Organizational Behavior: Culture, Psychology, and Leadership Essay

This essay delves into the multifaceted realm of organizational behavior (OB), providing a comprehensive overview of its core concepts and practical implications. The essay begins by defining OB, organizational development (OD), and organizational effectiveness (OE), establishing a foundational understanding of the subject matter. It then proceeds to define culture, exploring different types of organizational culture, including power, role, task, and person cultures, as defined by Charles Handy. The essay also elucidates the Johnson and Scholes Cultural Web, a valuable tool for analyzing and shaping organizational culture. Furthermore, the essay examines the critical impact of organizational culture on organizational psychology (OP), highlighting the interconnectedness between the two. Finally, the essay explores the influence of leadership on organizational culture during times of crisis, emphasizing the importance of a positive mindset. The essay concludes by reiterating the significance of OB and its various components in fostering effective organizational practices.

Running head: OB
Organizational Behavior
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Introduction:
According to Luthans (2017), organizational behavior (OB) remains directly connected
with production, understanding and the control of the human behavior within organizations. On
the other hand, Mullins (2014) defined organizational behavior (OB) as the study as well as
understanding of the individual and behavior of a group along with the patterns of the structure
for improving organizational effectiveness and performance. The concept of organizational
behavior (OB) helps in examining the human behavior within a work ambience and determine
the impact on the job performance, structure, motivation, communication and leadership. The
concept of organizational development (OD) is a purposely planned as well as the organization
wide efforts for increasing the effectiveness or efficiency of the organization. On the other hand
organizational effectiveness (OE) is defined as an efficiency through which an organization is
capable of meeting the objectives.
The essay provides an insight into organizational behavior through multiple definitions.
The essay will also put forward a definition of culture, mention the types of culture and the
concept of the culture web. The essay will further explain the impact and importance of culture
on organizational psychology and how culture remains affected positively as well as negatively
during crisis depending on leadership.
Discussion:
Definition of Culture:
According to Hofstede (2013), culture is defined as “collective programming of the mind
which distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from another”.
Types of Culture:

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Charles Handy defined the various types of organizational culture. The description of
which is mentioned in the following paragraphs (Russo et al. 2013)
Power Culture: This kind of culture remains associated with the autocratic leadership.
Here the power remains concentrated in center of an organization
Role Culture: This type of culture remains linked with the bureaucratic organizations.
The staffs are found to operate within rules and portrays very little creativity.
Task Culture: This culture leads to the formation of group for solving problems and the
lines of communication remains similar to matrix structure. Here the teams remain empowered to
take decision.
Person Culture: This kind of culture is often found within the scientific environment of
research. Here there is no such emphasis on the teamwork as every individual remains focused
on doing their projects and task.
Entrepreneurial Culture: Here success is rewarded and failure is not criticized since it is
measured as the consequence of the enterprise as well as risk taking. The culture is a part of the
flexible structure of an organization.
Johnson and Scholes Cultural Web
The cultural web represents a vital tool for altering and analyzing the assumptions
surrounding culture of an organization. It is used for highlighting the specific beliefs and
practices and consequently line them up with the preferred strategy and culture of the company.
Johnson and Scholes recognized six unique interconnected elements that contributes to what has

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been known as the paradigm that is comparable to pattern of work environment or values of a
firm (McDonald and Foster 2013). These six elements are explained in the following paragraphs
Stories and Myths: These indicate previous events that are often discussed by the
individuals’ often outside and within company.
Routines and Rituals: This indicate the day to day behavior and action of the individuals
within organization. Routines refers to the expectations from the employees on a daily basis.
Symbols: These refers to the visual representations of the organization. This comprises of
the office spaces, logos, dress codes and the advertisements.
System for Control: They refer to the pathways and the system through which the
organizations gets controlled. They might refer to performance based reward system, financial
management and structures for quality control.
Structures of the Organization: They refer to the structure and the hierarchy designated
by an organization. Johnson and Scholes also use it for referring the unwritten power and
influence exerted by some of the members.
Power Structures: This refers to the actual power structures and the responsible
individuals within organizations. It indicates the CEO, executives, board members and the
managerial division. These individuals represent those who has huge influence over decision
making and seem to have a final say on the major changes or the actions.
Importance and Impact of Organizational Culture on Organizational Psychology (OP)
The concept of culture is essentially vital while making an attempt in managing
organizational changes. Practitioners have been gradually realizing the fact that irrespective of

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the best laid out plans, an organizational change not only includes the change of process and
structure but at the same time changing corporate culture. The organizational culture seem to
have an influence on organizational commitment of the employees (Alvesson and Sveningsson
2015). Healthier organizational culture binds the employees to the organization that also leads to
the decrease in the turnover. Organizational Psychology (OP) play a key role in determining the
commitment of the employee towards the firm.
Impact of Culture at Times of Crisis Depending on Leadership
Culture can also be defined as the existing mindset of employees within organization.
The positive impact of culture during crisis lies in determining how effectively it will handle the
crisis (Frandsen and Johansen 2016). During a crisis the leadership plays a crucial role in
ensuring the prevalence of mindset within the organization otherwise it will have a negative
impact on culture that would indirectly impact the hiring decision, employee interactions and the
customer service.
Conclusion:
On a concluding note, it can be said that although different authors defined organizational
behavior differently but its essence remains the same. The essay also draws in the concept of
organizational behavior (OB), organizational development (OD) and organizational effectiveness
(OE). OB refers to examining the behavior of humans within work ambience while OD remains
achievable through shift in communication. OE on the other hand refers to the fulfillment of the
objectives of an organization. The essay provides a definition of the culture, its types along with
an explanation of cultural web put forward by Johnson and Scholes. The essay also shows how

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organizational culture and organizational psychology remains interconnected. In addition to this,
the essay also shows the impact on the culture at times of crisis based on leadership.

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Bibliography:
Alvesson, M. and Sveningsson, S., 2015. Changing organizational culture: Cultural change
work in progress. Routledge.
Frandsen, F. and Johansen, W., 2016. Organizational crisis communication: A multivocal
approach. Sage.
Luthans, F, 2017. Psychological capital: An evidence-based positive approach. Annual Review of
Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 4, pp.339-366.
McDonald, S. and Foster, R.A., 2013. The use of Johnson's Cultural Web to improve
understanding of organisational culture: a critical review. International Journal of
Management, 30(4), p.340.
Mullins, R., 2014. The role of brand communications on front line service employee beliefs,
behaviors, and performance. Journal of the academy of marketing science, 42(6), pp.642-657.
Russo, G.M., Tomei, P.A., Linhares, A.B.J. and Santos, A.M., 2013. Correlation between
organizational culture and compensation strategies using Charles Handy's
typology. Performance Improvement, 52(7), pp.13-21.
Venaik, S. and Brewer, P., 2013. Critical issues in the Hofstede and GLOBE national culture
models. International Marketing Review, 30(5), pp.469-482.

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