Organizational culture

Basically, organizational culture is the personality of the organization. It is comprised of the values, norms and tangible signs (artifacts) of organization members and their behaviors. Organizational culture involves a learned set of behaviors that is common knowledge to all the participants. These behaviors are based on a shared system of meanings which guide our perceptions, understanding of events, and what we pay attention to.

Culture is about individuals in a group sharing patterns of behavior. There is no cultural absolute. Because culture is relative, we have the power to create a culture that is the best fit for an organization’s future direction.

Organizational culture is one of those terms that are difficult to express distinctly, but usually every member of an organization understands it.

The culture of every organization (corporate culture) is one of those focus areas that are not always fully understood and are not optimally utilized either in an organization. It differs in every organization, for example, the culture of a large, for-profit organization is quite different from that of a hospital or of a university. You can tell about the culture of an organization by looking at the arrangement of furniture, at the clothes that the members wear, etc.

Large organizations usually have a dominant culture that is shared by the majority of the organization and subcultures represented by groups of individuals with unique values or beliefs that may or may not be consistent with the dominant culture. Subcultures that reject the dominant culture are called countercultures.

Strong organizational cultures are those where the core values of the dominant culture are strongly believed by the great majority of organizational members. A strong culture tends to increase behavior consistency and reduce turnover. However, strong cultures may be less adaptive to changes, may create barriers to diversity.