Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The values and behaviors that contribute to the unique social and psychological environment of an organization are called organizational culture. Organizational culture includes an organization's expectations, experiences, philosophy, and values that hold it together, and is expressed in its self-image, inner workings, interactions with the outside world, and future expectations. It is based on shared attitudes, beliefs, customs, and written and unwritten rules that have been developed over time and are considered valid. Also called corporate culture, it's shown in
1. The ways the organization conducts its business, treats its employees, customers, and
the wider community,
2. The extent to which freedom is allowed in decision making, developing new ideas,
and personal expression,
3. How power and information flow through its hierarchy, and 4. How committed employees are towards collective objectives.
It affects the organization's productivity and performance, and provides guidelines on customer care and service, product quality and safety, attendance and punctuality, and concern for the environment. It also extends to production-methods, marketing and advertising practices, and to new product creation. Organizational culture is unique for every organization and one of the hardest things to change.
INTRODUCTION
Every organization holds its own exceptional culture. Some organizations are known for their flexible and fast approach and some are known for their steady evolution, longevity and their dependable values. It is important to understand organizational culture because everything that goes on in an organization is based on it such as decision making, procedure that would be implemented in that organization and result that is expected from the organization. Through the culture of organization, its organization personality can be reveled and judge. Organizational culture is the collective behavior of humans that are part of an organization, it is also formed by the organization values, visions, norms, working language, systems, and symbols, it includes beliefs and habits. This contributes to the unique social and psychological environment of an organization. It is also the pattern of such collective behaviors and assumptions that are taught to new organizational members as a way of perceiving, and even thinking and feeling. Organizational culture affects the way people and groups interact with each other, with clients, and with stakeholders. Also called corporate culture, it manifests in the ways the organization conducts its business, treats its employees, customers, and the wider community, the extent to which autonomy and freedom is allowed in decision making, developing new ideas, and personal expression, how power and information flow through its hierarchy, and the strength of employee commitment towards collective objectives. Although a company may have "own unique culture", in larger organizations, there is a diverse and sometimes conflicting cultures that co-exist due to different characteristics of the management team. The organizational culture may also have negative and positive aspects.
2. Values: Core beliefs have strong positive and negative emotions associate with them.
The positive emotions are expressed as values. Every core belief holds a promise of success that is transformed into a set of values. We value the tenacity and risk taking that individual champions bring to the organization!
3. Fears: Every core belief also has an associated fear of what will happen if the
organization ignores the belief; Without champions the bureaucracy will micro-manage and kill new products! Therefore any product that does not have a champion is doomed to failure.
Beliefs. Accountability is achieved by developing a system of rewards and punishments the things the culture values are rewarded and the things it fears are punished. Now the organization's Core Beliefs are locked into the way we do things around here.
to hone the skills of the employees. The management makes sincere efforts to upgrade the knowledge of the employees to improve their professional competence. The employees in an academy culture stick to the organization for a longer duration and also grow within it. Educational institutions, universities, hospitals practice such a culture. 4. Baseball team Culture: A baseball team culture considers the employees as the most treasured possession of the organization. The employees are the true assets of the organization who have a major role in its successful functioning. In such a culture, the individuals always have an upper edge and they do not bother much about their organization. Advertising agencies, event management companies, financial institutions follow such a culture. 5. Club Culture: Organizations following a club culture are very particular about the employees they recruit. The individuals are hired as per their specialization, educational qualification and interests. Each one does what he is best at. The high potential employees are promoted suitably and appraisals are a regular feature of such a culture. 6. Fortress Culture: There are certain organizations where the employees are not very sure about their career and longevity. Such organizations follow fortress culture. The employees are terminated if the organization is not performing well. Individuals suffer the most when the organization is at a loss. Stock broking industries follow such a culture. 7. Tough Guy Culture: In a tough guy culture, feedbacks are essential. The performance of the employees is reviewed from time to time and their work is thoroughly monitored. Team managers are appointed to discuss queries with the team members and guide them whenever required. The employees are under constant watch in such a culture. 8. Bet your company Culture: Organizations which follow bet your company culture take decisions which involve a huge amount of risk and the consequences are also unforeseen. The principles and policies of such an organization are formulated to address sensitive issues and it takes time to get the results. 9. Process Culture: As the name suggests the employees in such a culture adhere to the processes and procedures of the organization. Feedbacks and performance reviews
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do not matter much in such organizations. The employees abide by the rules and regulations and work according to the ideologies of the workplace. All government organizations follow such a culture.
