Organizational Culture Theory

Have you ever been part of a club or organization? This could be anything from a sports team, to where you work. When you are in those setting it is said you have a specific cultural identity that permeates your organization and creates the reality for which you are apart of. This is the idea of Organization Culture Theory. For me, I think the organization that best illustrates Organizational Culture theory is was when I did Crew freshman year. Organization Culture Theory is the essence of the organizational life that you are apart of. You over time create rituals, symbols, and interpretations of events all while creating a shared reality with the organization. There are three main assumptions about this theory that really illustrate what organizational culture life is like. First is what I mentioned earlier in regards to a shared reality. When I was on the team there were 18 of us and we all hung out before, after, and (if we weren't caught)during practice. As the year progressed the reality we made together grew stronger as we started developing values and principles such as not being late for 5:00 am practice; we created standards such as getting good grades and not getting into trouble. All of these things were acted out by all individuals on the team, making everyone very close. Unfortunately for those who didn't notice we only really hung out with each other, even though other's tried they usually got a like this. This leads to the second assumption.

The second main assumption is the ability to maintain the shared reality created. This requires participation by all involved, and in my case it was my teammates and my coach. In order to maintain our organizational culture we used a variety of symbols; physical symbols, behavioral symbols, and verbal symbols. When we had practice at our weight lifting facility we all had to wear the same uniform, a Nike crew shirt and black Nike shorts or pants (this would be a physical symbol). As we got closer the symbols we used become more constant, almost like a habit; rituals and customs were made like all of us eating breakfast burritos after practice on Saturdays or always being ten minutes early to practice in order to avoid the wrath of the coach (All of these would be defined as behavioral symbols). Lastly were verbal symbols and much of these dealt with nicknames and jargon made from ourselves and coaches. We never called the rowing machine a rowing machine, instead it was referred to an erg or "erging." An erg is a unit of energy, described to us by our coach as work done by a force over time. We also had our fair share of anecdotes and jokes like when one of us fell out off the dock or when I crashed our boat on a Willamette River bank(yes it happened multiple times) and the coaches were never happy, but hey, no one ever got injured!

The third and last main assumption of the OCT is how different cultures vary. When talked about in the book the example that was given was about a woman named Amelia whose company was bought out. In this process of having a new employer she had to begin to do different actions and create new and different interpretations. Since all cultures vary it only makes sense that she had to create a whole new shared reality with her new employer. This was no different for Crew and a great way to illustrate it would be to look at the varying sports cultures we have across campus. To us, a rowing machine will always be an erg, for everyone else it is something completely different. I had to walk my friend on the basketball team through why it was called an erg in the first place. This goes to show that just because our team had a reality it didn't mean it was the same as everyone else's. Our team had different organizational practices as well, we had team meetings once a month and much if not all of the content was built around the aspects of the life of a rower, we even had to meet with a nutritionist to tailor make a diet for the amount of calories we needed to eat. This practice (as well as diet) would be much different than the kid who belongs to a differing organization such as radio or chess. All of this reiterates the fact that every culture has intricate components that make them different from others. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRteokw7m80

In conclusion this goes to show that organizations are everywhere and within each culture is a vary unique and differing culture and identity.

West, Richard, and Lynn H. Turner. Introducing Communication Theory Analysis and Application. 5thth ed. New York City: Mcgraw-Hill Education, 2014. Print.