Understanding Organizational Culture in Strategic Management

Organizational Culture

• A desired end state or outcome that people seek to achieve is termed a "vision".

Characteristics of Cultures

• An "achievement culture" is a culture framework that describes a community's ability to pursue shared objectives quickly and effectively.
• A "sociable culture" is characterized by sincere friendliness and reciprocity among members, with no expectations of return favors.
• A disadvantage of a sociable culture is that it can lead to a lack of accountability and poor performance.

Types of Organizations

• A "professional organization" lacks conscious organizational membership, identifies more with the profession than the organization, and is secretive about projects.

Factors Influencing Organizational Culture

• According to the text, an organization's culture comes from its founders, leaders, and industry.

Importance of Culture

• Culture can be a source of competitive advantage.
• A company that lacks culture is implied to lack direction and cohesion.
• Culture is all about how people work together, what they believe in, and how they get things done.

Change and Culture

• Cultural change can help tackle cultural and organizational differences that arise from mergers and acquisitions.
• After the Delta-Northwest merger, Richard Anderson oversaw the integration of the two airlines' cultures.
• Alan Mulally's management team at Ford faced a cultural change challenge in turning around the company.

Leadership and Culture

• After the Ciba Geigy and Novartis merger, Dan Vasella emphasized the importance of creating a new culture that combined the strengths of both companies.
• Edgar Schein defined organizational culture as a pattern of shared basic assumptions that an organization learns as it solves its problems.

Case Studies

• At Eco Lab Industrial cleaning company, a cultural transformation helped to improve customer-centricity, which was being negatively impacted by a lack of accountability and respect among employees.
• After the merger, Ciba Geigy and Novartis formed Novartis, a single, unified company with a new culture.