Organizational Culture: Analysis, Examples, and CSR Research

This report analyzes the concept of organizational culture based on an article by Michael D. Watkins. It identifies the main argument regarding the importance of organizational culture and its impact on shaping behaviors. The report discusses the assumptions and limitations of the research, highlighting the lack of a clear definition of culture and the limited scope of the LinkedIn discussion. It then explores the main ideas relevant to the themes of company culture, communication, and leadership. The main conclusions emphasize the significance of a strong organizational culture for business success. Furthermore, the report provides a real-world example of an IT business, discussing its adhocracy culture and offering recommendations for improvement. Finally, it includes two peer-reviewed journal articles on corporate social responsibility, relevant to the broader discussion of business practices and organizational performance.

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1. Identify and discuss the main argument presented in this article
This section of the paper will identify and discuss the main arguments that is presented in
the article. The main argument or the line of thesis that is presented in the article of
discussion argues over the importance of organisational culture. The entire article
discusses over the several aspects and the contribution of culture towards the
organizational development. Culture is also identified as one of the major factor that
plays a crucial role towards shaping the organizational behaviours as well as influence
the leaders of the organization towards some changes that will result in the growth and
success of the organization (Paul, Saini & Beniwal, 2018). As stated in the article, culture
has its deep rooted connection with some of the key elements of organizations (Watkins,
2013). These are the incentive and the structure of the organizational systems. The article
shed light over the thesis statement, justifying the importance to understand the context of
culture for a better vision and development of good and effective approaches for
analysing, transforming and preserving cultures. Relevant knowledge on organizational
culture provides the opportunity for handling the methods for proper diagnosis of the
challenges as well as for the design and the development of better cultures.
2. Identify and discuss the assumptions and limitations of the research in the article that
readers need to be aware of.
There lies some of the assumptions as well as limitations within the article that readers
require to get aware of. One of the major limitations of the article is that this article lacks
a proper definition of culture and the context of the culture within an organizational
setting (Watkins, 2013). The absence of reasonable definition of culture is creating

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confusion regarding the understanding of the connection of culture with organizations
structure and incentive systems. The article includes the LinkedIn response related to the
question of organizational culture definition and the process to diagnose challenges for
developing a better design and cultures (Brunetto et al., 2018). However the major
limitations of this article is that the author included only 7 distinct posts related to his
question which he was relevant as per his understanding. The article lacks the proper
coherence and format of an article. The author of this research study assumed the 7
quotes that he included in his paper are the most authentic and genuine responses towards
his question on organizational culture (Watkins, 2013). He provided the distinctive views
of the users in the LinkedIn by illustrating their responses with some of the direct quotes.
However some of the major limitations of this research paper is that there are the
inclusion of multiple range of posting that have common themes and hence the author
selected the answers and opinions of the early viewers.
3. Identify and discuss the main ideas in this article relevant to the themes and/or concepts
The article majorly identifies organization culture as its main idea. Culture is a vital part
of an organization since it initiates in shaping the corporate identity and therefore
contributing the growth and paving the way for lasting legacy and success. The article
identifies the importance of the knowledge regrading culture of an organization in line
with the several responses by different individual in the LinkedIn profile (Watkins,
2013). It is to note that the culture of an organization ensures that main aim and the
purpose of the organization are thoroughly aligned with the aim and the purpose of the

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organization. Some of the relevant themes that can be highlighted in line with the
organizational culture are the company culture, communication, relationship building and
leadership development (Hashemi, 2016). The theme of company culture is mainly the
foundation that requires to be in the place and also needs to be stagnant for moving
forward. This includes the assessment which is utilised for the determination of the
mentor readiness within organization. Communication is the next most important thing
which possess a major challenge within an organization (Chatman & O’Reilly, 2016). In
line with the Hofstede model that proposes the culture of the organization as the pattern
that is actually developed by the organizational members, this article shed light over the
importance and the critical role of culture within organization which is directly linked to
the leadership, motivation and other factors that directs towards the success and the
growth of an organization.
4. Identify and discuss the main conclusions of this article
All organisations, like individuals, have a single identity which we call 'culture.' It is a
strong, invisible force which drives every one of its members' thoughts and actions. It is a
network of collective principles, beliefs and objectives. The article concludes over the
importance of knowledge related to organizational culture, as responded by several
LinkedIn user (Watkins, 2013). This is the consistency that unites and keeps the company
from breaking up; a consistency that empowers the organisation; a standard that truly
stands out against daunting challenges. Organizational culture does have an immense
effect on the company's ability to thrive and to develop in the dynamic environment in

