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17 Culture models and organization

change

Introduction

Throughout much of the twentieth century, research into organizations looked
at how most effectively to increase performance, productivity and profitability.
Latterly client/customer satisfaction and the satisfaction of employees came to be
seen as central to improved performance, and public service organizations were
increasingly the subject of study. It is worth noting that in the USA and in Europe
major wars led to rapid increases in research efforts as attempts were made to
solve the novel problems presented by such conflicts. These included learning
how to select candidates for officer training in rapidly expanding armed services
and looking at the factors affecting productivity in factory systems being rapidly
expanded to manufacture weapons on a vast scale.
After the end of the Second World War in 1945 many observers argued that the
Cold War, other incipient conflicts around the world and the growing pressures
of global competition, alongside the demands of what Eisenhower famously
called the ‘military–industrial complex’, added substantial and continued impe-
tus to this research effort and to the related and impressive growth of business
schools in the USA and elsewhere. (Professional schools such as law schools,

medical schools and the like were established earlier but the emergence of busi-
ness schools was a feature of the educational ‘landscape’ during that period.)
The twentieth century has been labelled as ‘the American century’ as America’s
capitalist organizations came to be dominant in sectors such as automobile and air-
craft manufacture. Moreover, American culture came to be almost the defining cul-
ture for big cities around the world. American business, diplomacy and military
power eventually evolved into such a position that led scholars to cite the USA as
the world’s only global superpower, at least for the moment. Yet even as this posi-
tion emerged there were clear signs of change in the position of business in the USA
relative to the rest of the world. More particularly it is clear that while US businesses
continue to deliver economic success there are, nevertheless, US businesses strug-
gling to survive and prosper in mature sectors such as automobile manufacture.
This has led many thoughtful business leaders to raise new questions.
As long ago as 1986 Turner (1986) traced the emergence of interest in corporate
culture to both the decline in standards of manufacturing quality and design in the

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