artikel week 42

8/13/2019 Artikel Week 42

1/13

Sage Publications, Inc. Johnson Graduate School of Management, CornellUniversity

http://www.jstor.org/stable/2393715.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at.http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of

content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms

of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Sage Publications, Inc.andJohnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell Universityare collaborating

with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access toAdministrative Science Quarterly.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 131.174.75.30 on Wed, 16 Oct 2013 08:38:22 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sagehttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cjohnhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cjohnhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/2393715?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cjohnhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cjohnhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sage


2/13

Culture:The MissingConcept inOrganization tudiesEdgar H. ScheinMassachusetts Institute ofTechnology

? 1996 by CornellUniversity.0001-8392/96/41 2-0229/$100.

Inattentionto social systems in organizations has ledresearchers to underestimate the importance ofculture-shared norms, values, and assumptions-inhow organizations function. Concepts for understandingculture in organizations have value only when theyderive from observation of real behavior inorganizations, when they make sense of organizationaldata, and when they are definable enough to generatefurther study. The attempt to explain what happened tobrainwashed American prisoners of war in the Koreanconflict points up the need to take both individual traitsand culture into account to understand organizationalphenomena. Forexample, the failure of organizationallearning can be understood more readily by examiningthe typical responses to change by members of severalbroad occupational cultures in an organization. Theimplication is that culture needs to be observed, morethan measured, if organization studies is to advance.The purposeof this briefessay is to note that organizationalpsychologyis slowly evolvingfrom an individualistic ointofview towarda more integratedview based on socialpsychology, sociology, and anthropology. n this evolutionwe have absorbedsome of the more important onceptsfrom these fields such as role, norm,and network, but wehave not yet sufficientlyunderstoodthe impactof culture.Eventhough I have workedon cultureas a variable or over10 years, I keep being surprisedby how little I understandits profound nfluencein situationaftersituation.I believeour failure o take cultureseriously enough stems from ourmethods of inquiry,which put a greater premiumonabstractions hat can be measured than on carefulethnographicor clinicalobservationof organizationalphenomena. I will begin historically nd then give a couple ofexamples of where culturecomes into playin theexplanationof phenomenathat have not been sufficientlyunderstood.Thiswill put more focus on occupationalcultures that are globaland raise the possibility hatorganizations re not the rightunit of study for certainpurposes. In the end, Ialso hope thatwe as researchers willcome to recognizehow much our own methods andconcepts are a productof our own culture.SOME REFLECTIONSN THEEVOLUTION FORGANIZATIONALSYCHOLOGYThe concept of organizationalsychologywas introduced nthe early1960s by Hal Leavittand Bernie Bass in an articlefor the AnnualReview of Psychology (Leavittand Bass,1964) and by BernieBass and me in textbooks with that title(Bass, 1965; Schein, 1965). The importantssue at that timewas to separate out from a fairlywell-developedindustrialpsychologythose elements of social psychologyandsociology that dealt specificallywith groupand organizationalphenomena.A numberof new concepts were introducedinto the field but, as I lookbackon it, most of them dealtwith propertiesof the individual nd were clearlyderivativefrompsychology. Thoughwe paid lipservice to andreviewedthe workof organizational ociologists in our229/AdministrativeScience Quarterly,41 (1996): 229-240

