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Chapter 17 ■ Culture models and organization change
scheme was clearly an important part of the reasons for the group pressure so it
is difficult to conclude that no economic explanation applies. Certainly output
increased in the relay assembly test room. However the Roethlisberger and
Dickson book, although published in 1939, shows the data only to 1929.
Whitehead (1936) publishes the relay assembly test room data to 1934. From the
advent of the Great Depression of 1929 output fell away thus reinforcing the like-
lihood that while social factors were important there is the possibility that these
factors mediate the operation of a group incentive scheme, and that from 1929
onwards the key motivation was that of limiting output. Note, however, that
other, operational factors may explain falling output from 1929 onwards. We
cannot tell from the available data but what we can conclude is that a combina-
tion of social, cultural and economic explanations are needed.
We note here the intersection of various economic, social and contextual vari-
ables, as well as social group factors related to the ‘informal’ organization idea.
Of course, we have long known that the ‘real world behaviour’ in an organiza-
tion operates differently from the formally proscribed rules, procedures and so
on. In order to ‘get things done’ people develop ‘short cuts’. From there it is not
difficult to see how corporate cultures may emerge. A combination of the opera-
tion of formal systems and processes and informal organization could reasonably
be expected to result in the development of tacit understandings about what is
and is not ‘acceptable behaviour’ in any given organizational situation. The
important point to note here is the intersection of factors at different levels, indi-
vidual, organizational and contextual. If this is how culture arises we should also
note the Deal and Kennedy (1982) observation about ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ cultures.
A strong culture exists where employees respond to changing situations con-
sistently with their alignment to the values of the organization. There is a high
degree of predictability in this regard. Conversely, a weak culture exists where
there is little alignment with organizational values. Here control must be exer-
cised through extensive procedures, rules and formal systems. Where the culture
is strong we have the possibility, identified by Janis (1972), of ‘groupthink’. This
happens when people do not challenge current thinking but also where the
group will take riskier decisions than would any individual member acting alone.

There is a strong belief in the organization’s values and a tendency to create neg-
ative stereotypes of competitors, the latter leading to a belief in the inherent
advantages of the organization on the part of its members. In turn this leads to
the riskier decision making. It is worth noting that strong cultures tend to out-
perform weaker cultures (Kotter and Hesketh, 1992; Burt et al., 1994).
Are strong cultures likeliest to emerge in a period of growth? Is that when
organizations with strong cultures perform best? Could the Hawthorne research
not be an example of a strong culture in operation but one in which the contex-
tual factors were both conducive to the development of a strong culture and
likely to support effective performance due to the congruence between employee
objectives and needs and corporate goals. Does the very predictability of pre-
dictable performance limit the differentiation most likely to help innovation and
adaptability? I cannot provide final answers here but the questions are intriguing
to say the least. We turn now to various well-established models of organizational
culture before considering these questions more fully.

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