J Public Adm Res Theory 1997 Mahler 519 40

Influences of Organizational Culture
on Learning in Public Agencies

Julianne Mahler
George Mason University
This article examines an underappreciated influence on

organizational learning: the culture of the organization. Because
organization culture informs the sense making and interpretation
of the kinds of ambiguities seen in puzzling data, problematic
situations, uncertain program technologies, and obscure links
between problems and solutions, it may be useful to consider
some particular ways that culture guides learning. Culture provides a reservoir of organizational meanings against which
results, experience, and performance data are interpreted and
inquiries about changes in procedures and program technologies
can proceed. The more equivocal the data or technologies, the
more influence the culture is likely to have in shaping the course
of learning. The examples given in the article suggest this pattern
and offer a basis for a model of the influences that culture has on
learning in public organizations.
Organization learning refers to the capacity of organizations
to change themselves in response to experience. Learning is concerned with how organizations monitor their operations, their
results, their environments, and their clients for clues to the
adequacy of their performance. It focuses on how organizations
come to identify some situations as problems and how they
attempt to correct them. Learning organizations do not ignore the
consequences of their actions, try to shift the blame for failures,
establish policies to subvert the detection of errors (Argyris
1991), or redefine what counts as success. They embrace error
(Korten 1980) and try to understand its sources. Learning organizations change themselves by altering their rules, strategies,
structures, routines, program technologies, or even their goals in
an attempt to come closer to achieving their objectives.
J-PART 7(1997):4:519-540
Not all change is learning, but learning is thought to be an

especially informed and effective type of change because it
519/ Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory
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ABSTRACT
Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning
But not all organizations do learn. The converse of the

learning organization is a static organization, in which procedures, routines, and objectives persist in the face of perceived
inadequacies. Perhaps even more commonly, inaction results
because members remain unaware of problems or accept them as
unalterable conditions (Barzelay 1992, 22-33).
CULTURE AND LEARNING
This article examines an underappreciated influence on
learning: the culture of the organization. Because organization
culture informs the sense making and interpretation of the kinds
of ambiguities seen in puzzling data, problematic situations,
uncertain program technologies, and obscure links between problems and solutions, it may be useful to consider some particular
ways that culture guides learning. Specific elements of an organization's culture may affect the capacity of the organization to
learn and may influence what it learns and how it learns. Though
culture has most often been seen as a "source of resistance"
(Schein 1992, xiv)" or "source of defensive routines" (Argyris
1991) to learning and change, we might also consider its more
creative potential as a basis for the interpretation of situations and
experiences that could prompt learning and the construction of
effective solutions. Examples of both patterns are seen in the
cases reported here. Though the more interesting influence of
culture may be how it guides or inspires learning, whether it
fosters or blocks it, culture's effects on learning deserve study.
Several examples from the cases of organizational change
efforts described below suggest the outline of a model of the
relationship between culture and learning. The model highlights
the role of culture in influencing how agency actors make sense
of equivocal program results and the implications of these results
520/J-PART, October 1997
represents a conscious effort to interpret and analyze results in

order to correct problems rather than a blind reaction to crises or
to the latest management fad. Interest in organizational learning
has grown among public administrators because it addresses the
issues of change, innovation, and environmental adaptation, all
major concerns in organization theory and practice for decades
and clearly important now as public organizations are being reinvented and reengineered. The organizational learning approach
highlights the act of changing by examining how agency members struggle to apply experience and information to entrenched
routines, to attribute causes to the problems they face, and to
create remedies for these problems. Individual learning becomes
organizational when these lessons are institutionalized, making
them available to other members.

for program and management procedures. The case examples
show the particular importance that beliefs about the legitimacy
of various sources or types of information sometimes have for
organizational learning. Correspondingly, the cases suggest some
of the ways that cultural values that surround existing procedures
influence the kind of changes that would be seen as feasible,
valid, or professional. These beliefs and values might be thought
of as constituting a culture of information and a culture of
organizational technology.
THEORIES OF ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING

Organizational learning is a very broadly defined
phenomenon, with no one widely accepted characterization (Fiol
and Lyles 1985). An overview of this large literature cannot be
offered here (but see Cohen and Sproull 1996; Daft and Huber
1987; Dixon 1992). However, two models of learning capture
much of the diversity in theoretical formulations in the field. A
distinction in versions of learning exists between those who view
learning as the working of a rational, information-based system
(Levitt and March 1988; Huber 1991) and those who see it as a
socially constructed process (Daft and Huber 1987; Morgan
1986; Dixon 1992). The former version is an elaboration of the
information-processing model of organizations while the latter is
indebted to interpretive theories in the social sciences (Rabinow
and Sullivan 1987; Burrell and Morgan 1979; Rosenberg 1988).
Rational-Analytic Theories of Learning
Most writers characterize the learning process as a more or
less analytic activity in which members assemble information
about past efforts, search out problems and solutions, and adopt
incremental or fundamental changes in operations, routines, or
standards to improve the organization's responses. The key
element in all this is the processing of information, which
includes collecting, distributing, storing, and retrieving information (Huber 1991; Walsh and Ungson 1991) and using this
521IJ-PART, October 1997
The thesis offered here is that together these elements of

culture influence the capacity of the agency to learn and the
direction that learning will take. Agency beliefs may spur the
recognition of problems or justify the status quo. They may
inspire innovative technologies or prescribe greater orthodoxy.
All this implies that learning by agency actors depends not only
on the collection and retrieval of output data and other kinds of
information, it also depends on the culture of beliefs, norms, and
professional identities that provides the context of meaning for
this information.

