Charles Handy classes of organizational culture

Charles Handy classes of organizational culture

Organizational Culture

Charles Handy developed several classes of organizational culture in a bid to get a better understanding of why employees behave in some way. Power culture is the first class. Here, Handy says that in an organization, the power to make essential decisions lies in the hands of a relatively small number of people (do Carmo Silva & Gomes, 2015). Even though the number of influential individuals is low, their impact is felt by all the people in the organization. The powerful few in an organization determine the things that should happen at a particular time. They also decide the person or group of people that should implement their decisions. The junior members in the organizations are expected to do exactly what their leaders decide (do Carmo Silva $ Gomes, 2015). In the case of a company, employees are judged by the outcomes of their actions as opposed to their ways of doing things. That kind of culture promotes Consequentialism in ways that benefit the organization even when the processes of achieving the outcomes cause adverse effects to employees. A power culture can sometimes be toxic, especially where the influential individuals misuse their privilege or conflict for the limited opportunity.

Some organizations have a role culture. Such organizations promote deontological ethics, where the rightness and the wrongness of an employee are based on whether the person performed their duty. In such organizations, everyone understands their responsibilities and roles (do Carmo Silva $ Gomes, 2015). People have different responsibilities depending on their positions in the company structure. Organizations with role culture have chains of command, where the processes of formulation and implementation of policies take place in stages and involve different individuals or organizations at a time (Glisson, 2015). One of the significant disadvantages of such cultures is that the process of decision making is relatively slow compared to most of the other cultures.

Some organizations have a task culture. Here, the organization makes essential decisions regarding particular problems or projects through groups of people. Such organizations focus more on the task or problem at hand as opposed to the people involved (Glisson, 2015). Some matters require the involvement of members with skills and experiences in the respective area. It means that the power to make crucial decisions in such cultures will shift depending on the status of the project or problem. The outcomes of the team activities significantly depend on the available skills and experiences related to the issue at hand (Serrat, 2017). For the case of Costco and BJ’s merger, there was a change in the roles of BJ’s former manager and that of the vice president who resigned. The two parties were demoted to perform less prestigious functions, a factor that made them feel the quitting is more dignified than staying in a position that makes one less worthy.

Some organizations have a person culture. Here, the people involved in the organization feel to be more significant and influential than the organization. In such cases, the organization only acts as a unifying factor for the different individuals to work together (Serrat, 2017). Such organizations can be described as collections of individuals working toward a common goal.

1. i) Individual Behavior and Performance

Costco and BJ’s merger caused the change in the degrees of respect for the leaders of both organizations. The even had a significant impact on their willingness to perform their duties in the new organization. Some organizations lose good employees for many reasons, but the loss of respect is a substantial cause in many organizations (do Carmo Silva). Each employee feels that they deserve some respect. If the employee is not given the respect they think they should be given; the organizations will experience significant difficulties to keep them. The term respect, in this case, refers to the dignified treatment of an employee by their managers and co-workers. It could also cover the kind of tasks that their seniors assign one. In the case of Costco and BJ’s merger, BJ’s former manager was sure to receive less respect in the new organization. The co-workers could also lower their respect for them. According to Lut (2016), all people who leave organizations do so for a reason (Lut, 2016). In the case of organizations with power culture, loss of power and influence is, in most cases, the most significant cause.

1. ii) Team Behaviour and Performance

The leader who becomes the Chief Executive officer gains the ability to execute decisions that will guide all the activities in the new organizations. For that reason, the less powerful leader will be expected to follow whatever the CEO approves (Fellague & Bennafla, 2015). The leader could hardly accept the change of becoming a follower I an environment in which they had been leaders to at least a section of the organization. As a less powerful individual in the new organization, BJ’s former CEO would be expected to implement decisions, after which they would be judged based on the outcomes of their actions as opposed to the processes of implementing the decisions.

iii) Organizational Culture

For the case of Costco and BJ’s merger, both organizations had a power culture in which the few influential individuals had developed a strong connection with their positions. The merger of the two organizations led to a change in roles for the leaders of both sides. The changes strengthened the power culture (Turlais & Dubkevics, 2017) through changes such as the promotion of some employees to occupy the roles of the members that left and the increase in powers to the new CEO.

References

do Carmo Silva, M., & Gomes, C. F. S. (2015). Practices in project management, according to Charles Handy’s organizational culture typologies. Procedia Computer Science, 55, 678-687. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877050915015495/pdf?md5=77a123d5b822bb0c0dbe4506f75718ce&pid=1-s2.0-S1877050915015495-main.pdf

do Carmo Silva, M., Castro, C. J., Fontes, V. G., & Gomes, C. F. S. PRACTICES IN INTERNAL MARKETING ACCORDING TO CHARLES HANDY’S ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE TYPOLOGIES. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Carlos_Francisco_Gomes/publication/279176062_Business_and_Management_Review/links/5593c0cf08ae5af2b0eba485/Business-and-Management-Review.pdf

Fellague, M., & Bennafla, K. (2015). ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE AND THE IMPLIMENTATION OF TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT IN SONATRACH (MEDGAZ PROJECT AS CASE STUDY). Indian Journal of Management Science, 5(1), 1. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mohamed_Fellague/publication/303952669_INDIAN_JOURNAL_OF_MANAGEMENT_SCIENCE_IJMS_ORGANIZATIONAL_CULTURE_AND_THE_IMPLIMENTATION_OF_TOTAL_QUALITY_MANAGEMENT_IN_SONATRACH_MEDGAZ_PROJECT_AS_CASE_STUDY/links/576007df08ae97c123143ad3/INDIAN-JOURNAL-OF-MANAGEMENT-SCIENCE-IJMS-ORGANIZATIONAL-CULTURE-AND-THE-IMPLIMENTATION-OF-TOTAL-QUALITY-MANAGEMENT-IN-SONATRACH-MEDGAZ-PROJECT-AS-CASE-STUDY.pdf

Glisson, C. (2015). The role of organizational culture and climate in innovation and effectiveness. Human Service Organizations: Management, Leadership & Governance, 39(4), 245-250. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5008450/

Lut, D. M. (2016). The influence of national culture on organizational culture in Romanian Companies. Quaestus, (9), 73. http://www.quaestus.ro/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/lut1.pdf

Serrat, O. (2017). A primer on organizational culture. In Knowledge solutions (pp. 355-358). Springer, Singapore. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-10-0983-9_40

Turlais, V., & Dubkevics, L. (2017, May). Comparative analysis of organizational culture models in Management Science. In Turiba University. International Scientific Conference (p. 204). Turiba University. https://www.academia.edu/download/55468703/Conference_XVIII_Turiba_18.05.2017.FINAL.pdf#page=205