The Effect of Organizational Culture on the Organizational Performance in the Restaurant - Essay Example

Title: Describe the culture in your organisation and explain how it helps or hinders your organisation’s performance. Name Institution Date of submission Organizational culture All organizations have their respective organizational cultures that can influence the performance of employees either positively or negatively. According to Ybema, Yanow & Sabelis (2011), organizational culture is cultivated from values and artifacts existing among the members of the organization. Values that are held by the individuals in the organizations can be enacted or advocated. In case these values are advocated and not demonstrated practically by the enactors, it leaves the organizational culture weakened about the objectives and goals (Whitfield & Landeros, 2006). Therefore, leaders are responsible in ensuring that what is good for the organizational culture is promoted. Culture is often realized during the times of organizational change. Organizational change can result from companies merging and the cultures clashes. For instance, when the organization realizes that growth strategies need to be executed, the present culture may become inappropriate. In a static organization environment, the cultural values may not boost the morale of staff but rather hinder their contribution towards the organizational changes (Tepeci, 2005). Organizational culture is important since it defines the members’ perspectives and their collective behavior to achieve the set goals and objectives. The three levels of cultures defined by Schein appropriately reflect the kind of culture an organization is experiencing. Surface manifestation is the first level of culture that defines the visible structures and processes within the organization. Secondly, espoused values are the philosophies and goals of the organization that unites the members together. The elements in the second level of organizational culture should be justified to ensure everyone within the culture has the specific objective as far as performance is concerned. The third level is the basic assumptions (Hogan & Coote, 2014). This level entails thoughts and perception of the members regarding the overall experience in the organization (Tong, Tak & Wong, 2015). From the theory of Schein, it is found that the culture is build from the external survival, internal issues and deeper assumptions (Wiwiek Harwiki, 2013). This form of culture can be transmitted and rooted through organizational socialization (Carroll, 2008). This paper reflects on the effect of organizational culture on the organizational performance in the restaurant context. In the hospitality industry, organizations having a higher level of customer orientation are more likely to have a higher level of customer satisfaction (Miroshnik, 2013). Employees are more likely to influence the organizational culture in the restaurant industry. This is because employees in these organizations have a high level of interactions with the customers and also the industry is labour intensive (Lim, 1995). One of the major challenges leaders and managers face in organizations is to attract, keep and develop employees who are service oriented. According to (Liden, Wayne, Liao & Meuser, 2013) managers can overcome this challenge by matching the organizational culture and the values of the people the organization is hiring. Restaurants promote organizational values such as fairness among employees and guests, caring, innovation and teamwork (Heskett, 2012). These cultural values within the organization motivate members to achieve higher standards for customer services. From my observation, the three levels of organizational culture was manifested in the restaurant organization I was working. Dimension of restaurant culture There are seven important dimensions of restaurant culture. First, members of the organization make a difference thus contributing to either success or failure of the organization. A culture with people-oriented personality is more likely to bring success in the restaurant organization. Thirdly, every member in the organization requires hard work. Having fun and teamwork is very important for organizational success. Fifth, leaders are there to show a clear sense of direction that should be followed by the employees. The sixth dimension is that training is important to ensure that all members are capacitated to handle various responsibilities. The last dimension is that people rise from the groups they are in and become managers (Chatman, Caldwell, O'Reilly & Doerr, 2014). The above dimensions define various characteristics of organizational culture. They include employee empowerment, equitable remuneration, honesty, safe environment for working, capacity building and fairness among employees. However, theft can be a disaster in the restaurant organizations since it destroys the integrity of members (Carroll, 2008). Long working hours and high physical demands are the main challenges that may hinder members from achieving the expected goals and objectives. For example, I noted that organizational values like pushing for innovation often help individuals grow, and in return brings in organizational success as well as growth. Therefore, the managers in the restaurants should understand the external form of the culture and translate it to influence performance positively. Individual values and organizational culture in restaurant organizations The service work requires needs employees to interact with the customers and the co-workers. This interaction defines the perception of the quality of services being provided by employees in the restaurant (Tepeci, 2005). The restaurant organizations may prefer to have employees with perceived qualities such as people and team oriented, commitment and empathy (Shahzad, Luqman, Khan & Shabbir, 2012). The culture experienced in the restaurant organization was defined by the personal values of employees such as flexibility and empathy towards the customers. It is important to understand that determining the personal characteristics of employees and staff will make it easy to understand the