Whether the Insights by Schein Are Applicable for Contemporary Organisational Leaders - Literature review Example

Schein begins his analysis by distinguishing between three levels of organisational culture. Does his approach lead to insights that are useful for today’s organisational leaders? Name Institution Professor Course Date Introduction Organisational culture entails the behaviours and values that contribute to the distinctive psychological and social setting of a firm. It is involves a structure of shared beliefs, values and assumptions that directs how individuals conduct themselves in firms. The shared values hold powerful influence on the persons in the firm and dictate how these people perform their roles, act and dress. Each firm establishes and upholds a distinctive culture that offers boundaries and guidelines for the conduct of all people in the organisation. Culture as a coercive background and dynamic occurrence influence people in several ways, and is continuously created, and re-enacted by interactions of people that shape their behaviour. Organisational culture is the foundation of social order that employees live in and the established rules. There is a powerful link between organisational leadership and organisational culture. The dynamic procedures of culture establishment and management are the essence of leadership. According to Schein, (2010) organisational culture is made of three distinct levels. This essay establishes whether the insights by Schein are applicable for contemporary organisational leaders. The concept of culture helps managers to comprehend the hidden, complex aspects of a firm’s life. Culture as a blueprint of shared assumptions and values demonstrates how things are carried out within a firm. Members of the firm learn the blueprint as they cope with internal and external problems. More so, culture is taught to novel members of a firm as the correct way to feel, think and perceive. The culture of a firm influences the performance of an organisation, the degree to which formalisation is needed, employee turnover and commitment and employee support to the firm’s management among other factors. Organisational culture is considered a crucial aspect that powerfully influences the performance of firms. From the perspective of a manager, cultural aspects move into the centre of attention. Schein (2010) asserts that the culture of a firm could help the firm to address its internal integration and external adaptation. The issues linked to external adaptation relate to how the firm addresses forces from outside. These include the core strategy and mission of the firm, its goals and objectives and the best manner of attaining these goals. Problems linked to internal integration, on the other hand, involve forces that are internal to the firm and that inspires employees to attain the desired results. The internal integration include the differentiation of status and power, the standards of friendship and intimacy, standards of punishment and rewards and the best means of communication in the organisation (Berning, Beer, Toit & Singh, 2005). Schein (2010) distinguishes three levels of organisational culture. These levels include artefacts, values and basic assumptions. Analysing organisational culture based the three levels leads to insights that are useful for today’s organisational leaders. According to Mukherjee (2005), artefacts include things such as patterns of behaviour, physical symbols office layout, organisational ceremonies and mode of dressing. Visible artefacts entail all the things that one can hear, see and observe by watching the organisation’s members. According to Saiyadain (2010) at level one, the organisational culture can be viewed in the form of physical objects, technology and other visible forms of conduct like rituals and ceremonies. Even though the culture would be visible in different forms, it can only be at the superficial level. For instance, employees may interact with one another but what the fundamental feelings are, requires probing. According to Kratschmer (2013), the surface level that comprises of artefacts develops the visible embodiment of a firm’s culture. Artefacts can take a massive amount of diverse forms such style of clothes, stories about the firm and corporate language. At the second level of organisational culture are beliefs and values that are not observable but discernable from how individuals justify and explain what they do. The second level includes values that members of the firm hold at a cognisant level. The level includes values that are conscious philosophies, goals and strategies. Members of a firm share these espoused values. However, the beliefs or values are invisible to a great extent and some firm attempt to establish the firm’s mission statements or organisational philosophies to concretise the unwritten behavioural commands. The mostly invisible and unconscious assumptions and values find their expression in the organisational culture’s top level. The values can be interpreted from the symbols, language and stories a firm’s members utilises to represent them. The basic values that characterise cultures are comprehended through visible manifestations of ceremonies, slogans, stories, heroes and symbols. For instance, most firms have slogans that express their major corporate value. For instance, Virgin Australia’s slogan, ‘Now You are Flying’ convey a special meaning to the members of the organisation. More so, cultural values for modern firms are discerned in written public statements such as corporate mission and vision statements. Saiyadain (2010) asserts that at there is greater internalisation and awareness of cultural values at the second level of organisational culture. Leaders in a firm try to solve