Paper Example on Organizational Culture

The success of any organization lies in its culture; the organizational culture shapes how effective employees or participants become. According to research, strong organizational cultures have a positive impact on the organizational goals, the motivation of the employees, and the organizational effectiveness (Senge, 2006). Additionally, the key element to an organization's effectiveness is its organizational culture. The management is in charge of implementing making a particular culture in an organization effective. By definition, organizational culture entails the extent of employee commitment and involvement to attain the goals of the organizations, how employees feel about an organization and their perception of the authority system and the management (Berson, Oreg, & Dvir, 2008). In layman's language, one can simply define organizational culture as the manner in which things are done in an organization. Henceforth, the lifeblood of an organization is its culture as it directs and shapes the desired behavior needed to attain the organizational mission, vision, and goals.

In the exposition, I will conduct a cultural analysis of the municipal agencies in the city of San Pablo focussing on the Community Services Department in Senior Services. Furthermore, I will dive into the concepts of the municipal agencies. The Community Service Department empowers the community and makes life better and enjoyable to the people of San Pablo. The Seniors Service offers special events, educational and recreational activities, and services such as transportation, nutritional and social needs to the seniors. The goal of the department is to make the life of the senior citizens in San Pablo enjoyable, better, and lively by offering opportunities geared towards the citizens' intellectual development and growth. In the next sections, I will analyze the Community Services Department in Senior Services to detail and identify the sub-cultures presents and later give a recommendation on the possible sub-cultures that can be added to the existing ones.

Analysis of the Organization Culture

The ultimate goal of the Community Services Department is to make life better and enjoyable for all its citizens irrespective of their age ("Seniors | San Pablo, CA - Official Website", 2017). The department offers different age groups different programs geared towards their empowerment and growth. When the citizens come into contact with the Community Services Department, they come into contact with the norms, the department's rules and procedures, the tasks, the jargons, the formal codes, and the department's programs.The mentioned elements encompass some of the Community Services Department cultural manifestations. At first, it may be difficult and challenging to adapt to the department's culture; however, with time, the citizens become part and parcel of the Community Service Department. Different employees work in the various 'units' of the Community Service Department. In the paper, the focus is on the seniors' services, where the involved citizens are the elderly in San Pablo.

The employees at the Department of Community Service offering seniors services have a responsibility to ensure the senior citizens that join the program have an enjoyable life by participating in various activities such as attending special events, educational and recreational activities, and services such as transportation, nutritional and social needs. The organizational culture further promotes the social system stability by ensuring all senior citizens understand the department, what it does, and how it intends to accomplish its goals in the society. Ideally, when the citizens understand the goals of the department there is a tendency of collective commitment where the citizens join the program because they like the environment, facilitation, and values of the services on offer. The relevant concepts of organizational culture present at the Community Services Department include the organizational values, the value system, the culture strength, the culture uniformity, the dominant culture, and the subculture (Bellot, 2011). A subculture is a set of values that the minority share within an organization. In the case of the seniors' services, common sub-cultures can be the ravelers, the diabetic, the deaf, the elite, and much more.

Comparison and Contrast of Sub-Cultures

As mentioned, the minorities in an organization create a sub-culture that closely relates to what they love or do. Sub-cultures are the resultant of existing problems or expectations shared by some of the members of an organization. Sub-cultures are as important as the culture and should never be overlooked as they assist some members to identify themselves to something (Sutton, 2007). In the case of the senior citizens, I have identified four sub-cultures that present in their program. They include the raveler, the elite, the diabetic, and the deaf. The ravelers encompass those individuals that love going for raves or night outs. The diabetic subculture encompasses those individuals that suffer from diabetes. The deaf encompasses those that have a problem with their sense of hearing and have to rely on hearing aids. The elite encompasses those that love reading or doing research on various things such as the existence of extraterrestrial life.