How a culture Begins: An organization current customs, traditions and general way of
doing things are largely due to what it has done before and the degree of success it has had with those endeavors. This leads us to the ultimate source of an organizations culture: its founders. The founders of an organization traditionally have a major impact on that organizations early culture. They have a vision of what the organization should be. They are unconstrained by previous customs or ideologies. The small size that typically characterizes new organizations further facilities the founders imposition of their vision on all organizational members. Cultures creation occurs in three ways. First founders hire and keep only employees who think and feel the same way they do. Second, they indoctrinate and socialize these employees to their way of thinking and feeling. And finally the founders own behavior acts as a role model that encourages employees to identify with them and thereby internalize their beliefs, values and assumptions.
Keeping a Culture alive: Once a culture is in place, there are practices within the
organization that act to maintain it by giving employees a set of similar experiences. For example, many of the human resource practices we discuss in the next chapter reinforce the organizations culture. The selection process, performance evaluation criteria, training and development activities, and promotion procedures ensure that those hired fit in with the culture, reward those who support it, and penalize those who challenge it. Three forces play a
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particularly important part in sustaining a culture: selection practices, the actions of top management, and socialization methods.
Selection: The explicit goal of the selection process is to identify and hire individuals who
have the knowledge, skills and abilities to perform the jobs within the organization successfully. Typically, more than one candidate will be identified who meets any given jobs requirements. When that point is reached, it would be nave to ignore the fact that the final decision as to who is hired will be significantly influenced by the decision makers judgment of how well the candidates will fit into the organization. -Top management: The actions of top management also have a major impact on the organizations culture. Through what they say and how they behave, senior executives establish norms that filter down through the organization as to whether risk taking is desirable; how much freedom managers should give their employees; what is appropriate dress; what action s will pay off in terms of pay rises, promotions, and other rewards; and the like.
Socialization: No matter how good a job the organization does in recruiting and selection,
new employees are not fully indoctrinated in the organizations culture. Because they are unfamiliar with the organization culture, new employees are potentially likely to disturb the beliefs and customs that are in place. The organization will, therefore want to help new employees adapt to its culture. this adaption process is called socialization. Finally the new member must work out any problems discovered during the encounter stage. This may mean going through changes-hence; we call this the metamorphosis stage. Careful selection by management of newcomers socialization experiences can-at the extreme-create conformists who maintain traditions and customs, or inventive and creative individualists who consider no organizational practice scared.
Encounter stage: The stage in the socialization process in which a new employee sees
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what the organization is realty like and confronts the possibility that expectations and reality may diverge.
Metamorphosis stage: The stage in the socialization process in which a new employee
changes and adjusts to the job, work group, and organization.
Cooperation - by providing shared values and assumptions, culture may enhance goodwill
and mutual trust, encouraging cooperation
Decision Making - shared beliefs gives members a consistent set of basic assumptions
which may lead to a more efficient decision-making process due to fewer disagreements,
Commitment - strong cultures foster strong identification which causes commitment Perception - what an individual sees is conditioned by what others sharing the same
experience say they are seeing
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Internal Leadership: in organization setting tone leadership plays most important role.
If the employees have positive trust in leadership, organization path to success is certain. When staff recognizes leadership seems as honourable, trustworthy and full of integrity, more productivity is given by them. In this way organization will be recognized for its leadership qualities that result in organization success.
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Although little empirical research exists to support the link between organizational culture and organizational performance, there is little doubt among experts that this relationship exists. Organizational culture can be a factor in the survival or failure of an organization although this is difficult to prove considering the necessary longitudinal analyses are hardly feasible. The sustained superior performance of firms like IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Procter & Gamble, and McDonald's may be, at least partly, a reflection of their organizational cultures. A 2003 Harvard Business School study reported that culture has a significant impact on an organizations long-term economic performance. The study examined the management practices at 160 organizations over ten years and found that culture can enhance performance or prove detrimental to performance. Organizations with strong performance-oriented cultures witnessed far better financial growth. Additionally, a 2002 Corporate Leadership Council study found that cultural traits such as risk taking, internal communications, and flexibility are some of the most important drivers of performance, and may impact individual performance. Furthermore, innovativeness, productivity through people, and the other cultural factors cited by Peters and Waterman (1982) also have positive economic consequences. Denison, Haaland, and Goelzer (2004) found that culture contributes to the success of the organization, but not all dimensions contribute the same. It was found that the impacts of
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these dimensions differ by global regions, which suggests that organizational culture is impacted by national culture. Additionally, Clarke (2006) found that a safety climate is related to an organizations safety record. Organizational culture is reflected in the way people perform tasks, set objectives, and administer the necessary resources to achieve objectives. Culture affects the way individuals make decisions, feel, and act in response to the opportunities and threats affecting the organization. Adkins and Caldwell (2004) found that job satisfaction was positively associated with the degree to which employees fit into both the overall culture and subculture in which they worked. A perceived mismatch of the organizations culture and what employees felt the culture should be is related to a number of negative consequences including lower job satisfaction, higher job strain, general stress, and turnover intent. It has been proposed that organizational culture may impact the level of employee creativity, the strength of employee motivation, and the reporting of unethical behavior, but more research is needed to support these conclusions. Organizational culture also has an impact on recruitment and retention. Individuals tend to be attracted to and remain engaged in organizations that they perceive to be compatible. Additionally, high turnover may be a mediating factor in the relationship between culture and organizational performance. Deteriorating company performance and an unhealthy work environment are signs of an overdue cultural assessment.
