A(n) __________ intensely holds and widely shares the organization’s core values.

At this juncture, team leaders may be convinced of the value and importance of organizational culture but skeptical of their ability to utilize their knowledge to improve it for their companies. By following the six steps described below, organizations can maximize the benefits of their newly acquired insights by being active and strategic in their organization’s cultures.

Step 1: Measure It

Whether an organization is trying to strengthen or change its organizational culture, it must first learn about its current state. Measuring something as abstract as organizational culture may seem daunting, if not downright impossible. However, there are a number of concrete steps that can be taken to simplify the process.

1. Chose a cultural assessment tool: Several cultural assessment tools have been developed by researchers and organizations looking to learn about organizational culture. One of the more tried and tested instruments is the Organizational Culture Profile (OCP). A view of the full OCP, as it is often given to participants in experiments, can be seen here. Below is a modified version of this tool designed to incorporate the insights and frameworks developed throughout this post.

Go through the list above and decide which descriptions accurately represent your company. Then, write down the cultural traits that those descriptions are indicative of. The more times you write down a particular trait, the more prominent it is in your organization's culture.

2. Survey a wide range of employees: Employees in different positions will have different perspectives on their organization’s culture. For instance, team leaders may feel that the culture is characterized by a focus on employees, while team members might feel the opposite is true. As a result, a survey must be inclusive to be accurate, meaning that employers must survey members from every part of their organizations and make sure the sample is reflective of the population as a whole.

3. Conduct employee focus groups: While surveys are useful, they have their limitations. Focus groups provide employees with a chance to voice opinions about their organization’s culture that are not adequately captured in surveys that include a limited list of characteristics. Additionally, focus groups may encourage more candid and authentic responses.

Step 2: Evaluate It

Once you have a clear idea of your organization’s culture, you can decide whether to strengthen or to change it. When making this decision, team leaders can start by thinking carefully about the unique benefits associated with each of the cultural attributes above. In doing so, they should consider the working styles and personalities present within their ranks along with the industry dynamics within which their companies operate.

Leaders at this stage might also benefit from a company-wide discussion on their organization’s current and intended cultures. Employees want a say in the organizational culture they will inhabit. Moreover, they may have valuable insights that cannot be obtained from a team leader’s perspective. As a result, an inclusive dialogue on your company’s culture is likely to result in a stronger adoption of its values, beliefs, norms, and behavioral dispositions.

Step 3: Make It Explicit

In many cases, the values, norms, beliefs, and behavioral dispositions that make up an organization’s culture are left unspoken and even undecided. Make sure that your organization’s current or intended culture is clear both to yourself and your employees. This is especially important during employee onboarding when newcomers have adopted norms and beliefs that may be incompatible with the company’s culture.

Step 4: Explain Its Value

Rules are easier to adopt when you understand why they are being implemented. When employees understand why their organization’s values and beliefs are what they are, they may be more inclined to internalize them.

Step 5: Practice What You Preach

Employees are far less likely to accept and abide by an organization’s norms, values, beliefs, and behavioral dispositions if their leaders make exceptions for themselves. As a result, leaders should embody their organization’s culture to the best of their abilities.

Practicing what you preach with respect to your organization’s culture doesn’t end with cultural embodiment. Since effective leaders must extoll the values of the culture they are encouraging employees to support, they need to create an environment that facilitates the adoption of their organization's desired traits. This can be done through organizational nudges, policies, management structures, and physical environmental changes.

Step 6: Hire For Culture

Rather than persuading current employees to adapt their norms and values to suit the culture of their organizations, it can be easier and less time consuming to hire individuals with the “right” cultural traits from the get-go. Try out the following strategies designed to give culture its proper place in hiring practices.

1. Look for cultural complements: For some time, the perceived wisdom has been that companies should hire candidates with a strong cultural fit. This means the prospective employees have traits that match up with or resemble those of the employees already working for the company. However, while some degree of shared expertise, or knowledge, is important, an unwavering requirement for complete conformity can hold companies back. If a business only looks for more of what it already has, it can’t grow and gain new areas of strength. As a result, organizations should recruit individuals who, in addition to valuing an organization’s standards and culture, bring something different that positively contributes to it.

2. Conduct a cultural complement interview: Below are some examples of the kinds of questions that are likely to bring out the candidates culturally relevant beliefs, values, norms, and behavioral dispositions.

• How do you measure success as work? (Can be used to assess a candidate’s preferred method of task-evaluation)
• Describe a time when you helped a coworker or direct report with a work problem? (Can be used to assess a candidate’s attitudes toward cooperation)
• What attracted you to the role? (Can be used to assess the degree to which the job or organization’s purpose motivated them to apply)
• Tell me about a time you had to change your mind or way of doing things in order to improve. (Can be used to assess a candidate’s response to criticism and attitudes towards innovation)

3. Wait to describe your company’s culture: If you describe your culture up front, candidates may modify the way they describe their culturally relevant traits to seem like a good cultural fit. To avoid this, listen to what applicants have to say about their beliefs, values, and experiences prior to discussing your organization’s culture. With this tactic, you are far more likely to receive candid, sincere, and authentic responses.

4. Get multiple perspectives: When assessing the degree to which a candidate complements an organization’s culture, it is nearly impossible to prevent one’s own values, norms, and beliefs from getting involved and biasing the evaluation. To combat this, cultural assessments should include a motley crew of evaluators with different backgrounds and perspectives. Employers can be far more confident that personal bias is not an issue when diverse evaluators agree about whether a candidate would add or detract from an organization’s culture.

Putting It All Together

Organizational culture is a holistic phenomenon formed by an organization’s norms, values, beliefs, stances, and behavioral dispositions. Organizational culture is associated with several significant outcomes, ranging from improvements in employee well-being to increases in an organization’s bottom line. Cultures can take on a variety of traits, each of which comes with a unique set of advantages. In turn, these advantages impact how an organization should respond to a wide range of critical decisions (e.g., whether to implement a vaccine mandate, what kind of workplace flexibility policies to put in place, how to cultivate a more diverse workforce, etc.). This explains why optimal business decisions for employers may differ; the right solution must incorporate organizational culture, which varies from group to group.

Finally, organizational culture is not a static, self-contained phenomenon over which organizational leaders have no power. Instead, cultures are living, breathing entities that are responsive to a variety of easily implementable strategies. These tactics allow employers to form and maintain the kinds of cultures they feel will optimize their workforces.

Being a great place to work is the difference between being a good company and a great company. Choose to be a great company.

When organization's core values are intensely held and widely shared It is called as?

Which of the following expresses the core values that a majority of members share and that give the organization its distinct personality?

What are the core values of an organization quizlet?

What are the beliefs and values shared by members of an organization?