Chapter 16 Organizational Culture

Mentoring

A process by which a junior level employee develops a deep and long lasting relationship with a more senior level employee within the organization.

Subcultures

A smaller subset of the organization's employees.

Creativity culture

Affects both the quantity and quality of creative ideas within an organization.

Encounter stage

Begins the day an employee starts work. There are some things about an organization and its culture that can only be learned once a person becomes an organizational insider. During this stage, new employees compare the information they acquired as outsiders during the anticipatory stage with what the organization is really like now that they're insiders.

Symbols

Can be found throughout an organization, from its corporate logo to the images it places on its Web site to the uniforms its employees wear.

Stories

Consists of anecdotes, accounts, legends, and myths that are passed own from chart to cohort within an organization.

Networked cultures

Cultures in which all employees are friendly to one another, but everyone thinks differently and does his or her own thing.

Fragmented culture

Employees are distant and disconnected from another.

Understanding and adaptation

Final stage of socialization. Newcomers come to learn the content areas of socialization and internalize the norms and expected behaviors of the organization.

Ceremonies

Formal events, generally performed in front of an audience of organizational members.

Anticipatory stage

Happens prior to an employee spending even one second on the job. First stage in socialization.

Reality shock

Mismatch of information of what is expected in a job and what the job actually is like.

Realistic job previews

Occur during the anticipatory stage of socialization during the recruitment process. They involve making sure a potential employee has an accurate picture of what working for an organization is going to be like by highlighting both the positive and het negative aspects of the job.

Diversity culture

Organizations that focus on diversity within the business.

Safety culture

Organizations that focus on safety quality within the business.

Customer service culture

Organizations that focus on service quality within the business.

Mercenary cultures

Organizations that have cultures in which employees think alike but aren't friendly to one another.

ASA framework

Potential employees will be attracted to organizations whose cultures match their own personality, meaning that some potential job applicants won't apply due to a perceived lack of fit.

Language

Reflects the jargon, slang, and slogans used within the walls of an organization.

Physical structures

Says a lot about a culture at a workplace.

Espoused values

The beliefs, philosophies, and norms that a company explicitly states.

Rituals

The daily or weekly planned routines that occur in an organization.

Person-organization fit

The degree to which a person's personality and values match the culture of an organization.

Observable artifacts

The manifestations of an organizations culture that employees can easily see or talk about.

Socialization

The primary process by which employees learn the social knowledge that enables them to understand and adapt to the organization's culture.

Organizational culture

The shared social knowledge within an organization regarding the rules, norms, and values that shape the attitudes and behaviors of its employees.

Basic underlying assumptions

The taken-for-granted beliefs and philosophies that are so ingrained that employees simply act on them rather than questioning the validity of their behavior in a given situation.

Culture strength

When employees definitively agree about the way things are supposed to happen within the organization (high consensus) and when their subsequent behaviors are consistent with those expectations (high intensity).

Countercultures

When people's values don't match those of the large organization, the subcultures are called this.