Abstract
The concept of organisational culture is a subject of interest for many researchers in the field of organisational behaviour. There is an agreement among various researchers that organisational culture comprises of norms, beliefs, values and symbols of an organisation. Organisational culture is directly related to innovation in organisations.
Organisations with strong organisational culture are able to stimulate innovations while the reverse is true for organisations with weak culture. Strong organisational culture also enhances implementation of organisational change with little or no resistance from the employees. The Palladium group has a strong organisational culture. This has enabled it to obtain good results for the past two years. However, the president of the organisation needs to embrace servant leadership for the organisation to enhance its organisational culture.
The concept of organisational culture
An organisation is a group of people who work together with coordinated efforts to achieve certain objectives or goals. Organisational goals and objectives are of various categories. The variation of organisational goals and objectives classifies organisations into three main categories namely profit-making, service-based and social responsibility-based organisations.
Culture is defined as people’s way of life. In the organisational context, culture refers to the norms, beliefs, attitudes, values and perceptions of employees. Every organisation exists in unique sociocultural, political and technological environments. Organisations also vary in terms of their objectives, resources, mission, vision, philosophy and approach in meeting their objectives. Every organisation therefore creates a culture which enables it to navigate successfully towards meeting its objectives.
Since organisational culture is very crucial in enabling organisations to meet their objectives, it is paramount for managers to try as much as possible to create a culture which fosters unity, collaboration, harmony and teamwork among the employees. The reason is that employees are social beings but not machines and there is need to acknowledge their input by giving them the permission to be flexible while discharging their duties.
When given the permission to be flexible, employees become motivated and maximise their talents, skills, creativity, innovativeness and commitment to their work which increases productivity. The best organisational culture is therefore the one in which employees feel as if they are shareholders of the organisations which they work for (Kaplan 2014).
Organisational culture is learned implicitly through interaction within the organisational setting. New employees learn it by imitating those employees who they find in organisations.
This imitation happens unconsciously due to the human instinct to adopt behaviours which make him or her to fit in the social environment which he or she finds himself or herself in. Through communication and interaction with each other, employees may develop norms, values, symbols and ways of doing things which are unique to their organisation.
Employees also learn organisational culture through conditioning and reinforcement. For instance, if a particular behaviour is rewarded by the management of an organisation, the employees would adopt that behaviour which eventually becomes part of the organisation’s culture. Similarly, if another type of behaviour is prohibited by the management, then the employees would avoid it.
A strong organisational culture is found in organisations where the employees are committed to their work and discharge their duties with little or no supervision. A weak organisational culture on the other hand is found in organisations where the employees are not committed to their work and are closely supervised to discharge their duties effectively (Brown 1998).
Dimensions used in describing organisational culture
Effective communication
Communication is the transfer of information from one person or source to another. In organisational context, effective communication involves using the correct language in communication between the employees and their seniors. The language used should be neutral and inoffensive to anybody.
Managers should also avoid discrimination of employees based on their position in the organisation, age, gender, level of education, race and religion. This paves way for respect and discipline to prevail in the organisation. Respect and discipline are a must for organisations which aspire to have a friendly work environment.
Group work
Organisations encourage employees to work in groups instead of working independently. This makes organisations to benefit from the synergy found in groups (Kurt 1958). Working in groups gives employees an opportunity to exercise their creativity, innovativeness, skills and talents.
It also enables the group members to learn from the strengths of each other as well as from the diverse experiences of the group members. When employees work in groups, they learn how to welcome positive criticism. Working in groups also enables the employees to generate new ideas which are implemented by the organisation. This increases their motivation because they feel that the organisation values their input.
Employee motivation
Managers of organisations strive to ensure that their employees are well motivated in their job. Motivation may be intrinsic or extrinsic. Intrinsic motivation comes from the employees and is characterised by the need to achieve good results, the passion in work, the ambition to acquire new knowledge and the need to be successful at the workplace (Dixon 1994).
