Importance of Organizational culture 📌🎯
Why is organizational culture important?
Part 1
Organizational culture affects how employees experience an organization, and consists of the values, behaviors, beliefs, expectations, and communication style that go along with it. Understanding one’s own workplace culture can reveal the level of employee engagement, opportunities to attract new talent and improve retention. How does it feel to be a part of a great organization? Organizational culture can answer that, as it affects every aspect of one’s perception of an organization.
Employee engagement
The level of commitment, motivation, and satisfaction that employees have with their work and work environment is known as employee engagement. Although there are many factors that affect it, organizational culture is one of the most significant ones.
For employees who share the same vision and mission, it fosters a sense of identity and belonging. It creates an environment of mutual respect and trust between employees and managers, which improves feedback and communication. In addition, by promoting experimentation, risk-taking, and ongoing improvement, it fosters innovation and growth. Furthermore, it aligns the objectives and performance of the workforce with the strategy of the company.
Employee engagement can be increased by an organization with a strong and positive culture by giving employees a sense of empowerment, inspiration, and value. Employee engagement has a growing impact on an organization's existence and has become a factor in determining its financial performance (Bersin, 2014).
Talent retention
Organizational culture plays a crucial role in determining if a company has the resources necessary to attract top talent in the fiercely competitive field of recruitment. Studies show a connection between how the general public views organizational culture and how well a company's reputation serves as a barometer for corporate branding. (Kowalczyk S.J.& Pawlish M.J,2022)
Talented candidates will take note of a company’s positive public image and express a desire to work. Therefore, management will use branding to effectively communicate their organization’s culture to attract the best candidates. Findings from one study show support and achievement-focused cultural behaviors had significantly positive effects on retention when compared to power-focused cultural behaviors, which had significantly negative effects on retention. (Tetteh, E & Brenyah, R,2016)
Fosters innovation
Organizational culture impacts innovation in many ways. At a high level, in a culture where fear of failure is present, innovation will not happen.
However, in a culture where fear is absent and trust is high, innovation happens much more easily.
This is why it is so important for employees to be allowed and encouraged to actively contribute to the creative process that sets the stage for continuous innovation. (Farson.R. and Ralph. K,2002)
Having a culture of innovation fuels creativity and can lead to better-informed decision-making for upper management.
Strong brand identity
An organization's reputation and public image are reflected in its organizational culture. For one cannot fake or hide organizational culture. Based on their interactions both inside and outside of the organization, people form assumptions about businesses.
If the brand is connected with a weak image or lacks an organizational culture, clients can be reluctant to do business with it. Strong brand identities help businesses draw in more customers and job seekers who share their values and are committed to the same goals.
Studies suggest that the concept of brand identity can affect the way employees work or the whole company’s internal culture when applied to an organization. (Roy & Banerjee, 2014)
Through the next article other important aspects of organizational culture will be discussed.
Additional reading :
What Is Organizational Culture? And Why Should We Care? (hbr.org)
Bersin, J. (2014). It's time to rethink the 'employee engagement 'issue. It's Time To Rethink The 'Employee Engagement' Issue (forbes.com)
Richard Farson and Ralph Keyes (2002) The Failure-Tolerant Leader
https://hbr.org/2002/08/the-failure-tolerant-leader
Roy and Banerjee, 2014
Identification and measurement of brand identity and image gap: a quantitative approach", Journal of Product & Brand Management, Vol. 23 No. 3, pp. 207-219. https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-01-2014-0478
S J Kowalczyk & M J Pawlish, 2002. Corporate Branding through External Perception of Organizational Culture
Corporate Reputation Review volume 5, pages159–174
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/palgrave.crr.1540172
Tetteh, Edward & Brenyah, Richard. (2016). Organization culture and its impact on employee retention: Evidence from the tertiary educational sector of Ghana. European Journal of Business and Management. 8. 157-163 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312902087_Organization_culture_and_its_impact_on_employee_retention_Evidence_from_the_tertiary_educational_sector_of_Ghana
Ideally, organizational culture is the DNA or the identity of the organization. It is a system of shared values, beliefs, behaviors and practices that identifies the organization and how it operates. If the culture is bad, there is negative image to the organization. There will be high staff turnover, low morale and bad performance for the organization (Moseley, No Year). Companies will find it hard to attract and retain talent.
ReplyDeleteTherefore, I totally propose and endorse your article. Agreed Madame!!!
Organizational culture refers to the shared values, beliefs, norms, and artifacts that shape the behavior and interactions of individuals within a company. It represents the collective identity, personality, and "way of doing things" in an organization. Understanding one’s own workplace culture can reveal further Organizational Reputation and Employer Branding.
ReplyDeleteThere may be a debate on whether innovation is more influenced by personal abilities and market conditions than by the culture of an organization. However, I would argue that a culture of trust, fearlessness, and support for employee input are crucial factors in promoting innovation within a company.
ReplyDeleteIn essence, the organizational culture serves as the very essence or identity – the DNA, if you will – of a company. It constitutes a cohesive system encompassing shared values, beliefs, behaviors, and practices that not only define the organization but also dictate its mode of operation. When the cultural fabric is tainted, it casts a negative shadow on the organization, leading to repercussions such as high staff turnover, diminished morale, and subpar performance (Moseley, No Year). The ability to attract and retain talent becomes an uphill battle for companies grappling with a less-than-ideal culture. In complete alignment with your sentiments, I wholeheartedly support and echo the sentiments articulated in your article. Well said, Piyumi !
ReplyDeleteOne factor that influences people's decision to do business with an organisation is its organisational culture. A candidate's and potential client's needs must be met by the overall branding image, values, and mission statement. Any successful firm depends on this constant alignment, but culture provides much more.
ReplyDeleteTalent retention is the biggest challenge today with so many different generations contributing to the workplace culture. Varied approaches are taken by companies to tailor-make their approaches to suit the different generations but it's an ever challenging task.
ReplyDeleteOrganizational culture can effectively promote or inhibit cooperation, exchange of knowledge, experience and ideas. Open culture, promoting the participation of all team members in the creative process, is favourable to the activity and initiative of employees, while culture based on strong con-trol is definitely not conducive to creativity and innovation. Cultures aimed at developing innovation and creating suitable conditions for doing so are characterized by dynamism, flexibility, fast adaptation to changing condi-tions, and non-stereotypical solutions. A key to the development of innova-tion in an organization is support, and encouragement for every employee to seek and discover unconventional, non-standard ways of achieving ob-jectives and performing tasks. (Woszczyna, 2014)
ReplyDelete