Organisation Analysis and Design

1
Organisation Analysis and Design

• Political Frame III
• Cultural Frame I

2
Lecture Overview

• The Memo that Every Woman
• Culture Exercise
• Analysing a culture

3
Exercise I

• In small groups design a strategy for Liz
• Keep in mind
• existing power dynamics
• existing organisational structure and strategy
• personal characteristics and preferences
• potential resistance to this strategy

4
Exercise II

• The Cultural Experience
• 2 groups in two rooms
• practicing own culture
• 3 visits to other culture
• Task
• figuring out the other culture

5
Conducting a Culture Audit (Schein)

• Analyse the process and content of the
  socialisation of new members
• obtain through interviews with socialisation
  agents
• Analyse responses to critical incidents in the
  organisations history
• requires construction of organisational biography
  from documents and interviews of past and present
  organisational members

6
Culture Audit (Morgan)

• What are the principal images or metaphors that
  people use to describe the organisation?
• What physical impression does the organisation
  and its artifacts create? Does this vary from one
  place to another?
• What beliefs and values dominate the organisation
  (officially and unofficially)?
• What are the main norms (i.e. the dos and
  donts)?

7
Culture Audit II

• Analyse values and beliefs of culture creators
  (founders) and carriers (current leaders)
• requires identification, behavioral observations,
  and interviewing of the founders and current
  leaders
• Explore anomalies or puzzling features discovered
  in other analyses
• joint problem solving sessions with current
  leaders in the organisation

8
Culture Audit III

• What are the main ceremonies and rituals and what
  purposes do they serve?
• What language dominates everyday discourse (e.g.
  buzzwords, cliches, catch phrases)?
• What are the dominant stories or legends that
  people tell? What messages are they trying to
  convey?

9
Culture Audit IV

• What reward systems are in place? What messages
  do they send in terms of activities or
  accomplishments that are valued and those that
  are not?
• What are the favourite topics in informal
  conversations?
• Think of three influential people. In what ways
  do they symbolise the character of the
  organisation?

10
Culture Audit V

• Are there identifiable subcultures in the
  organisation? Are they in conflict or in harmony?
• What impacts do these subcultures have on the
  organisation? What functions do these groupings
  serve for their members? Is the overall effect on
  the organisation positive or negative?

11
Assignments

• Assignment I can be picked up during the
  Vice-Chancellors Week
• Assignment I can be mailed to those who hand in a
  self-addressed envelope
• Assignment II should be started now

12
Next Week Break
Following Week Public Holiday
11 October Cultural Frame II