Extrinsic motivation arises from things which are external to employees and include things like appreciation, rewards, pay increment, promotions and congratulatory messages. It may be based on performance of individual employees, group efforts or collective success of the organisation as a whole.
Motivation of employees makes them acquire positive values, beliefs, norms and attitudes towards their organisation. Positive values include things like hard work, faithfulness, commitment, respect and appreciation. Examples of positive beliefs include believing that ‘it can be done’ and being optimistic in everything which the employees undertake.
Norms are informal rules which are institutionalised in organisations. They govern the conduct of employees and constitute what is allowed and disallowed in different organisations. Motivation makes it possible for employees to learn new things from each other and from outside the organisation. They also learn new ways and strategies of doing things or improving their operations at the workplace. This becomes an organisational culture which is sustained and passed from generation to the other in the employee fraternity.
Employee training
This involves the training of employees on a continuous basis. The employees may be trained on various aspects of their job and other processes of the organisation. Training of employees enables them to improve their performance and efficiency, which consequently impacts positively on the productivity of the organisation.
Employee training also ensures that an organisation makes maximum use of its human resources because well trained employees are capable of multitasking. For example, the training of an accountant on administrative work may enable him or her to work both as an accountant and an administration officer. This may enable the organisation survive during times of financial crisis when reduction of staff becomes a strategy of reducing operational costs.
Critical review of theories of the nature of organisational culture
A theory is a set of ideas which provide an explanation for something. Theories act as frameworks or models for guiding scholars and researchers in their work to avoid duplication of ideas or repetition of mistakes made by previous researchers or scholars. In the study of organisational culture, various researchers have come up with theoretical models which help in explanation of the concept of organisational culture.
However, what is common among all the theorists is that there is no single organisational culture which can be described as typical for all organisations. All the theorists also base their explanations of the concept on the beliefs, norms, values and perceptions of members of organisations.
Charles Handy
In an effort to advance Harrison’s views on organisational culture and structure, Handy describes four models of organisational culture namely power, role, task and person’s culture. According to him, power culture is characterised by concentration of power in few individuals in an organisation.
Such individuals are usually very influential in the organisation and everybody in the organisation wishes to have a good relationship with them. In this culture, employees’ motivation is based on the extent to which they are close to those individuals. Decisions are also made easily because there are few centres of power in the organisation.
Role culture is characterised by doing things purely on the basis of job descriptions of employees; meaning that an employee only cares about what is of concern to him or her or what lies under his or her scope of work. In this culture, the bureaucratic nature of the organisational structure makes it hard to make decisions thus interfering with organisational efficiency.
Task culture is characterised by the formation of groups of people with the ability or knowledge to do specific tasks. In this type of culture therefore, group work is very important while authority and supervision play little or no role because the groups are trusted by the management with their tasks.
Lastly, person’s culture is characterised by superiority battles among the employees. In such a culture, unity and cooperation among the employees may be rare because each employee thinks that he or she is the best and therefore not ready to share what he or she knows with fellow employees.
Lewis
As he makes his contribution towards the topics of status, leadership and organisation, Lewis pays special attention to the radical shift from the cultural hegemony enjoyed by western powers such as the United States, Germany and Japan to cultural diversity. He defines cultural diversity as a variety of human societies or cultures living in different parts of the world. According to him, cultural diversity may also refer to the static representation of several cultures in a place and at a particular time.
According to him, cultural diversity is characterised by the minimisation of differences and inequalities and the maximisation of uniformity and equality among people. He argues that as a result of globalisation, the modern society has become more culturally diverse than ever (Lewis 2006).
Lewis tries to link organisational culture with leadership by demonstrating how leadership of organisations is responsible for shaping organisational culture. He also outlines how management and culture are depended on cultures of countries. According to him, there are countries which have organisational cultures which are conducive for doing business and others with cultures which are not conducive for doing business.
Consequently, culture is not static but varies from a country to another and therefore, managers need to be equipped with the knowledge about the culture of the country which they are to work as expatriates. Such awareness is an essential component in the success of the managers in their foreign assignments.
