Managing Corporate Culture, Employee Motivation, and Workforce Diversity Effectively - Literature review Example

Managing corporate culture, employee motivation and workforce diversity effectively Name Professor Institution Course Date The considerations of managing corporate culture, employee motivation and workforce diversity effectively Introduction Variety is regarded as the spice of everybody’s life. Both in normally life and workplace perspective there are diversities amongst human beings based on sex, gender, color, race, personality, attitude, personality, just to mention a few which affect how they relate (Cornelius, Gooch & Todd 2000, p.67). This diversity in individuals causes individuals to react to events, situations and actions differently. Similarly, as experts put forward, organizations cultures and policies influence people differently owing to differences in their needs, wants, aspirations and interests. In contemporary rational organization manager ought to recognize, consider and allow these differences as opposed to making attempts at reducing them and overlooking at their reality (Daphne & Maggie 2008, p.172). The recognition, consideration and tolerance of the workforce diversity in an organization are what are considered as an ideal diversity management. Day (2007, p.215) says that as the manager accommodates different cultures, they must also blend harmonize these different cultures so as to come up with organization culture that suit everyone. When every employee’s culture is taken into consideration, they feel appreciated and motivated. This essay, thus, focuses on the considerations of managing corporate culture, employee motivation and workforce diversity effectively. It concludes with focus that businesses must endeavor to increase its workforce diversity, improve corporate culture and employee’s motivation and applies these issues to its benefits. Considerations of managing corporate culture Business owners and managers should concur that the corporate culture is distinctive to every organization, doing away with a "one size fits all" strategy of management (Cornelius, Gooch & Todd 2000, p.67). Corporate culture is defined as range of shared visions, values, customs and internal goals which make every organization unique. Knowingly or unknowingly created by managers or owners, corporate culture matters can add to or hinder the success of organizations; whether large and small by increasing or limiting team effort to realize organization goals. Together with managing marketing, finance and operations, small organizations have to direct, control, manage and increase the positive aspects of their intrinsic corporate culture. Experienced theorist, Edgar H. Schein in his book "Organizational Culture and Leadership" states that "Culture not only just explains several organizational phenomena; it is something which leaders can influence to build an effective business (Schein, 2010). Managing corporate culture entails identification of external and internal business conditions influencing business, whilst manipulating corporate culture to be more effective market player. Organizational success relies upon many factors that are both internal and external to the organization (Hugh 1993, p.519). Culture remains one of the internal factors where the organization problems can be resolved and success and effectiveness can be realized, but there are several researchers who resist the same issues. Based on the statement “culture is somewhat an organization is and culture is somewhat an organization has” (Parker 1999, p.19) it can be claimed that managing corporate culture is characterized attributed by two different contentious arguments in which some scholars state that, a strong culture has a critical role in solving the issues of organization and drives an organization to success whilst, many scholars oppose the statement claiming that a strong organization creates as strong culture and it is crucial for success. To create a strong culture which brings everybody on board, some considerations have to be made. These considerations are organizational structure, management style, national cultures, treatment of clients, and market strategy among others. The manager establishes the corporate culture after a thorough research on the market and customers needs. Through corporate culture an organizational structure is established which show the chain of command (Parker 1999, p.21). Similarly the corporate culture works in line with structure that it has established. Schein (2010) claims that since a healthy organizational culture considers the best organization structure, it determines how the responsibilities are distributed and monitored including the communication flow between various levels and department, it is wholly reliant on the organizations objectives and how it endeavor to realized them. To realize their objectives effectively organizations usually require having a formal structure. This is significant to allocate tasks into diverse groups to make sure that no two individuals are working on similar task or project in order that people obtain the most productivity for input (Robbin & Judge 2011). Due to the fact, an organization cannot run without workforce, this have the tendency of forming different informal structures in the given organization which results to different perceptions, attitudes, traits and behavior with lots of different