Changing organizational culture: A Case Study

Extract

[...] This is, in part, because organizational change is not a foolproof solution and enough resistance will lead to further quitting or firings, which, it must be conceded, are both a potential outcome and might, in the long run of the enterprise, prove beneficial if, regardless of who was shifted from the situation, the result was a more consistent sense of purpose among the managers and the store. The potential benefits are far greater. While certain basic and everyday standards and tasks were placed into flux because of the uneven ways in which they were applied, the heightened awareness of merchandising and the frantic nature of the struggle had actually kept sales on track, was external factors were averaged out. [...]

[...] Application strategies in organizational culture often encounter the debate between culture being a built in aspect of social life (and therefore it is something that naturally emerges in groups, including work teams) and the idea that culture is something that arises in cultures as an unintended consequence of behavior. This second side of the debate sees organizational culture as a balance between languages, methods of problem-solving and implementing tools that teams use to bring change to their environment. This latter ideological construct is more valuable for this case study and is more applicable to analysis and evaluation of the attempts to change culture in the name of improving productivity, responsiveness, employee retention and overall big-picture store systems, such as the flow of product through the store. [...]

[...] This led to Mark interacting with those three managers more directly and caused a situation of communication breakdown as his frustrations mounted and organizational day-to-day decisions lapsed into old methods of doing things quite consistently, even among the Assistant Managers. New merchandise was left unopened to deal with maintaining the display area of the store. Lines at the front cash registers ran more slowly due to hesitation between choosing when to call a manager because head cashiers would check the schedule rather than call the Manager-On-Duty right away. [...]

[...] Propose a Strategy for Changing this Situation A primary issue is that the attempt to mesh two organizational cultures has failed. Basic assumptions and beliefs (such as learned responses to shared problems, be they tardiness in staff, management and bookseller scheduling and staffing, the cosmetic appearance of the displays and dealing with customer complaints) have come into conflict since the final arbiter for the staff has a radically different perspective than the rest of his management team. Privately, Mark has expressed a desire to cave on all fronts and let the store run around him without much interaction on his part but his, at almost all moments, done the opposite, giving an impression that he is roaming the building and looking for problems. [...]

[...] Jean, about a year before Barbara's departure (in which she became a district manager for another neighboring district), was given a store of her own and then brought back to 2645 to replace Barbara when she advanced. After two years of gradual improvement on almost all fronts such as: coming within one percent of sales plan for the year five years running, developing a stable core of full-time employees (in the Children's section, Receiving, Head Cashiers and Lead Booksellers), successfully launching company initiatives (the customer loyalty membership and company credit card plan), Jean was transferred to another large store in the district because that store was lagging. [...]