Peters
In an article tilted ‘productivity through people’, Peters tries to explain organisational culture through success stories for various organisations such as McDonald’s, Tandem, Dana, Wal-Mart, Tupperware, HP, Delta, Kodak and IBM. The criteria used to explain organisational culture in these organisations includes the use of people oriented language and terms such as extended family or family feelings.
These phrases signify an organisation which is so cohesive such that all the employees consider themselves as members of one big family. This aspect of organisational culture is very important because it not only gives identity to an organisation but also boosts the morale of the workers who feel proud for being associated with their organisation (Peters & Waterman 1984).
Peters also describes organisational culture as having the ability to be learned. He points out that employees and managers learn organisational culture though observation and discussions with their colleagues.
Such learning enables organisations to prepare employees for any change which may come as a result of organisational restructuring, mergers or due to adoption of a certain technology. It also enables organisations to have in place competent and reliable employees who are flexible and open-minded to handle any assignment in their lines of duty.
Organisational learning puts organisations in a strategic position for increasing their competitiveness. It also enables them to come up with best practices which not only improve their productivity but also their reputation.
Johnson
Gerry Johnson is known for his description of organisational culture through what he calls a cultural web. In the web, he describes various elements which influence organisational culture. These elements include symbols, stories, myths, control systems, power structure, organisational structure and organisational core values. According to him, these elements are not independent but they overlap or they are mutually depended.
For instance, the extent to which the power to make decisions is distributed in an organisation is depended on the control systems which have been put in place by the organisation. Organisational culture is therefore supposed to be looked in totality for one to accurately understand and describe it (Scholes & Johnson 2000).
Hofstede
He is widely known for his five cultural dimensions. He defines culture as ‘a collective programming of the mind which distinguishes one group from another’. In his research, he comes up with five dimensions which describe cultures for different countries. These dimensions are most applicable in international business because they describe each country’s five cultural dimensions thus giving business owners and investors an overview of what they should expect when doing business in a particular country (Luger 2009).
Power Distance Index (PDI)
Power is a concept used to refer to the possession of the ability to direct or influence others to behave in a certain manner either through coercion or dialogue. PDI has to do with equality or inequality between people in country and the extent to which the citizens of a country embrace or fail to embrace such equality or inequality.
A high ranking in PDI is characteristic of caste systems where social upward mobility is highly restrained. A low ranking in the same is an indication that there are no inequalities in distribution of power and wealth in a society and in social institutions. It also means that the citizens of that country do not embrace inequality between people irrespective of their social, economic and academic status (Luger 2009).
Individualism (IDV)
This looks at how the citizens of a country embrace individual or collective success and achievement. A high ranking in IDV signifies that individuality is paramount in that society and that the citizens tend to form very loose interpersonal relationships.
A low ranking in the same means that the society is cohesive in and that the citizens value collective success more than individual success. This cohesiveness is common in communities which still value extended familial arrangements where almost everything is perceived as a responsibility of all the people (Luger 2009).
Masculinity (MAS)
This looks at the extent to which gender differences affect the distribution and control of power and wealth among citizens of a country. It also looks at the extent to which men embrace feminine roles and values as well as how women embrace masculine roles and values.
In countries where MAS rankings are high, roles are highly differentiated along gender lines where there are jobs for women and jobs for men. The reverse is true for countries with a low ranking in MAS, meaning that both men and women have similar roles and values (Luger 2009).
Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI)
This looks at the extent to which a society embraces ambiguity and uncertainty. A high ranking in UAI means that the country is guided by clear rules and laws while a low ranking means that the country is open to new ideas and it embraces diversity. Such a country is also capable of utilising diversity to bring positive change in various sectors such as the economy, education, health and in business (Luger 2009).
Long Term Orientation (LTO)
It looks at the extent to which a society embraces long- term dedication to forward thinking, traditions and values. A high ranking in LTO implies that the country acknowledges hard work and traditions as the basis for the establishment of long term benefits.
