Organisational Culture

Organisational Culture is the unwritten beliefs, attitudes, values, and expectations about how people work within the organisation.

Aspects:
Visible Aspect of a Company:
The visible aspect of an organisation are features of a company that can be seen by the public. Examples of this would be the uniform that staff wear, building structure of a company and so on.

Hidden Aspects of a Company:
The hidden aspect of a company are features of a company that cannot be seen by the public. Examples of that would be the values, the attitudes, the beliefs of a company and so on.

Organisational Culture theory:
There are two theories about Organisational Culture. one is the Iceberg theory by French and Bell, 1990, and the other one is the Organisational Onion theory by Schein,1912.


Iceberg theory:
If you look at in iceberg, only 1/10th of it is visible above the surface and the rest 9/10th is submerged beneath the water. These two theorists use this as an example to say that an organisation only has 1/10th of visible aspects (formal) and 9/10th of it is not visible (informal).

Formal Organisation:

• Goals
• Strategy
• Structure
• Systems and procedures
• Products and services
• Financial resources
• Management

Informal Organisation:

• Values, attitudes and beliefs
• Leadership styles
• Norms of behaviours
• Power and Politcs
• Informal groupings

Onion Theory:
The onion theory says that an organisation is like an onion and that the outter layer is the visible aspect and as these layers are pealed off, the deeper and hidden aspect of the company.

Visible aspect of culture (Outter aspect):

• Physical office layouts
• Uniforms
• Languages
• Status Symbols
• Rites and Rituals

Values and beliefs (semi hidden aspects):

• Values serving as guidelines for action

Basic assumption (hidden aspects):

• Fundamuntal basis of orgnisation

M&S:
Here i will be talking about the visible and hidden aspects of M&S when i went to Eden shopping centre to observe it.

Visible Aspect:

• M&S uniform
• The building structure was a modern and attractive one
• Calm relaxing music
• freindly staffs

Hidden Aspect:

• Their brand name
• Their beliefs of every product has quality
• eveyr staff had a different role e.g. management, duty management, sales assistant, all these people had different roles to do.
• the way the manager manages the store, i could see him going around and talking to staff. maybe he was giving feedbacks.

Four types of cultures:

Charles Handy is regarded by many as the most advanced management thinker in the world. His early work, such as his 'Motivation Calculus' , has been steadily surpassed and extended by his more recent modern and sophisticated thinking about the purpose of work, business and organizations.

Handy was born in 1932 and is popularly regarded as Britain's greatest management visionary. He graduated from Oxford and worked for Shell International, and during two years at the Sloan School of Management became a protégé of Warren Bennis, the organizational and leadership guru.

Handy's first book, Understanding Organisations (1976, revised 1991) is well regarded. Gods Of Management (1978), is another highly regarded work, in which Handy uses a metaphor of the Greek Gods to explain different organizational cultures:

• Zeus (power, patriarchy, 'the club' culture)
• Apollo (order, reason, bureaucracy, the 'rôle' culture)
• Athena (expertise, wisdom, meritocracy, 'task' culture)
• Dionysus (individualism, professionalism, non-corporate, person culture)

(http://www.businessballs.com/charleshandy.htm, accessesd: 25/10/09)

Power Culture:
This culture is all about one or two person being in power, and telling staff what to do. All decisions are made by that one or two person, this kind of culture is normally in a small or medium type of organisation.The advantage of this type of culture is that when making decisions there won't be any disagreements or any problems as there will be only one person making them. However the drawback of this type of culture is that it can easily demotivate staff, as they mostly have no say and only do what they are told to do.

Role Culture:
This culture is when different employees of an organisation have different roles. therefore each staff is concentrating one role and as time goes they will be more used to their role and execute them faster. This type of culture is mainly used in large organisations and the advantage of it is that employees will focus on one particular role and therefor this will be able to increase productivity of a company. The disadvantage is that because the employee will be doing the same thing all the time, this may demotivate them on the long run.

Task Culture:
This type of culture is where employees are put in a time and have to complete a task/project together before a given deadline. This type of culture is mostly used by companies employing engineers or architechts to create and complete plans by a deadline for a building in construction or ect... The advantages of this type of culture is that employees will be motivated as they have more freedom towards decisions and have been given a huge responsibility; however the disadvantage of this type of culture is that since its a team, if one does not meet the deadline, this may ruin the whole project.

Person Culture:
This type of culture is mostly adapted by self employed employees, where they make decisions and are the centre of the business. This will include people such as barristers, sugeons and ect... This type of business are sometimes non profit business such as charities aswel. the advantages of this is that employees are highly motivated as the pay is usually high and they make most of the decisions, however the disadvantage is that due to the minority level of those type of people companies won't have as much power as they could on a normal employee.

