leadership and culture
How Leaders Can Optimize Organizational Culture
By Lisa Haneberg, VP and OD Practice Lead
MPI Consulting
April, 2009
Realigning processes and roles to fit a new organizational reality is daily work for leaders. Planning and implementing changes is a fundamental set of skills at which all leaders must excel to ensure their teams and functions are set up to do great work. This paper explores organizational culture, which is important to understand, consider and align when adjusting practices, projects and programs. Improving an organization’s success through aligning its culture became a popular focus of work in the 1980s. During this time, many behavioral science researchers acknowledged the power and importance of organizational culture. In the last twenty-five years, organization culture has become a frequent topic of discussion among a broad audience of leaders including operational managers and organization development, human resources, and training professionals. Culture is now a regular consideration – or it ought to be – during strategic planning sessions and throughout change management initiatives.
Changes that go against a work culture or that are initiated without regard to the culture are likely to fail whereas culture-consistent changes ensure better results while reinforcing the most important workplace values and beliefs. Sometimes it is the culture that needs to change to support a new reality. Determining how to change a culture without wrecking intrinsic motivation or losing top talent is a delicate matter, indeed. To begin examining this challenge, let’s first establish a common definition of organizational culture.
What is an organization’s culture?
Many definitions of organization culture can be found in behavioral sciences literature. A frequently cited definition comes from organization development pioneer Edgar Schein. In his book,
Organization Culture and Leadership, Schein described culture as being deeper than behaviors and artifacts. “I
By Lisa Haneberg, VP and OD Practice Lead
MPI Consulting
April, 2009
Realigning processes and roles to fit a new organizational reality is daily work for leaders. Planning and implementing changes is a fundamental set of skills at which all leaders must excel to ensure their teams and functions are set up to do great work. This paper explores organizational culture, which is important to understand, consider and align when adjusting practices, projects and programs. Improving an organization’s success through aligning its culture became a popular focus of work in the 1980s. During this time, many behavioral science researchers acknowledged the power and importance of organizational culture. In the last twenty-five years, organization culture has become a frequent topic of discussion among a broad audience of leaders including operational managers and organization development, human resources, and training professionals. Culture is now a regular consideration – or it ought to be – during strategic planning sessions and throughout change management initiatives.
Changes that go against a work culture or that are initiated without regard to the culture are likely to fail whereas culture-consistent changes ensure better results while reinforcing the most important workplace values and beliefs. Sometimes it is the culture that needs to change to support a new reality. Determining how to change a culture without wrecking intrinsic motivation or losing top talent is a delicate matter, indeed. To begin examining this challenge, let’s first establish a common definition of organizational culture.
What is an organization’s culture?
Many definitions of organization culture can be found in behavioral sciences literature. A frequently cited definition comes from organization development pioneer Edgar Schein. In his book,
Organization Culture and Leadership, Schein described culture as being deeper than behaviors and artifacts. “I
Cited: Deal, Terrence, and Kennedy, Allan. Corporate Cultures. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing, 1982. Hofstede, Geert. Culture’s Consequences. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1980. Kotter, John and Heskett, James. Corporate Culture and Performance. New York: The Free Press, 1992. Reis Louis, Meryl. Organizations as Culture-Bearing Milieux from Organizational Symbolism, Greenwich, CN:JAI Press, 1983. Schein, Edgar H. Organization Culture and Leadership. San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1985. Leadership. New York: Pergamon Press, 1984. Trompenaars, Fons. Riding the Waves of Culture. London: The Economist Books, 1993.