This means that an outsider may have difficulties in establishing and stabilising his or her business due to the strict adherence to traditions by the people. On the other hand, a low ranking in LTO means that the country does not embrace traditional values which impede change. Such a country is also open to new ideas and innovations which may make it a preferred choice for multinational corporations (Luger 2009).
Morgan
He is famous for explaining the role of organisational culture in management. He argues that culture influences peoples’s values and norms which vary immensely. It is these variations in values and norms which make expatriate managers have difficulties in adapting to new business and organisational environments. Their managerial skills and strategies are affected by the variations in cultures which may make it difficult for them to match their skills and capabilities to the diverse cultural backgrounds (Morgan 2006).
According to him, some cultures value hard work while others do not. Others value sincerity, equality, fairness and justice in the distribution of resources within the society while others do not adhere to such values. Religious orientations may also affect the work of expatriate managers. Some religions have rules governing the days and hours of work.
This may affect managers working as expatriates. There is therefore the need for expatriate managers to be trained on the cultural aspects of the country in which they are to work.This may help them in dealing with the challenges which are associated with the cultures of various countries in the world (Trusted 2002).
Cameron
His description of organisational culture is based on the values framework. In his study on organisational success, he distinguishes four types of organisational culture which are based on two paradigms namely internal versus external focus and stability versus flexibility (Cameron & Quinn 2011).
The four types of culture include clan, market, adhocracy and hierarchy culture. Clan culture is characterised by a friendly work environment in which the leaders play a big role in promoting good relationships among workers. The workers therefore view their leaders as father figures.
Market culture is characterised by stiff competition in the workplace where employees and managers alike try to outwit each other by showing how much they know than their colleagues. Such competition is sometimes characterised by witch hunt where some employees and line managers may go to the extremes of sabotaging each others’ efforts in the workplace (Cameron & Quinn 2011).
Adhocracy culture is characterised by a dynamic workplace. The leaders in adhocracy culture are hardworking and always in the fore front in initiating innovations. Hierarchy culture is characterised by hierarchical authority and written rules and regulations which specify the exact nature of the relationships among the employees and how tasks are performed (Cameron & Quinn 2011)..
Javidan
Javidan is one of the many scholars who have contributed to the debate of ‘global mind set literature’. His description of culture is based on globalisation and diversity of cultures. He points out that contemporary globalisation is characterised by the liberalisation of trade, the emergence of multinational corporations and global institutions like the World Bank, the international monetary fund and other United Nations’ affiliated institutions.
It is also characterised by increased rates of immigration, technology transfer and the liberalisation of education systems to allow for people to study in any part of the world. Culture has also been diversified through mass media, smart phones, social media and the internet (Freytag & Thurik 2010).
The advancement in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has transformed the world into a global village. Through ICT and improved means of transport, people are more than ever able to do business with each other without any barriers.
Through globalisation; organisations have been able to open new branches in other countries as part of their expansion strategy. Examples of organisations which have embraced globalisation and cultural diversity include Tesco in United Kingdom and Wal-Mart stores in the United States (Khalil 1996).
Bate
He views organisational culture as something which is implicit; that is, something which is found in people’s minds and not capable of being observed directly. This characteristic is perhaps what makes organisational culture difficult to conceptualize. It also makes many scholars have different views and opinions on what exactly is organisational culture.
He points out that organisational culture is capable of shaping the relationships of employees within organisations which can have positive or negative effects on the organisations. He outlines six elements which can be used to conceptualize organisational culture. They include isolationism, unemotionality, conservatism, subordination, antipathy and depersonalization (Salaman 1984).
Isolationism (collectivism versus individualistic orientations) has to do with the extent to which employees tend to work alone or with others. Unemotionality (affective orientation) has to do with the extent to which employees separate their personal and emotional issues with work related issues.
Some cultures may encourage unemotionality while others may not. Conservatism has to do with the extent to which employees embrace new ideas or new ways of doing things in the workplace. Some cultures are known to embrace organisational change while others do not embrace it.