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


3/13

books, I have a feeling we did not then and maybe do noteven now take them very seriously.Most of the business schools that adoptedthis field hiredindustrial r social psychologistsand called it organizationbehavior, a labelwith which I was never comfortablebecause it struckme as a kindof conceptual oxymoron.Eitherwe were anthropomorphizinghe legal entity calledthe corporation, r we were loosely adoptinga kindofbehavioristmodel that derived much more fromindividualisticsychologythanorganizational eality.At theMITSloan School I rememberinsistingthat we call ournewly formed group Organization tudies to allow us tobring n whateverdisciplineswere relevantto theunderstanding f organizational henomena.At that time wedid not reallyknowvery muchabout what went on inorganizations.We dealt in abstractions,not realphenomena,and we did not reallyknow how to incorporate ome of thesignificant indings of Roethlisberger nd DicksonintheHawthorne tudies, the industrial ield studies of Trist,Rice,andJaques in the TavistockInstitute,Sherif'sboys' campstudies that illustratedntergroupphenomena so clearly,and,or course, KurtLewin'sgroundbreaking ork on groupnormsand leadershipstyles.Fortheirpart,the organizationalociologists paid equallylittleattention to what the psychologists had learned aboutindividual ifferences, testing and selection methods, trainingand development, incentives, motivation,and rewards. Thiswas illustrated or me personally nthe field of careerstudies, where the sociologists of occupationssuch asHughes, Becker,and Osipow made no references at all tothe groundbreaking ork of Strong, Super, Holland,andother vocationalpsychologists,and vice versa. Thesociologists knew allaboutoccupationsbut not how peoplegot intothem, andthe psychologistsknew all about howpeople chose occupationsand how they could be helped inthis process, but nothingabout what it was likeonce onewas in one.In the 1970s, organization tudies maintained ts bias towardthe individualn thatwe continued to ignorethe hugeamount that the sociologists of occupationsknew about therealitiesof what went on in organizationalife, even thoughthose studies were often focused on occupationsrather hanorganizations s such. MelvilleDalton's(1959)Men WhoManagewas a kindof expose of what organizationalife wasreallyallabout,and Katzand Kahn's 1966) SocialPsychology of Organizationsmade a valianteffort to get usto thinksystemicallyand in terms of networks and roles, butmy impressionis that the individualisticsychologicalbiascontinued to rule.Inpartthis was due to the discoverythat organizationsweremean to people. Argyris's 1957) classic PersonalityandOrganizationmade itvery clear that organizationsnfantilizedtheiremployees, and McGregorn HumanSide of Enterprise(1960)argued persuasivelythat most managerial ontrolsystems created a negativeview of human naturethatpeople eventuallyadopted,not because they are that waybut because the organization rained hem to be that way.230/ASQ, June 1996



4/13

CultureFollowingLewin's studies of the positive longer-rangebenefits of the democratic eadershipstyle, Likertand manyothers saw the need to retrainmanagers, to teach themhumanrelations, and to show them that human naturewas not intrinsicallyad. Organization ehaviorbecame anadvocatefor more humanetreatment of employees byshowing that people were in the long runmore productiveand creative if they were treated as adults. The fact thatshort-runproductivitynthe autocraticallyungroups wasjust as high has seemingly been forgotten. We focused onproductivity efined interms of the individual's bility o beproductiveand creative but did not consider the systemicforces that operated in organizationso make managers,especiallyat the top of organizations,behave in theautocraticway they tended to do. We focused oncharismatic eadershipand became prescriptive,rather hanstudyingthe realitiesof what executives in organizationsdealt with on a day-to-daybasis. We viewed the organizationfromthe bottom up and took the employee's point of viewrather han seeing it as a complex system consisting ofmany conflictingpointsof view. We acknowledged theexistence of groupnorms but failed to note that normsacross wider social units such as entireorganizationsoroccupations hada decisive influence on how those systemsoperated.And if we thoughtthose normswere inimical oorganizationalealth, we gliblycalledfor leaders tochange them. We did not graspthat norms held tacitlyacross largesocial unitswere much more likely o changeleaders than to be changed by them. We failed to note thatculture, viewed as such taken-for-granted,hared, tacitways of perceiving, hinking,and reacting,was one of themost powerfuland stable forces operating n organizations.The individualistic ias and the underestimatingof the powerof culturecan be understoodhistoricallyf we thinkabouthow we get concepts in the firstplace, what our methods ofinquiry re that lead to ourabstractions.Here, too, thepsychologistshave not paidenough attention to thesociologists and anthropologistswhose traditionshave beento go out into the field and observe a phenomenon at lengthbefore trying o understand t. And,for theirpart,thesociologists have not paidenough attentionto the impactofindividual ifferences on the social phenomenathat theyobserved.CONCEPTSAND METHODSOF INQUIRYI start with an emphasis on concepts and methods of inquirybecause knowledge in the human sciences arises initiallythroughcombining he clinicaland ethnographic nsightsofthe trainedobserverwith ever-bettertheory.The field canprogress onlywhen we have a set of concepts (1) that areanchoredinand derive fromconcrete observations of realbehavior n realorganizations,2)that hang together andmake sense of the data that we observe as we studyorganizations, 3) that are amenable to some kindof formaland operationaldefinitionso that they can be studied further,and (4)that providesome link o the concerns ofpractitionerswho are solving real organizational roblemshere and now.231/ASQ, June 1996



