Introduction
Social construction is a sociological theory that deals with development of social contexts and social phenomena. Human choices made out of the divine nature and will are a result of social constructs. The thinking pattern of the members of an organization that is socially constructed influences the long-term performance of the organization. The realities of socially constructed culture in an organization influence organizations greatly.
Culture in an organization is defined and affected by socially constructed realities. The cultures of a company or an organization includes the attitudes of the members, behavior patterns, values used in the company and other ways that are used to conduct business. Goods or services and culture of conducting business differentiate companies and organizations.
Socially constructed Realities
Socially constructed realities influence the strategies used in an organization, which in turn affect the organizational effectiveness in a great way. The success of any strategies used by an organization depends on the culture selected. Additionally, the culture selected by an organization depends on the social interactions, which lead to construction of different realities depending on their understanding.
The interpretation of corporate culture in an organization may be different for individuals in different departments depending on the social interactions. The organizational effectiveness can be impacted by socially constructed realities where the members develop coordination and communication problems due to different ideas on corporate culture of the organization.
The conflict, which may be dysfunctional, might lead to decreased performance of the organization. Moreover, socially constructed realities affect organizational effectiveness when some practices in the organization are not acceptable. Realities based on practices that are not accepted by the organization reduce effectiveness of the company, which may in turn reduce the performance, and the capability of the employees and the members.
Wrong constructed realities to individuals affect their performance and that of the whole group depending on the basis of the social realities. For example, people from different departments in an organization may interpret corporate culture of an organization in different ways and work on different ideas depending on their notion.
The effectiveness of an organization depends on the outputs from the systems used in different levels of operation. The open system model is comprised of input, environment, and output. Organizations focus on inputs that are later transformed to outputs and the product might be goods, services, or ideas.
People are among the inputs of an organization and their output depends on their performances at the transformation stage. In the environment stage, social component is the main factor for the operations and it determines the quality of output for the organization.
A negative socially constructed reality in the transformation stage affects the culture of the organization, which determines how effective the organization remains. Culture represents the outcome of the organizational design and the foundation for change. Good designed components in the environmental stage measures organization effectiveness that is reflected by the transformed design components.
The inputs of every organization are supposed to fit the designed components, which should be internally consistent. Organizational effectiveness will be affected if the designed components do not fit the inputs and if there is no support for each other in a mutual way (Cummings, & Worley, 2008, p.96).
Every organization has its own way in which it uses the available resources to sustain competitive advantage over other organizations, which is referred to as ‘the strategy.’ Different strategies adopted define the output and it depends on socially constructed realities developed by the management and the members. This also affects the conversion of inputs into services and products; that is, the technology used.
Socially constructed realities affect the structure, which in turn determines how resources and attention are used to focus on accomplishment. Organizational incompetence due to socially constructed realities separates an organization from others. For instance, an organization might be affected because public institutions withdraw their support.
Anderson posits, an organizations needs inquiry from which it can act on and it acts as a practice that creates social reality (1992, p. 353). Incompetence of the company is not an individual issue; therefore, should be dealt with corporately by the organization because it is an organizational issue based on social construct.
For instance, competence caused by an organization might occur when a supervisor or head of department announces that the organization has decided to open another plant. The message might have different meanings to the employees depending on the inherent social interactions. Some of the employees might think that there will be expansion for the organization while some may think that the current plant will be shut down.
The latter group may reduce its performance in the work place, which affects the organization’s effectiveness. The responsibility of the organization is to give clear information that will not give room for different ideas on the same issue. According to Hines and Quinn, (2005, p. 535), an organization should establish a segmentation of constructed understanding based on the notions of group and self-identities.
Conclusion
The main difference in organizations is determined by the realities that are constructed from social interactions. Different realities result to different input components, which may lead to high or low organizational effectiveness. Well-constructed social realities and alignments result into high organizational effectiveness.
References
Anderson, J. (1992). On the ethics of research in a socially constructed reality. Journal Of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 36(3), 350-353.
Cummings, T. G., & Worley, C. G. (2008). Organization Development & Change (9th Ed.). Mason, OH: Southwestern Cengage Learning.
Hines, T., & Quinn, L. (2005). Socially Constructed Realities and the Hidden Face of Market Segmentation. Journal of Marketing Management, 21(6), 534-537.