Managing the Unmanageable and Explaining the Unexplainable

Every group inevitably faces some issues not under its control, events that are intrinsically mysterious and unpredictable and hence frightening. At the physical level, events such as natural disasters and the weather require explanation. At the biological and social level, events such as birth, growth, puberty, illness, and death require a theory of what

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Shared Assumptions About the Nature of Reality and Truth

A fundamental part of every culture is a set of assumptions about what is real and how to determine or discover what is real. Such assumptions tell members of a group how to determine what is relevant information, how to interpret information, and how to determine when they have enough of it to decide

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High Context and Low Context

A useful distinction can be found in Hall’s (1977) differentiation between what he calls high-context and low-context cultures and Maruyama’s (1974) contrast between unidirectional and mutual causal cultural para­digms. In the low-context, unidirectional culture, events have clear univer­sal meanings; in the high-context, mutual causality culture, events can be understood only in context, meanings can

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Moralism-Pragmatism

A useful dimension for comparing groups on their approach to reality testing is an adaptation of England’s (1975) moralism-pragmatism dimension. In his study of managerial values, England found that managers in different coun­tries tended to be either pragmatic, seeking validation in their own experi­ence, or moralistic, seeking validation in a general philosophy, moral system,

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What Is “Information”?

How a group tests for reality and makes decisions also involves consen­sus on what constitutes data, what is information, and what is knowledge. As information technology has grown, the issue has become sharpened because of debates about the role of computers in providing “information.” Information technology “professionals” often hold shared assumptions that differ in

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Deeper cultural assumptions: the nature of time

The perception and experience of time are among the most central aspects of how any group functions. When people differ in their experience of time, tremendous communication and relationship problems typically emerge. Consider how anxious or irritated we get when someone is late, when we feel our time has been wasted, when we feel

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Deeper cultural assumptions: the nature of space

Our assumptions about the meaning and use of space are among the most subtle aspects of organizational culture because assumptions about space, like those about time, operate outside of awareness and are taken for granted. At the same time, when those assumptions are violated, very strong emotional reactions occur because space comes to have

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Deeper cultural assumptions: Distance and Relative Placement

Space has both a physical and a social meaning (Van Maanen, 1979b). For coordinated social action to occur, an individual must share assumptions about the meaning of the placement of physical objects in an environment and also know how to orient himself or herself spatially in relation to other members of the group. A

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Deeper cultural assumptions about human nature

Every culture has shared assumptions about what it means to be human, what our basic instincts are, and what kinds of behavior are considered inhuman and therefore grounds for ejection from the group. Being human is not just a physical property but also a cultural construction, as we have seen throughout history. Slavery was

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Deeper cultural assumptions about appropriate human activity

Closely connected to assumptions about human nature are shared assump­tions about the appropriate way for humans to act in relation to their envi­ronment. Several basically different orientations have been identified in cross-cultural studies, and these have direct implications for variations we can see in organizations. 1. The Doing Orientation At one extreme, we can

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Deeper cultural assumptions about the nature of human relationships

At the core of every culture are assumptions about the proper way for indi­viduals to relate to each other to make the group safe, comfortable, and productive. When such assumptions are not widely shared, we speak of anarchy and anomie. Whereas the previous assumption areas deal with the group ’s relationship to the external

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Why Culture Typologies and Why Not?

When we observe the “natural” world, what we see, hear, taste, smell, and feel are potentially overwhelming. By itself, “raw experience ” does not make sense, but our own cultural upbringing has taught us how to make sense of it through conceptual categories that are embedded in our language. What we experience as an

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Typologies That Focus on Assumptions About Authority and Intimacy

Organizations are ultimately the result of people doing things together for a common purpose. The basic relationship between the individual and the organization can, therefore, be thought of as the most fundamental cultural dimension around which to build a typology because it will provide critical categories for analyzing assumptions about authority and intimacy. One

Typologies of Corporate Character and Culture

Typologies trying to capture cultural essences in organizations were first introduced by Harrison (1979) and Handy (1978) with four “types” based on their primary focus. Harrison’s four types were: Power oriented: Organizations dominated by charismatic/autocratic founders. Achievement oriented: Organizations dominated by task results. Role oriented: Public bureaucracies. Support oriented: Nonprofit or religious organizations. Handy

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Examples of Using A Priori Criteria for Culture Evaluation

A different kind of approach is illustrated in a German publishing com­pany offering a prize in 2003 to six companies selected from a nomi­nated pool of sixty-three for the following: individual models of excellence in developing and living a corporate culture . . . An international working commission composed of experts from academia and

Why Decipher Culture?

There are several quite different reasons for wanting to decipher or assess an organizational culture. At one extreme is pure academic research where the researcher is trying to present a picture of a culture to fellow research­ers and other interested parties to develop theory or test some hypoth­esis. This covers most anthropologists who go

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Ethical Issues in Deciphering Culture

Deciphering culture has some inherent risks that both the insider and the outsider should assess before proceeding. The risks differ, depending on the purpose of the analysis, and they are often subtle and unknown. Therefore, the desire to go ahead and the organization’s permission to do so may not be enough to warrant proceeding.

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How culture emerges in new groups?

The rules of the social order that dominate our day-to-day interactions are the bedrock of culture. We learn those rules as we are socialized into our family and acculturated into our nation and ethnic group. How those rules were created in the first place is difficult to decipher in cultures that have existed for

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Group Formation Through Originating and Marker Events

All groups start with some kind of “originating event” : (1) An environ­mental accident (for instance, a sudden threat that occurs in a random crowd and requires a common response), (2) a decision by an “originator” to bring a group of people together for some purpose, or (3) an advertised event or common experience

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Group Formation Process – Stage 1: Dealing with Assumptions About Authority

Initially, each member of a new group is struggling with the personal issues of inclusion, identity, authority, and intimacy, and the group is not really a group but a collection of individual members, each focused on how to make the situation safe and personally rewarding. Even as they learn how to learn in the

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