5/13

As I look back,what is missing most in our methods ofresearch is the anchoringof our concepts in observed reality(Schein, 1987). We have gone too quickly o formal elegantabstractions hat seemingly couldbe operationally efinedand measured, i.e., centralization-decentralization,differentiation-integration,ower, etc., and failed to linkthese to observed reality.I say seemingly because in theeffort to define such concepts, we often relied on furtherabstractions, .e., questionnaireresponses, and began totreatthe abstractionsas the reality.Not only does thiscreate fuzzy theoryand research that is made significantonly by massaging the datastatistically,but the results areoften useless to the practitioner.The role of the practitioners quitevisible when one reviewsthese fields historically.The important heoreticalandempiricaladvances came in response to social needs. Weneeded to explainthe bizarrebehaviorsthat occurred underNazism(e.g., Adornoet al., 1950), we needed to prove thatdemocraticforms of governmenthadvalidity Lewin, Lippitt,andWhite, 1939), we needed to know how to designeconomical communication ystems for civil defenseshelters and sensible methods for rationingnWorldWar 11(e.g., Lewin, 1943; Bavelas, 1948, 1950),we needed tounderstandand amelioratethe racial ntergroup onflicts thatplaguedus in the 1940s (e.g., Sherif et al., 1961), weneeded to develop tests to recruit or the militaryboth inWorldWarIand 11Stoufferet al., 1949), we needed todevelop concepts of organizationshat were bothveryproductiveand had highmorale(McGregor,1960; Likert,1967), and so on. My point is that breakthrough esearchwas driven n part by the need to contribute o the solutionof highlyvisiblerealproblems that were plaguingus at thattime. We had real data aroundwhich to buildourabstractions.Throughouthis time, the concept of groupnorms was in good repute,but for some reason it was rarelyappliedto groups larger han teams or problem-solvingunits.Forme, the largerculture issues surfaced first in relation omy serendipitousresearch on repatriates rom the Koreanconflict.COERCIVE ERSUASION: NDIVIDUAL RORGANIZATIONALHENOMENON?The connection between social needs and empiricalresearchbecame veryclearwhen the opportunitypresented itself tostudy the behaviorof prisonersof war (POWs) n the Koreanconflict. The early exchange of sick andwounded prisonershad revealed that many POWs hadseemingly collaboratedwith the enemy and had exhibited behaviorsthat wereincomprehensible, uch as making alse confessions ofdroppinggerm bombs. The three branches of the militarycombined to do a thorough screening of all the repatriatesand to learn what hadgone wrong or what didbrainwashing ctuallyconsist of. EdwardHunter'sbooksby that title impliedPavlovian onditioning,hypnosis,drugs,and other esoteric methods seemingly learned from theRussiansduring he heydayof Communism(Hunter,1951,1956).Thoughnone of us who were sent to Korea o debrief therepatriateshad experimental, urvey,or even tightly232/ASQ,June 1996



6/13

Culturecontrolled nterviewdata,the need to understandwhat hadhappenedwhen POWs allegedly collaboratedwith theenemy and changed theirattitudes toward Communismwasso great that most of us who were fortunateenough to havetalked to the repatriates ound ourselves havingto inventand develop new concepts to explainthe observed andreportedevents (e.g., Schein, 1956, 1961a; Lifton,1961;Biderman,1963). The concepts available n psychology at thetime were simply not capable of explaining he observedbehavior.To understandwhat had happenedto the individual risonerin POW camps and to the Western civilianprisoners in thepoliticalprisons on the Chinese mainland, t was necessaryto understand he entire milieuthat the captor was able tocreate through (1)the manipulation f information uch aswithholding upportive mail, tellingone prisoner hat anotherhad alreadyconfessed, showing forged documents to thateffect, or constant lecturingand indoctrination n theChinese Communistpointof view towardthe KoreanWar;(2)the manipulation f incentives, such as indeterminateprison sentences until he prisonerwas willingto make asincere confession, punishmentfor false confessions orother forms of resistance, or rewardsfor any small stepsin the rightdirection owardconfession; (3) the manipulationof group support by removing eaders from groups, bybreakingup relationships f they stimulatedresistance, bytyingthe fate of a group cell to the progress of its mostresistant member; and (4)the captor's complete sincerityand conviction n his efforts to convertthe prisoner o a newpointof view.Whatwe viewed as a cynicalkindof social psychologicaltorture,the captorviewed as a normalprocess of teachingWesterners the realitiesof Chinese Communism,a processthatwas widely practiced hroughoutChina n the process ofthe Communists' political akeover.The Chinese Communistmovement had been forged out of a common experienceand had resultedin a shared view of the world that can quitelegitimatelybe calleda culture.One of the mainforcesoperatingwithin that culturewas what manyobserverscalleda passionfor unanimity, which reflected itself in thezeal that allof the interrogators,prison guards,and ordinarycitizensdisplayedintheirdealingwith Western prisoners.And it was this zeal that often proveddecisive in opening upthe mind of the prisoner,not the discomfort of prisonlife.My point in rehashingsome of the phenomena of coercivepersuasion,as Icame to call this process, is that we sidedwith the prisonerand dida good job of trying o understandwhat happenedthat would account for changes in attitudesand the kindof cognitiveredefinition hat caused prisonersto make sincere confessions. We did not, however, payenough attention to the organizationalmplications, o theconcept of milieucontrol,to the creationof an environmentby the manipulation nd controlof multiplevariablestocreate certainorganizational utcomes, and to the role of ashared belief system in integratinghe variouscomponentsof the social system. Leaders and executives think n termsof such systems of incentives and controls and areconcerned about shared values and beliefs because they are233/ASO, June 1996