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Problems of Organizational Culture: One of the biggest obstacles in the way of the
merging of two organizations is organizational culture. Each organization has its own unique culture and most often, when brought together, these cultures clash. When mergers fail employees point to issues such as identity, communication problems, human resources problems, ego clashes, and inter-group conflicts, which all fall under the category of "cultural differences". Usually pointed as a source of creating "family like" environment, the notion of corporate culture is also used for firing, with this practice started from shoe company Zappos, which granted its fired employees with huge afterwards compensations. As the corporate culture may mean almost everything, firing on the base of culture means the employer does not accept and desire to be inclusive for the culture of the employee and thus the employee "does not fit in corporate culture" (Zappos, Netflix, and many other companies hire and fire based solely on cultural fit, although this may fall in the ground of discrimination, there is still not law or case law resolving or addressing the question making this practice possible and available for businesses for now. Firing on corporate culture is a recent practice, from the 2008.
Robi Axiata Limited is a joint venture company between Axiata Group Berhad, Malaysia and NTT DOCOMO INC, Japan. Robi is the third largest mobile phone operator in Bangladesh with more than 18.2 million subscribers as of April 2012. It was formerly known as Telekom Malaysia International (Bangladesh) which commenced operations in Bangladesh in 1997 with the brand name AKTEL. On 28th March 2010, the service name was rebranded as Robi and the company came to be known as Robi Axiata Limited. Robi is truly a people-oriented brand of Bangladesh. Robi, the people's champion, is there for the people of Bangladesh, where they want and the way they want. Having the local tradition at its core, Robi marches ahead with innovation and creativity. It is the first operator in the country to introduce GPRS. To ensure leading-edge technology, Robi draws from the international expertise of Axiata and NTT DOCOMO INC. It supports 2G voice, CAMEL Phase II & III and GPRS/EDGE service with high speed internet connectivity. Its GSM service is based on a robust network architecture and cutting edge technology such as Intelligent Network (IN), which provides peace-of-mind solutions in terms of voice clarity, extensive nationwide network coverage and multiple global partners for international roaming. It has the widest International Roaming coverage in Bangladesh connecting 600 operators across more than 200 countries. Its customer centric solution includes value added services (VAS), quality customer care, easy access call centers, digital network security and flexible tariff rates.
balance, movement and change, underlining the rich, vibrant culture and heritage of Bangladesh. The logo should always appear in Bengali. Special authorization is required if the logo is presented in English.
Michael Kuehner, the Managing Director and CEO of Axiata (Bangladesh) Ltd said Robi brings the first gleam of light that shows us the day, a symbol of harvest that brings smile on the faces of farmers. He went on to point out that the word Robi is also very familiar to Bangla speaking people as it is the name of their pride poet, Rabindranath Tagore. We aim to develop an emotional link with the culture and roots of this nation. Therefore, we chose the Bangla word Robi to be our identity, he said.
Robi s Alpona motif is uniquely created especially for them. The alpona is vibrant and modern. It has a very organic soft feel providing a forward moving direction one of positively and focus. The lack of sharp points and use of large curves provide a feeling of warmth and friendliness.
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In Robi organizational culture is defined as a set of shared beliefs, truths, assumptions, and values that operate the organization. Here organizational culture has been described as how people behave when no one is looking. It is made up of people that have the same aims and objectives and that is to work with different people and to support them in a number of innovative ways. The staffs are skilled and experienced in community work. It is a friendly, non-bureaucratic organization Robi follows certain standards, ethics and codes of conduct coupled with personal interactions and communication styles to maintain its organizational culture. How things are done around here Reflects underlying assumptions about the way work is performed here What is acceptable and not acceptable here What behaviour and actions are encouraged or discouraged
Purposes and values define the acceptable standards which maintain the behavior of individuals within the organization. Without such values, individuals will pursue behaviors that are in line with their own individual value systems, which may lead to behaviors that the organization doesn't wish to encourage. Any organization's values must be in line with its purpose and goals that it is trying to achieve. The values of an organization can provide a framework which will support the achievement of the organization's goals and purposes. Robi Axiata Limited employees hold themselves accountable to the following guiding Principles for the organization. Purpose: EMPOWERING YOU: We are there for you, where you want and in the way you want, in order to help you develop, grow and make the most of your lives through our services. Values and principles: Emotional: Passionate, Creative, Respectful, and Open Functional: Simple, Ethical, Transparent, Ownership No matter what we do in order to realize our purpose, we hold ourselves accountable to the following overarching guiding Principles for our organization: 1. Being respectful towards everyone. 2. Being trustworthy by action. Being passionate and creative in all we do. 3. Keeping things simple in the way we do things. 4. Being ethical and transparent. 5. Demonstrating individual and collective ownership. 6. Practicing an open culture in communication and interaction
Organizational culture is the unique combination of the values that each organization believes in. The more positive each member becomes within an organization, the better the organization looks as a whole. The characteristic of organizational culture of the Robi Axiata Ltd has certain levels based on their visibility and how closely they are adhered to in the organization. They cannot be actually seen, but they are so well ingrained in the employees that they come out quite naturally because that is the way the organization thinks. These are the strongest held components of culture as they are not influenced, but are evolved and affect behavior and values of employees of Robi. Thus these characteristics make up the personality of the organization. The characteristics of organizational culture are the outcome of both the management's initial beliefs and employees' adoption of those beliefs. The characteristics of Robis Organizational culture are giver below.