solutions following ways that have been tested and tried earlier. If leaders succeed in solving the problem, a shared perception is established that in turn instigates cognitive shifts that turn perceptions into beliefs and values. The third level of organisational culture entails the basic values and assumptions. The essence or core levels of culture are characterised by the fundamental values and assumptions that are intricate to discern. These values and assumptions are obscure to distinguish as they subsist at a considerably unconscious level, but they offer a major comprehension why situations occur they way they do. According to Saiyadain (2010), these fundamental assumptions occur around deeper human existence dimensions such as the temperament of human beings, truth and reality and human relations and actions. According to Kratschmer (2013), the core of organisation culture can be defined as a set of fundamental assumptions that direct the action and perception of a firm. These assumptions are mostly unconscious and invisible. Saiyadain (2003) confirms that the third level of organisational culture embodies a process of conversion. For instance, when members of a firm observe that a technique that was tested earlier works well, the technique becomes the preferred solution and is eventually converted into dominant orientation or underlying assumptions. However, the conversion procedure holds both disadvantages and advantages with the advantages being the dominant value orientation that guides behaviour. The disadvantage of the conversion process involves the manner in which the process influences rational and objective thinking. Saiyadain (2003) further asserts that the three levels of organisational culture range on a scale of exterior to a deeply embedded scale. As cultural symbols get changed into shared assumptions, they shift from a superficial level to a genuine internalised level. The deeply embedded level comprises of current customs, traditions and the manner of doing things. The culture of quality, customer satisfactions, leadership and success in most firms Apple, Virgin Australia and other firms are examples of internalised organisational culture levels. According to Kratschmer (2010), the three levels of organisational culture are interdependent where every level and the relationship amid them are crucial in comprehending organisational culture as a whole. Organisational leaders understand that they must integrate all the three levels of organisational culture to ensure successful organisational performance. According to Schein (2010), the levels of organisational culture range from very tangible open manifestations that one can feel and see to the profoundly embedded, unconscious fundamental assumptions. In between the layers are numerous espoused values, norms, beliefs and rules of conduct utilised by the members of the organisation as a means of depicting the culture. Schein prefers that the basic assumptions represent the deepest levels because members of an organisation tend to take them for granted and treat them as non-negotiable. Schein (2010) analysis of organisation culture leads to lead to insights that applicable by modern organisational leaders. Apparently, leadership holds the key to unlocking highly productive cultures that can establish a powerful working environment. This is attained by defining the desired culture, evaluating and enhancing the current culture and shaping the way forward. Modern leaders use the three levels of organisational culture in enabling employees to do their best. The leaders understand that the essence of their organisation’s culture is its blueprint of shared, fundamental assumptions. However, culture manifests itself at the level of observable artefacts and shared espoused norms, values and rules of conduct (Roussel, Swansburg & Swansburg, 2006). Most organisational leader acknowledges that artefacts are easy to observe but intricate to decipher when analysing cultures. They also understand that espoused values and beliefs may only mirror aspirations and rationalisations. These leaders require that their employees get the shared fundamental assumptions of their firms and comprehend the learning process through which the fundamental assumptions evolved. More importantly, today’s organisational leaders understand that leadership is the source of values and beliefs that keep their organisations moving as well as helping their firms to address external and internal problems. The leaders propose strategies that may work in addressing the internal and external problems. When a leader’s assumptions work, the employed strategies become the shared assumptions. The most central concern for leaders is to comprehend the deeper levels of their firm’s culture, assess the functionality of the assumptions and address the challenges that may face the assumptions made. Schein three levels of organisational culture provide an understanding that is useful for today’s organisational leaders. Notably, through the three levels of organisational culture, leaders understand that they cannot describe an organisational culture in its entirety. Understanding of organisational culture is desirable for everyone but is crucial for leaders. Apparently, the effect of organisational culture is central to effective leadership (Gamage & Pang, 2003). Organisational leaders need to comprehend the temperament of the firm’s culture, understand how to access it and acknowledge when change is necessary. The three levels of organisational culture which include artefacts, espoused values and basic underlying assumptions offer a useful approach to examine the cultural construct depending on the extent to which the cultural occurrence is visible to the observer. Today’s leaders understand