This content downloaded from 131.174.75.30 on Wed, 16 Oct 2013 08:38:22 AMAll bj t t JSTOR T d C diti


7/13

dealingwith thousands rather han a few immediatesubordinates,and it is theirability o organizethousands thatcreates some of the most effective organizationswe haveseen. Instead of focusing on the negative effects of suchshared belief systems and the milieu control they generate,shouldwe not thinkmore aboutthe forces that create suchculturesin the firstplace and thereby influence in executivesthe tendencies to manage in the way they do?On the level of social process, I saw many parallelsbetweenwhat the Chinese Communists were doingand what we doevery day in families,in schools, in prisons, and in privateand publicorganizationsunder the concepts of training,development,and socialization Schein, 1961b).The goalsare different, but the methods are remarkably imilar.Whenwe disapprove,we call it a cult and deplore it; when weapprove,we call it an effective indoctrination rogram,suchas a boot camp or academy.We need to understandbetterwhat the forces are that cause organizationsof all kinds tocreate similarculturalmilieux, ncentive and controlsystemsthat operate in the same way, even thoughthe goals of theorganizationsare quite different.Myown understanding f this phenomenoncame aboutfrom seeing more clearly hat culturesarise in wholeoccupationalcommunities and that, therefore, partsoforganizationsare as much a reflectionof the occupationalbackgroundsand experiences of some of their members asthey are of their own unique organizational istories(VanMaanen and Barley,1984). Because Idid not observeorganizational henomenacarefullyenough, Iassumed thatthe unique historyof an organizationwould eventuallyoverride he priorculturalassumptionsof all of theiremployees, but, as I will tryto pointout below, this may notbe the case either for certain classes of professionalsinorganizations r for chief executives. Myown insightintothis phenomenon crystallizedas a result of an effort tounderstandwhy so manyof the programsof organizationdevelopmentand organizationalearning hat we launchedwith so much enthusiasm seemed not to survive or diffuseacross hierarchical r functionalboundarieswithinorganizationsor across organizationswithinbroader ndustrialsectors. I lookfirstat why organizationalearninghasassumed such importanceand then analyzethe obstacles tosuch learning.OCCUPATIONALULTURESAND THEFAILUREOFORGANIZATIONALEARNINGScholars of organizationshave talked aboutorganizationaladaptation,coping, learning,adjusting o theirenvironment,and so on for as long as the field has existed. The field ofplannedchange and organization evelopment is all aboutlearningand was alreadywell articulatedby Lippitt,Watson,andWestley in 1958 inthe Dynamicsof PlannedChange.The postwarefforts of the TavistockInstituteunderRice,Trist, Bridger, aques, and manyothers were entirelydevoted to how to help organizationso learn.The entire lastchapterof my 1965 first edition and the subsequent editionsof Organizational sychologyargued that one of the central234/ASQ, June 1996