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which everyone work. A business without a clear culture finds it impossible to cultivate
and keep workers satisfied with their full potential. And this also jeopardizes the health of
both the company and its employees (Kumar, 2016). A good organizational culture can
have a major positive effect on the company from creating a brand identity to bringing
peers together and through employees involved. The article summarizes how culture is
the product of compensation, how cultures define shared description of organization and
the role of organizational culture towards defining the sum of values that serves as glue
for integrating the organizational members.
5. Discuss an example of a real business, either a place you have worked at or a workplace
you are aware of. What organisational culture does this business exhibit? Justification
and recommendations
I have been a part if a business organization before. I have been employed in an
organization that deals with information technology. The business process I was a part of,
used to deal with services related to support of software, design of computer system and
the facilities of data processing management. I was employed and has been the part of the
real business of information technology. According to my believe organizational culture
plays a very essential and vital role in the business field of information technology. This
is because the organizational culture influences and initiate in the implementation of the
performance of organization. In order to survive and thrive, companies are eager to
embrace evolving IT in rapid development of the new Information Technologies (IT)
(Saxena & Dasgupta, 2017). However, IT projects frequently fall short of managers'
standards in terms of their utility in improving corporate efficiency. Scholars believe with

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the close relation between culture and the practices of Information technology business
(Smircich, 2017). The growth and the success in the business of Information technology
is attributable to the implication and the practice of the organizational culture.
Organizational culture induces models of innovation that contributes to the values of
performance and practices in the field of Information Technology business sector (Attili,
Mathew & Sugumaran, 2018). Being the personality of a business organization, the
organizational culture that this business exhibit includes adhocracy types of the
organizational culture among the four major categories in the field of business. The
adhocracy culture are generally entrepreneurial and dynamic that majorly focus over the
innovation, risk taking for doing “the first thing first” (Calvin & Igu, 2019). The context
of culture includes the factors and assumptions related to values, assumption and other
tangible signs of the member of organization together with their behaviour. In case of
information technology, the effect of the organization and the usage of the information
technology has been increasing rapidly. Hofstede’s national model is relevant in the case
of the impact of the organizational culture over the informational technology business.
However some of the recommendation towards the implementation of the organizational
culture in the informational technology sector includes creation or development of
meaning ways for effective communication, conduction of proper selection, improvement
of the on boarding and orientation, enabling and the empowerment of the employees,
engagement of employees through out the year, coaching the existing employees of the
organization and engage in effective communication with the employees (Mardiana,
Tjakraatmadja & Aprianingsih, 2018). Besides this it is important for the business
organization to initiate in the recognition of the employees as well as their efforts by

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having meaningful and tough conversations as well as undergoing strategic decisions for
the organization as well as its culture.
6. Find two peer reviewed journal articles on corporate social responsibility (CSR)
Saeidi, S. P., Sofian, S., Saeidi, P., Saeidi, S. P., & Saaeidi, S. A. (2015). How does
corporate social responsibility contribute to firm financial performance? The
mediating role of competitive advantage, reputation, and customer
satisfaction. Journal of business research, 68(2), 341-350.
This article is relevant since it researches over the relationship among corporate social
responsibility and the performance of firms. This research study mainly focused over the
probable mediators, which are reputation, competitive advantages and customer
satisfaction, in relation among the performance of the firm and corporate social
responsibility.
Story, J., & Neves, P. (2015). When corporate social responsibility (CSR) increases
performance: exploring the role of intrinsic and extrinsic CSR
attribution. Business Ethics: A European Review, 24(2), 111-124.
This piece of article has been found to be much relevant since it investigates over the
motives of employees over the efforts of organizational corporate social responsibility
and whether these motives effect the performance of the employees. The research study
focused majorly over the difference among intrinsic and the extrinsic CSR motives by
doing survey among 229 employee supervisors belonging from several industries. The