Organizational pride Ambition towards being the best Obvious teamwork and communication Quality leadership Constant review of profits and costs Employee relationships Client and customer relations Honesty and safety developmental programs Cutting edge thinking
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One of many dimensions of organizational culture would be that the promotion of organizational culture. To promote organizational culture Robi works on higher management level as well as also emphasis on employees personal and family level. Robi Believes in Open Communication culture Organize events to promote culture
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Organize annual family day: Every year Robi organizes annual family day. Every year all the employee along with their family members get the opportunity to enjoy picnic.
Organize programs for the family members of Robi employee: Robi organizes different programs to promote its organizational culture. These programs are organized for the employees and their family members to participate so that the employees can communicate between their family life and corporate life. Robi Axiata Limited organized an art competition for children of its Dhaka based employees on Saturday, June 9, 2012. The event was organized in observance of the World Environment Day 2012.The theme of the contest was Rong Tulite Amar Prithibi and the children were drew/painted pictures portraying the world as they would want it to be. About 80 children, aged between 5 to 14 participated in the art competition. The competition was rounded off with a magic show performed by popular magician Ulfat Kabir.
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One way to combat corporate cultural difficulties is through cultural leadership. Organizational leaders must also be cultural leaders and help facilitate the change from the two old cultures into the one new culture. This is done through cultural innovation followed by cultural maintenance. Cultural innovation includes: Creating a new culture: recognizing past cultural differences and setting realistic expectations for change Changing the culture: weakening and replacing the old cultures Cultural maintenance includes: Integrating the new culture: reconciling the differences between the old cultures and the new one Embodying the new culture: Establishing, affirming, and keeping the new culture
Conclusion
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In organization life, organizational culture is important parcel and part of it. Organizational culture includes habits, values and traditions on how things used to be done and how its going to be done in future, through this organization working method and identity can be symbolized. It is naturally born inside the organization, but outside factor can influenced it very much. It is unavoidable to deal organization culture, and administration knowledge is dominant value in formative the performance and strength of organization all together, particularly for appropriate actions and its appropriate decision.
Personal Reflection
I think for any organization, organizational structure is important concept, because three determinants are involved in it known as structure, group and individual. An organization is not a place where by chance unsystematic group of people come mutually. Its a place where individual are selected by proper criteria in order to achieve goals set within and outside the organization. Organizational culture is complex and enduring and may have negative and positive effect on workplace and staff. It is very important to understand organization structure because it helps individual to understand the environment of the organization and how to come out with better result.
References
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Aspinwall, L.G. & Staudinger, U.M. (2003). A Psychology of Human Strengths: Fundamental Questions and Future Directions for a Positive Psychology. Washington. American Psychological Association. David, FR. (1999). Strategic Management: Concepts. 7th Edition. New Jersey. Prentice-Hall. Department of Social Welfare. (1997). White paper on Social Welfare. Pretoria. Government Printers. DuBrin , A.J. (2002). Fundamentals of Organizational Behaviour. USA. Thomson Learning. Friedman, R.R. (1991). The Child Care Worker and The Organization. In Knowledge Utilization in Residential Child and Youth Care Practice . Washington. Child Welfare League of America. Hellreigel, D. , Jackson, S.E., Slocum, J., Straude, G. & Associates. (2001). Management. South Africa. Oxford University Press. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/management.html#ixzz21mNSx7R8 http://www.international.gc.ca/cfsi-icse/cil-cai/whatisculture-questlaculture-eng.asp
http://www.robi.com.bd http://www.buzzle.com/articles/primary-characteristics-of-organizational-culture.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robi http://www.axiata.com/operating-companies/bangladesh/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organizational_culture http://www.managementstudyguide.com/types-of-organization-culture.htm
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