Organizational Culture and How This Affects an Organizations Effectiveness - Literature review Example

Running head: Expression of organizational culture Name Course Lecturer Date Expression of organizational culture and how this affects an organization’s effectiveness This paper presents an analysis of how culture is expressed in organization and the subsequent impacts on an organization’s effectiveness. Organizational culture is defined as cohesion of shared ideologies, values, philosophies, beliefs, attitudes and norms in an organization leading to shared meaning, behaviours and activities (Herzog & Leker, 2007; Inceoglu, 2002; Alvesson, 2002). It is expressed in various ways implying that culture is something an organization is and has. This subject has also been explored with reference to corporate culture, focusing on the role of culture as a central determinant of financial performance as well as organizational strategic driver. Organizational or corporate culture has been described as the ultimate strategic asset (Flamholtz & Randle, 2011). In contemporary business and financial competition, there is a rising emphasis to managers on the importance of resource-based view (RBV) management approach. This is an approach in which management focuses on organizational resources that are difficult to be imitated by competitors. Human resource is the most prominent element of RBV. Interestingly, human resource stands out in the development, expressing and changing of organizational culture. As such, it is vital that management gets a clear understanding of the way culture is expressed in organizational behaviour and the way this expression has implications in performance management. In contemporary globalized situations where market-driven change is constant, this knowledge is vital as culture largely influences how organizations adapt to market needs. Organizational culture is expressed in various ways, processes and outcomes. Essentially, it is expressed at three core different levels of engagement: surface level, espoused values and basic assumptions. The surface level refers to the physical environment and the visible aspects of an organization. These include products, language, and symbols. The espoused values refer to the leadership values and the way this relates to organizational mission, vision and subsequent strategies. The level of basic assumption is the most intimate level as it refers to attitudes, perceptions and thoughts of the members. These levels constitute what an organization may be or has. With reference to this, literature suggests that organizational culture may be evaluated as from a functionalist perspective referring to what the organization has, and from a cognitive or interpretive perspective which evaluates the subject as what the organization ‘is’ (Inceoglu, 2002). Further on, these levels reflect how organizational culture coins and influences the members’ cognitive and affective aspects in its shaping and expression (Alvesson, 2002). At the basic level, culture is expressed in the physical environment of an organization. The nature of organizational culture and of organizations is such that members’ interactions go beyond interpersonal to between the members, individually and as groups, and the physical surroundings. Organizational culture can be expressed in its physical elements such as building and office layout, uniforms, machinery, technology, artefacts, land marks and symbols. Artefacts are physical environment aspects which have a cultural meaning (Nelson & Quick, 2011). They are influential on the social work environment and are thus open to varied interpretations. It is therefore vital that workplace design is so meticulously done to communicate only what is intended by management to both the internal and external publics. It defines what is taught to employees, consumers, suppliers and other publics on how to think and perceive about the organizational goal and strategies (Nelson & Quick, 2011). For instance, organizations exploring less hierarchical culture have a tendency to have open space office systems thus promoting multi-directional communications. In addition, organizations are known to make robust investments in designing front office spaces, interior architecture and signage. As such, they will often hire work place planners and outsource their services. According to Tharp (2009), the work place planners will often conduct organizational culture assessments since the culture offers a foundation or basis upon which to establish physical environment design. The main focus is to use organizational culture elements in developing workplace solutions with internal and external linkages thus promote performance. Subsequently, a change in culture requires commensurate changes in the physical environment, whereas it is also reflected in the new culture (Ashkanasy et al., 2011). This brings out the relationship between organizational culture and its elements as being essentially a complete interaction with two-way exchanges. One is a reflection of the other. The role of the physical environment has been highlighted as relating to organizational culture with regard to symbolism. Using a three-dimensional model, literature has demonstrated how the physical design of an organization may be manipulated to enhance how the members’ needs for instrumentality, symbolism and aesthetics are met (Elsbach & Bechky, 2007). The physical environment has diverse effects on almost all organizational competitive aspects as it influences how human resource and consumers relate to the organization. In Ashkanasy et al., (2011), it is demonstrated how work setting design instrumentality influences task performance and adjustments to personal needs. Environments that allow more personal control and ability to adjust to personal needs enhances the sense of belonging and self and group worth. Satisfying aesthetic needs enhances productive interactions and reduces absenteeism (Elsbach & Bechky, 2007). It also communicates the intention of management and reflects the priority the management gives to relationships. Organizational