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research highlighted the fact that corporate social responsibility can no longer be
considered as the potential competitive advantage but as an original strategic necessity.
7. Provide two sentences and appropriate citations
Quote from Article 1 - (paraphrased)
“Recently, researchers are very interested in the identification of the close relationship
among CSR and corporate performance. These results are somewhat inconclusive and
even misleading. That's because, while in many studies, a positive relationship between
CSR and business success was overwhelmingly dominant, others indicated negative or no
connection” (Saeidi et al., 2015)
Quote from Article 2 – (direct)
“What we know is that while some organizations do benefit from CSR, others, despite
investing substantially in it, fail to capitalize on its gains. Thus, understanding how
stakeholders may interpret a firm’s CSR practices can help to explain how a firm can
benefit from it”. (Story & Neves, 2015)

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References
Attili, V. P., Mathew, S., & Sugumaran, V. (2018, December). Organizational culture and
information privacy assimilation: An empirical study. In Proceedings of the 13th Pre-
ICIS Workshop on Information Security and Privacy (Vol. 1).
Brunetto, Y., Xerri, M., Farr-Wharton, B., & Nelson, S. (2018). The importance of informal
professional networks in developing a proactive organizational culture: a public value
perspective. Public Money & Management, 38(3), 203-212.
Calvin, J. R., & Igu, J. (2019). Culture, Conflict and Team Management in I4H: Experiential
Learning in Business Practice to Support Community Development
Entrepreneurship. Journal of Organizational Culture, Communications and Conflict.
Chatman, J. A., & O’Reilly, C. A. (2016). Paradigm lost: Reinvigorating the study of
organizational culture. Research in Organizational Behavior, 36, 199-224.
Hashemi, M. S. (2016). The effect of infrastructure, corporate culture, organizational structure
and information technology on Competitive Intelligence in Organizations. Human
Resource Management, 3(3), 43-50.
Kumar, A. (2016). Redefined and Importance of organizational culture. Global Journal of
Management And Business Research, 16(4), 14-18.
Mardiana, S., Tjakraatmadja, J. H., & Aprianingsih, A. (2018). How organizational culture
affects information system success: The case of an Indonesia IT-based company. Journal
of Information Systems Engineering and Business Intelligence, 4(2), 84-95.

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Paul, R., Saini, R., & Beniwal, R. K. (2018). IMPORTANCE OF ORGANIZATIONAL
CULTURE & ITS DIFFERENT DIMENSIONS. International Journal of Research in
Economics and Social Sciences (IJRESS), 8(2).
Saeidi, S. P., Sofian, S., Saeidi, P., Saeidi, S. P., & Saaeidi, S. A. (2015). How does corporate
social responsibility contribute to firm financial performance? The mediating role of
competitive advantage, reputation, and customer satisfaction. Journal of business
research, 68(2), 341-350.
Saxena, V., & Dasgupta, A. (2017). Local Roots, Global aspirations: Impact of culture on work
environment and organizational culture in Malaysian Small and Medium Enterprises in
the Information Technology Sector. In SHS Web of Conferences (Vol. 33, p. 00070). EDP
Sciences.
Smircich, L. (2017). Concepts of culture and organizational analysis. In The Anthropology of
Organisations (pp. 255-274). Routledge.
Story, J., & Neves, P. (2015). When corporate social responsibility (CSR) increases
performance: exploring the role of intrinsic and extrinsic CSR attribution. Business
Ethics: A European Review, 24(2), 111-124.
Watkins, M. (2013). What is organizational culture? And why should we care. Harvard Business
Review, 15.