Sep 2, 2020. Updated: Feb 5, 2023.

Organisational Culture

The social culture in organisations must be rooted in the local culture where it is operating, especially in aspects such as holidays, dress code, language, inter-relationships, etc. Many organisational structures of the Eastern, African and Latin American nations resembles that of the European and American organisations. The adoption makes sense because socio-political systems are tough to design and it is sensible to take inspirations or adopt certain elements from elsewhere. But common sense must prevail and prevent such adoptions from being mere imitations.

These days, in the name of professionalism and formalism, English is becoming the de-facto language of communication even among non-English working class, and western dresses are becoming the dress codes of many organisations. Some people confused ethnic dresses and formal dresses to be mutually exclusive when they are mutually inclusive. We can have home wear, lounge wear, party wear, casual wear, formal wear and festive wear in both ethnic as well as western clothings.

With many cultural elements imitated in organisations, mono culture is becoming a trend among all forms of organisations globally. It is strange that most workplaces in India have an "ethnic day" once in a while, where employees wear their ethnic dresses and come to work. Shouldn't it be otherwise where one's ethnic formal dress is the everyday norm and the western day happens once in a while?

Integrating foreign cultures blindly in the business and corporate system is an imitation that will lead to dysfunctional teams in societies with distinct cultures. People come from various cultural backgrounds which have influenced their psychological faculties and acts as the comfort zone for performance. If they are forced into a mono-culture, it will eventually compromise the advantages that diversity and localisation¹ have in a team. If employees does not follow their own culture, how can they interact well with each other? How can they find solutions to the problems of consumers who are largely local? How can they provide the best customer services if they think and talk different from their local customers? How can a marketer figure out a product opportunity if he is distances himself from the reality of how people live?

Only by rooting on local culture can organisations connect with the local communities and establish a relationship, which is imperative to the gratification of an organisation product strategy. Only then can organisations ensure that there are no job roles that can be termed as undignified or disrespectful for their employees.

The practice of regional culture will contribute to the prevention of the spread of mono-culture in the corporate sector. Mono-culture, wherever it is, decreases our resistance. And change is the only thing constant. Practising local culture will also contribute to better product design and customer support.

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Employees do not live to work, they work to live. This maxim must reflect in every policy affecting the employees. Two weekly offs are basic necessities. If the process allows it, let day shift be the working hours.

If the process runs for 24 hours, take advantage of your employee's chronotype for health reasons. A chronotype is an individual's biological inclination to a particular sleep timing in a 24 hour period. Some people are late owls, others are early birds, and the rest lie in between. The early birds can be placed in early morning shifts, late owls in late night shifts and the rest in the day shift. While it is highly improbable to find the exact number of chronotypes for each shifts, considering whatever available can result in rostering shifts with the least health impact.

Organisations are not families and employees are not family members. Here is a relevant quote from an organisation called 37 Signals,

When companies say they’re a family, it’s a veiled way of demanding total sacrifice. Nights, weekends, whatever it takes for, you know, “the family”. But great companies are’t fake families — they’re allies of real families. They don’t eat into people’s personal time, they don’t ask people to dial-in during vacations, and they don’t push them to work Sundays to prep for the meeting on Monday.

35th Signal

Create a culture where employees work with you towards your mission; not a culture where employees work for you. The difference is the attitude management have towards the working class.

Practice equality of opportunity instead of equality of outcome. Nothing about your candidate except competence must matter. There must be no entitlement to any position because of gender, race, ethnicity, sex, sexual orientation, or any such personal traits that has no relation to competence. Some traits, on the other hand, can be relevant to certain roles. In that case, make that trait and that trait only as a requirement.

Pay your employees well; not just to survive, but to live a decent life. There is no place for exploitation in business; all deals must be mutually beneficial deals. Profits from business are a result of team work and no matter how indirect the contributions are, every worker have contributed to it and thus deserves a part of the profit or bonuses.

Provide the right tools to the workers in the interest of productivity, ergonomics and health. Keeping employees productive is profitable to the organisation and keeping employees healthy ensures sustainable operations.

It is best for organisations to have happy employees. Some are unhappy because they want something else in life; in which case, the management has hired wrong people. Others are unhappy because the organisation is dysfunctional; in which case, wrong people are heading the management.

The management is the captain of the organisation on whom the responsibility of steering the processes in the right direction lies. Their competence can ensure that employees do not slough overtime trying to fix what resulted from the poor decisions of the management. Things go wrong, but never must it become a trend.

Customer is not the king as considered generally in the business industry; nor are you the king. There is no king in any business altercations — there is only the reality where one is wrong or either of them are. So do not force any representative of your establishment to take on unpleasant and unfair encounters with your customers when the latter is wrong. In most cases, you are not in a dire survival situation to endure such encounters.