(http://www.learnmanagement2.com/culture.htm, accessed: 25/10/09)

Problems of trying to classify culture in one of the four types described above:
The problem with this is that an organisation, in my point of view cannot be classed in only one of the culture above. For example if you take an organisation such as M&S, in their stores you could say that they have a role culture as every staff have different roles. Some staff will be on the shop floor and some on the tills, management will be doing price verifications or check any changes and monitor staff. This would fit in the role culture. In their headquaters they could be doing projects as a team to improve their stores, this would fit in task cultures. All major changes of the stores would be made by high ranked chief executivs which would fit in power culture. Just here M&S fits in three kind of cultures.

A company that demonstrate a strong culture:
I believe that M&S demonstrate a strong culture, and and i have decided to explain about it as i am one their regular customers. Their stronger culture would be the role culture as they mainly operate many stores around the country and most of their staffs have different roles in stores. Every time customers go to M&S they see staff doing different things, regular customers will notice that the same staff will be doing the same work most of the time they go shopping but they may swap with another staff where they would go on the till and the other one on the shop floor. Managers don't seem to have a problem with that as long as they do their work. this also gives a little change for the employee which won't demotivate them as much.

Conclusion:
Overall organisational cultures play a key role towards the success of an organisation. Without these cultures an organisation won't stand and grow for long, as these different cultures which partly represent the companies and differ them from any other, keep customers and employees happy.

Improving Staff Performance

Content and Process theory:

Content Theory:
A content theory define motivation in terms of need satisfaction, e.g. Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs theory. (http://www.oppapers.com/essays/Process-Content-Theory-Motivation-They-Apply/147561, accessed: 16/10/09). Three theories would come under the content theory. These are: Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, Aldefer's ERG Theory, and Herzberg's Two Factor theory.

Process Theory:
A process theory define motivation as a rational cognitive process occurring within the individual e.g. Adams’ Equity theory. (http://www.oppapers.com/essays/Process-Content-Theory-Motivation-They-Apply/147561, accessed: 16/10/09). Three thoeries would also come under the Process theory. These would be the Expectancy Theory, the Equity Theory, and the Goal Theory.

Brief description of each theory:

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs: states that a person has 5 levels of needs and that every time one of the need has been accumulated, the person would have needs from the next level up. these 5 levels are:
1. Physiological- Basic requirement
2. Safety - Health and Safety
3. Social - Social activities for staff through company
4. Ego/Esteem - Recognized for completed work
5. Self Actualisation - Gain control, have more freedom.

Aldefer's ERG Theory:
E- Existence Needs
R - Relatedness Needs
G - Growth Needs

Herzberg's Two Factor Theory: States that people have two factors that motivates them. One would be Hygiene Factors and the second one would be Motivator Facors.
Higiene Factors would motivate an employee by giving him/her a reward. These would be factors such as salary,work conditions and ect..
Motivator Factors would motivate an employee by involving him/her more into the companies work and in what is going on in the company. These would be factors such as giving responsibility, growth, recognition and ect..

Expextanct Theory: This theory was founded by Victor Vroom and he states that an employee has to put in effort in order to increase their performances, and as a result of high performance the employee will receive a reward.












(http://www.arrod.co.uk/archive/concept_vroom.php, accessed: 16/10/09)

Expectancy is the belief that increased effort will lead to increased performance i.e. if I work harder then this will be better. This is affected by such things as:

1. Having the right resources available (e.g. raw materials, time)
2. Having the right skills to do the job
3. Having the necessary support to get the job done (e.g. supervisor support, or correct information on the job)

(http://www.arrod.co.uk/archive/concept_vroom.php, accessed: 16/10/09)

Equity Theory: This theory was founded by J. Stacey Adams. TheEquity Theory calls for a fair balance to be struck between an employee’s inputs (hard work, skill level, tolerance, enthusiasm, etc.) and an employee’s outputs (salary, benefits, intangibles such as recognition, etc.). According to the theory, finding this fair balance serves to ensure a strong and productive relationship is achieved with the employee, with the overall result being contented, motivated employees.
(http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_96.htm, accessed: 16/10/09)

Goal Theory: The goal theory was founded by Dr Edwin Locke's. (http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newHTE_87.htm). This theory suggestes that every one has a goal and that employees will work hard and be motivated in order to achieve that goal. The harder the goal the greater level of motivation there is.

The difference between process theory and content theory is that, the content theory looks at WHAT motivates staff; whereas the process theory looks at HOW does it motivate staff. each theories looks at motivation but in a different approach.

Two Company Examples:

MORRISON'S:
This is what Morrison's say they offer their staff:

"At Morrisons we value our staff.

