The individual and organizational culture: strategies for action in highly-ordered contexts

Article Abstract:

Writers in the management literature use one of three general concepts of culture: homogeneous organizational culture, heterogeneous subgroup cultures, and ambiguous cultures. In spite of their differences, each of these conceptualizations focuses attention primarily on the context in which the individual member of an organization acts, and suggests that the latitude for individual action increases as the orderliness of that context decreases. In doing so, the culture literature has underestimated the role of individual actors as active agents in their contexts, regardless of the degree of orderliness prevailing in them. By incorporating a more dynamic perspective of action into the cultural analysis of organizations, this article develops a framework which focuses attention on how individuals not only adhere to, but also depart from even highly-ordered organizational and subgroup cultures. This framework is then used to investigate managerial interactions during a planning meeting in HAPCO (a pseudonym), a Fortune 500 company. Two general conclusions emerge from these analyses. First, the normative force of HAPCO culture suppresses conflict, as well as the discussion of alternative ideas during decision-making meetings. Thus, this particular organizational culture severely limits the range of individual action. Second, even in large, highly-ordered organizations such as HAPCO, culture never completely dominates action because individuals comment critically on their situation. Consequently, individuals possess the capacity not only to adapt to, but also to challenge and depart from cultural rules. Four general types of strategies for individual action are empirically observed and conceptually distinguished. (Reprinted by permission of the publisher.)

Conformity

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Coming to terms with the field: understanding and doing organizational ethnography

Article Abstract:

This article argues that ethnography is inadequately understood and recognized within administration science as a method for studying organization culture. Ethnographic analyses of organizational cultures are largely absent from the administration science literature, primarily because such work derives from a social constructionist understanding of science. The knowledge of organizations thus provided it interpretive, denying the subject-object dichotomy inherent in mainstream empiricist applications of social analysis. In addition, whereas ethnographic analysis and writing is an appropriate method for studying culture, organizational ethnography is substantially different from ethnographic studies of whole (and largely foreign) societies. Formal organizations are both partial and specialized in comparison to general societal organization. The conceptual and practical toolkit the organizational ethnographer brings to the field and the writing table is thus tailored to this particular research arena, and is outlined here. (Reprinted by permission of the publisher.)

Analysis, Ethnology, Cultural anthropology

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