Culture is the system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviours, and artifacts that the members of society use to cope with their world and with one another, and that are transmitted from generation to generation through learning.
Visible aspects of culture within an organisationVisible aspects within an organisation are the things that can be noticed such as punctuality, employee’s uniform, the business logo and structure, staff being on time and informing the manager if they are going to be absent.
The two similar stores I researched for visible aspects within a business were Primark and River Island. They both sell similar products, but one being a cheap designer and one being a more expensive designer wear giving there cloth a different value from one another.
I researched two similar stores during the lecture, which were Primark; who sell clothing and accessories at a cheaper price, and River Island; whose products are priced much higher compared to Primark.
The visible aspects of culture I noticed from the River Island shop front and while walking in was the business structure. The entrance to the store is very bright with quite a few lights and mannequins displayed on the shop window. There were different paint colours used on the walls, such as green, white, black, blue, furthermore there were colour lights involved. The layout of the cloth and models were much different to the layout of Primark’s and the cloth was aimed at young adults rather than mature adults and children. The staff also gave off a different vibe, they are dressed slightly informally compared to Primark, wearing jeans and trainers but the only thing being formal and similar to Primark is the top showing the River Island logo. Another visible aspect that I noticed was there was a mixture of hip hop, R&B and a bit of rock music for young adults to enjoy while roaming around the store. Whereas in Primark has no music and it sticks to the simple plain white colour and the products are aimed at families.
The power culture
Handy describes the power culture as a ‘web’. He suggests that this reflects the concentration of power of a family-owned business, which can either be extremely large or small. (Sherwin 2009) The family operation with strict responsibilities going to family member’s responsibility given to personalities rather than expertise creates the power structure of the ‘web’. Examples of businesses which come under this culture will be newsagents and corner shops because they are usually family owned businesses and only one dominant person makes rules.
The role culture
This has been typified as a Greek temple. Common in most organisations today is a role culture. In a role culture, organisations are split into various functions and each individual within the function is assigned a particular role. The role culture has the benefit of specialisation. Employees focus on their particular role as assigned to them by their job description and this should increase productivity for the company. This culture is quite logical to organise in a large organisation. Examples of jobs in this type of culture are government departments and local authorities such as the police department, this is because there is a hierarchy within these types of jobs and everyone knows what they are doing and the day-to-day work are similar.
The task culture
A task culture refers to a team based approach to complete a particular task. They are popular in today's modern business society where the organisation will establish particular 'project teams' to complete a task to date. Staffs feels motivated because they are empowered to make decisions within their team, they will also feel valued because they may have been selected within that team and given the responsibility to bring the task to a successful end. Examples of businesses which can be labelled under this category are design agencies and management consultancies because the value of an individual to a certain project depends on their expertise rather than job titles
The person culture
This is characteristic of the consensus model of management, where the individuals within the structure determine collectively the path which the organisation pursues. If there is a formalised structure, it tends to service the needs of the individuals within the structure. Organisations which portray this culture reject formal hierarchies for ‘getting things done’ and exist solely to meet the needs of their members. The rejection of formal ‘management control’ and ‘reporting relationships’ suggests that this may be a suitable culture for a self-help group or a commune, etc., but it is not appropriate for business organisations. Examples of organisations that come under this category are barristers, universities and doctors’ practices.
Problems when trying to classify culture
The problem with classifying culture is when two business go into partnership it can take a while to realise which culture would be most suitable and they would have to change from one culture to another.
Another problem would be the takeover of a new leadership for example the manager may want to change the layout of the business make it formal from it being informal and it may take a while for the organisation to adjust. Meaning it would have to change its culture which may even lead to describing its culture.
And the other problem I found to classifying culture is the fact that a large business may be running more than one culture because of its different sectors for example the HR department and the manufacturing department have separate goals and objectives giving them separate cultures.
Conclusion and EvaluationThe culture to an organisation is the attitudes, beliefs and values that are originally controlled by the leader, for example the manager of a business. This processes the way in which things are done within a business. This is shown in two ways one being the visible aspect for example punctuality of the staff, uniform and the layout of the business. The second aspect is the hidden aspect being the way you behave towards customers and use the right manner, this goes under attitudes and beliefs.
All companies have their own culture, it might not always fit in with the four types of cultures Charles Handy mentioned but every business has a way of operating and they share their own beliefs about how things should be done within the business. for example most businesses start off small and so they will usually follow Handy’s power culture theory but however some business grow and so they move into other categories such as role culture, were different people have different roles.
References
Mary Simpson, n.d.
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