Organisational Culture

Organisational culture describes the values, beliefs and behaviours which provide norms for the environment of an organisation (Anon., 2012). The culture of an organisation sets out to provide structure for employees within a business and often culture shows to be a strong factor in certain organisations. Edgar Schein, a culture theorist explains that the definition of organizational culture must be general otherwise factors may be eliminated which may contribute to culture within a business. (Anon., 2007). Culture impacts on the working procedures in which a business performs and effects the way in which the organisation is run on a daily basis.

The organisational iceberg theory proposed by French and Bell (1990) explains that there are both visible and invisible aspects that make up a business culture showing that visible aspects are known to customers however invisible aspects are hidden within the organisation. Examples of visible aspects are the structure and aims of a business including their views on how they wish to progress in the market. Using the Body Shop as an example of an organisation with a strong culture, the visible aspect shown to customers to have a big impact on their culture is their view on using fair trade products which are responsibly sourced. The Body Shop launched community fair trade in 1987 to benefit their suppliers helping to ensure they will obtain a fair price from the products they sell and benefiting consumers due to buying products containing natural ingredients. This programme has resulted in over 25,000 people in 22 countries worldwide benefiting from products sold by Body Shop. (Anon., 2012) This visible aspect of Body Shop has adapted their culture into showing their strong views in helping fair trade farmers across the globe to earn a fair price for their stock selling to the store, which may result in an increase in customer spending due to following their beliefs of the company. They promote this visible aspect in store by the layout of their shops using wood panelling on their shelves to create a rustic view for customers following their value of selling fair trade products. Another visible aspect of the Body Shop is there view on abolishing animal testing on products. They pride themselves in being a company which does not use animal tested products and ingredients in which their suppliers use to make the goods. The Body Shop campaign globally against cosmetic animal testing and this is shown heavily on their website enabling people to obtain information about their values and views on the concept of animal testing. (Anon., 2012)

Handy is another theorist in the explanation of organisational culture within a business. Handy explains that there are four types of culture within a business, each of which has different ways of monitoring and managing their employees.

Power culture is used by firms who have a centralised team of management and where all decisions are made by a central figure of the company. Other employee’s views and opinions are usually dismissed and the ultimate decision is made from the centralised management. This culture is usually incorporated into businesses with a primary leader and with strict management processes. Virgin Company is a business which is an example of incorporating power culture by being led by Sir Richard Branson, the founder of the company. Branson makes many corporate decisions of the company and deals with many of the crucial problems the business may face. ‘Your people need to be led well. A good leader must know the team, its strengths and weaknesses; socializing and listening to the team is key.’ (Branson, 2010)This quote is told by Richard Branson when explaining how he created a beneficial culture within his business. This quote helps to illustrate how he leads the company and the employees within it showing a prominent power culture.

A role culture explains a type of culture in which power of each employee is determined by the roles in which they undertake within the organisation and within the hierarchical state of each job position. Employees follow specific job descriptions and their aim is to complete individual tasks set, role culture also displays bureaucracy within a company (Sherwin, 2009). John Lewis has implemented a role culture within their organisation allowing staff to have individual roles to complete advantageously giving them a sense of job identity within the culture of the business. (Potter, 2010) explains that John Lewis encourage respect, fairness, dialogue and collaboration between all staff (shareholders or partners) to work from a leadership base of high credibility and trust. Therefore this shows they value importance on their employees and ensure they have a positive reputation of culture. By issuing yearly bonuses to employees, they show importance of their staff to the company and communication of this is shown in the public eye.

Task culture is an explanation of businesses which value high importance of the tasks in hand and make every effort of the company to complete tasks set. There is less control and influence from sub ordinates as employees work in team based groups to ensure completion of work. An example of this culture would be seen in more research based businesses where more team working is required with different skills to implement within the business surroundings.

A person culture reflects a culture in which the business surrounds the importance of employees and key job roles are led by staff decision making where in which there is no hierarchy. The individual employees are the centralisation of how the business is run and therefore would reflect smaller businesses such as sole traders or self-employed workers.

A problem with classifying culture of a business into one of four types of culture in which Handy suggests is that cultures of organisations may overlap within different types as they may contain different characteristics. Therefore it would be difficult to classify certain businesses into one specific type of culture as this may not be a true reflection of how their employees operate. Another issue of culture classification is that Handy’s four types of culture are specifically defined and therefore businesses may have some of the characteristics however not others and therefore certain organisations culture may not have a true likeness of a specific type.

