The Modern Environment and Corporate Culture

Introduction

The Modern Environment and Corporate Culture
Picture 1: The Modern Environment and Corporate Culture
Source: (Reference for Business, 2021)

The External environment has a huge influence on organizations internal corporate culture. Cultures can vary from one organization to another but there will be similar cultural characteristics within the organizations in the same industry, since they are operating in similar environments. The internal culture should consist of factors that are require to be succeeded in the environment. When deciding what cultural values are important for an organization, managers must consider the external environment the particular organization deal with, and the company’s strategy and goals.

The right fit between culture, strategy, and the environment is associated with four type of cultures which are based on two dimensions (Daft, 2014);

  1. The extent to which the external environment requires flexibility or stability (Daft, 2014).
  2. The extent to which company’s strategic focus is internal or external (Daft, 2014).

Picture 2: Diagram on four type of cultures
Source: (Management Twelfth Edition by Daft, 2016)


The Four types of corporate cultures associated with these differences are;

  • Adaptability Culture

Organizations with adaptive cultures engage in more successful change efforts (Nesbit & Lam, 2014). This type of culture often emerge in an environment that requires fast response and high risk decision making (Daft, 2014). The Management of these organizations encourages rapid detection, interpretation, and translation of signals from the environment into new behaviors and, also more autonomy will be given to employees to make decisions and act accordingly to satisfy customer requirements. Managers may also participate in the process of creating by encouraging and rewarding creativity, experimentation, and risk taking.

The best example of adaptability culture is the "Box", a company that provides cloud content management and file sharing services for businesses, which was co-founded by Aaron Levie in 2005 when he was 20 years old. The fast, risk taking culture at Box has helped the organization to grow quickly doubling its sales every year (Daft, 2014).

In addition, with the spread of covid- 19 pandemic, most fast food restaurants had adapted to online delivery services. This makes them to be survived in the industry as other restaurants couldn’t sustain themselves.

  •          Achievement Culture

The achievement Culture emphasizes serving specific customers in the external environment, but without the intense need of flexibility and rapid changes (Daft, 2014). Achievement cultures would be more result oriented that values competitiveness, personal initiative and achievement. Oracle Corporation and EMC are considered as best examples for organization embodied with achievement culture (Daft, 2014).

  •        Involvement Culture 

The involvement culture highly persuades the contribution of employees to adapt rapidly to changing needs of the external environment. These cultures are more internal focus as they keep satisfying the needs of employees. The Walt Disney World Resort is the most popular example for involvement culture, as the strategy implemented motivates their employees, to inspires Disney customers and keep them coming back for more magical memories (Zmorenski, 2021). The Lack of external focus is the main drawback of this culture.

  •       Consistency Culture

The consistency culture assumes that they are working under stable external environment conditions and will be more internal focus. In this type of cultures people values methodical, rational and orderly ways of doing things (Daft, 2014). Highly consistent cultures will become more difficult to change, and they become inbred as you can see in some of Government Organizations. However, some of organizations like Pacific Edge Software has successfully implemented elements of a consistency culture (Course Hero, Inc, 2021).

Conclusion

In the modern context, the environment is dynamically changing. Rapid innovation by competitive organizations, fast changes in customer preferences, rapid technological changes, globalization, natural disasters, and the emergence of unexpected circumstances like ongoing pandemic covid-19 have laid the groundwork to become more responsive to external environmental factors. Human Resource Management performs a crucial role by promoting proper cultural adjustments to the organizations by considering the external factors as it is a decisive factor for the success of an organization. As today’s organizations operate in a turbulent environment the adaptability culture will be more suitable for survival.

YouTube Link:

                                                                                                                
Video 1: Corporate Culture
Source: (KnowledgeAccess, 2016)


References

Anon., n.d. Google. [Online]
Available at: https://www.google.com/search?q=corporate+culture+&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwjd5p-i9-bxAhUlJrcAHSRSAXcQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=corporate+culture+&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzIECCMQJzICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyAggAMgIIADoGCAAQCBAeOgQIABAYOgQIABAeUJ6nugFY4rG6AWCi0boBaABw

Course Hero, Inc, 2021. Nokia is an example of an adaptability culture the. [Online]
Available at: https://www.coursehero.com/file/p2b7ojb/Nokia-is-an-example-of-an-adaptability-culture-The-achievement-culture-is-a/
[Accessed 16 July 2021].

Daft, R. L., 2014. Management Twelfth Edition. In: s.l.:Cengage Learning, pp. 94-96.

KnowledgeAccess, 2016. Adaptability in the workplace. [Online]
Available at: https://youtu.be/rlmX1yWt_SI
[Accessed 20 July 2021].

Nesbit, P. L. & Lam, E., 2014. Cultural Adaptability and Organizational Change. [Online]
Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/277573670_Cultural_Adaptability_and_Organizational_Change_A_Case_Study_of_a_Social_Service_Organization_in_Hong_Kong
[Accessed 14 July 2021].