that organisational culture is an essential element that sustains organisational productivity and performance. One of the scores of roles confronting today’s organisational leaders is the establishment and maintenance of organisational personality that encourages and reward collective efforts. Following the establishment of the three levels of organisational culture, today’s organisational leaders give organisational culture the attention it requires. For organisations to be successful, leader’s assumptions are shared and the assumptions are embedded and viewed as a way of socialising novel members of an organisation. Today’s organisational leaders attain success through being dependable in sending apparent signals relating to their beliefs, values and priorities (Cooper, Johnson & Holdsworth, 2012). Once the culture is a created and accepted, the culture becomes a powerful leadership tool that facilitates communication of leaders’ values and beliefs to employees and particularly novel employees. Careful establishment of organisational culture calls for understanding of the factors that facilitates and influences the culture. Leaders make use artefacts that entail the obvious and open elements of a firm to establish feasible organisational cultures. According to Sims and Quarto (2015), the most visible level of culture is its artefacts and creations. The artefacts involve a firm’s social and physical environment. At this level, leaders look at the physical space, artistic productions, language, technology and open conduct of members. However, this level is readily observable but precariously superficial as a cultural insight. As regards espoused values, organisation leaders define articulated values that are explicitly evidenced or written by the artefacts. The values must be congruent with observable behaviours. Leaders understand that sometimes the understanding of the articulated values does not adequately define the deepest level of a firm’s culture. In this regard, they try and test the values to see if they can be institutionalised. The constant testing and trying of values and productive application of the values lead to basic assumptions that guide the behaviour of members of the organisations. The basic assumptions tell members of an organisation how to feel, think and perceive things. According to Sims and Quarto (2015), organisational culture at the deepest level is principally the integrated reflection of the personality of the persons who form part of an organisation and who have internalised and shaped the basic assumptions in the firm. Gaining continuity and alignment across the three levels of culture is essential for organisational leaders as this understanding facilitates the development of organisational health (Taylor & Haneberg, 2010). For today’s organisational leaders, the deepest and the most fundament level comprises of assumptions. These assumptions characterise the truth and reality of truth. Based on the three levels of organisational culture, today’s organisational leaders understand that the ability of a firm to change calls for positive impact upon the deepest level of culture and the personality of the persons who make up the organisation. More so, the basic assumptions and mental models are crucial in the establishment of organisational culture. The three levels of the organisational culture stand out as an essential element that leaders can use to sustain organisational productivity. Organisational leaders find the three levels of organisational culture essential because they offer a non-mechanistic, imaginative and flexible approach to understanding creation and maintenance of a productive culture in their organisations. Conclusion Organisational culture entails norm and standards that prescribe how members of an organisation behave. Leaders and organisational members’ behaviours are directed, tempered and governed by their organisational culture. Schein distinguishes between three levels of organisational culture that include the artefacts, espoused values and basic assumptions. The surface level of organisational culture includes processes and structures, technology, products, rituals, stories and language while the second level includes unwritten guidelines and corporate principles. The third level includes the perceptions, feelings and thoughts. The three levels of organisational culture are crucial for today’s organisational leaders as they facilitate establishment and maintenance of feasible and productive organisational culture. These levels help today’s organisational leaders to comprehend the hidden, complex and essential aspects of a firm’s life. References Berning, A, Beer, A, Toit, D., & Singh, D.(2005). Focus on management principles. UK: Juta and Company Ltd. Cooper, C. L., Johnson, S., & Holdsworth, L. (2012). Organisational Behaviour for Dummies. UK: John Wiley & Sons. Gamage, D., Pang, N.(2003). Leadership and management in education: Developing essential skills and competencies. China: Chinese University. Kratschmer, P.(2013). Organisational culture is highly resistant to change-Discuss. UK: GRIN Verlag. Mukherjee, S.(2005). Organisation & management and business communication. UK: New Age International. Roussel, L., Swansburg, R. C., & Swansburg, R. J. (2006). Management and leadership for nurse administrators. USA: Jones & Bartlett Learning. Saiyadain, M.(2003). Organisational behaviour. India: Tata McGraw-Hill Education. Schein, E.(2010). Organisational culture and leadership. UK, John Wiley & Sons. Sims, R., & Quatro, S.(2015). Leadership: Succeeding in the private, public and not-for- profit sectors. UK: Routledge. Taylor, J., & Haneberg, L.(2010). Connecting top managers: Developing executive teams for business success. UK: FT Press. Read More