categories of aptitudes. So when workforce is to work on a task in the limitations of a formal structure to accomplish a particular goal there are particular methods to interact and speak, where influence forms an organizational culture, in which it may be formed intentionally or unintentionally by the workforce (Lewis 2001, p.21). Lewis (2001, p.24) contends that in centralized form of organization structure all decision making authority is held at the top management level and all the other departments are controlled and monitored, whilst in a decentralized form of structure decision making authority is distributed to lower levels in addition to some extent in order to increase the pace of implementation including improve job satisfaction amongst other things. Organizational structure is classified into two dimensions, horizontal and vertical (Knights & Hugh 2006, p.45). The vertical form of organizational structures have several different levels of power with people in supervisory or management positions having a narrow or small pan of power as opposed to horizontal structure (Jackson & Carter 2007). A small span of control is simpler to communicate with and manage. It also needs lesser management knowledge and skill compared to controlling a large number of individuals such as in a broad span of influence. Horizontal organizations structure has the tendency to have a control span i.e. numerous subordinates under just one supervisor or manager (Kyle & Nyland 2011, p.895). Horizontal structures have the tendency to have an improved communications and are considered to be cost effective for a company owing to not requiring several managers. An ideal culture is a formal culture that focuses on authority and control to maintain the organization operating smoothly. This form of culture provides stability and security. Getting right the corporate culture is crucial, that is why organizations spend heavily on reshaping their cultures and impacting the behaviors and attitude of their workforce (Hugh 1993, p.542). In an organization that values workforce for the contribution to their business, experience of the employees, high positive attitude and morale towards the organization. Employees having a positive attitude tend to be loyal to the company, which minimizes employee’s turnover. Employee’s turnover bears a higher cost to the business, particularly for recruitment and training. An ideal corporate culture can assist an organization retain employees who are valuable and decrease the costs of human resource (Rajput, Marwah, Balli & Gupta 2013, p.135). With the quick way the world is transforming, so as to stay competitive in the market environment it is crucial to understand the nature of leadership and how the changing styles impacts the cultural effects of the organization (Lewis 2001, p.27). The formulation of organizational culture is defined by and based on the styles of leadership in the organization. “The relationship between corporate culture and leadership is clearer in organizational cultures and micro cultures.  What people end up refereeing to as a culture in such mechanism is normally the result of the entrenching of what a manager has imposed on a team which has worked out” (Schein, 2010). Simply claimed, culture is on the basis of the style and tone of leadership. Every leadership style, decision, and individual affects organizational culture. When corporate is 'supported', employees are persuaded to commit themselves to its principles and products and to evaluate their personal worth in these regards (Parker 1999, p.25). By encouraging this type of commitment, employees are concurrently needed to understand and take responsibility for the connection between their contribution to the competitiveness of the product and servicers and job security. Considerations in managing employee’s motivation Recognizing human behavior in a place of work has been one of the major prioritized roles for many organizations (Glenn & Spicer 2011, p.253). Human behavior in the workplace determines whether the company is likely to do well or not. So, it has turned out to be more important for the employers to understand what motivates employees before concentrating on increase productivity. The atmosphere where the employees operate in as a team has to be built and sustained in order that they are personally driven towards realized the common objectives. Thus, motivation is given extra emphasis in the workplace to understand employee’s behavior (Skemp-Arlt & Toupence 2007, p.30). According to Skemp-Arlt & Toupence (2007, p.30) employee motivation is therefore defined as the "psychological forces that which decide the course of an individual's behavior in a workplace, an individuals’ degree of effort and persistence". In managing effective motivation, factors like job design, employee’s participation, rewards, and Quality-of-work-life programs are considered. The design of an employee’s job can have a significant impact on their job motivation (Knights & Hugh 2006, p.55). Job design comprises of designing jobs which make both an interesting and challenging duty for the worker and is efficient and effective for making the job completed. Several researches indicate the effectiveness of employing job design methods as an employee motivation practice. Herzberg argued that employees demonstrate different attitudes and behavior which is dependant on the types of jobs allocated to