Whether you work in one of our stores, at Head Office or at one of our warehouses or distribution centres, you can expect excellent training, great prospects and fantastic benefits and opportunities including the following:

• Competitive Rates of Pay
• 10% Staff Discount
• Free Life Assurance
• Profit Share (after qualifying period)
• 29 Days Paid Holiday (after qualifying period)
• Service Award (after qualifying period):
  £125 after 5 years, £250 after 10 years, £375 after 15 years and £500 after 20 years
• Subsidised Staff Canteen
• Opportunity to join the Stakeholder Pension Scheme
• Health Care Cash Plans
• Premium Payments for Sunday Working
• Selected Discount Benefits with APH, Thomas Cook, RAC, Kwik Fit and many more
• Social Committees – many of our locations have Social Committees which organise a number of activities ranging from theatre trips to Christmas parties
• Fundraising Events for the Charity of the Year"

(http://www.morrisons.co.uk/Corporate/Work-with-Morrisons/Employee-benefits/)

M&S:
This is what M&S say they offer their staff:

"So we feel it's only fair that they’re well rewarded for their efforts. Our benefits package (detailed below) has been developed to help us attract, motivate and retain the best people in retail and includes everything from subsidised healthcare and performance related pay rewards to our fantastic employee discount. But that’s not all we offer. To find out more about these, use the link at the bottom of the page.

Our Shared Services teams enjoy slightly different rewards to the rest of the business.

Benefits

Our benefits package is under constant review but the main things you'll be able to enjoy include:

Competitive rates of pay and performance related rewards

We regularly check our salaries against other retailers to make sure we’re competitive. And in order to keep up with any changes in the market, we’ll review your basic pay every year. We also offer extra performance rewards to recognise individual achievement.

Employee discount

For all your store purchases (excluding technology and certain kitchen electrical products) at Marks & Spencer, you get a 20% discount. We’ll also give your partner or a member of your family who permanently lives with you their own card, so they can benefit from the discount too. There’s no limit on the amount of goods you can buy with discount.

Pension

Our retirement plan is one of the best of its type in the UK. Once you've worked with us for a year you can save up to 100% of your pay in the plan and we'll match it with double contributions (up to a limit of 12%). It’s an excellent way to provide for a secure retirement and, even if you decide not to stay with us until you retire, you can still transfer your investment when you leave.

As an extra incentive, if you join the plan within the first year of becoming eligible you can pay extra contributions, which we will double (up to a limit of 24%).

On top of these benefits, we also offer our people:

• SAYE for all employees;
• More holidays the longer you stay with us; and
• Optional subsidised company benefits, such as health and dental care.

Bonus

The annunal Bonus Scheme is open to all employees in Head Office and Retail Management. Bonus targets are linked to team and Company performance. The Bonus Scheme is open to new employees from the date they join the Company and they will be eligible for a proportionate bonus, based on the number of full calendar months they work in the financial year. However, we reserve the right to review and where appropriate withdraw the Scheme each year.

Extras

A range of offers and discounts available exclusively to Marks & Spencer employees. You can take advantage of special discounts on a wide range of holidays, health club memberships, leisure attractions and many more products and services."

(http://corporate.marksandspencer.com/mscareers/rewards_benefits)

Looking Morrison's motivation tactics:

By looking at Morrison's employee benefits, it can be seen that they are using the content theory in practice. There are however no signs of any use of the process theory. If looked into Morrison's employee benefits, Morrison's cover all the stages of Maslow's hierarchy of needs:

1. Physiology: Competitive Rates of Pay, 10% Staff Discount, Subsidised Staff Canteen
2. Safety: Free Life Assurance, Opportunity to join the Stakeholder Pension Scheme, Health Care Cash Plans
3. Social : 10% Staff DiscountSelected Discount, Benefits with APH, Thomas Cook, RAC, Kwik Fit and many moreSocial Committees, many of our locations have Social Committees which organise a number of activities ranging from theatre trips to Christmas parties, Fundraising Events for the Charity of the Year
4. Ego/Esteem: Profit Share (after qualifying period), 29 Days Paid Holiday (after qualifying period), Service Award (after qualifying period):
   £125 after 5 years, £250 after 10 years, £375 after 15 years and £500 after 20 years, Premium Payments for Sunday Working
5. Self Actualisation: In order to get to this level the employee has to have done excellent work for a good period of time.

From the above discussion it can be seen that Morrison's has been concentrating on purely on Maslow's hierarchy of needs and has every single way to motivate an employee for every levels of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. This seems to have worked successfully as Morrison's is the UK’s fourth largest supermarket chain, with 382 stores and 117,000 staff serving ten million customers a week. (http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/news/4042302.Morrisons_serves_up_5_000_new_jobs/)

Conclusion:
During the writing of this report, a deeper understanding of the content and process theory has been developed, and the differences between them were distinguished. When looking at two companies it is noticeable that both these companies M&S and Morrison's have not used the process theory but only the content theory, and they are both successful companies. this shows that employees would rather work for given rewards such as discounts, good salaries, bonuses; instead of rewards that are non-real, such as being treated equally, or achieving goals that may not last. Overall it is concluded that the content theory is a more successful way of motivating staff than the process theory. This is because it is believed that most people would rather work harder in exchanche for what they need rather than for something that may not last long.