management studies have, over time, stressed the importance of teams tasks. However, organizations hinder the potential by way of unsupportive physical environment elements. Supporting open and interactive systems promote team work, productive social interaction and bonding, and communication. Augustin & Brand (2011) demonstrates how an enabling, flexible and stimulating physical environment design stimulates collaborative behavior, creativity, belongingness, openness, knowledge management processes, beneficial synergies and a sense of natural organization. In addition, this literature links such design with the ability to stimulate brand immersion and freedom to think. Intentionally collaborative environments demonstrate an organization’s value of relationships subsequently influencing customer and human relations and communications strategies. As such, it also has influence on how a knowledge worker learns. According to O'Toole (2001), the physical environment is caught within the web of role associations, symbolic meaning and hierarchical and power relationships (pp. 18). These are vital in learning and adjustment to organizational goals. The espoused values of the expression of cultures refer to the element of leadership and its role in bridging interlinks between organizational goals, strategies, resources and the needs of a market. The definition of leadership incorporates the influence on followers, organizational tasks, employee commitment and compliance, group and team processes, identity and culture (Alvesson, 2002). This definition presents leadership and organizational culture as interchangeable terms in management literature and practice. Neither can be understood alone as each is a component of the other in an organization’s operating system (Transit Cooperative Research Program, 2003). As such, this paper suggests that leadership is perhaps the most visible area in which culture is expressed given its role in providing essential directional authority to all the other aspects of an organization. Leadership is only recognized in groups or in situations that demand human interaction, thus it does not just top organizational structures. As such, the leadership-culture expression is a phenomenon that is dynamic, ambiguous and complex (Scott et al., 2003). It affects the organization, supervision, and rewarding of work reflecting management behaviour. Scott et al. (2003) uses deconstructive and post-structuralists perspectives to explore the leadership-culture relationship. The deconstructive perspective views culture as a writing that is co-written by all organizational participants with reference to the leadership role. Both the authors and readers of this culture have a shared meaning, and interpretation of the leadership role. The post-structuralist view considers leadership as being an expression of supra-human forces. These forces are expressed in human and organizational culture (Scott et al., 2003). Organizations often take on their leader’s qualities, leadership styles and personality. For instance, strong change-oriented cultures are exemplified by a leadership structure that is democratic, non-hierarchical and interpersonal trust (Transit Cooperative Research Program, 2003). This has the likelihood of promoting sense of belongingness and information sharing, thus promoting organizational effectiveness. There are two aspects of a leadership behaviour continuum that have featured in numerous leadership literatures: transactional and transformational leadership (Ashkanasy et al., 2011). They have featured mostly with reference to the culture of change of management and adapting to market needs, as well the concern for people and performance. Transactional leaders seek to influence followers’ efforts based on existing organizational rules, norms, and policies in order to get to the desired objectives. They often do well in organizational subcultures that have well established social norms that define the role and value of awards, and that indicate fairness in the procedural justice climate (Ashkanasy et al., 2011). They also do well in mechanistic and highly structured type of organizations in which there is an emphasis on the goal-reward relationship which is enhanced by clarity of roles and tasks. The followers are characteristically driven by extrinsic goals and prefer clarity of directions and procedures; hence the leaders will influence performance by providing rewards. Such leadership serves to reinforce the status quo and is hardly interested in change. In a dynamic global environment as we have today, transactional leadership may lead to organizational failure given the increasing need for organizations to be adaptive. The volatility of the business environment requires transformational leadership which has tendencies of challenging dogmas, assumptions and encourages followers to align their goals to organizational pursuits (Nelson & Quick, 2011). Transformational leadership has been linked to better performance than transactional leadership, leading to an increasing demand for managers who can exemplify transformational abilities. This leadership is change oriented and seeks to modify organizational culture and social norms setting up relationship-based organizational strategies and activities. This expresses a progressive nature of organizational culture. As aforementioned, organizations often emulate leaders’ traits and behaviours. Transformational leaders’ personal traits and confidence are shown on the organization, teams and groups in how identity and either self- or collective schemas are formed (Ashkanasy et al., 2011). In teams, members are most likely to identify with the traits of the immediate leader, rather than of the collective top organizational management (Kark et al., 2003). This is based on the leaders’ efficacy in influencing behavior by offering strategic vision and direction, coaching and motivation, enforcing organizational policies and providing resources (Jex, 2002). Another leadership-culture aspect is the balance between the concerns for people and performance. Although this is often a reaction