In conclusion, it is beneficial to show through visible aspects an organisations culture to customers as a positive corporate culture is beneficial when gaining consumer demand and customer loyalty. It is difficult to place a certain culture within one of Handy’s types of culture and therefore it may be difficult to group business cultures as many organisations differ. Also many organisations promote culture which is less visible to the public eye creating difficulty when defining a specified type of culture and this may have an effect on the businesses reputation. Culture can be generalised within organisations however businesses have an individualistic culture in which they pursue within the company’s operations and which employees follow. Although corporate culture is generalised to all organisations, individualistic cultures will define and outline businesses in the long term.

References

Anon. (2007) Definition of organizational culture [online]. Organizational culture. Available from: http://www.organizationalculture101.com/definition-of-organizational-culture.html [Accessed: 5 February 2012].

Anon. (2012) Organizational culture [online]. BusinessDictionary.com. Available from: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/organizational-culture.html [Accessed: 5 February 2012].

Anon. (2012) Values and Campaigns [online]. The Body Shop. Available from: http://www.thebodyshop.com/_en/_ww/values-campaigns/community-trade.aspx [Accessed: 5 February 2012].

Branson, R. (2010) Richard Branson: People Power -- the Engine of Any Business [online]. Entrepreneur. Available from: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/217350 [Accessed: 5 February 2012].

Potter, D. (2010) My Cultural Reflections : Doing Business The John Lewis Way [online]. Cultural change. Available from: http://www.culturalchange.co.uk/?p=923 [Accessed: 5 February 2012].

Sherwin, L. (2009) Managing change toolkit [online]. Lindsay Sherwin. Available from: http://www.lindsay-sherwin.co.uk/guide_managing_change/html_overview/05_culture_handy.htm [Accessed: 5 February 2012].

Improving Staff Performance

Content theories are a type of motivational theory which explains how people become motivated by their own individual needs. These can be personal needs and the varied strength of these needs will determine how motivated a person is to fulfil them. Process theories describe how a person creates specific goals for themselves and examine the way in which they will achieve these goals. This process will occur when a person becomes motivated to achieve their specific goal by following the requirements needed to obtain this achievement.

A Process Theory

A specific process theory of motivation is Locke’s goal setting theory which describes that employees are motivated to complete individual tasks set by them in order to achieve specific goals. These goals may be set by senior management giving them encouragement to complete these goals improving their quality of work performance. If a goal set for an employee is more personal to themselves they will be more inclined to want to achieve this goal as they will have the concentration to complete the tasks leading up to it and have the influence of other management staff. This theory also states that a strong motivation to achieve a goal is the specific feedback given to the employee encouraging them to complete tasks set.

How an organisation motivates their staff

I have chosen John Lewis as an organisation to focus on its motivational strategies for its employees. John Lewis partnership focuses highly on sharing profits with their employees taking recognition of their loyalty to the company. ‘The most tangible advantage of being a Partnership is the annual bonus, where we distribute a proportion of profits to Partners as a percentage of salary’. John Lewis also has an annual pay review to analyse their employees salary to ensure its in contrast with the standard of work. The organisation also helps to encourage motivation by changing employees responsibility when alternating their job roles on a trial basis getting employees to focus on learning new skills in the working environment. Management training schemes aim to suit everyone in the management field of work to improve their managerial skills and goals are set to help achieve this. John Lewis partnership jobs also stated that ‘Every employee at every level of the business is encouraged to take on new challenges or develop a career in Management’.

These motivational strategies can impact on employee’s standards of work and can show the factors of motivation of Locke’s goal setting theory. This is because most of these strategies are aimed at setting goals for employees to achieve such as alternating job roles which can provide the input of a task set followed by the motivation gained to complete it resulting in a goal achieved by the individual employee. This follows the process pattern of the goal setting theory with an outcome of achievement and therefore further motivation to achieve more goals set. John Lewis’s annual pay review is an example of the feedback process in Locke’s theory as manager’s look at individual’s contracts and give single advice ensuring that employees feel they are treated fairly encouraging motivation within the workplace. ‘Chris Charman, a senior consultant in executive compensation and rewards at Towers Perrin, believes the John Lewis Partnership is an ideal type of organisation to offer a profit-sharing scheme because it enables front-line retail staff to identify how they impact on the business' profitability’. This statement suggests that employees will feel more motivated to work hard for the business in the long term as they will have an individual identity seen by senior management. This also benefits team morale and social relationships within the work team as all employees feel there is equality within the work place reducing risks of industrial action which may cause bad reputation for the organisations brand. . If more goals are set to a higher standard for staff to achieve within the job roles that are altered on a trial basis, staff will be able to combine what they have learnt previously to focus on learning new skills increasing their future motivation levels.

