An analysis of corporate culture

2.1.2 Definition of Concept

Corporate culture is often used interchangeably with “company culture” and “workplace culture.” It is a complex term that portrays the vision, beliefs, values, and ethics of any organization, including its work environment and the behaviour of employees. Scholars in business administration, global management, and HR domains agree and differ in certain aspects of the subject (Tkachenko et al, 2022). For example, Möller et al, (2022) argued that corporate culture features a shared pattern of basic assumptions that employees assimilate as they gather experiences from dealing with challenges in the micro and macro business environments. Carson et al (2020) defined workplace culture as a set of assumptions that determine group behaviours. According to the scholars, new employees learn organizational culture to think, perceive, and feel like others. They also agreed that culture influences how employees interact with one another, customers, and stakeholders. Although there are studies linking corporate culture to employee motivation, loyalty, trust and engagement, others suggest that cultures differ and may even have subcultures in large organization.

It is common for small- and medium-scale enterprises to have unique cultures, but large corporations often have subcultures that either support or disprove certain aspects of business strategy. According to Mozaffan et al (2022), subcultures have disruptive tendencies because each subculture is strongly attached to a management team, thus, workplace culture should be viewed as the corporate personality of organizations that promotes inclusiveness by recognizing the existence of sub-groups. The scholars argued that norms, values, and beliefs shared by members of a sub-group can improve employee motivation and engagement if properly analysed, understood, and aligned with organizational goals (Newman & Wander, 2018).

Corporate culture does not only influence interpersonal relationships but determines how knowledge is created and shared. As a metric for monitoring group behaviours, business analysts can use corporate culture to predict the possibility of resistance to change management. Although there is a consensus that workplace culture includes all principles, beliefs, and values shared by employees, Gabriel et al (2022) argued that market forces, business strategy, workforce capability, technology integration, management style, historical precedents, and national culture also have a direct impact on the culture of organizations (Uyar et al, 2022). Recent studies expanded the context of culture to include factors like environment, location, languages, symbols, and habits (Denney, 2019).

Managers at all levels and across departments in the organization have a responsibility to sustain corporate culture. Some of the valued entitlements that employees benefit when organizations show full commitment to corporate culture are:

(a) Ample opportunities for growth.

(b) Equity and equality in terms of pay rates, level of work, compensations, merit-based promotions.

(c) Fair and just treatment of workers, with focus on their mental. psychological, and emotional wellbeing.

(d) Cordial relations between superiors and subordinates and among workers at different levels/departments.

(e) Clear communication channels and a responsive, open-door communication policy that strengthens trust and confidence in the workforce (Lobrij et al, 2020; Kwarteng & Aveh, 2018).