Diagnosing Organizational culture

Hi ppl !!

It is a well know fact that in today's competitive world it is very important to have right mix of culture. with globalisation, it is essential for any company to know it's existing culture and take appropriate steps to correct.
then my question is why there are so less company's who are trying to diagnose their orz culture and taking proactive steps to change their culture !!!
Got any answers ????

Corporate culture is hard to change.

What would we change it to?

How would we change it?

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Bob Gately, PE, MBA

Hi,

The organisational culture plays a significant role in making organisations get the best out of themselves. Even if the climate does not show any direct linkages at a given point of time, logically it makes sense to have a good HR climate for the benefit of the organisations. The culture provides the energy needed to function well by ensuring as it were a proper circulation of the blood through all the organs. The HR culture is one that results from the beliefs of the top mgt initially and subsequently from the HR systems and practices.

Now coming to the question as to why it is not changed, I personally feel that since the top mgt influence the climate they would not want to change it or there might be resistance to change.

Then next question, as to change from corporate culture to what? The answer is to a better corporate culture; from better to best; and from best to improvement on the best culture. but practically there is no best culture.

What you can do is study the climate and know what the employees have to tell regarding the change? Prepare a questionaire that would bring out the opinion.

Then benchmark the best practises and these new practises would slowly bring a change in the climate

I hope I have attempted satisfying your qurey.

Regards,
Soumya Shankar

Hello Soumya:

>The organisational culture plays a significant role in making organisations get the best out of themselves.<

Does organisational culture make anyone do anything? Organisational culture is the result of who is hired and promoted and what behaviors are rewarded and punished. We cannot change the organisational culture if we don’t change who is hired, who is promoted and what behaviors are rewarded and punished.

>The culture provides the energy needed to function well by ensuring as it were a proper circulation of the blood through all the organs.<

Using that analogy I suspect most organizations have one or more cancers that need to be cut out, e.g., supervisors, managers and executives who need to be fired.

>The HR culture is one that results from the beliefs of the top mgt initially and subsequently from the HR systems and practices.<

Are beliefs or behaviors the driving force? I cannot see people’s beliefs but I can certainly see their behaviors.

>I personally feel that since the top mgt influence the climate they would not want to change it or there might be resistance to change.<

I agree that they are comfortable and the culture is what they have created or inherited from others.

>…but practically there is no best culture.<

I think you have it.

>What you can do is study the climate and know what the employees have to tell regarding the change? Prepare a questionaire that would bring out the opinion. <

Never ask employees what they think without a clear plan of action to make changes that are identified. Most executives will not commit to making changes unless they know what changes are to be made.

>Then benchmark the best practises and these new practises would slowly bring a change in the climate.<

If we don’t change the behaviors of current employees, can change occur?

Bob

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Bob Gately, PE, MBA

There are surprising questions.

We have seen corporates to collapse due to their interaction with internal and external process and interaction. It's the right practice which should improve the culture and and can be learned by an organization as a whole.

As being on learning curve today big corporates make the small cosmopolitian civilizations subject to do not try to attack and demolish each other.

As people make the organization and as size increases it becomes more and more difficult to manage the organization build on initial business model.

There are continously changed corporate environmental factors needs to be incorporated in the organization business model to make it survive and as well sharpen the saw to put it and carry on the upward spiral.

They need to identified by good analyst, find good solutions for them and seemlessly included as part of culture. But business compitions have made
and increasing presseure makes to do difficult and as leadership changes
we are likely to lost directions but to manage is the key to a ever growing
organization.

Regards

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Sincerely,

umalme

I agree with anuj that as the organisation grows, the values that the pioneers had would be diluted and unknowingly there would be a thin line of people who would start influencing the culture.

Some time back there was a story on this cite, about the 8 monkeys being locked in a room with a bunch of bananas hanging in the middle of the room. My apology to the author of that article as i don't remember his name. But that is a very practical scenario which happens in all the organisations.

It is not impossible that the culture cannot be changed, it is just that who is going to bell the cat. In my opinion it should be the HR dept. Who else can think for the betterment of the employees if we don't take care of them.

Let me know if you agree with me

Regards,
Soumya Shankar

“OC” is interchangeably used between org climate and culture. Climate is the perception and culture is the resultant seen through behaviour – according to me

Climate is the influenced behaviour and values of leaders resulting into visible behavior expected and exhibited by the members in the organization which becomes the culture in the long run. The management model resorted by the leaders will become an unwritten rule and norms will be followed by members and transferring the same to new comers as well…………………..and the cycle goes on

As BOB pointed out very precisely, the behaviour is the only factor that can be changed which will entail in change in climate and culture. The leadership behaviour should be brought into assessment for building a culture the management believes.

For instance to nurture the entrepreneurial culture in an organization, when the organization consider that to be one the core values, the management development programs should be based on assessing and developing managers to identify these competencies and qualities amongst the members and properly reward and recognise them.
The individual behaviours exhibited by each will not be the aggregate organization climate as the individual behaviour changes with varying environment. Foe eg: a person was assessed introvert in a telecom company recently – but in the real life he is one of the good sociable character since I know him personally. The assessment was made on his behaviour during the assessment centre and in his organization he was never allowed to carry out his judgement or decisions – this has resulted in the assessment of him being introvert

Hence, the Organization changes we are talking about is nothing but the changes we meant to bring in the behaviour aspects of people

And of Our role is extremely important is bringing in competecnies to identify and analyse the climate and culture and suggest changing measures

This is my view
Regards
Rajesh B

This seems to be Dilution decade or century but what factors to dilute
those are important to see, i hope learning organizations are making
incremental changes and keeps a log of drive to reach a mile stone and gear up again.

I appreciate the members questions asked in 'bebaak' manners...

__________________
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Sincerely,

umalme

CORPORATE CULTURE

is real and people work under the influence of culture.

The culture in organization means a combination of norms,
procedures, practices , policies, logos, methods etc which are
unique for the organization.

This is normally initiated by the top leadership-- may be one
CEO and/ or a small group.

This individual or the small group tends to maintain the
culture due to

-source of comfort

-source of pride/ satisfaction

-cost of change [ risk ]

-defensive attitude to change

-own security under the current culture

-fear of losing authority

-status conscious

-sees no need / benefits in change

etc.

This attitude can be changes only

-if the management feels the heat of globalization

-if the management feels they are losing out

-if the management sees the enormous benefits they could
gain.

etc



regards

LEO LINGHAM

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LEO LINGHAM

PRINCIPAL:BestBusiCon Pty Ltd

are we talking about here organizations mainly those have realized self actualization.

__________________
_________
Sincerely,

umalme