Other Process theories

Locke’s findings of his goal setting theory established that more specific goals improved individual’s task performance than goals with less importance resulting in reduced motivation levels. Findings have shown also that feedback is a crucial part in the process theory to reward employees of their achievements when reaching desired goals. This can also relate to other process theories such as Expectancy theory (Vroom, Porter and Lawler) which explains that following effort and performance behaviour, a perceived reward is gained resulting in job satisfaction which in turn achieves increased motivation levels. This theory states that effort is required to achieve a goal set which relates to Locke’s theory as the more difficult the goal set is the more effort will be given in task performance to achieve the desired goal. The other process theory of motivation is Adam’s Equity theory which defines that a person’s motivation changes depending on the equity of work and that performance behaviour should be level to the perceived outcome. This links to the other two process theories as effort alters with the skill needed for each goal to be achieved therefore contrasting with Locke’s theory stating that motivation levels alter with task and goal difficulty.

 In conclusion, the process theories can be effective when contrasting ideas of how organisations motivate their staff and how this affects their task performance. However employees must be willing to want to achieve goals set, and these goals must be developed by the individual to encourage them to seek goal achievement and become more motivated. Research from all three process theories can help to understand the fundamentals of how motivation is formed within a work environment and shows that steps must be taken to work up the levels of motivation encouraging loyalty of workers to organisations and improvement of work quality in the long term.

Reference List

John Lewis Partnership jobs (2011) John Lewis Partnership (online) Available from: http://www.jlpjobs.com/your-career/training-development.htm [Accessed 22^nd November 2011]

John Lewis (2011) John Lewis (online) Available from:  http://www.johnlewis.com [Accessed 22^nd November 2011]

Blog One - Motivation

Motivation is the driving force in which help people to pursue their aims. Motivation can be both intrinsic; a personal motivation or extrinsic; motivation from external sources. People are motivated to achieve their goals and become persistent with motivation when successful in achievement. Motivation can encourage and enhance employee’s performance within a business environment resulting in improved service from the company achieving market sales and growth.

Content theories of motivation discuss how people pursue their personal needs in aim of getting a successful result. One content theory is McClelland’s theory of needs which states that driven behaviour is explained by three forces; the need for achievement, the need for affiliation and the need for power. People with the need for achievement will be highly motivated to achieve certain tasks in which they set out for themselves in order for them to achieve their aims including taking part in certain activities which they feel will benefit their success. The need for affiliation describes a person’s willingness to feel a part of a group and to conform to the behaviours within the group encouraging social connections.  Lastly the need for power describes the need for a person to have control on themselves and their lifestyle around them willing to achieve by being motivated by power and the need for organisation and delegation.

The motivation for starting my degree course

The motivation for me to progress to my degree course has occurred from my desire to achieve my goals of graduating with a degree to pursue a career in business. This has sprung from my willingness to want to learn and enhance my skills in the business sector to take forward with me to future job prospects.  The completion of my A level exams and results from previous education has given me motivation and confidence to pursue a degree course for the length of 3 years. This shows the need for achievement through gaining my A level qualifications giving me the drive to study a degree course at university. My driven behaviour of entering on to a degree course has also come from my motivation to want to seek a wider social group of friends. This represents my need for affiliation which can also be highlighted by my choice to join the football team as a society of the university. This has allowed me to join social groups to make new friends and motivated me to consistently participate in the team. Two forces of motivation from McClelland’s content theory have contributed to personally motivate me to start a degree course. This strong drive of motivation will encourage me to be consistent in completing my work throughout my time at university to progress to years two and three and beyond this. McClelland’s content theory of motivation is effective in explaining factors which will personally contribute to encourage behaviour that will help towards specific goals. McClelland’s theory can help to identify personal goals and motivations which can be a provision in ultimately achieving specific goals.