them in the organization (Knights & Hugh2006, p.51). In addition, they claimed these attitudes and behaviors towards their job bear a considerable impact on the performance of the business. There is a well-known statement that is in reference to Herzberg's idea that if a company wants its workforce to perform a proper job, then allocates them a proper job to perform (Skemp-Arlt & Toupence 2007, p.39). People are different and therefore perceive a similar thing in different means. People have dissimilar expectation and needs which they endeavor to fulfill in different techniques. If these expectations and needs are not met, the employees will be dissatisfied and the outcomes will be absenteeism, turnover just to mention a few. As such motivating workforce has been a hard task for many managers given that employees respond in various ways in jobs allocated. Some people are motivated with the nature of the job (Skemp-Arlt & Toupence 2007, p.42). The nature and job design here means permanent, part time or casual job. Working lives are mainly dictated by positive career outlook, better remuneration, job security, and material and immaterial rewards with the job. For some people, their job can be source of social mobility. In short having a job makes them motivated in life. Most people feel motivated to have a permanent job compared to casual job. They understand that permanent job offer them more job security. The younger people between the ages of 15-24 fall in this category which prefer permanent full time job (Daphne & Maggie 2008, p.161). Others feel motivated by having part time jobs. Experts argue that most part time jobs are preferred by married women because they feel satisfied with the fewer hours offered so as to accommodate their family responsibilities. According to Daphne & Maggie (2008, p.161) part time job design is also favored by older workers because this helps them reduce workload and retire gradually. Critics advise managers to first consider hiring employees on permanent full time basis as opposed to casual jobs. This is because casualisation job design undermines employees in the job market which results to low security, low remuneration hence low quality of job (Daphne & Maggie 2008, p.163). Because managers are entirely responsible for motivating workforce, they ought to be able of providing employees with reasons to be dedicated to the work and the organization. Staff normally feels less motivated and dissatisfied when the top management fails to make employees recognize what drives them. This drive creates a need which must be fulfilled. Robins (2003) posits that there are three connections in which employees become less motivated when they feel their expectations and needs are not met. These needs are actually arranged according to Maslow Hierarchy of needs. It should be noted that unmet needs is what influences human behavior at the workplace (Knights & Hugh 2006, p.46). First relationship illustrates the performance and effort of the employees. Managers must make their workers consider that maximum effort put results to recognition in appraisals of performance. In some situations, this is not usually true as staff do not think that their effort will lead to recognition and are demotivated to carry out their work. The second connection is concerning the performance of the employee and organizational reward (Skemp-Arlt & Toupence 2007, p.34). The workforce is made think that they must be rewarded for their exceptional performance. As such managers in their managerial duties must consider rewards as a way of motivating employees. However, there will be less motivation since when employees understand that they may not be rewarded by the company they work for only for their performance. Workforce diversity Hicks-Clarke & Iles (2000) contend that in business practice and management theory, handling diversity, particular workforce diversity, has played a vital role in the recent years. In the economy that is globalizing, organizations understand prospective benefits of a diverse workforce and attempted to build more inclusive work settings. Because diversity is in essence about cultural norms and values, apt reflection work becomes a critical task to form a truly inclusive work setting where individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds feel recognized. Workforce diversity is defined as the aspect of cultural difference among employees (Hicks-Clarke & Iles 2000, p.325). In organizational outlook, diversity usually implies a range of human resources, suppliers, and clients with regards work experience, educational background, income, sexual orientation, geographic location, gender, physical qualities and abilities (Cornelius, Gooch & Todd 2000, p.78). Job satisfaction and cultural diversity of the employees have been said to have some impacts of the performance of an organization. Ethnic diversity can frequently enhance or reduce job motivation and satisfaction of the employee. Day (2007, p.217) claim that managers are needed to have some key managerial skills to deal with workforce diversity to improve performance. In the present business arena managers are expected to handle cultural diversity which includes behavior, values, norms and language. To rise above the challenges of workforce diversity, a new strategy rose in the 1980s which became identified as the diversity management (Day 2007, p.214). A workplace where diversity