8/13

Cultureconditionsof organizational ealthwas the ability o copeand adaptand specified several mechanisms and conditionsfor such coping. Learning s, however, a basicallyindividualisticoncept drawndirectly rom psychology,where it is highlydeveloped, and we have not yet settled ona good definitionof what it mightmean for an organizationto learn.Argyrisand Schon (1996) finesse this issue byarguing hatwhen individuals re in organizationalolesactingon behalfof the organization,we can thinkof theorganization s learning.Bycontrast,CookandYanow(1993)argue persuasivelythat organizationsdo have to performastotalorganizational nits, and theirability o do so underchangingenvironmental onditions must be legitimatelythoughtof as organizationalearningwithoutattributing nyconsciousness to the organizationper se.The intensiveattention to this concept in the 1990s has todo with the fact that organizationsboth in the publicandprivatesector have discoveredthat they are not efficientenough, given the levels of globalcompetition and shrinkingresources. The crisis of today is not war but how to remaincompetitive in a rapidly hangingglobalcontext in which theU.S. is no longeran overwhelminglydominantplayer.Fromthe perspective of the market-basedeconomy operating nWestern capitalistsocieties the fact that thousands oflaid-offemployees may be sufferingeconomic deprivation sa resultof worldwide downsizing s onlya small problemwhen the very survivalof total organizations nd industriesisviewed to be at issue.What is differenttoday is that organizations re more introubleand that the environment s changingfaster. Leadersboth in the privateand publicsector are wrestlingwithdifficulteconomic problems,and the publicat largehasbecome cynicalaboutthe money spent by organizations,particularlyublicorganizations,on social services.Technologicaladvances have made some of these services,such as healthcare, so sophisticated and expensive that weare havingto assess what social values are being served andwhat role governmentshouldplayin the deliveryof thoseservices. Othertechnologicaladvances, particularlyhose ininformationechnology, have made it possible to conceive ofnew kinds of organizingprinciples hat do not depend onco-location n time or space. All of this requirestremendouslearning-how to collaborate,how to become more trustingand open in communications,how to deal with dependencyin the new kinds of fluidhierarchicalelationships,how towield personalvs. positionalpower without losing thecommitment of subordinates,how to design organizationswith fluidboundaries,and so on.One phenomenonthat is frequentlyobserved in this contextis that new methods of learningor solving problemsdo notdiffuse or even become embedded in the organizations hatfirstused them. Organizations isplaywhat can be thoughtof as learningdisabilities, or what Argyrismightcalldefensive routines that get in the way of the kindofsecond-order earning hat may be needed in today'sturbulentworld(Argyris nd Schon, 1996). Individual rojects235/ASQ, June 1996

This content downloaded from 131.174.75.30 on Wed, 16 Oct 2013 08:38:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions


9/13

learn new methods of operating,but these methods do notdiffuse to other groups or organizations.If we go backinto the field and observe carefullywhat goeson when organizations ttempt to improvetheiroperations inresponse to new datafrom the economic, political,andtechnologicalenvironment,we discover the criticalrole thatcultureand subcultures playin this process. Iam definingculture as the set of shared,taken-for-grantedmplicitassumptionsthata group holds and that determines how itperceives, thinks about, and reacts to its variousenvironments (Schein, 1992). Norms become a fairlyvisiblemanifestationof these assumptions, but it is important oremember that behindthe norms lies this deepertaken-for-grantedet of assumptions that most members ofa culture never questionor examine. The members of aculture are not even aware of their own culture untiltheyencountera differentone.As I observe efforts to improveefficiencyand effectivenessin manydifferentkinds of organizations have noticed thatthere are operatingsilentlywithineach of them threedifferentcultures.Two of these cultures are based on largeroccupationalcommunities and thus are more stable in theassumptionsthey hold(VanMaanenand Barley,1984).Three Cultures of ManagementThe operators. The groupwe typicallywork with I willcallthe operators, he line managersand workerswhomakeand deliverthe productsand services that fulfill heorganization'sbasic mission. Inmost organizationsheseoperations acquirethe name the line, as contrastedwithstaff or executive management. We have pretty goodconcepts fromgroup dynamics,from motivation heory,andfrom learning heoryon how to make operations moreefficient, effective, and innovative.It is the operatorgroupthattypicallybecomes the targetof change programsandorganizationalearningefforts. And it is this groupthatdiscovers the systemic interdependenciesamong thefunctions and learns to deal with them. It is this groupthatis typically he targetof managementin the sense thatdeveloping managers is typicallyconceived of as trainingpeople how to better handlethe operatorsin theorganization.Yet in organization fterorganizationwe havefound that the innovationsand more effective operationsdonot diffuse upward n the organization r last. To explain this,we need to discover how two other cultures interactwithwhat Iam calling he operator ulture.The engineers. Inevery organizationhere is a coretechnologythat underlieswhat the organization oes, andthattechnologyis designed and monitoredby variouskindsof engineers who share a common occupationalculture.Ihave labeled this community engineers, but it includesthetechnocrats and core designers in any functionalgroup.Forexample, the designers of informationechnology systemsmightbe software programmers,but I would includethemin this concept of the engineeringculture.The designers offinancialrewardsystems or marketresearchprogramssimilarlybelong in this broadoccupationalgroup.236/ASQ, June 1996



