Understanding Organizational Culture

Catalog description

Organizational culture exists in all kinds of organizations including profit-seeking firms, non-profit organizations and government agencies. It is a primary determinate for how well employees function together and like working in the place they do. Ultimately organizational effectiveness and success depends on a healthy organizational culture. This course introduces organizational culture and methods of analyzing it. The course takes an interdisciplinary functionalist view of organizational culture and subcultures as being: (a) things observed, felt, heard and expressed by employees; (b) organizational values espoused in mission statements, goals, ideals, norms, standards, and moral principles; and (c) underlying assumptions of employees about their roles, responsibilities and relationships given available resources relative to client/constituency performance expectations, applicable labor-management agreements and regulatory/safety compliance issues. Methods for analyzing the health of organizational culture and subcultures are related to various kinds of circumstances faced by firms, organizations and agencies.