The Importance of Solid Organizational Culture

According to Classics of Organizational Theory, Organizational Culture is “the culture that exists in an organization, something akin to a societal culture” (Shafritz, 352). In other words, the culture that exists within an organization is no different than the culture that exists within a society. Culture is anything or anyone with “shared values, beliefs, and cultural norms” (Youker, 2).

Organizational Culture Theory is important to understand because it gives us insight to how a business functions because of the culture within. There is an abundance of literature available about the effects of culture and conflict within an organization, but this paper will attempt to take a only brief look at the function of culture within organizations, influence that culture has on organizational relations, and the importance of having a solid culture within an organization.

The culture that exists within organizations is bound to vary from organization to organization. However, to be a strong organization, it must meet the criteria of a culture.

For instance, the organization must have shared values. The persons within the organization must believe in, to a certain extent, the same things. The group must have shared goals, ideas, values, and purposes. Similarly, the group must have shared norms. The individuals within the group must follow the same moral code and abide by the same set of rules while in the organization – whether such rules be written or unwritten.

In her article, “Cultural Theory and Organizations: Analytical Method and Case Organization Studies,” Yehuda Baruch discusses the important of understanding different organization cultures. She talks about how important it is for a leader to understand the different cultures and to be able to lead his or her organization in the best manner possible. (Baruch.)

There are several different organizational cultures, and each one has its pros and cons. Through studying these different cultures, a leader or supervisor would be able to better understand how his or her organization functions and which organizational culture would be most applicable.

Most leaders, however, are unaware of the culture that exists within an organization, even without understanding the different formal theories that go along with running a corporation. Each organization, even without a formal, set-in-stone organizational culture, contains some sort of culture within. A leader tends to run an organization or group with the manner that he or she is most comfortable leading in, and though different people lead groups in different ways, these methods may not always work as well as one would hope, so it is important to be not only an informed leader, but also a flexible leader.

Let us use, for example, a small business that we will refer to as “Milton Books.” Milton Books is a small company that has been around for five years and hasn’t grown or expanded, despite the owner’s dreams to become a franchise. The owner, a distinguished businessman, is constantly away on business trips, so his manager runs the bookstore alone. Because of the manager’s incompetence, the culture that exists within the bookstore is a mess. Employees are unaware of the rules and do not understand what their individual duties are because the manager has failed to communicate with each employee what is expected of him or her. Instead, he believes that each worker will somehow
“just know” what is expected of them.

As a result of the manager’s failure to manage properly, the employees don’t understand what the rules for the organization are or what the company’s goals are. While the owner may imagine his business to be one where the employees are always on time and dressed in a uniform, the reality may be that the employees are unaware of when they are supposed to be at work due to poor scheduling habits and they may not even own a company uniform. Similarly, the owner may have hopes that the employees will have the goal of expanding the business and bringing in more customers, when the reality may be that there is no motivation from within the business to push the employees to be more outgoing with the customers, more friendly, or more helpful.

What we see in this example of a business organization is that the owner has a different idea of what the organization’s culture is or should be than what the culture actually is. The culture that we see in this organization is one that is flawed and disorganized and one where employees are not understanding the common goals that should be uniting them.

The manager, as head of the bookstore, should begin to try to unite the employees into a solid, adapted group. The employees should all understand the goals of the business and therefore be able to help the company meet those goals. If each person believes that the company should expand and grow, than he or she would be more friendly, outgoing, and helpful with customers as the owner so desperately hopes they will.

The owner hopes that the company will contain a culture based on tidiness and compliance with his rules. If he would communicate these culture needs with the manager, the company would begin to flourish as it nourishes a healthy culture instead of the poor culture it now contains.

Organizational culture may differ from group to group, but one thing remains the same: the importance of a good, stable culture within an organization. One cannot have a flourishing company or business if there is not a solid and healthy culture existing within that organization.

In order to maintain this sort of healthy organizational culture, the manager or supervisor should make it his or her priority to understand what the problems are within the organization and how those issues can be solved quickly and completely.

As the superiors learn about building a healthy culture, the employees will understand that these are serious changes being implemented, and because they are healthy changes, will grow as workers in the company and begin to adhere to the new culture tactics that are being put in place.

When an organization has a strong culture, it cannot help but grow and expand because more people will want to be a part of that type of culture. It is human nature to desire some amount of predictability within our lives and something that we can share and relate to with other people. Organizational culture supplies that.

The importance of organizational culture, therefore, is obvious: to provide an organization with shared beliefs, values, and cultural norms. If a business has shared beliefs, it will promote teamwork so that the persons involved with the business organization are working towards the same goals, rather than working towards individual goals and thus causing each other unnecessary and unplanned for setbacks, and will therefore contain what we can firmly call a solid organizational culture.

Works Cited

Baruch, Yehuda. “Cultural Theory and Organizations: Analytical Method and Case Organization Studies.” FindArticles.com. 1998. April 20, 2007.

Shafritz, Jay M. Classics of Organizational Theory. 2005. California. Editor: David Tatom.
252-357.

Youker, Robert. “What is Culture in Organizations?” PMForum.com. 2004. April 2, 2007.