information in analysis, search, decision making, and subsequent
monitoring. This view of learning is linked closely to cybernetics-inspired information-processing models of decision making
such as the several forms of rational and bounded rational choice.
The breakdown of these information processes when technology
is poorly understood or goals are not agreed on leads to organizational anarchy and incomplete, interrupted learning (March and
Olson 1979).
Information collection also may be incomplete or distorted

(Downs 1967), and in some cases administrators do not want to
know about problems or performance gaps (Kaufman 1973).
Even when performance monitoring is reliable, administrators
may have very little idea about how to use the information to
improve performance, because their understanding of program or
task technologies is poor or there is disagreement about the
cause-effect links in the program, such as appears in education
and crime reduction technologies (Wilson 1989). In the absence
of real understanding about the nonobvious twists in relations
between inputs and outputs in dynamic systems, overcorrection
can be much worse than inaction (Senge 1990).
Even when learning is successful, however, it may be difficult for outsiders to identify. In some cases learned changes may
not have an immediate or evident effect on behavior. Yet die
lessons learned may make it possible for the organization to continue performing even if circumstances change drastically or
Much of the literature on the information-processing model

of organizational learning focuses on barriers to learning and
searches for ways to improve learning by increasing the quality,
quantity, and distribution of information. For example, learning
from experience requires a diversity of experience and experimentation, but this is curtailed by premature control (Landau and
Stout 1979), routines designed to reduce ambiguity and unpredictability (Levitt and March 1988), and low tolerance for risk
(Huber 1991). Information that is not routinely collected may be
richest in data about the need for change, such as errors in
coordination or conflicts in priorities. But these data are by
definition not systematically collected or assembled, though they
may be reflected in cultural expressions or other forms of
collective memory (Levitt and March 1988; Huber 1991; Walsh
and Ungson 1991). Learning also requires that information about
experience be routed to those who are making decisions or those
conducting analyses to recommend choices. Howeverespecially
in complex, hierarchical, program agenciesthis often does not
happen (Bushe and Shani 1991; Huber 1991; Pressman and
Wildavsky 1979).

become unfavorable in the future (Cook and Yanow 19%). Some
lessons may be kept in reserve by the affected actors to be put
into practice when the appropriate circumstances arise.
Interpretive Theories of Learning
Organization learning is propelled by the tension that results

from the basic equivocality of virtually all organizational information (Weick 1979). Because the evidence the actors have is
ambiguous, sense must be made of it in the context of existing
beliefs and assumptions of members. This is an act of interpretation, not solely of data collection and dissemination. This tension
can be seen in the contrast between the new logic of a proposed
innovation and the existing dominant logic. In cases reported by
Bouwen and Fry (1991), tension leads to struggle and confrontation and is resolved through the negotiated reconstruction of the
organization. In their case studies of organizational learning, the
greatest innovations were seen when actors confronted each other
repeatedly over attempts to make changes in the organization and
were made aware of their progress or lack of progress. These
cases illustrate the role of interpretation, and conflict among
interpretations, in debating options and the struggle to arrive at
solutions. Learning is preserved in shared interpretations stored
in the organizational memory (Walsh and Ungson 1991) and in
the enacted organizing process (Weick 1979). This view of how
lessons are institutionalized reinforces the point noted earlier that
An alternative model of learning emphasizes the intersubjectivity of organizational knowledge and the interpretive
character of the learning process itself. Learning proceeds
through sharing interpretations of events and through reflection
on these interpretations, which leads to adjustments in operations
or changes in policies and procedures (Walsh and Ungson 1991;
Daft and Huber 1987; Argyris and SchOn 1978). Learning is
characterized by dialogue, in which the richer the media of communication (e.g., face to face rather than electronic) the deeper
the sharing and the greater the potential for learning (Daft and
Huber 1987). The availability of multiple interpretations, if they
are well understood by actors, is said to increase learning (Huber
1991). In a similar vein, Jenkins-Smith (1990) and Sabatier and
Jenkins-Smith (1993) found that though policy learning (i.e.,
cognitive change in positions taken by members of policy coalitions) was rare, it was most likely to occur in professional
forums where alternative expert interpretations of program technologies are debated. Policy learning arises from dialogue about
alternatives and reflection about alternative interpretations of
evidence.

