Organizational Culture (Part I)
Culture is a very broad concept in the world of words that has countless different dimensions such as ethnic culture, national culture, university culture. The term organizational culture is one of the subsets of this broad concept.
What is Organizational Culture?
Culture has different dimensions, each of which has its own definitions. Despite some similarities regarding such definitions that originate from the totality of culture, each component of this discussion has its own definition and description. In this sense, organizational culture includes management and organizational behavior. That is, it specifies a set of mechanisms that are related to the behavior of employees in the organization’s environment in interaction with each other, communication with customers and dealing with shareholders.
This style of culture is a general and common framework for the employees of an organization, which is determined by the manager of the collection. This culture is developed and strengthened in various ways.
Characteristics of Organizational Culture
Organizational culture has 7 special and unique characteristics that the manager of an organization can expresses and explain clearly the organizational culture of his group for employees:
1. Risk Taking and Innovation
Expressing how employees of an organization are encouraged for their innovations and creative actions.
2. Attention to Detail
Encouraging employees to pay attention to details and analyze them.
3. Conclusion
Clearly stating that the focus of management is on achieving the result or the methods of achieving it.
4. Humanism
Paying attention to the people in the organization when making decisions and intro-organizational policies.
5. Tendency to Teamwork
The importance of doing things as a team and expressing the priority of team or individual work.
6. Aggressiveness
Determining the scope of the competitive environment for employees.
7. Stability
Examining the plans and goals of the organization to determine the stability of the activity process or its growing movement.
The Importance of Learning Organizational Culture
1. Improving the quality of internal and external communication
In addition to cultural differences between different organizations, it is possible that there are cultural differences between different units of a single organization. For example: there may be many cultural differences between the accounting unit of an organization and the marketing and sales unit of the same organization.
2. Strengthening Negotiation Skills
Our success in external negotiations depends on many different factors, one of which is familiarity with the organizational culture of the relevant organization. Because we always deal with people and organizations with different cultures and ethnicity in our negotiations, we cannot expect the same result in different organizations with different cultures. Familiarity with cultural differences can also be a positive point for success in international negotiations.
3. Culture Engineering in Organizations and Companies
Managers who are familiar with this category will have more crisis management capabilities when faced with problems. They can also reduce existing tensions by raising the level of efficiency and performance of the group and employees.
4. Talking about Company Values
The more culturally rich a company is, the more its inner values are manifested. In fact, the organizational culture is a direct reflection of the internal values of the organization. Because it expresses our true nature and will reflect our organizational and interactive opinions with others.
5. Converting Employees into First-Class Supporters
When we have a favorable organizational culture in which employees achieve their ideal conditions or at least get close to it, they can become the biggest internal or even external supporters of the organization. For example, their innovations and creativity should be noticed, their work activities should be valued and considered important. To achieve these conditions, the smallest successes and improvements of employees should be noticed and encouraged. A culture other than this will turn employees into disillusioned, unmotivated and critical people.
Types of Organizational Culture
1. Team-Oriented Culture
In this sample of culture, the spirit of teamwork is emphasized above all. Employees are in constant and correct interaction with each other, decisions are made collectively and based on consensus, and their interactions and relationships can be compared to a family.
2. Developmental Culture
In this type of culture, managers’ approach to developing their organization is creative, innovative and risk-taking. By accepting challenges, they prepare themselves to break the imaginations of other competitors and organizations.
3. Market Culture
Perhaps it can be said that the hardest and most intense culture among its different types is the market culture. In the market culture, competition is the first and last word. Because in today’s competitive market, every organization tries to maintain its position among competitors and get more profits and shares.
In the market culture, the priority is to achieve the result, not the method of achieving it. This culture may not seem honorable or even cruel at first glance, but competition and of course survival in the domestic and foreign markets requires continuous and tireless efforts by framing it with the principles and rules of business, customer orientation and continuity of communication and sales, it becomes solid and honorable.
4. Hierarchical Culture
This culture is based on order and harmony. The main issue in this type of culture is to do the tasks assigned according to the existing rules and regulations.
Up To Sum
The importance of organizational culture to be superior to other competitors is undeniable. This importance includes both internal organizational culture and familiarity with the culture of other organizations at the international level. In today’s competitive market, it is necessary to choose, determine, introduction and introduce your organizational values to others in order to surpass them.