Reference for Business, 2021. Google Images. [Online]
Available at: https://www.google.com/search?q=corporate+culture+&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwjd5p-i9-bxAhUlJrcAHSRSAXcQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=corporate+culture+&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzIECCMQJzICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyAggAMgIIADoGCAAQCBAeOgQIABAYOgQIABAeUJ6nugFY4rG6AWCi0boBaABw

Zmorenski, D., 2021. How to Foster a Culture of Involvement. [Online]
Available at: https://www.reliableplant.com/Read/29196/culture-of-involvement
[Accessed 16 July 2021].

Comments

  1. Fayaz SadiqueJuly 20, 2021 at 12:45 PM

    Thank you for sharing this Rukmali, it is very informative and very similar to Denison's model of Organizational culture but in Denison's model the Mission culture is addressed instead of Achievement culture.
    Agree with your conclusion that Adaptability Culture is more appropriate considering modern and dynamic External environment but in all situations the HRM plays an important role to mold the employees according to specific organizational culture to achieve favorable performance.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Rukmali FernandoJuly 20, 2021 at 9:55 PM

      Thank you so much for the feedback Fayaz. Yes, it is closely related to Dension's model.

      Delete
  2. Oshadha BandaraJuly 20, 2021 at 7:29 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oshadha BandaraJuly 20, 2021 at 7:29 PM

    Agreed Rukmali. I see this content as a strategic planing concept. Strategic planning is where we plan our resources towards the organizational goals , in a timely manner with regard to the existing changes and future changes may happen. Environmental-Adaptive - People oppose loss and disruption but they adapt readily to new circumstances. Change is based on building a new organization and gradually transferring people from the old one to the new one. This strategy seeks to shift the burden of change from management and the organization to the people. Hence management of changes and adaptation is the Key of managing organisations.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Tharindu DassanayakeJuly 21, 2021 at 12:24 AM

    Hi Rukmali , you have explained these cultures really well . I was able to get a clear understanding about these cultures . In fact your article made interest in my self to further research on the above subject . I think all these culture have it's own unique pros and cons . my personal opinion is organizations should not strict to a one culture and it's better if organizations can choose the culture case by case . But adoptability culture seems more prominent as you stated

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Rukmali FernandoJuly 21, 2021 at 9:35 AM

      Agreed Tharindu, Cultural fitness highly depend on the industry the particular organization operates in. Thank you so much for feedback and sharing your view regarding the topic.

      Delete
  5. Sunith GeeganageJuly 22, 2021 at 6:14 PM

    Rukmali;
    Nicely explained how external environment influence organization culture and importance to thinks before appliance made to organization culture.
    Workplace culture can be just as important as your overall business strategy because it can either strengthen or down your organization and your long-term objectives and it links things like employee engagement, happiness, productivity, retention rate and positive recruitment efforts and more.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Harsha MahalekamJuly 31, 2021 at 1:07 AM

    Organizational culture is present in every organization and affects every aspect of its operations. Some believe that it depends primarily on patterns of action that are observable within an organization, while others point to shared values that provide team. It is a framework through which managers and executives lead, and it is the character behind the branding concepts that define a product for a customer. Thank you for sharing this Rukmali.

    ReplyDelete
  7. blogs of UMESHAugust 3, 2021 at 12:56 PM

    Interesting topic Rukmali, corporate culture is actually the personality of the company, it is important to build a strong and accurate representation of the organization. In this post you have aligned all the things with the modern environment. Thank you for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
  8. D.Gangani BandaraAugust 16, 2021 at 9:22 AM

    Organizational culture plays major role in strategic planning. When compared to the current global situations I agree with you on implementation of Adaptability culture.
    An interesting article.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Praveen Joel FrancisAugust 24, 2021 at 10:35 AM

    Rukmali, your blog post is well-written. Organizations looking for new methods to engage their employees understand the importance of workplace culture. Workplace culture refers to an employee's entire experience in their working environment. Even though you've linked the four types of corporate culture to the authors' different theories, you've highlighted the need of adopting a modern workplace culture.
    Good job.

    ReplyDelete
  10. D.I.KanchanaAugust 24, 2021 at 8:59 PM

    Organizational culture is a set of shared assumptions, values, and beliefs that helps individuals to understand which behaviors are appropriate and which are not in an organization. Organizations' cultures can be a source of competitive advantage. Strong organizational cultures have the potential to serve as both an organizing and controlling mechanism for organizations. While cultures can differ between organizations, there will be similarities among those in the same industry because they share similar environments.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Pradeep RajapakshaAugust 25, 2021 at 6:34 PM

    Digital transformation is needed in organizational management and performance, corporate culture is very influential so that the work pattern of employees needs to be given flexible working due to the adjustment of work trends with the emergence of more sophisticated technology and there is a diverse workforce from various generations.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Parami RathmalgodaAugust 28, 2021 at 12:21 AM

    Hi Rukmali. Corporate culture is very related to the modern environment. When Depict how corporate culture relates to the environment, A major impact on interior corporate culture is the outer environment. One way managers change standards and qualities toward what is versatile to the outer environment or for smooth incorporation is through the emblematic initiative. Thank you for sharing.

    ReplyDelete

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