Culture is made up of tangible aspects such as symbols and artifacts and of intangible elements such as values and beliefs.

By the end of 1970s modern societies witnessed widespread diffusion of individualism that alienated people from the society. Lonely people searching for an identity celebrated organizational culture as a haven. Organizational culture allowed people to answer aching questions for raison d’etre! “Who am I, what is my reason for being in this world? what this organization stands for?” are all examples of questions asked and generally found an explanation within the concept of organizational culture.

1. Individualism and alienation

2. Technically advanced production and the rise of service industry

   Machine bureaucracy gradually became less useful in managing people

   Innovative production techniques

   Japanese miracle

After the devastation experienced by Japan following the 2nd World War, Japan’s reborn as an economic power found to be related to the Japanese management style. Globalization led to an increase in awareness and curiosity in the global west for the east. It was self-evident that Japanese miracle was mostly related to the Japanese cultural value system and its reflections within Japanese organizations. Other countries tried to understand and encapsulate these reflections for themselves, and hence the interest in the cultural aspect of organizations tend to strengthen.

Organizational culture is made up of fundamental beliefs and assumptions, providing shared values that make being a part of an organization meaningful, and offers organizational members well- defined integrative patterns for expressing themselves.

Subculture is defined as groups sharing overall cultural values of the society but diverges from these groups by holding different values brought by their lifestyles, values, and norms.

• Differentiates organization from the others.

• Members’ organizational identification is easy.

  Guides organizational behavior.

  Creates stability throughout the organization.

Makes mergers & acquisition harder.

Basic assumptions, espoused values, and artifacts.

Jargon/names/nicknames
Explanations/theories
Stories/myths/legends and their heroes and villains

Superstitions/rumors
Humor/jokes
Metaphors/proverbs/slogans Speeches/rhetoric/oratory

of founder's business idea.

Step 4:As organization grows and matures, new employees are recruited, initial values and founder's vision transmitted and hence sustained.

Physical Symbols

Jargon is a contextualized special language.

Ouchi describes three types of organizations which are called Type J, Type A, and finally Type Z. As the names denote, Type J depicts features of the typical Japanese firm, on the other hand, Type A depicts characteristics of the average American firm. Type Z, offered by Ouchi, is the blended version of Type J and Type A in which suitable elements of Japanese firms are adapted to the US context.

1. A Bias for action

2. Close to the customer

3. Autonomy and entrepreneurship

4. Productivity through people

5. Hands-on, value-driven

6. Stick to the knitting

7. Simple form, lean staff

8. Simultaneous loose-tight properties

Four quadrants of Cameron and Quinn’s model of organizational culture are named as clan, adhocracy, hierarchy, and market.

Major ethical perspectives are the utilitarian view, rights view, justice view, and integrative social contract view.