Unlike the ravelers, the diabetic individuals come together to understand and learn more about ways to manage their condition with the help of the Community Services Department. The ravelers love partying and prefer going out at night to have fun, drink, and enjoy their life. On the other hand, the elite individuals prefer studying and researching, they are more of introverts and prefer keeping to themselves. The employees at the seniors' services have to keep a close eye on such and ensure they do not do things that can harm their life such as experimenting with corrosive or harmful substances. The deaf individuals prefer being together and learning a thing or two about their condition and ways to better interact with others despite their shortcomings. The Community Services Department seniors services in San Pablo enforces various policies and rules that sub-cultures have to adhere to in their quest for organizational goal attainment.

Recommendations

Based on the research, there is a need for more sub-cultures to cater for the needs of the minority in the program. Different people have different desires, opinions, fantasies, and recreational activities. Examples of sub-cultures that ought to be included in the program include cosplay, fandom, new age, zazou, and alcoholics anonymous. The cosplay sub-culture would encompass individuals that love wearing costumes and role playing. The fandom sub-culture would encompass those individuals that love certain movies, celebrities, or other shared interests. The new age would encompass those individuals that have a liking for the metaphysical and spiritual associations such as parapsychology and holistic health. The zazou sub-culture would encompass individuals with a liking for wearing flashy clothes and dancing to swing and bebop, a French sub-culture during the World War II. The alcoholics anonymous sub-culture would encompass those individuals recovering from alcohol addiction.

The senior citizens deserve to have the best of everything they can have as they are nearing their sunset days. The numerous events, activities, and associations make their life enjoyable, better, and eradicating instances of worry. Moreover, the program makes the seniors active hence boosting their mental, physical and psychological development. I would suggest the redesign of the department to suit an adaptive organizational culture. An adaptive organizational culture puts the needs of the senior citizens ahead unlike in an unadaptive organizational culture where the management puts its needs before that of the senior citizens (Leinwand, Mainardi, & Kleiner, 2016). The management of the Community Services Department should allow change when needed regardless of the risk involved; a risk can result in the failure of the organization attaining its goals but serves as a good educative piece to the organization.

Conclusion

Conclusively, an organizational culture shapes how effective employees or participants become. Strong organizational cultures have a positive impact on the organizational goals, the motivation of the employees, and the organizational effectiveness. The Community Service Department empowers the community and makes life better and enjoyable to the people of San Pablo. The Seniors Service offers special events, educational and recreational activities, and services such as transportation, nutritional and social needs to the seniors. The goal of the department is to make the life of the senior citizens in San Pablo enjoyable, better, and lively by offering opportunities geared towards the citizens' intellectual development and growth. The relevant concepts of organizational culture present at the Community Services Department include the organizational values, the value system, the culture strength, the culture uniformity, the dominant culture, and the subculture. I would suggest the redesign of the department to cater for an adaptive organizational culture. An adaptive organizational culture puts the needs of the senior citizens ahead unlike in an unadaptive organizational culture where the management puts its needs before that of the senior citizens.

References

Bellot, J. (2011). Defining and Assessing Organizational Culture. Nursing Forum, 46(1), 29-37. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1744-6198.2010.00207.x

Berson, Y., Oreg, S., & Dvir, T. (2008). CEO values, organizational culture and firm outcomes. Journal Of Organizational Behavior, 29(5), 615-633. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/job.499

Leinwand, P., Mainardi, C., & Kleiner, A. (2016). Strategy that works: How winning companies close the strategy-to-execution gap.

Senge, P. (2006). The fifth discipline: the art and practice of the learning organization (1st ed.). New York: Randomhouse.

Seniors | San Pablo, CA - Official Website. (2017). Ci.san-pablo.ca.us. Retrieved 17 May 2017, from http://www.ci.san-pablo.ca.us/1144/Seniors

Sutton, R. (2007). Weird Ideas That Work: How to build a creative company (1st ed.). New York: Free Press.