is overlooked, employees seem to experience, discriminations of different types such as race, gender, religion etc, which leads to social stigma. To manage workforce diversity the manager must make consideration such as national culture, equality and inclusion, gender, climate for diversity, and team environment. To ensure that workforce diversity is appreciated in an organization, the manager must ensure that climate for the same is created (Hicks-Clarke & Iles 2000, p.27). This is done by hiring and training people from different cultural background to coexist and work together for a common goal. The manager should be a person with cultural intelligence and understand that employing people of different cultural can help the organization attract different markets. The climate for cultural diversity is strongly impacted by the corporate culture and insight of practices of the organization by people in organizations (Kyle & Nyland 2011, p.194). Diversity climate is viewed to comprise of policy created to support diversity and justice recognition; that is the call for diversity, workforce support for the diversity and the insight of organizational justice in HR practices, procedures and policies. Individual results claimed to be influenced by diversity climate consists of job satisfaction, organizational commitment, career planning behavior, career commitment and satisfaction, career and satisfaction with manager. Examining procedures, the recruitment and selection of individuals from diverse backgrounds such as minorities, different nationalities and women, is a vital approach to improve diversity within the company (Cornelius, Gooch & Todd 2000, p.71). Leading business talents prefer to work with an organization which has a diverse workforce. However, for a reason to form a culture of inclusion it is not adequate to just recruit individuals from different cultural backgrounds into an organization. It turns out to be essential to hire those applicants who share desired values in reference to diversity and demonstrate behavior favorable and competencies to a broad and diverse job culture (Groschl & Doherty 1999, p.263). Talking of culture of inclusion, it can only be shown with the assistance of people who agree to this idea, who are devoted to bringing the organizational vision to life and those who feel relaxed working in a dissimilar work setting. The manager must create teams based on the concept of diversity. This concept ensures that this team comes up with experience and fresh ideas. Diversity in the team environment provides exposure to staff from different cultural backgrounds (Day 2007, p. 215). This is especially factual for workforce in multigenerational work settings. Traditional-generation workforce learns new processes and technology from staff that belongs to the generation that are tech-savvy. Similar, Generation X staff learns from interaction to from go-getter work ethic and assertive typical of several Baby Boomers. However, the work of the manager is bringing team together and ensures that everyone is accepted in the group (Dipboye & Halverson 2004, p.146). If this is not ensured, some members might find may make this as an opportunity to act like a boss and harass new members (Ackroyd & Crowdy 1990, p.6). After the manager have selected a team which seem have same drive and almost similar personalities, they can be left alone to pick leaders, present their own evaluations, make their personal decisions and offer their own rewards. Dipboye & Halverson (2004) assert that gender discrimination is still a problem in some organization. However, managers who have realized how good gender can be are now balancing recruitment to include both male and female gender. The people who are mostly affected in the labor market are women (Lewis 2001, p.25). In the modern era, gender diversity holds more importance than simply promoting and mentoring female employees. Gender diversity implies inclusion of the transgender or non-sexed employees as well as the normal cis-gender roles of both male and female. By employing and promoting with no gender discrimination, an organization earns not just professional acclamation but also employees and customers’ loyalty (Dipboye & Halverson 2004). Managers are also backed by Civil Rights Act of 1964 which prohibits any form of discrimination on the basis of social group. Conclusion To sum up the essay, it should be noted that workforce normally make great ideas and diverse skills and thinking towards what they are doing provided that the team is diverse and self-regulating. A group of workmate from the same cultural background and are almost identical are not likely to be intelligent. This not only summarizes the importance of diversity but also depicts it fault. Diversity in organizations, discovering and recruiting talents with diverse skills and knowledge, from different cultural settings, has been very efficient in unlocking creativity and improvement of innovation. It is therefore the work of the manager to create a corporate culture that encourages workforce diversity. As such employees from different cultural background will feel appreciate hence motivated to work to work with everyone. References Ackroyd, S. & Crowdy, P 1990, Can culture be managed? Working with “raw” material: the case of the English slaughtermen, Personnel Review, Vol. 19, No. 5, pp. 3-12. 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