learning may not be immediately evident in new procedures, even
though it has occurred.
Who Learns?
Another question that bears on theories of organizational
learning is: Who learns? Since the organization is an abstraction
and does not have a mind that can be changed, organization
learning typically is viewed as dependent on, though different
from, individual learning. This means that lessons learned by
individuals become organizational learning when they are institutionalized in a variety of formal and informal ways as rules,
routines, standards, technologies, norms, or tacit communities of
practice. In this way the impact of lessons survives over time,
and they can be integrated into other organization processes.
Learning by agency members can fail to become organization
learning when individual knowledge of problems is not institutionalized. Argyris and Schdn (1978, 9) note for example, "There
are too many cases in which organizations know less than their
members. There are even cases in which the organization cannot
seem to learn what every member knows."
There are contending views about who it is that learns,
however. Some emphasize that learning is a cognitive process
that only individuals can undertake. In this view, organizational
learning is individual learning that occurs in organizations and
from which the organization may benefit. Research then focuses
on finding ways to speed or shape individual learning curves to
improve overall organizational effectiveness. Here the term
organization learning is used metaphorically. Some research
based on this approach, however, finds evidence for the existence
of organizational learning as defined in the previous paragraph
There may be less to the distinction between these two

models of learning than most authors suggest, however, especially with regard to their advice about how to improve learning
or about the role of culture in learning. While they differ in their
characterization of the inquiry process as relatively objective or
interpretive, their advice about improving learning often emphasizes increasing the availability of information and becoming
better systems thinkers (Senge 1990). Daft and Huber (1987),
among others, go further to suggest that organizations need a
logistic system to distribute information and an interpretive
system to help actors integrate their interpretations. Little
attention is paid, however, to the specific influences of organizational cultures on learning, which is especially surprising in the
case of the interpretive model, given its concern with social
meaning, the basis of culture.

when it concludes that the whole organization is better off when
new individual knowledge can be stored and shared in some way.
This finding is close to the idea of institutionalized knowledge.1
'Epple, Argote, and Devadas (1996), for

example, explicitly adopt such a view in
their research on irammg across shifts in
industrial settings to determine if such a
thing as organizational learning apart
from individual learning can be identified.
They conclude that individual learning
that becomes embedded in new technologies makes some contribution to what
might be called organizational learning.
In another example Cariey (1996) reasons
that *[s]ince organizational or group
performance is dependent on the experience and capabilities of individual members . . . organizations should learn as
their personnel learn. * In her study of
turnover and learning, she simulates individual learning and concludes that despite
new recruitment, turnover leads to net
information loss in the memories of individual acton and to poorer organizational
performance. She notes, however, that
many other studies have found improved
performance with increases in routinization or in "socially shared cognitions or
memories" (p. 256) and suggests that if
"knowledge repositories" such as standardized routines, computer data bases,
or even files had been made part of her
simulation, she would probably have
found less information loss with turnover.
The ideas of a "dominant logic" (Bouwen
and Fry 1991) or "Iogic-in-use* (Argyris
and Schfln 1978) are used in ways that
are somewhat similar to the idea of an
organizational culture, but generally they
do not include the symbolic and emotional attributes of culture. Logk-in-use
likely reflect! the imprint of cultural
assumptions of various professional,
occupational, or policy groups within an
organization.
The model proposed here takes the first view: Organizational learning is a distinct and real organizational process, linked
both to individual learning and to organization-wide action to
preserve the lessons learned. The focus here is on seeking out the
effects of culture as they influence learning by individual agency
members acting either in isolation or collectively. The model
proposes that culture can affect the learning seen in the choices
that agency actors make when they identify a situation as a problem, diagnose the source or character of the problem, devise possible solutions, and determine how to institutionalize the. lessons
learned. Thus culture's potential influence extends from interpreting situations to preserving the lessons learned.
ROLE OF CULTURE IN THEORIES OF
ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING
Writers in the field of organizational learning typically
assign one of three roles for organizational culture to play in
learning: storehouse for past history and lessons to be passed on
through socialization (Levitt and March 1988; Walsh and Ungson
1991; Schein 1992; interpretive filter through which members
view events and their own actions (Shrivastiva 1983; Hedberg
1981; Levitt and March 1988); or source of strategy and action
(Hedberg 1981).21 am not suggesting that these are inappropriate
roles for culture, but the implications of these roles have not
been developed, and their effects on the learning process have
not been investigated. Though it appears that they refer to different effects of culture, the case studies that will be described
shortly show them to be different portrayals of the same process.
It is not simply that some cultures are more likely to foster
learning than others (though Schein [1992] does imply this position, arguing that a learning culture would be one in which the
organization was assumed to dominate its environment, members
The other end of the spectrum also is represented in the

literature: organization learning means that organizations themselves learn, in ways that are independent of what individual
members are learning. Cook and Yanow (1996, 438) perhaps put
this best when they argue that just as an individual cannot be said
to perform a symphonic work, organizational knowing resides in
the organization as a whole. When a "group acquires the knowhow associated with its ability to carry out its collective
activities, that constitutes organizational learning."
Before we explore the specific effects of organization

