Organizational culture

About: Organizational culture is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 31507 publications have been published within this topic receiving 926787 citations. The topic is also known as: corporate culture & organisational culture.

Assessing the organizational climate and contractual relationship for perceptions of support for innovation

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to study the relationship between organizational climate and perceptions of support for innovation, considering that the relationship may be moderated by the type of labor contract the employees have. This moderating effect may have its origins in the perception of reality and the type of knowledge applied on the job. The results drawn from empirical research among 312 observations of the employees in 80 offices of a Spanish financial company enable us to verify, on the one hand, that an organizational climate characterized by support, cohesion and intrinsic recognition favors perceptions of support for innovation; and, on the other hand, that there are differences in the dimensions of climate that favor perceptions of support for innovation depending on the employees' contractual relationship with the organization.

Competing values in software process improvement: an assumption analysis of CMM from an organizational culture perspective

Abstract: The capability maturity model (CMM) approach to software process improvement is the most dominant paradigm of organizational change that software organizations implement. While some organizations have achieved various levels of success with the CMM, the vast majority have failed. In this paper, we investigate the assumptions about organizational culture embedded in the CMM models and we discuss their implications for software process improvement (SPI) initiatives. In this paper, we utilize the well-known competing values model to surface and analyze the assumptions underlying the CMM. Our analysis reveals contradictory sets of assumptions about organizational culture in the CMM approach. We believe that an understanding of these contradictions can help researchers address some of the difficulties that have been observed in implementing and institutionalizing SPI programs in organizations. Further, this research can help to open up a much-needed line of research that would examine the organization theory assumptions that underpin CMM. This type of research is important if CMM is to evolve as an effective organizational change paradigm for software organizations.

The meaning and measurement of implementation climate

Abstract: Background: Climate has a long history in organizational studies, but few theoretical models integrate the complex effects of climate during innovation implementation. In 1996, a theoretical model was proposed that organizations could develop a positive climate for implementation by making use of various policies and practices that promote organizational members’ means, motives, and opportunities for innovation use. The model proposes that implementation climate–or the extent to which organizational members perceive that innovation use is expected, supported, and rewarded–is positively associated with implementation effectiveness. The implementation climate construct holds significant promise for advancing scientific knowledge about the organizational determinants of innovation implementation. However, the construct has not received sufficient scholarly attention, despite numerous citations in the scientific literature. In this article, we clarify the meaning of implementation climate, discuss several measurement issues, and propose guidelines for empirical study. Discussion: Implementation climate differs from constructs such as organizational climate, culture, or context in two important respects: first, it has a strategic focus (implementation), and second, it is innovation-specific. Measuring implementation climate is challenging because the construct operates at the organizational level, but requires the collection of multi-dimensional perceptual data from many expected innovation users within an organization. In order to avoid problems with construct validity, assessments of within-group agreement of implementation climate measures must be carefully considered. Implementation climate implies a high degree of within-group agreement in climate perceptions. However, researchers might find it useful to distinguish implementation climate level (the average of implementation climate perceptions) from implementation climate strength (the variability of implementation climate perceptions). It is important to recognize that the implementation climate construct applies most readily to innovations that require collective, coordinated behavior change by many organizational members both for successful implementation and for realization of anticipated benefits. For innovations that do not possess these attributes, individual-level theories of behavior change could be more useful in explaining implementation effectiveness. Summary: This construct has considerable value in implementation science, however, further debate and development is necessary to refine and distinguish the construct for empirical use.

Promoting quality: the health-care organization from a management perspective.

Abstract: Background Although agreement about the need for quality improvement in health care is almost universal, the means of achieving effective improvement in overall care is not well understood. Avedis Donabedian developed the structure–process–outcome framework in which to think about quality-improvement efforts. Issue There is now a robust evidence-base in the quality-improvement literature on process and outcomes, but structure has received considerably less attention. The health-care field would benefit from expanding the current interpretation of structure to include broader perspectives on organizational attributes as primary determinants of process change and quality improvement. Solutions We highlight and discuss the following key elements of organizational attributes from a management perspective: (i) executive management, including senior leadership and board responsibilities (ii) culture, (iii) organizational design, (iv) incentive structures and (v) information management and technology. We discuss the relevant contributions from the business and medical literature for each element, and provide this framework as a roadmap for future research in an effort to develop the optimal definition of ‘structure’ for transforming quality-improvement initiatives.