10/13

CultureIf one examines the tacit shared assumptions of this broadcommunity,one discovers that their preferredsolutions aresolutionswithoutpeople. They prefersystems, machines,routines, and rules that are automaticand totally reliable.Theneed to do realengineering or basic design drivesthemtoward simplicity,elegance, and routinized olutions thatoften ignorethe social realitiesof the workplace (Kunda,1992; Thomas, 1994). I have often overheardconversationslike the one I heard most recentlyfrom a couple of MITengineers, on theirway to Boeing,while our planewaslanding n Seattle: Fromtheirpointof view, the cockpit crewis not necessary because the planecan be flown bycomputerfromthe ground.The social interaction hat isnecessary under unanticipated risis conditions or the needto reassure passengers is viewed as irrelevant ndexpensive. Ifgiven the choice, the engineers would replacepeople with machines and routines. Engineerstend to viewthe need for complex humanteams, the need to buildrelationshipsand trust,andthe need to elicitthecommitmentof employees as unfortunateand undesirablederivativesof humannature o be circumvented, fpossible, because they are so hard o manage and control.Operators,with theirnew systemic insightsand new-founddesires to work in effective teams, are often thwartedbythe lack of supportand enthusiasm of the engineers whokeep proposing echnical solutions that make operatorsveryskepticalandfeel threatenedbecause they might lose theirjob as a result of the technical solution. The resolutionof thetension between operatorsand engineers often results inproposalsfor new machinesor new trainingprograms hathave to be pushed up in the organizationor approval(Thomas, 1994). Thatprocess reveals the presence of a thirdcriticaloccupationalculture.The executives. If one looks at organizationsworldwide,one can identifya globalcommunityof chief executiveofficers (CEOs)who share a common set of assumptionsbased on the dailyrealitiesof their status and role. Iamreferringhere to CEOswho have workedtheirway up theladderand have been promotedinto these positions.Entrepreneurs,oundersof companies, and members ofowningfamiliesare more diverse and would typicallynotdisplaythe kindof assumptions Isee in the promotedCEO.The essence of this role is financialaccountabilityo theowner shareholders,often embodied in the principle o keepthe stock priceand dividendsas highas possible (Donaldsonand Lorsch,1983). The essence of their status is that theyare the place where the buckstops, where ultimateaccountabilityies. Though lipservice is paidto long-rangestrategy,to humanresources, to balancing he needs ofdifferentstakeholders,the reality s drivenby the capitalmarkets and the need to remain inancially iable.Though lipservice is paidto the office of the president andexecutiveteams, the reality s that CEOs the worldoverlearnthat they alone must make the tough financialdecisions based on imperfect information, ecause theybecome isolated and find it harderand harder o trust whattheir subordinates ell them.237/ASQ, June 1996