cultures on learning, the idea of culture itself needs clarification.
Like learning, there are numerous formulations of the concept
(Schein 1992; Ott 1989; Trice and Beyer 1993; Van Maanen and
Barley 1985). A common conceptual definition of organization
culture is that it refers to the collectively held and symbolically
represented ideas members of an organization have about the
meaning of the organization and the work they do. Van Maanan
and Barley (1985, 33) describe the evolution of cultures when
they define it as "a living historical product of group problem
solving." Others take the learning element further, defining
organization culture as the "accumulated shared learning" of a
group (Schein 1992, 10) or as the " . . . collective phenomena that
embody peoples' responses to the uncertainties and chaos that are
inevitable in human experience" (Trice and Beyer 1993, 2).
Culture often is considered to be composed of two elements:
the overt signifiers of culture and the meanings the signifiers
have to the actors themselves (Trice and Beyer 1993). The former includes icons, rituals, stories, myths, argot, ceremonies,
office layout and space use, and decorative displays. These constitute the symbols of a culture to the degree they represent or
connote the emotional and ideational content of the culture. These
outward signifiers have been termed artifacts (Schein 1992; Ott
1989) or forms (Trice and Beyer 1993) though sometimes they
represent the culture itself. The interpretation of these artifacts
reveals the content of organizational culture (i.e., the beliefs,
values, philosophies, norms, and justifications that actors
collectively hold about the meaning of the organization and their
work in it). The work identity of members, the assumptions they
hold about how the work is to be done, and the meaning to professionals of the program technologies they employ all contribute
to this content. Based on these collectively held beliefs, members
interpret or make sense of events and judge what counts as a professional program, valid information, a plausible inference, a just
decision, and so forth. Cultures are created from many sources,
including the larger culture; the socialization that members
collectively adopted a pragmatic view of truth, and human nature

was seen as good and mutable, and so forth [pp. 365-66]). The
learning literature seems to show, however, that learning occurs
in myriad cultures; therefore it makes more sense to look at the
ways that cultural elements define the content and style of learning than to suppose that only some types of culture allow learning. If culture influences the uses that are made of the information an organization has and can learn from, and if it can be seen
to shape the alternatives for change that are considered, we can
see culture-based learning in action.

received in prior educational, professional, and work settings; the
history of events and personalities in the organization; and the
accretion of collective efforts to make sense of all these over
time.
It is this collectively created frame of reference that makes

culture important to organizational learning. I propose that this
frame of reference fills in the gaps in the inevitably equivocal
information about results and experience. The importance of culture to the study of organizational learning in public organizations is that individual and collective behaviors and prescribed
activities are not solely the product of new information or
innovative decision support technologies. Behavior and activity
also depend on the interpretation of that information in the
context of the historically developed organizational meanings
represented or symbolized in the organization's rituals, myths,
and ceremonies.
Inclusion of culture as an element in organizational learning
extends our capacity to explain what happens in the learning
process and why learning often does not occur. The culture-based
approach to learning offered here tempers the information-processing model of organizational change and learning with an interpretive view of the process.
CULTURAL INFLUENCES ON LEARNING
Specific influences of culture on learning can be observed in
the following assemblage of examples of learning efforts. In these
examples culture sometimes inspires learning and in other instances blocks it. Together they provide the basis for the model of
culture-based learning that will follow. The examples cluster
around five kinds of direct effects of culture on learning: the role
of culture in interpreting performance results; informing the
meanings inscribed in established routines; defining what constitutes legitimate information; specifying the consideration to be
given to external demands; and defining subculture relations.
All this tells us that the study of organizational culture is

essentially interpretive. It rests on the view that actions of
organizational members are informed not only by rules, incentive
schemes, and orders but also by a "collectively created" common
frame of reference (Van Maanen and Barley 1985, 31). The
ongoing cultural frame of reference takes numerous forms and is
evident in rituals, myths, often-repeated stories, and many other
kinds of artifacts. But the underlying collective beliefs about the
organization that these artifacts represent provide the context for
interpreting organizational data and events.

This list of examples is not meant to be exhaustive but to suggest
the types of linkages between culture, interpretation, and learning
that can be seen in public organizations.
The Role of Culture in Interpreting Performance Results
We generally expect that failures, especially well-publicized

failures, will lead to a reexamination of procedures or even more
fundamental changes in basic premises and that public success
similarly will lead to efforts to duplicate or extend the triumph.
But a culture-based learning approach would suggest that the
meaning of apparent disasters or successes and the lessons to be
derived from them cannot be assumed. Responses may be influenced strongly by the beliefs officials hold about their professional identities as revealed in the organization's myths and
legends. All these affect what problems are perceived as real,
what work is deemed good, and what results are expected.
Perhaps the most common and unfortunate instances of this
thesis are the cases in which public failures do not bring selfstudy and action because internal professional norms have inured
members to expectations of better things. In other cases, however, professional definitions of what counts as a good management strategy have led to program designs that are innovative and
responsive.
One case that illustrates both patterns over time is described
by Barzelay (1992). In the purchasing department of Minnesota
state government, interorganizational cooperation was rare, which
resulted in a series of costly crises that stretched over many
years. Routines in the unit were designed to take advantage of
cost minimizing tactics such as holding orders until there were
enough to get volume discounts and taking the lowest bids for
items judged to be comparable by those in the purchasing unit.
Because of these routines lengthy delays for educational computers caused cancellation of classes, and quality of laboratory
equipment was so poor that it could not perform the work for
which it was purchased.
5WJ-PART, October 1997
How does culture influence the interpretation of the events

that we expect will stimulate learning? What meanings do members draw from apparent disasters and triumphs? More specifically, how do commonly held beliefs as revealed in myths about
the true mission of the organization, legends about past successes
or failures, or stories about the identity or prowess of its officials
influence the interpretation of prominent or conspicuous events as
problems to be remedied, or situations to be accepted resignedly,
or opportunities to be taken.
This began to change, according to Barzelay, only after

