Chapter 10: Organizational Culture

Question 1

What is organizational culture?

Answer 1

system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organizations

Question 2

What are the seven characteristics of organization culture?

Answer 2

• innovation and risk taking
• attention to detail
• outcome orientation
• people orientation
• team orientation
• aggressiveness
• stability

Question 3

Seven Characteristics: Innovation and Risk Taking

Answer 3

The degree to which employees are encouraged to be

innovative and take risks

Question 4

Seven Characteristics: Attention to Detail

Answer 4

Degree to which employees are expected to work with precision,
analysis, and attention to detail

Question 5

Seven Characteristics: Outcome Orientation

Answer 5

Degree to which management focuses on results, or outcomes, rather than on the techniques and processes used to achieve these outcomes

Question 6

Seven Characteristics: People Orientation

Answer 6

Degree to which management decisions take into consideration the effect of outcomes on people within the organization

Question 7

Seven Characteristics: Team Orientation

Answer 7

Degree to which work activities are organized around teams rather than individuals

Question 8

Seven Characteristics: Aggressiveness

Answer 8

Degree to which people are aggressive and competitive rather than easygoing and supportive

Question 9

Seven Characteristics: Stability

Answer 9

Degree to which organizational activities emphasize maintaining the status quo in contrast to growth

Question 10

What are the different levels of characteristics?

Answer 10

• Artifacts are aspects of an organization’s culture that you see, hear, and feel
• Beliefs: Understandings of how objects and ideas relate to each other
• Values: Stable, long-lasting beliefs about what is important
• Assumptions: Taken-for-granted notions of how something should be

Question 11

What are culture’s functions?

Answer 11

• Has boundary-defining role because it creates distinction between one organization and others
• Conveys a sense of identity to organization members
• Helps create commitment tot something larger than an individual’s self interest
• Enhances stability; it is the social glue that helps hold the organization together by providing standards for what employees should say and do
• Serves as a control mechanism that guides and shapes the attitudes and behaviours of employees, and helps them make sense of the organization

Question 12

What are the visible ways to read an organization’s culture?

Answer 12

• Stories: Include narratives about organization’s founders, rule breaking, rags-to-riches successes, reduction in the workforce, relocation of employees, reactions to past mistakes, and organizational coping
• Rituals: Repetitive sequences of activities that express and reinforce the key values of the organization; what goals are most important; and which people are important and which are expendable
• Material Symbols: What conveys to employees who is important, the degree of egalitarianism top management desires, and the kinds of behaviour that are appropriate
• Language: Help members identify with the culture, show their acceptance of it, and help preserve it such as Starbucks drink size names

Question 13

What are some liabilities of Organization culture?

Answer 13

• barriers to change
• barriers to diversity
• barriers to mergers and acquisition

Question 14

What are Barriers to Change?

Answer 14

When shared values do not agree with those that further the organization’s effectiveness where practices that previously led to success can lead to failure when those practices no longer match up well with environmental needs

Question 15

What are Barriers to Diversity?

Answer 15

Paradox created when hiring new employees that differ from majority in race, gender, disability, or other characteristics where newcomers who wish to fit in must accept the organization’s core cultural values

Question 16

What are Barriers to Mergers and Acquisitions?

Answer 16

Recently, cultural compatibility has become a primary concern where mergers or acquisitions work mostly due to how two organizations’ cultures match up

Question 17

How does an organization change its culture?

Answer 17

• Dramatic Crisis: Shock undermining the status quo that calls into question the relevance of the current culture
• Turnover in Leadership: New top leadership, which can provide alternative set of key values that may be perceived as more capable of responding to the crisis
• Young and Small Organization: Younger the organization, the less entrenched its culture will be where its also easier for management to communicate its new values when the organization is small
• Weak Culture: The more widely held a culture is, and the higher the agreement among members on its values, the more difficult it will be to change

Question 18

How do you create an ethical organizational culture?

Answer 18

• Be a Visible Role Model
• Communicate Ethical Expectations
• Provide Ethics Training
• Visibly Reward Ethical Acts and Punish Unethical Ones
• Provide Protective Mechanisms

Question 19

How do you create a positive organizational culture?

Answer 19

• build on employees strength
• reward more often than punish
• emphasize vitality and growth