11/13

CEOslearnthat to manage largenumbers of people,departments,and divisions,one must rely increasinglyonrules, procedures, and systems, most notably rewardandcontrol systems. Thoughthey may have grown up with theknowledge and insightsof the operators, hey increasinglyhave to abandonthose insights and replacethem withperceptions that in a tough competitiveworld, compromiseshave to be made, chances have to be taken, and financialcriteriaalways have to be treated as paramount.When oneis accountable for thousands of employees, one cannotworryabout individual ubordinaterelationships.As one CEOput it, I love to play ballwith the troops after hours, but Ikeep my immediate subordinatesat a distance. Peoplebecome humanresources and cost factors rather hancapital nvestments.One consequence is that when the operatorcultureattempts to improveeffectiveness by building earningcapacity,which requires ime and resources, the executivesdisallow the proposed activitieson the groundsthat thefinancialreturnscannot be demonstrated or that too manyexceptions are involved hat would undermine he controlsystem. Executivesthus unconsciouslycolludewith theengineers inwantingto minimize he human factor. Ineffect,all of the researchfindingsaboutthe importanceofteamwork, collaboration, ommitment,and involvementfallon deaf executive ears, because inthe executive culture,those are not the important ariables o consider.Even if a given CEO sees the light and creates a companythat is more productivebecause it is more in tune withhumanneeds, his or her replacementis likely o holdthemore standardcost-drivenassumptions and willdismantlemany of the improvementsthatthe previous enlightenedCEOcreated.As a growing body of research has shown,some organizationshave been able to overcome thenegative impactsof short-run inancial hinkingby evolvingcultures that integratethe executive, the engineering,andthe operatorpointof view, but those organizationsare stillthe exception rather han the rule,and we stilldo not fullyunderstandhow they did it (e.g., Donaldsonand Lorsch,1983; Kotterand Heskett, 1992; Collinsand Porras,1994).Whatthis line of thinking eads to is the possibility hat theorganization s a unitmay not ever be able to be a reliablelearning ystem unless it reconciles the built-in onflictbetween these three cultures,two of which have their rootsin largerworldwideoccupationalcommunities. Thesecommunitieshave learnedtheirassumptionsfrom theenvironments n which they exist, the financial tructureofcapitalismand the technologicalstructureof engineering,and until hose structures andthe educationalsystems thatsupportthem change, organizationswill not be able to makesome of the fundamentalchanges that the learningideologues, myself included,have been advocating.If webelieve in learning,we must redefine ourquestion and askhow occupational communities learn. How do executiveslearn, given the realitiesof theirroles, and how do we helpthem to become effective learners?How do engineers learnoutside the narrowconfines of theirtechnologies, and howdo we help them learn?These are questions that have only238/ASQ, June 1996



12/13

Culturebegun to be addressed because they cut across disciplinarylines. To address them will require he collaboration foccupationalsociologists, organizationalheorists, andpsychologists knowledgeableabout the learningprocessitself. Most of all, it will require,at the outset, therecognition hat we are dealingwith other culturesand areimposingour own culturalbiases on them.The humanisticbias that is inherent n the field oforganization tudies makes it hardfor us to be trulysympatheticeither to the technocraticemphasis of theengineer or the financialemphasis of the executive. So wespend our time advocating hat they should become moreaware of the humanfactor,which is tantamount o sayinggive up yourculture and become a member of ours.Organization tudies will not mature as a field untilwespend much more time in observingand absorbing heseother cultures, learning o see them from the insider'sperspective, discoveringin that process even otheroccupationalculturesthat affect how organizationswork.IMPLICATIONSND CONCLUSIONSI have always been struckby the analogybetween the artistlearning o see his or her subject before it can be renderedand the social scientist learning o see the psychodynamicsand sociodynamicsof individuals, elationships,groups, andlargerorganizational nits. My own insights have only comeafter I have spent hours and hours immersed in a givenphenomenon,after I have identifiedand dealt with all myown priorexpectations and stereotypes, and have graduallycome to see what is reallyout there. I thinkit is a difficultprocess, and ourtheories are weak because we have notpracticed t enough. Particularlyn relation o culture,when Isee my colleagues inventingquestionnaires o measureculture,I feel that they are simplynot seeing what is there,and this is particularlyangerouswhen one is dealingwith asocial force that is invisibleyet very powerful.We are ingrave dangerof not seeing our own culture,ourassumptions about methods, abouttheory, about what isimportant o study or not study, and, in that process, pay toomuch attentiononly to what suits our needs.Artistsget very interested in each other's work and learn agreat deal from how other artists have solved problems.Here, too, we could learnby spending more time withcolleagues from related but differentdisciplines. It iscomforting or the social psychologist trained nquestionnaireor laboratorymethods to spend time withcolleagues who have the same training,but it might be moreproductive or that psychologistto go into the field with anethnographeror become a participant bserver in a realorganization.We can only see that to which we exposeourselves and, I fear, we have limitedour exposure toomuch to the artificial.We will not learn about the power ofcultureunless we cross real culturalboundaries.This is anuncomfortableprocess, as every traveler n a foreigncountryknows, but I believe it is essential if we are to developorganization tudies as a viable and practical ield.239/ASQ, June 1996

This content downloaded from 131.174.75.30 on Wed, 16 Oct 2013 08:38:22 AM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions


13/13

REFERENCESAdorno, Theodor W., ElseFrenkel-Brunswik, Daniel J.Levinson, and R. Nevitt Sanford1950 The Authoritarian Personality.New York: Harper.Argyris, Chris1957 Personality and Organization.