newly appointed officials from outside the agency began a long
process of inculcating a new ethos of internal customer service.
Starting from the bottom up, the reformers worked to have
agency members reconceptualize their work as service to professional workers in other state agencies, rather than as routine
paperwork for greedy, irresponsible bureaucrats. This resocialization took years but began with an understanding of the existing
professional culture of the agency. What emerged finally, according to the reports of some participants, might be considered a
culture change. As a result, Barzelay notes, what had been considered an unalterable condition was redefined as a problem. A
bottom to top search for solutions turned up many changes in the
technology and financing of state procurement. The innovative
procedures that resulted illustrate the new capacity of officials to
learn from their mistakes, using customer feedback and marketlike mechanisms to monitor their performance and spur further
changes. Rules and state laws were changed. Under the emerging
culture of the agency, a new system of financial accountability to
the state was created based on tracking the link between customers and payers, by definition not a typical procedure in
bureaucracies. In this case the slow change in beliefs about
service, trust, and responsibility opened the way for innovative
ideas about the design of services.
Argyris collates a number of cases of policy making and
administration at the highest executive levels in which learning is
blocked by specific features of organization culture. The Reagan
White House staff culture of hiding overt conflict (Argyris 1991)
and protecting the presidential staff from criticism (Noonan 1990)
prevented an examination of overall budget planning. This is the
pattern Argyris calls an organizational defensive routine that
blocks the detection and correction of error.
In contrast, David Korten's (1980) analysis of the characteristics of successful third world development programs illustrates
This situation was accepted all around as undesirable but

unalterable in a state bureaucracy. The long-standing culture
within purchasing and other bureaus included the belief that
program offices could not be trusted to spend state dollars
wisely. State rules also required these practices as economies.
Program staff had learned to accept delays and substandard quality as the price paid for public service. The culture of distrust
insulated the purchasing department from the kind of feedback it
got from other departments. At this point in the case, the cultural
beliefs surrounding the work technology clearly had blocked
learning.

the ways that culture can stimulate and shape learning. Features
that distinguished successful development programs were principally that they started small, accepted responsibility for their
errors, and looked to the traditional ways of their clients for
inspiration in designing local solutions to problems.
The Effects of Collective Meanings Invested

in Existing Routines
What meanings are invested in existing routines, and how do
members react to challenges to these routines? What do organizational rituals, argot, or often-told stories symbolize about the
meanings of particular routines, programs, or procedures? What
do rituals connoting, for example, the scientific or humanitarian
character of agency work tell us about how officials will respond
to particular criticisms of program paradigms? What does the cultural content of programs and entrenched routines suggest about
the kinds of problems that will be recognized or how debate
about alternatives will proceed? To what kinds of program
changes would it even occur to officials to give serious consideration?
According to the information-processing model of organizational learning (Daft and Huber 1987; Huber 1991; Walsh and
Ungson 1991), learning is institutionalized by encoding new
procedures or norms into the routines for search, work technology, communications, or decision making. The work culture
can tell us about the meanings of the various routines and norms
to the members and can help us understand and cope with resistance to changing routines. In some cases, proposed changes in
routines may be defined in the culture as unprofessional, as
a quick and dirty fix, orin the case of efforts to disseminate lessons learned in a large organizationas meddling by
But behind these good learning strategies were stable program structures and groups of professional staff. Permitting
project builders to remain together, maintaining the ethos of
"planning with the people" that drove the program, was linked
more often to program success than the common procedure,
which was to try to duplicate the formal structural characteristics
of promising programs in other settings with other staff. It was
not the formal program structures but the staffs commitment to
working closely with local people, their tacit understanding of
how to do so, and the culture of grassroots action among project
builders that shaped the program learning and made the projects
successful. The professional culture of the agencies provided a
context for interpreting local situations and choosing a method to
achieve effective development.

headquarters. However, the cultural investment in routines also
may reflect professional values or local priorities that foster
learning by insisting on improved results or valuing constant
experimentation. Thus the specific cultural assumptions built into
routines either can impede or encourage learning.
This cultural setting appears to have limited the capacity of

agency officials to respond to acknowledged problems. External
oversight agencies identified several serious agency failings. In
one case, in response to criticisms of work backlogs, some
agency officials proposed new examination procedures to speed
inspections. These new procedures involved using sampling techniques to select likely lawbreakers, but this innovation was long
resisted because it clashed with the law enforcement ethos within
the agency. Sampling was inconsistent with the collectively held
belief that every guilty party should be apprehended and that the
long-honed skills the officials used to size up likely suspects, not
a statistical interval, should guide their efforts.
In another instance, officials in the central personnel department and in some of the regional offices of the bureau proposed
to introduce total quality management (TQM) as the centerpiece
of a new management approach. This approach was meant to
combat a variety of internal and external criticisms of the bureau,
including stress, low morale, and problems with recruitment.
Again, however, consistent with the law enforcement culture of
much of the organization, management finally rejected all the
empowerment and involvement programs, preferring to react to
the criticisms with renewed efforts to monitor and control
employees rather than to experiment with greater autonomy and
These influences of culture on learning are illustrated by the

case of a large federal bureau charged with carrying out regulatory programs for many other agencies. Bureau personnel include
examiners of several types and investigators with law enforcement responsibilities. Investigators, who are law enforcement
professionals, operate in an aura of particular danger and are said
to enjoy more autonomy and higher salaries than other types of
bureau personnel. The distinctive status of the investigators also
is indicated by their separate chain of command. Examiners, in
contrast, view their jobs as the carrying out of the bureau's core
professional work, and they reportedly feel underappreciated for
their role in identifying many of the cases that the investigators
then pursue to completion. All this contributes to the dominance
of the law enforcement professional culture within the agency, an
emphasis on control, and, until recently, little opportunity for
employee participation.