Subordination has to do with how employees perceive the differences in power and positions in their organisations. In highly bureaucratic cultures, employees are highly submissive to their seniors while in less bureaucratic cultures, employees perceive their seniors just as fellow employees but not as sources of fear, discrimination and intimidation.
Depersonalisation has to do with the extent to which employees blame their fellow employees for personal problems. This is synonymous to blame culture in which employees always perceive their fellow employees as enemies not as workmates. Antipathy has to do with the extent to which organisational groups relate to each other. In some cultures, there may be rivalry between various organisational groups while in others; there may be cohesion among the organisational groups.
Alvesson
He has written extensively on organisational culture and change. According to him, organisational culture is best viewed from the perspective of groups not individuals. He is in agreement with the argument that organisational culture is not about social structures but mental phenomena in groups and how the individuals in these groups perceive reality in the same way and how their perception of reality is different from that of other groups; either in the same or a different organisation (Alvesson & Sveningsson 2007).
Consequently, it is possible to have different cultures in the same organisation depending on the nature of the groups present in that particular organisation. He is categorical that organisational culture is not the behaviour of the employees but what influences the behaviour of the employees. Just like the other theorists discussed earlier, Alvesson shares the view that organisational culture is responsible for giving identity to an organisation through the beliefs, values and practices of the members of the organisation.
Fon Trompenaars
Just like Hofstede, Trompenaars explains organisational culture in relation to the cultures of different countries. He acknowledges that different countries have different cultures.
The cultural differences between people of different countries are sometimes extended to the workplace, especially in regard to how employees perceive work in terms of its importance to them and how to balance or separate work and personal lives. For example, the citizens United States find it easy to separate work with personal lives and emotions while their counterparts in France find it very hard to do so (Ahlstrom & Bruton 2010).
Fon Trompenaars outlines some dimensions which shape the interactions of employees in the workplace. These dimensions include universalism contrasted with particularism, neutral contrasted with affective relationships, individualism contrasted with collectivism, specific contrasted with diffuse relationships and achievement contrasted with ascription (Gullestrup 2006).
How organisational culture may impact on innovation
Organisational culture has a direct impact on innovation in that it can either stimulate or inhibit innovation. Innovation is the ability to invent, design and develop new products. It can also refer to the ability to come up with new ways of doing things in an organisation (Ahmed 1998).
Innovation is mainly driven by creativity in the sense that for a new product or process to be developed, there must be some degree of creativity involved. Creativity is not something which is in everybody’s mind but it is actually a talent which needs to be identified, nurtured and developed.
What this means is that many people have different talents but if they are not helped to discover them, those talents remain dormant for a long time. It is therefore very important for organisations to put in place mechanisms to ensure that employees are encouraged and assisted to discover their talents and potentials and use them positively for the benefit of their organisations (Ahmed 1998).
This is only possible in an organisational culture which is based on values but not on superiority battles. Some organisations are managed based on the Taylor’s scientific management approach which views workers as machines not as social beings. This management approach is associated with weak organisational culture which inhibits group or teamwork thus making organisations to miss the value associated with group or teamwork.
Such a weak organisational culture does not give room for employees to be creative and flexible in their work. This makes organisations to miss the creativity and initiatives of the employees, some of which may be very important for the progress of the organisations.
In such a culture, there is poor harmonisation of organisational processes and functions such as planning, employee development, manufacturing, processing, marketing, branding, labeling, public relations and packaging. This in turn compromises efficiency and effectiveness in the organisation thereby reducing productivity.
In organisations with a weak culture, it is very hard for employees to be creative because they are not provided with the necessary incentives to stimulate their creativity. The employees usually feel demoralized because they do not get the intrinsic value of work. Instead, they simply work for the sake of working and they do not care whether anything goes wrong because it is not their concern anyway.
Other organisations are managed based on the human relations approach which is mainly characterised by a radical shift from the mechanistic approach to a humanistic approach in the management of organisations. This kind of management approach is usually associated with strong organisational culture where more emphasis is placed on improving the work environment and making the employees feel appreciated.