culture in the organization. The employees’ behaviour determines the personal and situational attributes within that offers the potential to increase the intention of the culture formed. This is because individuals (both employees and staff) and the setting (second level of culture in Schein model) are not separable but rather interdependent and has interactional perspective. Personal-organization fit is an important aspect during the formation of organizational culture. Tong, Tak & Wong (2015), defined personal-organization fit a strategy of crafting an effective organizational culture by considering value and goal congruence. It also entails matching the employees’ needs and preferences with the work environment. This will help in understanding the appropriate integration strategy between employees’ personality and organizational culture (Whitfield & Landeros, 2006). The outcomes of organizational culture on performance About three decades ago, various organizational researchers found that organizational culture greatly affects the performance of members of the organization (ProQuest, 2007). There is a strong relationship between organizational culture and financial performance in the organization. The culture can be the source of strong financial performance in the organization only when the following conditions are met. They include the following: a) The culture of the organization should be valuable. In the context of the restaurant organization, the culture looked efficient and effective thus improving the performance of the company. b) Two, the culture must be unique. The characteristic and attributes of the organizational culture differ depending among different competitors. Every organization comes up with a unique culture depending on the goals and objective to be met. More effort is directed to ensure that the culture developed will achieve a sustained superior performance in the organization (Ogbonna & Harris, 2000). c) Three, the culture must be difficult to replicate. Organizational culture is normally a source of competitive advantage, particularly when it is difficult to be copied by other competitors. According to ProQuest (2007), it is difficult to copy the culture of restaurant organizations because it is built from the individual personal attributes. Therefore, with the three conditions in place, the organization can have a promising financial performance. Strong organizational cultures have a powerful effect on the performance of the organization. This can be explained in three ways. a) Goal alignment: In the organization where the culture is strong, all the individuals are likely to behave like other members in the in the organization. The majority of the members of the organization are goal oriented thus influencing the minority to follow what is expected to achieve the goals of the organization. The weak culture on the other side may leave members, employees, processes and systems disjointed thus hindering the achievement of organizational goals and objectives. b) Strong cultures boost the motivation of the employees: The shared values among the members make employees feel good within the organization. When individuals feel accommodated and included in the organization, they tend to strive and look for new challenges. As a result, the employees will ensure that they adhere to the norms of the culture formed. c) Strong culture provides effective structures and systems: The performance within the organization is increased when the systems and structures are designed to accommodate the needs of the employees. For example, the financial awards set for performance improvement would make the conditions of the financial system favourable. In this case, an employee will tend to improve his or her capabilities to get the financial reward. According to Miroshnik (2013), the system with strong organizational culture rarely depends on the authoritative leadership style but rather intrinsic motivation of the employee. Sometimes the use of authoritarian leadership style may lessen the motivation as well as the creativity of employees in the organization. This happens when the strong culture is supported by the authoritative management. Despite a strong link between organizational culture and performance, it is, however, difficult to operationalize its effects. Strong cultures have been found to improve the performance of the organization leaving the weaker cultures as the reason we have poor performance in the organization. From the experience in restaurant organizations, strong cultures that helps boost the performance of the organization are coherent, fully articulated, stable, and the values widely shared among the members. In this case, organizational culture implicitly could shape the behavior and help the new employees to have a positive interaction as far as organizational performance is concerned. Shared values and beliefs imply that the communication within the organization is increased thus making members work harmoniously for the common goal. Organizational culture and nonfinancial aspects A strong organizational culture boosts organizational non-financial features of performance. The features include job satisfaction and morale, and it may affect the financial performance in the indirect way when it comes to productivity and turnover (Hogan & Coote, 2014). In most cases, the organizations that are emphasizing on the interpersonal relationship and teamwork are more likely to retain employees for a long time. This only happens when the culture is influencing performance positively. According to Heskett (2012), a culture that is the focus on bringing in commitment, empowerment, creativity, and engagement affected the organizational performance positively. Therefore, the organizational culture that influences the human resource management practices can either boost the performance or can as well hinder the performance (Deal, 2005). In conclusion, organizational culture is important when it comes to changing the organizational programs to improve performance. Strong organizational cultures in most cases influence the performance positively. 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