responsibility. In this case the role of culture was to defend
routines from change (Mahler 1995).
The Influence of Cultural Beliefs on the Legitimacy
of Information Sources or Forums
Communications patterns in an agency like the Agency for

International Development (AID) also illustrate this pattern. The
culture of AID very much involves work in the field. One of the
dominant beliefs is that only in the field does one experience
what development work is really aboutworking directly with
people on sustainable projects. Since many staff come to the
agency from the Peace Corps, whose philosophy puts the highest
priority on field work, this is not surprising. According to this
belief, headquarters' analysis cannot comprehend the experiential
reality of work in the field (Mahler 1988). Thus, learning is
much more likely to result from field experiences than from
analysis of data in Washington. Communiques from the field are
accorded highest status and quickly passed around the office. To
receive one is an indicator of the importance of one's work.
Lessons drawn from the field are considered the most legitimate
bases for changing policies or procedures.
How do rituals surrounding the transmission or communication of information affect the credibility of the information or
other aspects of its interpretation? Stories, language, and visual
displays are artifacts that can reveal much about the organizational identity of officials and help explain why some channels or
types of communication are valued over others, influencing what
kinds of reports will be seen as convincing. In some settings,
many forms of data may be used. In others only data secured in
particular, company, ways are accepted, or different channels of
communication may invoke different norms. Rituals can tell us
how members identify data that is valid or what forums for
exchange or dialogue are considered appropriate or useful. The
focus of literature on the information processing approach to
learning is mostly on improving and increasing information flow.
While these are important issues, the impact of culture on
communication can provide clues to how an organization actually
uses this data in learning. Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith (1993)
address this process in case studies of policy learning that
illustrate that the professional communications in professional
forums are more likely to lead to real change in the positions of
policy actors than are exchanges that occur at public forums,
which include industry or interest groups. Dialogue in such professional settings engages actors in different roles than, does
public discourse.
The Influence of Culture on the Consideration

Given to External Demands
How does the organization socialize officials to deal with
outsiders, such as clients, oversight institutions, interest groups,
other agencies, or local residents? How does the collective frame
of reference about actors in the external environment influence
the level of attention or inattention that particular outsiders
receive? What kinds of needs, requests, or demands will officials
see and put on the agenda for change?
Culture-based assumptions about clients, oversight agencies,
and other organizations and actors articulate the meaning of
power and dependency relations, the legitimacy of external
claims, and service obligations to organization members. There
are vast differences in organizational cultures and ideologies with
regard to environmental relations generally, specific client
relations, and links to interorganizational networks of other
agencies and groups. What assumptions the agency holds about
client services and who it defines as its clients are concerns
highlighted by the present interest in TQM and reinventing
government. These beliefs are represented in various ways
formally in mission statements and rules for treating client
applicants and informally in language use; in stories and rituals;
and even in the physical surroundings in which clients wait, oversight hearings are held, or administrators function (Goodsell
1989).
Learning from results is much more likely, of course, when
results in the form of client outcomes or interorganizational
cooperation can be seen to have some effect on the organization.
This effect is notoriously difficult to observe in some types of
public organizations where neither outputs nor outcomes are
directly observable, such as the coping organizations that Wilson
identifies (1989). External sanctions for inadequate client outcomes often are weak, so learning may depend almost exclusively
53VJ-PART, October 1997
This collective cultural belief does not necessarily thwart

change, but it does influence which information about results will
be attended to and what kinds of new solutions are likely. In one
section of the agency, the most favored programs are those that
work directly with the farm sector, rather than through other
development mechanisms such as economic policies. The former
kinds of projects were protected by artful descriptions when the
environment, in the shape of a new presidential administration,
changed the external policy requirements and the resources available to the agency. The agency learned how to adapt to changed
policy eras while protecting its programs in the field.

on organizational ethos, professionalism, and the public service
ethic, and these may be part of the culture itself.
The Influence of Subcultures on Communication

and Learning Dialogue
What impact do hostile subcultures have on the spread of
reforms or innovations? How do the norms of a subculture influence the interpretation of information from other admired or
despised groups?
Organizational subcultures often arise based on differences
in geography, professional orientation, program responsibilities,
functional specialization, or other groupings (Trice and Beyer
1993). Diverse ideologies often emerge among subcultures, and
these differences can enhance or impede learning. Interchange
among subcultures can spark new learning. Communication
across these lines can lead to new perspectives and insights into
tasks or program technologies. Beck (1993) shows how new
organization structures at NASA opened multiple lines of communication among professionals in different project groups and
disciplines. This spurred new communications patterns associated
with self-reports of greater innovation.
Deep, long-standing divisions between groups in organizations can, however, limit learning as lessons adopted by some
groups are spurned by others. A new, widely praised structural
change was adopted by the law enforcement group in the large
federal bureau mentioned earlier. Its effect was to streamline
administration between headquarters and the field, a goal across
the organization. The change was not adopted by other divisions,
Korten's cases illustrate such a pattern of responsiveness to