Motivation Theories

I used to work at a BP petrol station, i have resigned a week ago. One content theory that is particularly for me, would be Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Maslow's hierarchy of needs has five stages:

1. Physiological- This is the very basic stage and it looks at the condition a person is working in, if it is poor or good. In my case i was working in good conditions; my work place had clean toilets, a clean staff area where you could sit and eat at break, and it had most of the equipments needed to do the job.

2. Safety- This is where an employee seeks to work safely in his/her working environment, it is also about the safety of securing the job for the future. In my case i was only concerned about the health and safety hazards, rather than securing a place there as i knew i was going to university the following year.

3.Social- This is when the company organises social activities such as staff dinners or staff parties or anything else that would relax the staff and motivate them. In my case the company i wasn't that keen on socialising with the staff and i found that very harsh. It didn't really matter to me because i had made my friend there and we would go out and etc...

4. Ego Esteem- This is where the employee looks to be recognised for the work he/she does. In my case i was never recognised for the work i did apart from a few occasions, and that i believe is very bad. it's like some times they would ask you to do an extra job for them, and they would beg u until u say yes and after they don't really care, because once you say yes u have to work that shift as you have agreed to do so. Sometimes when you stay late doing their (managers) dirty work, they would leave early and they wouldn't even say a little thank you.

5.Self Actualisation- This is when you are at a level where you have a little bit of control, or more control than anyone else (Duty Managers). In my case i wasn't a duty manager, however i have done good enough work to earn a little bit of control and this was the flexibility of my shifts. for example the manager told me that if i cant work any day to tell him one week in advanced. And also when i am on the shop floor, i don't get ordered what to do as i know already and can do it however i want in whatever time i want as long as i finish everything on time, basically i wasn't getting bossed anymore.

MOTIVATION TO GO UNI:
My main motivation to uni was my girlfriend and my family. since i have been with her i had this feeling of responsibility. The responsibility of looking after her and my family. i had realised that the only way to do that was to go university, get a degree and increase my levels of future earnings. i always wanted to be accountant, even though i have heard that the job is boring, i have this feeling that i will enjoy it. In the 2nd and 3rd year my main source of motivation will be my family, girlfriend, and the knowledge that i will safely secure a high earning qualification at the end of my degree. When you compare my motivation to Maslow's hierarchy of needs u will see that i will be on the 2nd and 3rd stage. Safety of securing a high level earning qualification is motivating me as well as social, which would be my family, girlfriend and friends.

DEMOTIVATION:
I remember during my time at BP, my manager used to tell me that i was working very hard and that he was considering to promote me as a duty manager and told me that in order for me to achieve this i will have to be on time do all these works. Back then i was taking a gap year and i thought to myself £1000 monthly was good money if i got promoted, compared to the £350 a month that i was earning. This had motivated me a lot, and i was doing hard and extra work, and started working more hours. but as a few months went past 1 of our duty manager left, and we had a couple of new ones in, and i asked my manager if i was going to get promoted and this is what he replied to me: "your work is not good enough", I went crazy, as i was working on an excellent level and was considered as one of the best staff, but the thing that made me even more angry was the fact that my manager lied to me all along to falsely motivate me in doing more work. From that day onward I was demotivated and until that day I resigned I hated going work and i wasn't working properly. The day I resigned from that place was one of the happiest days of my life.
Comparing my demotivation theory to each theorists theory:

• Maslow's hierarchy of needs: In Maslow's point of view i would be motivated to work for Esteem, i wanted to be recognised for the work i did and to get promoted. however since i was nevar recognised for the work i have done, i got demotivated and therefore wasn't looking to getr recognised anymore but, just doing my work as other employees.
• Aldefer's ERG theory: In Aldefer's theory i would be motivated to work for growth needs, I was working to complete meaningful tasks in order tom impress my manager and grow into a a better person within the company (duty manager).
• Herzberg's two factor theory: In Herzber's point of view i was demotivated by 2 motivator factor, recognition and growth. I was working hard to be praised and promoted, but since none of them happened i got demotivated as i thought that the extra efforts were just a waste.

In conclusion i have found that maslow's theory is most suitable for me as during my time at BP i went up exactly as maslow is suggesting it in his theory. first i was motivated to get the job to improve my living conditions, then to improve my safety, social didn't make any difference, however i was working extra hard for esteem/ recognition and promotion. i have also realised that i find Maslow's theory easy to follow compared to Herzberg's and Aldefer's theory.
But most of all......... I HATE BP!!!!!!!!! And i wouldn,t advise anyone to work there.