Culture Care Technologies
  Human Resource & Organization Development Specialists in Company Culture

(Re)negotiating the Cultural Order: A Participative vs. a Top Down Approach

The deepest layer of organization culture, the shared system of underlying beliefs and values through which members see the world and from which they think, is produced interactively and held among and between members of an organization. Although formal leaders have considerable influence in the development of cultural beliefs and values, particularly in the initial startup phase, they can only be changed interactively through a participative approach. This level of culture cannot be imposed in a top down fashion.

What can be imposed are new norms, customs and practices at the observable behavioural level of culture. Depending on the degree of change and resistance to it, imposing change at this level can be quite costly in terms of the resources, time, energy and attention required to police, enforce and reinforce the desired behaviour.

The participative approach required for a change in shared cultural beliefs reflects an important reality of organizations -- voluntarism. Every organization must rely to some degree on its members' voluntarism and their commitment to the beliefs required to accomplish the mission and, over the long term, realize the vision. Commitment to these beliefs provides an internal influence on the way people see the world and think in contrast to the external Influence of behaviour through orders, policies, rules and norms.

The contribution that a committed individual makes far exceeds that of one who is merely compliant or motivated, someone who provides the organization with what they are contractually obligated to — their time, professional energy, skills and knowledge. With commitment comes the power of the self and personal energy. Unfortunately, organizations are not entitled to this commitment. It cannot be provoked; it must be evoked and can only be given voluntarily. One of the best ways for evoking commitment is to ensure that work is not just a source of money, but is also a source of meaning.

The ultimate goal of a participative approach to cultural change is to identify and extend a broad consensus of meaning among all members of the organization in order to unite them in thought. This doesn't mean that they all think the same thing and see eye to eye on everything. What it does mean is that they see the world through and think from a new, shared set of fundamental beliefs and values that are held as a social contract -- an agreed interpretation of reality based on a mutuality of meaning, shared understandings and reciprocity.