Types of Organisations’ Culture.
Company culture is a living thing. It varies inside the organisation throughout its’ teams and levels. It also changes through time. Do you have the right one for your current needs?
Let’s get through a brief description of four types of organisations based on the proportion of two defining qualities: sociability and solidarity, the structure proposed by Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones in their article “What holds the modern company together?”
Networked Organisation:
[ high sociability, low solidarity ]
Signs:
People stop to talk in the hallways
They wander in each other’s offices with no purpose
People have lunch in groups
After-hour socialising is common
Birthdays, promotions and farewells are celebrated
Sports activities may be shared
Presence of internal jokes and nicknames
Blurred roles and responsibilities
Benefits:
High levels of flexibility inside the company
No bureaucracy
The working environment is enjoyable
Strong morale and loyalty to the company
High levels of creativity
People go beyond the formal requirements of their job
Problems:
Poor performance is tolerated
Exaggerated concern for consensus
Lack of purpose
Behind the scenes, networks may harm processes of the company
Hierarchies may be ignored
Mercenary Organization:
[ low sociability, high solidarity ]
Signs:
Relationships are based on common tasks or shared goals
Labour unions are present
Clear separation of work and life
Common for workers to prioritise work over private life
No outside of work mingle unless organised around business
Clear roles and responsibilities
Benefits:
A high degree of strategic focus
Swift response to competitive threats
High-performance standards
Strong sense of trust in the organisation
Meritocracy thrives
Problems:
Low loyalty
If the strategy is chosen wrong, it can lead to corporate suicide
Cooperation occurs only when individual benefits from it are clear
Employees don’t like sharing information
Internal competition is present
Workers may be overly focused on measurable targets
Fragmented Organisation:
[ low sociability, low solidarity ]
Signs:
Low consciousness of organisational membership
People believe they work for themselves or with occupational groups
Employees work in their rooms or at home
No extracurricular rites and rituals
Employees are secretive about their work progress
Benefits:
Good for people who prefer to work alone
Suitable for highly trained individuals who have idiosyncratic work styles
Suitable for virtual organisations
Little interdependence in work required
Once properly hired, employees self manage their work
Problems:
Employees rarely agree on companies goals, success factors and performance standards.
Leaders feel isolated and disempowered.
Personal benefit is carefully considered before acting
Communal Organization:
[ high sociability, high solidarity ]
Signs:
A typical small, fast-growing start-up or mature organisation
Employees or founders have strong friendships
Long work hours
High perception of organisational membership
Social events are high in significance
A high value of fairness and justice within the company
Leaders command respect and affection
Benefits:
Goals and values are clearly communicated
High loyalty and high productivity
A clear image of competition
Problems:
The tension between sociability and solidarity relationships
Strongly depended on the presence of the founder or a particular leader in the company
May be problematic in situations where massive and complex change is required
To know more about organisation’s cultures in modern age, which one you belong to and how to change it, consider reading the source of this information:
What holds the modern company together? By Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones. Harvard Business Review.
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