to the type of followers in an organization, the transformational-transactional bargain stands out as key determinant factor. This bargain expresses a culture as being either caring, integrative, apathetic or exacting (Ferrell et al., 2011). Caring leaderships or culture have a higher concern for people than performance, an opposite of the exact culture which focuses more on organizational interests. An apathetic culture prioritizes neither people nor performance whereas an integrative one marries both concerns equally. Transformational leaders are more integrative, inspirational that they are apathetic, caring or exacting (Ashkanasy et al., 2011). They are thus able to influence the achievement of organizational goals by empowering individuals. Further on, the value of ethics is enshrined better in transformational than transactional leadership. Finally, organizational culture is expressed in the basic assumptions held by members of the organization. Practices, behavior and activites are just at the apex of the iceberg, whereas the undersea level involves norm and shared assumptions, with the latter ones being at an even deeper undersea level (Herzog & Leker, 2007; pp 60). It is the third level of culture reflecting how members respond to the physical expressions and symbolism, and the leadership element (Jex, 2002). Organizational culture reflects shared meanings and interpretations in an organization’s operating system. Essentially, this sharing is based on underlying beliefs, values and assumptions of various individuals, which is often a reflection of the entire society. It is thus vital that any assessment of a culture is conscious of the assumptions. They determine how an individual or group perceives themselves, the organization’s mission, vision, goals, and management, and clients. They will subsequently influence norms which enable the operationalization of consistent actions. As such, they will guide behavior, and formulate the expectations for the performance-reward relationship (Flamholtz & Randle, 2011). For instance, Nelson & Quick (2011) demonstrates how underlying individual values are reflected in the type of following leaders and managers get from juniors. The values also feature prominently in the leadership styles and personalities. This may be demonstrated by McGregor’s x-y leadership theory (Kopelman et al., 2008). Leadership behaviour is often subject to the leader’s underlying assumptions and perceptions of the followers. In Berson et al., (2007) demonstrates how organizational leaders’ underlying values influence leadership culture and subsequent follower response. Self-directive values were linked to adhocracy, as security values were related to bureaucracies and benevolence to caring cultures. Due interaction with individual and collective assumptions and values, these orientations showed differences with regard to organizational effectiveness, growth and financial indices. Followers can either be passive, active, dependent, or independent critical thinkers. Passivity is shown by alienated and ‘sheep’ followers whereas effective and yes people show a high level of involvement and activity (Nelson & Quick, 2011). However, independence, critical thinking are seen in effective followers who show commitment and intentional purpose and high motivation. They are self driven, pursuing intrinsic motivations and show prominence of ethics and quality. Underlying assumptions and values aslo influence the hierarchy of needs influencing how an organization may program motivation to influence behaviour. Underlying assumptions of both leaders and followers influence on the type of culture generally exemplified. Depending on how members of an organization perceive its elements and external factors, the organizations may show either a market culture which is externally oriented, a clan culture which shows a large sense of togetherness, a hierarchy culture demonstrating bureaucratic value, and an adhocratic culture (Transit Cooperative Research Program, 2003). The latter is transformational, change oriented and prominently values individual innovativeness, creativity, adaptability. Such individuals are effective followers. The leaders in such situations work to create an adhocratic environment that is proactive to market volatility and that is intellectually stimulating to intrisically motivate followers. Thus, it is vital to delineate their influence in the management of change. Due to the underlying unconscious elements junior may be change receptive or hostile. Change management is essentially an information-/ knowledge-based process which requires a directed and goal-oriented acquisation, sharing and interpretation. How this is done represents an interplay of these underlying factors. In conclusion, this paper has explored various ways in which organizational culture is expressed and the resultant effects. it has attempted to demonstrate how managerial and followers’ behaviors are expressed in the design of the physical environment and symbolism, leadership styles and behavior and the underlying assumptions. Essentially, each of these levels has a direct impact on how human resource interacts with others such as information and technology to produce value for an organization. The physical expression include office layout, buildings, artefacts and symbolism. They are derivatives of the underlying managerial strategic values are enable employees to have a contact point with the organization. They affect how the members interact with each other, organizational goals and consumers. They also link an organization with its clients. The leadership element has been explored in the level of espoused values. Leadership and organizational culture are so intertwined that the literature suggests them to be interchangeable. Essentially, leadership influences followers’ behavior and effort. Finally, the basic assumption level has been described as the deepest, owing to its unconscious nature. It is the web in which followers interact with the physical environment, leaders and themselves. 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