ORGANISATION CULTURE

There are many definitions of organisational culture. One such definition is that an organisation can organise itself through its rules, procedures and beliefs making up the culture of the company.

Every organisation has its “visible’’and “hidden” aspects of organisational culture. The visible aspects of an organisation are reflected in slogans, symbols or behaviour of employees. The organisation of my choice is the DIY store I used to work for - Leroy Merlin.

The first example of organisational culture I came across was the company’s uniform, every employee had to wear a green top with the company logo and black trousers; this uniform made staff members easy to spot and enhanced the company’s corporate identity.

Another visible aspect of Leroy Merlin is definitely: the colour theme (green and white) and the display of shelves. The atmosphere in the shop was calm and relaxing. Also the staff members were very friendly and helpful to all customers.

Hidden aspects of organisational culture are all the values, attitudes or beliefs, one such aspect is customer care. Leroy Merlin always tried to understand customers need’s and make sure its customers were happy shopping there.  Another hidden aspect of Leroy Merlin was donating to charities and taking care of the environment by being involved in “The company good for environment” programme, focusing on waste of raw materials.

Charles Handy is an Irish author and philosopher specialising in organisational culture and behaviour. He broke up organisational culture into four categories, they are:

Power culture - where there is one person with the central power source (head of the organisation) that exercises control. His/her decisions are taken very quickly, there are few rules and procedures and the atmosphere is very competitive and political.

Role culture - An environment in which work is controlled by procedures and rules, such a culture is typical of a bureaucratic organisation. Power is associated with positions not people. A good organisational example is the military services or police.

Task culture – This is where the aim is to bring together the right people and let them get on with it. The culture is adaptable and teamwork is important. 

Person culture – An individual is the central point, the organisation exists only to serve and assist the individuals in it. There is no hierarchy. An organisational example of this culture is an architect or barrister.

The main problem of trying to classify culture into one of the four types as described above is that some organisations have their own cultures. Each company is different and sometimes more than one culture might be found in one workplace. For example a company such as Leroy Merlin has several departments and every department has its own type of culture. Changing all departments into one single type of culture might cause  problems like de-motivation and dissatisfaction.

To conclude culture is very important within the organisation because it makes an organisation ‘’unique’’. Every company has visible and hidden aspects. The role of visible aspects is to attract clients, while hidden aspects determine and affect them.

Both of them together help the company to gain a success.

REFERENCE:

-         Armstrong, M (2006) Strategic Human Resource Management.3^rd edition. London and Philadelphia. Kogan Page.

-         Learnmanagement2.com [n.d]. [Online]. Available from:
http://www.learnmanagement2.com/maslow.htm . Accessed January 2010

-         Leroymerlin.pl [n.d]. [Online]. Available from:
http://www.leroymerli.pl  . Accessed January 2010

-         Mullin, L.J. (2010) Management & organisational behaviour. 9^thedition. Essex. Pearson Education Limited.