In organisations with such a culture, employees are perceived as social beings with social, psychological and financial needs. Such organisations also acknowledge that employees have the potential of being creative in their work. They also value the synergy found in group or teamwork.
Consequently, supervision plays a minimal role because the employees are capable of forming group norms and rules which govern their work. Organisations with a strong culture also recognize the importance of employees interacting with their managers in a friendly way without fear of victimisation.
Such a strong culture is conducive for innovation. When managers and employees of an organisation perceive each other as colleagues not as rivals, the employees view the organisation as a personal business and put all their efforts to ensure that it becomes successful. Such loyalty stimulates the employees to think of new ways of doing things which eventually leads to innovation and increased competitiveness (Ahmed 1998).
How organisational culture may be affected by the leaders of an organisation
Leadership is defined as the ability of a person to influence other people to do things which they would not have done without the influence. People with this ability are referred to as leaders and are found in different contexts. In the context of organisations, leading entails the leader consolidating the efforts and resources of the organisation and focusing on the future by setting up a vision for the organisation which it intends to achieve in a given period using the consolidated efforts and resources.
Leading entails building and sustaining teamwork, strategic thinking, managing conflicts, coaching, inspiring a shared vision, problem solving, performance management and accountability, decision-making, delegation, systems thinking, leading change, dealing with ambiguities, developing trust, employee development, customer service, innovation and creativity, emotional intelligence, servant leadership, quality and productivity improvement.
The leaders of organisations may include managers, executive directors and board members. These leaders are responsible for shaping the culture of their organisations. The reason is that they are the decision makers of their organisations and are therefore best placed to decide what is good and bad behaviour in the workplace. The employees are just followers who simply copy what their seniors do or just follow what they are told to do and thus they do not play any role in shaping the culture of organisations.
If the leaders of an organisation are not friendly to their employees, then the organisation is characterised by fear and unending tension among the employees. Such relationship may lead to confusion and inefficiency because employes are not allowed or they are unwilling to consult their colleagues for fear of victimisation.
The overall result is creation of an organisation which the employees are not proud to be associated with. This can have serious negative effects such as increased turnover, reduced productivity and general organisational inefficiency.
On the other hand, if the leaders of organisations are open and friendly to their employees, then the organisations create what is referred to as cohesive organisational culture. Many organisational researchers agree that a cohesive organisational culture is one in which all members of an organisation have similar beliefs and values which hold them together as an organisation. These beliefs and values are implicit or explicit to the organisation.
In this kind of a culture, the organisational structure does not matter but what matters most is the commitment of each member of the organisation to these beliefs and values. For example, an organisation may value hard work, cohesiveness and teamwork and believe in transparency, faithfulness, work ethics and morality. A cohesive organisational culture has many benefits to organisations (Keshavarzi 2007).
One benefit is that it leads to high motivation among the employees because they share common beliefs and values. When employees are highly motivated, there is minimal use of resources in their supervision which in turn increases their productivity because to them, what matters most is the good of the organisation but not personal good.
Cohesive organisational culture also boosts organisational efficiency because of the internalisation of what is expected of each employee. The sharing of values and beliefs creates a good working environment free from confusion, ambiguity or lack of understanding among the employees.
This kind of environment not only increases organisational efficiency but also prevents time wastage because the employees are able and free to consult each other without the fear of victimisation or intimidation especially by their managers. Employees also portray good behaviour at work because they know the right thing to do.
Furthermore, cohesive organisational culture leads to cohesion among various departments of an organisation which leads to harmonisation of all organisational rules, policies and practices in each department. This cohesion leads to proper utilisation of organisational resources without sabotage as well as sound, logical and relevant policies on how to coordinate organisational activities in a manner that would maximise the organisations’ chances of realising their mission and vision.
Cohesion among various organisational departments also enhances the sharing of information which increases the employees’ levels of understanding of how various departments work. This is very important because it enables employees to multitask especially in times when the organisations are faced with shortage of staff.
