Guides and shapes the attitudes and behaviour of
employees.
Do Organizations Have Uniform
Cultures?
• Organizational culture represents a common
perception held by the organization members.
• Core values or dominant (primary) values are accepted
throughout the organization.
– Dominant culture
• Expresses the core values that are shared by a majority of the
organization’s members.
– Subcultures
• Tend to develop in large organizations to reflect common
problems, situations, or experiences.
Reading an
Organization’s Culture
• Stories
• Rituals
• Material Symbols
• Language
Exhibit 10-3 How Organizational
Culture Forms
Top
Philosophy management
of Selection Organization's
organization's criteria culture
founders
Socialization
Creating and Sustaining Culture:
Keeping a Culture Alive
• Selection
– Identify and hire individuals who will fit in with the
culture.
• Top Management
– Senior executives establish and communicate the norms
of the organization.
• Socialization
– Organizations need to teach the culture to new employees.
Exhibit 10-5
A Socialization Model
Socialization Process Outcomes
Productivity
Prearrival Encounter Metamorphosis Commitment
Turnover
Exhibit 10-6
Entry Socialization Options
• Formal vs. Informal
• Individual vs. Collective
• Fixed vs. Variable
• Serial vs. Random
• Investiture vs. Divestiture
Exhibit 10-7
Four-Culture Typology
High Networked Communal

Sociability
Low Fragmented Mercenary
Low High
Solidarity
The Liabilities of Culture
• Culture can have dysfunctional aspects in some

instances.
– Culture as a Barrier to Change
• When organization is undergoing change, culture may impede
change.
– Culture as a Barrier to Diversity
• Strong cultures put considerable pressure on employees to
conform.
– Culture as a Barrier to Mergers and Acquisitions
• Merging the cultures of two organizations can be difficult, if not
impossible.
Changing Organizational Culture
1. Have top-management people become positive role

models, setting the tone through their behaviour.
2. Create new stories, symbols, and rituals to replace
those currently in vogue.
3. Select, promote, and support employees who espouse
the new values that are sought.
4. Redesign socialization processes to align with the
new values.
Changing Organizational Culture
5. Change the reward system to encourage acceptance

of a new set of values.
6. Replace unwritten norms with formal rules and
regulations that are tightly enforced.
7. Shake up current subcultures through transfers, job
rotation, and/or terminations.
8. Work to get peer group consensus through utilization
of employee participation and creation of a climate
with a high level of trust.
Point-CounterPoint
• Why Culture Doesn’t • When Culture Can
Change Change
 Culture develops over many  There is a dramatic crisis.
years, and becomes part of
how the organization thinks  There is a turnover in
and feels. leadership.
 Selection and promotion  The organization is young
policies guarantee survival of and small.
culture.  There is a weak culture.
 Top management chooses
managers who are likely to
maintain culture.
Breakout Group Exercises
• Form small groups to discuss the following:
1. Choose two courses that you are taking this term, ideally in
different faculties, and describe the culture of the classroom in
each. What are the similarities and differences? What values
about learning might you infer from your observations of
culture?
2. Identify artifacts of culture in your current or previous
workplace. From these artifacts, would you conclude that the
organization had a strong or weak culture?
3. Have you or someone you know worked somewhere where the
culture was strong? What was your reaction to that strong
culture? Did you like that environment, or would you prefer to
work where there is a weaker culture? Why?

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Chapter 10

• The pattern of shared values, beliefs, and

Artifacts of Material Symbols

• Managers must fully document • Management encourages and

• Facilitates commitment to something larger

Socialization Process Outcomes

Prearrival Encounter Metamorphosis Commitment

High Networked Communal

Low Fragmented Mercenary

• Culture can have dysfunctional aspects in some

1. Have top-management people become positive role

5. Change the reward system to encourage acceptance

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