When I was demotivated in a part time job role

A period of time when I have been most demotivated was at work when I had a job at a lettings agent. The work was repetitive and unstructured giving me little incentive to work hard for the time I was there. This caused demotivation within my job role resulting in a slow work process and this did not benefit my drive to succeed. This can relate back to McClelland’s model explaining that I did not have the motivational factor of a need for achievement reducing the chance of driven behaviour of success. The hours of my work occurred around a time of slow movement in the market reducing the amount of customers in the shop which added to my demotivation in the work place as I had less work to complete. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is also a content theory as an explanation for motivation. This theory explains that employees must be given a minimal requirement to be motivated I.e. basic physiological needs such as water and light and these needs must be met by the company before the employee can progress onto the next stage of motivation in the workplace. The other stages consist of safety needs being met followed by social, ego/esteem and self-actualisation needs being the top stage in employee motivation. When I was demotivated at work this would have fitted in between safety and social needs as the tasks were repetitive and I only worked with one other employee therefore there was little social communication other than with the few customers which would enter the shop during the day. This caused reduced self-esteem levels resulting in less confidence during work.

Aldefer’s ERG theory is another explanation which can be used to define the different factors affecting motivation in the workplace. This theory consists of three factors affecting motivation; existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs. Firstly existence needs describes an employee’s basic physiological needs such as food, water and light in the workplace which can link to Maslow’s physiological needs. Relatedness needs describe employees need to interact socially with others, receiving public recognition from other staff members and having a positive social life within the workplace. Finally growth needs describes an employee’s self needs such as self-esteem progressing to self-actualisation. ERG theory explains that an employee’s actions at work are motivated by needs concurrently. Therefore employees may be more motivated by certain needs than others I.e. they may be highly satisfied with relatedness needs forming strong social friendships with other employees however lack motivation due to reduced existence needs which in turn may reduce their self-esteem. The theory also explains that if these needs are not met by a company, their employees will become demotivated and this will have a huge effect on their capacity of work done affecting their staff turnover and therefore future sales growth. Aldefer’s theory can explain my demotivation at work as both my relatedness and growth needs were not met. Due to work in a small environment there were few employees surrounding my job role and this in turn had a knock on effect in that my self-esteem decreased reducing my willingness to work hard to succeed in my job. This caused demotivation resulting in a poor work ethic, lack of concentration and lack of drive to complete work successfully.

Herzberg’s two factor theory consists of hygiene factors being met but also having motivators within the workplace which will encourage motivation of employees. Examples of motivators within the workplace may be employees gaining achievement, responsibility and recognition from subordinates. This can encourage growth and maturity of the business through persistence of motivators aimed at employees improving team morale. Meeting hygiene factors is another factor in Herzberg’s theory to motivate through employee working conditions, salary, company policy and admin and status within the company. When demotivated at work, I didn’t have the high status to make me feel a part of the business faculty and therefore had little impact on the company’s growth strategies due to being part time. However the company’s biggest motivator was their salary which gave me as an employee the motivation to maintain my job at the company. From Herzberg’s two factor theory, the work itself as a motivator was the most discouraging as there was little variance in the tasks given and therefore reduced my concentration levels and commitment to the work. This therefore culminated in a decreased work ethic within employees and lower productivity having negative effects on the businesses performance. 

How I became more motivated within my job role

My motivation levels began to increase within my part time job when more staff were hired. This improved the work ethic as social needs were met by the company when looking at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. My commitment to the job role also improved giving me an increased drive to complete tasks on time and to a better quality. This in turn improved the businesses output and therefore staff turnover reduced benefiting the overall performance of the business.

Overall, In conclusion I believe that each theory does not explain the exact processes which occur in motivating staff in the work place alone. However, the theories contrast when comparing different motivational strategies and each theory can help to identify the different motivations that occur for employees. Aldefer’s theory is more individualistic and shows a broad understanding of the different needs an employee must reach to become motivated however both Maslow’s and McClelland’s theories overlap in understanding of needs being achieved to allow employees to reach the next step in the motivation process showing a more stable approach which can be related to different jobs within a company.

Reference List

Union.umd.edu 2006, union (online) Available from: www.union.umd.edu/GH/basicneeds/index.html [Accessed 22^nd November 2011]

Google.co.uk 2011, Google (online) Available from: http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=alderfer%27s+erg+theory&gbv=2&rlz=1W1ADFA_enGB450&oq=aldefers&aq  [Accessed 22^nd November 2011]

Wikipedia.org 2011, Wikipedia (online) Available from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivation [Accessed 22nd November 2011]