Cohesive organisational culture enhances control, good coordination and consistency within an organisation. The reason is that the employees and the managers are always in good terms and are thus able to agree informally on various procedures and practices without compromising the quality of products and services offered by the organisation.
This saves time because employees implement the changes which they find necessary without having to wait for bureaucratic board meetings and discussions to approve even the slightest change in procedures and regulations governing how employees should work.
How culture influences innovation and change in Palladium Group
Organisational culture is closely related to organisational change. For organisational change to be implemented successfully, there must be a learning culture in an organisation. As mentioned earlier, organisations exist in unique sociocultural, political and technological environments. These environments are not static but they change from time to time. This calls for organisations to adapt to the changing environments to stay on course of meeting their objectives.
Some forces of organisational change include competition from other organisations, the need to improve organisational productivity, advancement in technology, financial crisis which may call for reduction of number of employees, change of the market preferences, mergers of organisations and expansion or reduction of organisational departments.
Many employees are also known to create what is referred to as comfort zones in their minds. This is the perception that the status quo is the best and any change which may disrupt the status quo must be approached with caution.
These forces of change calls for managers to put in place adequate measures to make sure that change is perceived positively by employees in order to reduce resistance. The reason is that if change is not effected properly, it may negatively affect the organisation by creating fears among employees who may react either by becoming less motivated or resisting the change all together.
Organisations therefore need to continuously train their employees to empower them with the necessary skills and knowledge about organisational change (Weisbord 1987).
Organisational culture is also explained using the organisational structure which shows the power relationships between various individuals in the chain of command.
If an organisation has a rigid structure, it usually has a culture which does not encourage good relationships between the managers and employees. When it comes to implementation of organisational change, the managers usually have hard time in convincing the employees to accept and own the change. In most cases, the employees usually sabotage or resist the change efforts.
On the other hand, if an organisation has a structure which is not rigid, it usually has a culture in which the managers and employees have excellent relationships based on professionalism and work ethics. In such a culture, the employees are proud to be associated with their organisation. When it comes to the implementation of organisational change, the managers usually have easy time in convincing the employees to accept the change and for this reason, the change is implemented with little or nor resistance from the employees.
Below is the organisational structure of the Palladium group
As shown above, the Palladium group’s organisational structure is not rigid and is therefore conducive for consultations among the line managers in the finance, human resource, consultancy, education, affiliation and partnership, knowledge and research, and marketing departments.
This kind of arrangement has enabled the organisation to have an organisational culture which is cohesive and conducive for innovations and implementation of organisational change. The reason is that all the departmental heads are able to reach a consensus about any proposed change in the organisation.
The cohesive organisational culture enhances teamwork and collaboration of the employees in the various departments. This is of crucial importance to the organisation because it opens the room for employees’ creativity, innovativeness and openness to positive criticism which makes work not only enjoyable but also enriched with a multiplicity of ideas (Kaplan 2014).
This in turn leads to increased achievement levels by the organisation as opposed to situations where employees’ creativity and innovativeness are not entertained by the management of an organisation (Kaplan 2014).
Recommendation for enhancing Palladium group’s organisational culture
From the organisational structure of Palladium group and data from the previous assignment, it seems that the top most leadership of the organisation is not in touch with the junior employees. While the UAE’s partner’s leadership style is described as empowering, that of the president of the organisation is described as transformational.
His main focus has been improving the results of the organisation which he has managed to do in the past two years. It is also argued that the president does not interact directly with the employees except when passing important information or guidelines to them.
For the organisation to enhance its culture, there is need for the president of the organisation to embrace servant leadership. This would transform him from a transformational leader to a servant leader. Having a president who is a servant leader would lead to excellent relationships not only between the president and the employees but also amongst the employees.
This would enhance the cohesiveness of the employees and lead to enhanced job satisfaction, innovativeness, reduced turnover and overall organisational efficiency and effectiveness. When the president embraces servant leadership, he would not need to strain to improve the productivity of the organisation because it would come automatically.
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