Organizations as Cultures

1. Organizations as Cultures Gareth Morgan

2. What is Culture? • Derived metaphorically from the idea of cultivation: the process of tilling and developing land. • Usually referring to the pattern of development reflected in a society’s system of knowledge, ideology, values, laws, and day-to-day ritual.

3. Organization as a Cultural Phenomenon • What does political scientist Robert Presthus mean when he states we now live in an “organizational society”? • Important dimensions of modern culture are rooted in the structure of industrial society, the organization of which is itself a cultural phenomenon.

4. Organization and Cultural Context • How does Morgan compare organizational culture of factories in Japan to that of the rice fields? • What does Morgan describe to be some of the cultural differences between Japanese and Western cultures?

5. How can culture create a form of “blindness”? • In providing taken-for-granted codes of action that we recognize as “normal,” it leads us to see activities that do not conform with these codes as abnormal. • There is considerable value in adopting the standpoint of the cultural stranger because, in becoming aware of the stranger’s point of view, we can see our own in a refreshingly new perspective.

6. Corporate cultures and subcultures • What is meant by the term “corporate culture”? • Organizations are mini-societies that have their own distinctive patterns of culture and subculture. • Patterns of belief or shared meaning, fragmented or integrated, and supported by various operating norms and rituals, all of which can exert a decisive influence on the overall ability of the organization to deal with the challenges that it faces.

7. Observing organizational culture • How would you describe the organizational culture of Nipissing University? • How does the organizational culture at Nipissing compare to the case examples given by Morgan? • How is the organizational culture at Nipissing different from other organizations you have been a part of?

8. Creating Organizational Reality • Harold Garfinkel: • The most routine and taken-for-granted aspects of social reality are in fact skillful accomplishments. • When we disrupt the norms of everyday life the ordered “reality” of life inevitably breaks down. • Karl Weick: • The process in which we shape and structure our realities is a process of enactment. • Although we often see ourselves as living in a reality with objective characteristics, life...requires that we take an active role in brining our realities into being through various interpretive schemes, even though these realities may then have a habit of imposing themselves on us as “the way things are.”

9. Organization: The enactment of a Shared Reality When looking at organizational analysing, Morgan asks: • What are the shared frames of reference that make organization possible? • Where do they come from? • How are they created, communicated, and sustained? How would you answer Morgan’s questions?

10. Aspects that shape Organizational Reality • Organizational structure • Rules • Policies • Goals • Missions • Job descriptions • Standardized operating procedures

11. Critical Analysis • What are the strengths and limitations of the cultural metaphor?