Question & Answer: Can you identify the characteristics that describe your organization’s culture? How does the culture…

Organizational culture is nothing but the collection of assumptions, values and beliefs which gives the clear picture to people as how to behave in organization. These shared assumptions, values and beliefs influence the people in the organization to depict right kind of behavior in order to perform their jobs better.

The organization culture that is followed by my organization is ethical culture. Ethic culture is very important in business environment. It is very essential to make a right kind of environment at work place and do the right things. The characteristics that describes the culture of my organization are: –

• Ethic is made the part of workplace culture.
• Guiding principle is clear and a proper framework has been made to evaluate the ethical actions.
• Employees who behave ethically has been selected, trained and organization focus on retaining those employees.
• Ethical behavior is considered important and is included in business and performance review.
• Organization focus on increasing moral sensitivity of different business perspectives like stakeholders’ reports, open discussions etc.
• Desired behavior is made keeping in mind the consequence and its occurrence are being measured on a regular basis.
• Organization structure and resource focus on monitoring or being committed to ethical environment. Example- By providing regular coaching and feedback, training sessions, performance review etc.
• External reviews are being conducted on a regular basis.
• Set of criteria has been made to evaluate self-actions of employees.
• Organization encourage all its employees to discuss, help and support each other and increase awareness to the ethical issues in decision-making.

Organizational change refers to the transition of the organization from its current state to future change. The change is done to the organization in order to make it more innovative and competitive so that the organization can meet its short-term and long-term goals.

The important elements of organizational change that can be influenced by organizational culture includes: –

• Strategy – Strategy refers to the plan of action that are made for the organization to meet the overall goal. The strategy is important part that helps in gaining competitive advantage.
• Organization structure – it refers to the way the organization is structured and the reporting points. This plays important role in managing change.
• Infrastructure – infrastructure refers to the technology, systems, workplace etc that is required for any change in the organization to take place.
• Values – values refers to the beliefs, ideas or perception of individuals in the organization which is influenced by the organizational culture and ethical standards within the organization. It is expected from every employee to work as per the value of the organization.
• Leadership – it is nothing but the skills and ability of individual or organization to lead other individual, group or the organization. It is important for the leader to have the qualities that can communicate organizational change and lead the organization effectively in change.
• Employees – the employees are important part of change within an organization. Their capabilities and efforts play important role in making the change process successful.
• Skills – the skills, knowledge, experience of employees are very important for the change process.

These elements of change are greatly influenced by the organizational culture. Thus, the culture of the organization has great impact on the organization’s ability to change.