New York: Harper & Row.Argyris, Chris, and Donald A.Schon1996 Organizational Learning II.Reading, MA:Addison-Wesley.Bass, Bernard M.1965 Organizational Psychology.Boston: Allyn & Bacon.Bavelas, Alex1948 A mathematical model forgroup structure. HumanOrganizations, 7: 16-30.1950 Communication patterns intask-oriented groups. Journalof the Acoustical Society ofAmerica, 22: 271-282.Biderman, Albert D.1963 March to Calumny: The Storyof American POW's in theKorean War. New York:Macmillan.Collins, James Charles, and JerryI. Porras1994 Built to Last: SuccessfulHabits of VisionaryCompanies. New York: HarperBusiness.Cook, Scott D. N., and DvoraYanow1993 Culture and organizationallearning. Journal ofManagement Inquiry,2:373-390.Dalton, Melville1959 Men Who Manage. NewYork: Wiley.Donaldson, Gordon, and JayWilliam Lorsch1983 Decision Making at the Top:The Shaping of StrategicDecision. New York: BasicBooks.Hunter, Edward1951 Brainwashing in Red China.New York: Vanguard.

1956 Brainwashing. New York:Farrar,Strauss & Cuddahy.Katz, Daniel, and Robert L. Kahn1966 The Social Psychology ofOrganizations. New York:Wiley.Kotter, John P., and James L.Heskett1992 Corporate Culture andPerformance. New York: FreePress.Kunda, Gideon1992 Engineering Culture.Philadelphia: TempleUniversity Press.Leavitt, Harold J., and Bernard M.Bass1964 Organizational psychology.In P. R. Farnsworth, OlgaMcNemar, and QuinnMcNemar (eds.), AnnualReview of Psychology, 15:371-398. Palo Alto, CA:Annual Reviews.Lewin, Kurt1943 Cultural reconstruction.Journal of Abnormal SocialPsychology, 38: 166-173.Lewin, Kurt, Ronald Lippitt, andRalph White1939 Patterns of aggressivebehavior in experimentallycreated 'social climates'.Journal of Social Psychology,10: 271-299.Lifton, Robert J.1961 Thought Reform and thePsychology of Totalism: AStudy of Brainwashing inChina. New York: Norton.Likert, Rensis1967 The Human Organization.New York: McGraw-Hill.Lippitt, Ronald, Jeanne Watson,and Bruce Westley1958 The Dynamics of PlannedChange. New York:Harcourt-Brace.McGregor, Douglas M.1960 Human Side of Enterprise.New York: McGraw-Hill.

Schein, Edgar H.1956 The Chinese indoctrinationprogram for prisoners of war.Psychiatry, 19: 149-172.1961 a Coercive Persuasion. NewYork: Norton.1961 b Management developmentas a process of influence.IndustrialManagementReview, 2: 59-77.1965 Organizational Psychology.Englewood Cliffs, NJ:Prentice-Hall.1987 The Clinical Perspective inFieldwork. Newbury Park, CA:Sage.1992 Organizational Culture andLeadership, 2d ed. SanFrancisco: Jossey-Bass.

Sherif, Muzafer, 0. J. Harvey, B.Jack White, William R. Hood, andCarolyn W. Sherif1961 IntergroupConflict andCooperation: The Robber'sCave Experiment. Norman,OK: University BookExchange.Stouffer, Samuel R., EdwardSuchman, Leland C. DeVinney,Shirley A. Star, and Robin M.Williams, Jr.1949 The American Soldier. NewYork: Science Eds.Thomas, Robert Joseph1994 What Machines Can't Do.Berkeley, CA: University ofCalifornia Press.Van Maanen, John, and StephenR. Barley1984 Occupational communities:Culture and control inorganizations. In BarryM.Staw and L. L. Cummings(eds.), Research inOrganizational Behavior, 6:287-365. Greenwich, CT: JAIPress.

240/ASQ, June 1996

artikel week 42

Documents