clients. One important difference between successful and unsuccessful international development projects was that the successful
projects worked with the local population. Officials respected and
built on local traditional solutions (Korten 1980). A less salutary
example comes from J.S. Ott (1989), who tells about the case of
an accounting firm that customarily described its clients in the
most derogatory terms and experienced, not surprisingly, a very
high client turnover rate. Complaints from clients were not taken
seriously. Because clients did not understand the services that
were performed and could not discern the quality of services,
their questions and complaints were seen as unworthy of attention
by the highly sophisticated staff. Understanding the meaning of
cultural expressions about the environment can tell us much about
how learning from failures and successes might be blocked and
how learning might be encouraged.

however, in part because of the distrust between the law enforcement group and the other groups (Mahler 1995).
A MODEL OF THE INFLUENCE OF CULTURE
ON LEARNING
Though there is no suggestion that the few examples summarized here represent all types of organizational learning in
public organizations, the cases do illustrate two specific patterns
of culture's influence on learning. The first concerns the influential of shared beliefs about the forms and sources of information on the interpretations of equivocal performance data. The
examples suggest that the more ambiguous the results appear to
the organization members, the more influential the collective
beliefs about the legitimacy and meaning of information sources
seem to be. These beliefs might be termed the culture of information. Put another way, the more difficult that situations are for
officials to assess or the more controversial the agency's results,
the more agency actors will rely on cultural beliefs to determine
if the news is bad, good, or inconsequential. These interpretations of data form the basis for either deciding to go on with
business as usual or launching an effort to improve the situation
(i.e., learning). Where there is less ambiguity about what results
might mean, culture should have less influence on learning.
Many factors, including competing professional norms or the
clarity of goals and expectations for the agency, could affect the
degree of ambiguity seen in the results data.
While the case examples presented here do not demonstrate
all these implications, they do illustrate the general pattern. In the
Minnesota case, staff were caught in the controversy between
their own well-entrenched procedures and frequent outside criticism. Their ethos allowed them to label this criticism as irresponsible. This interpretation changed as the culture of customer
service slowly took hold. In the case of the Agency for International Development, requests, inquiries, and other communiques
from the field were accorded the highest priority, and therefore
The preceding case examples illustrate the effects of several

different types of cultural elements in organization learning.
These cultural elements included organizational and professional
identities and work standards, rituals that connote the importance
of various sources of communication, subculture factions based
on professional identities, collective beliefs about the deficiencies
of clients or other departments, and beliefs about the wisdom of
clients and their traditional ways. It is time to summarize the
influences of these cultural elements on the course of learning in
a model.

led to action. In these examples the specific cultural beliefs about
the legitimacy of information sources themselves guided the interpretation of equivocal and controversial situations. These interpretations were critical in blocking self-examination in the firm
Ott studied and in the first years in Barzelay's account of the
Minnesota case. However, later in the Minnesota purchasing
agency and in the AID example, cultural beliefs about information spurred the diagnosis of situations as problems and energized
actors to seek solutions.
An even greater difficulty, however, in the design or

redesign of program technologies is that many agencies receive
mandates to undertake programs for which effective technologies
have not been discovered, (e.g., to protect neglected children, to
serve internal customers). This means that even if negative performance data were unambiguous, they might not contain much
in the way of clues as to how to rectify problems with a program. When program technologies are not well understood or are
controversial, the search for ways to adjust or redesign them
must fall back on other kinds of knowledge, including organizational beliefs about what it means to do a good, professional job.
Thus culture plays a role in learning by filling in gaps in technological understanding with the collective wisdom of the organization. Again, the less ambiguous or controversial the technology,
the smaller the role for culture.
A second and related pattern that emerged in these examples

concerns culture's role in guiding the analysis and debate about
solutions to acknowledged problems, particularly when existing
technologies are not well understood or are controversial. Collective beliefs about professional standards and identities and the
meanings attributed to the agency's mission shape perceptions
about legitimate options for new programs and procedures,
including the option of no action. This set of beliefs might be
called the culture of technology in an agency. Culture's role in
influencing the process of procedural analysis and the direction of
change is perhaps especially important for public organizations
because of the inherent ambiguity of many program and managerial technologies. Both Perrow (1967) and Wilson (1989),
among many others, have defined the technologies of public
organizations to include not only equipment but the whole collection of program procedures established to transform cases or situations into the state prescribed in public law or regulation. Often
such technologies are difficult to establish because the intent of
public policy is unclear, as much of the implementation research
demonstrates.
But cultural beliefs about what constitutes a good program

