organizational culture emerges from interactions

One of the most frequent Google searches that leads people to my blog is a search about managing culture. I have qualms about whether giving advice about how to manage culture is a responsible thing to do, since it may give managers the false impression that they can control their organization's culture.

Stephen Billing, at ChangingOrganisations.Com, posted a great blog entry this morning, asking "Is there such a thing as organisational culture?" In it, he writes

"I am just concerned about the idea that corporate culture is something (i.e. is a physical "thing" or something with properties similar to a physical thing)  that can be managed in the service of the most powerful managers."

I agree that corporate culture is not a thing. I also share Steven's concern about the idea that culture can be managed. In fact, in an entry last fall, I wrote

"the truth is that culture cannot always be managed. ... Understanding how employees may respond to change initiatives can help calibrate managers' expectations and remind them that their direct influence on corporate culture is limited.

(To read the rest of my earlier blog entry, see Organizational change: can we manage it? Another entry that may be of interest is building support for change.)

Essentially, Stephen and I see culture from the same angle. The angle is that culture is made up of patterns of interactions among organizational members. That's why managers have little ability to influence it -- they don't participate in many of those interactions. A manager cannot be in the middle of every conversation between coworkers. 

Where Stephen and I may differ is that I believe some kinds of interaction can be more influential than others -- specifically, the interactions that involve storytelling. If one employee tells a good story, the listeners may retell it to others. Thus, the story can have a ripple effect, influencing many interactions during which the storyteller is not even present. 

Of course, managers are not the only ones within organizations who can tell good stories. Some of the best stories, the ones that are retold the most often, are the stories that other organizational members tell about managers. Consider, for instance, how an enlisted sailor might tell a story about how his ship's captain held a luau for all those aboard. He could tell the story as a way to illustrate his belief that the captain believes everyone matters on his ship. Or, the story might be a way to illustrate a different belief -- that the captain is lax and wastes Navy resources. Or perhaps he sees the captain as trying to establish a connection with all the sailors aboard, but failing -- because the captain wouldn't allow beer at the luau.

So my conclusion is that if you want to shape your organization's culture, you should cultivate your storytelling ability. Beware, though, because every story you tell can become a kind of Pandora's box -- you cannot be sure about how the story's meaning may change as it ripples through the organization.

Comments

[Chris Rodgers]

Hi Sandy,

It's good to find another voice to add to the relational and emergent view of organizational dynamics. My own response to the latest of Stephen's blog posts is here, if you are interested in a related perspective that I call Informal Coalitions: http://informalcoalitions.typepad.com/informal_coalitions/2009/08/does-organizational-culture-exist-a-view-from-the-road-less-travelled.html

Glad I found your blog. I look forward to reading other posts.

Cheers, Chris

[Joe Espana]

I thought this posting was extremely interesting. My own point of view sort of coincides with yours in that our own research supports the views that organisational culture is not a 'thing' but rather a combination of patterns that lead to certain perceptions and behaviours.

Two points I'd like to make here. The first is that individual leaders will find it extremely difficult to affect the overall organisational culture, particularly in large, multi-national or global structures. What they do greatly influence is the climate they create for their immediate teams. Climate is something more immediate and perhaps smaller in size (if one is able to quantify it this way). And we know that leaders have a big baring on how that climate is perceived and experienced by others. The issue and relationship to organisational culure is the extent to which similarity and consistency exists in climate from team to team and function to function. Here is where organisational values can be most viseral and visible.

My second point is that I don't agree that organisational culture can't be measured. My own practice does a lot of work in the area of diagnosing organisational effectiveness, and of course we all know what a major moderator of performance organisational culture can be. We have developed several tool over the years to measure organisational culture and effectiveness. Our studies have shown that there are some discernable patterns that enable the measurement, and by implication, the management of organisational culture.

It is therefore possible to measure and manage organisational climate and culture by helping leaders throughout the organisation to support the culture the company needs to fully execute the strategy. I suppose, however, the next question that arises is: What kind of culture is that?

[Sandy Piderit]

Hi Chris,

thanks for mentioning your post. I'll take a look!

-Sandy

[Sandy Piderit]

Hi Joe, thanks for sharing your thoughts.

To respond to your second point first -- I believe that it is possible to measure the strength with which employees hold certain values. If that's what you mean by measuring the organization's culture, then I would certainly agree it's possible.

I find it easier to make sense of an organization's culture, if I am a newcomer, by thinking about what beliefs and assumptions help to connect and explain the symbols and stories and ceremonies that are visible within the organization. So, describing the culture in terms of statements of belief (which are often connected to values) is often more helpful for me than just measuring the values. But certainly, measuring values is helpful as well.

Regarding your first point -- it absolutely makes sense to emphasize that leaders have greater opportunities to influence their immediate workgroups, than to influence the culture organization-wide.

[Stephen Billing]

Sandy, I found it most interesting to read your comment about what you do when you first go into an organisation, and this made me think about what I do in the same situation.

Or should I say, what I think I am doing when I go into an organisation...

Rather than thinking about beliefs and assumptions, I am thinking to some degree about, derived from Heidegger, the experience of the other person, in terms of background meaning, concern, embodied intelligence and the situation itself. But the specifics of the model don't matter. To me it is about joint enquiry - what is your experience as a manager or employee, and what is my experience as a non-employee or manager. What sense do we make together of what is going on?

As for measuring - well I think that the engagement/climate/culture surveys are attempts to measure the unmeasurable. They amount to anonymous unsolicited feedback from the point of view of the manager. As a manager I would ignore anonymous feedback - it's always for the benefit of the giver, not the receiver.

Cheers,

[Sandy Piderit]

Hi Stephen,

The point I was trying to make in response to Joe was that measuring culture is not my primary instinct when I'm trying to make sense of it. My primary instinct is to learn more about individual members of the organization, so that I can reflect on what their shared beliefs and assumptions might be.

In that sense, your approach seems similar to mine -- we are both focused on the question of what sense we can make out of what is going on in the organization, and we are both learning about "the organization" through conversation with its members. I may not be as focused on the mutuality of the inquiry, and I'm not sure why. You've given me something to think about. Perhaps it is because we enter organizations in different roles? I don't always enter an organization as a consultant or action researcher. Sometimes I'm just curious, and I find that people are willing to talk with me!

When I am in a consulting role, I think there can be significant value in gathering survey data in large organizations, but only after I have had a chance to talk with people in many different "corners" of the organization. Surveys can be useful in examining whether patterns I've identified hold up with any consistency across groups of people larger than those who could be interviewed in a more open-ended way. But I would have no idea how to ask survey questions of any value before I spent some time in conversations with organization members.

I'd love to read your reaction to my initial post, about the role of storytelling in organizational culture change. Do you think it could be a useful approach to intentionally reshaping culture, or is it just a Pandora's box?