also can fill in when technology is ambiguous and controversial,
as in the case of international development, where again the
influences of agency culture appear to be important in program
definition. For example, Korten (1980) spotlights the attentiveness of program officials to the traditional ways that their clients
devise solutions to development problems; he notes that these
programs are remarkable because of their relative success in a
field where much controversy surrounds methods of development
and sustainability. In one of the program areas at the Agency for
International Development, officials favored hands-on training in
the field, consistent with core culture values, over nationwide
economic policy change.
These observations, along with the existing portrayals of the
organizational learning process, suggest a model of the ways in
which culture influences learning. Culture provides a reservoir of
organizational meanings that agency actors can draw from to help
interpret results and make sense of existing and proposed
procedures and program technologies. The influence of culture is
most likely when agency results or technologies are ambiguous
and controversial. This model builds on the interpretive approach
to organizational learning, which emphasizes the equivocality of
organizational information and the value of reflection and
dialogue, and it also acknowledges the information processing
perspective, which emphasizes the importance of data collection
and analytic problem-solving techniques when ambiguity or
controversy is low. In both cases the lessons learned by
individuals in the context of cultural interpretations become
organizational learning when they are formally or informally
shared with other agency actors as rules, new technologies,
stories, or group norms. Hard lessons may become part of the
agency mythology, contributing to future interpretations. The
examples given above suggest this pattern but do not offer a
systematic test of the model. The exhibit illustrates these
relationships.
This pattern is seen in several examples, particularly those

from the large federal bureau. Here, consistent with the dominant
law enforcement ethos, proposals to adopt sampling techniques to
remedy a work backlog were rejected. Traditional management
controls were continued despite evidence of stress, low morale,
and recruitment problems. Other examples from this agency
illustrate how imitative learning as a means of problem solving
can be blocked by hostile subcultures. These illustrations suggest
that management improvement technologies may be particularly
poorly understood, making them subject to cultural influences.

Exhibit
Settings in which the Influence on Learning of Beliefs about
Information Sources and Procedures is Most Evident
Level of ambiguity and equivocality in
performance data and results
High ambiguity
High reliance on
culture of technologies
High reliance on
cultures of information
and technologies
Level of knowledge or
agreement about procedures
and technologies
High levels of
knowledge
...:...
Little reliance on
culture
High reliance on
culture of information
The exhibit suggests that the likely influence of culture is

most pronounced when ambiguity or controversy surrounds both
the information about results and the associated procedures or
technologies of the agency. When ambiguity is low, however,
less reliance on cultural interpretations is likely.
Culture clearly is not the only influence in learning, but
given the ambiguity of results and the forces that shape program
technology, its role appears to be significant both in blocking
some changes and in spurring others. These effects of culture
have not been the subject of particular study in research on
organizational learning or in related studies of program implementation and evaluation. Generally, the meaning of data and
program processes to actors are not considered. The framework
drawn here offers a more systematic basis for studying cultural
influences on learning and the resulting changes in programs and
procedures.
CONCLUSIONS
The exploration of linkages between organizational culture
and learning leads to a model of the specific forms of influence
that culture exerts in the learning process. Beliefs and norms
about information and professional work standards are influential,
particularly when agency events or results are subject to ambiguous interpretations and do not clearly indicate a remedy.
53S/J-PART, October 1997
Low levels of
knowledge
Low ambiguity
Clues for building more effective learning routines are

especially welcome in public organizations, which are typically
constrained in extraordinarily complex ways from responding
directly to results. James Q. Wilson provides a catalog of the
constraints on the actions and perspectives of public managers
(1989). Learning in governmental organizations requires serving
a variety of external constituents, some of whom are customers,
some professionals, some overseers, and some opponents with a
variety of agendas for the organization. Many current reform
efforts such as reinvention and the National Performance Review
are aimed at altering these external constraints. Studies of the
internal inspirations for innovations and the limitations on change
embedded in the organization's culture have a useful contribution
to make to these efforts.
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Influences of Organizational Culture

on Learning in Public Agencies

This article examines an underappreciated influence on

Not all change is learning, but learning is thought to be an

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

But not all organizations do learn. The converse of the

represents a conscious effort to interpret and analyze results in

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

THEORIES OF ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING

The thesis offered here is that together these elements of

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

Information collection also may be incomplete or distorted

Much of the literature on the information-processing model

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

Organization learning is propelled by the tension that results

523/J-PART, October 1997

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

There may be less to the distinction between these two

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

'Epple, Argote, and Devadas (1996), for

The other end of the spectrum also is represented in the

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

Before we explore the specific effects of organization

collectively adopted a pragmatic view of truth, and human nature

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

It is this collectively created frame of reference that makes

All this tells us that the study of organizational culture is

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

We generally expect that failures, especially well-publicized

How does culture influence the interpretation of the events

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

This began to change, according to Barzelay, only after

This situation was accepted all around as undesirable but

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

The Effects of Collective Meanings Invested

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

This cultural setting appears to have limited the capacity of

531/J-PART, October 1997

These influences of culture on learning are illustrated by the

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

Communications patterns in an agency like the Agency for

532/J-PART, October 1997

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

The Influence of Culture on the Consideration

This collective cultural belief does not necessarily thwart

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

The Influence of Subcultures on Communication

Korten's cases illustrate such a pattern of responsiveness to

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

The preceding case examples illustrate the effects of several

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

An even greater difficulty, however, in the design or

536/J-PART, October 1997

A second and related pattern that emerged in these examples

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

But cultural beliefs about what constitutes a good program

531/J-PART, October 1997

This pattern is seen in several examples, particularly those

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

The exhibit suggests that the likely influence of culture is

53S/J-PART, October 1997

Influences of Organizational Culture on Learning

Clues for building more effective learning routines are

Bouwen, Rene, and Fry, Ronald.