Organizational culture and its impact on employee performance

¶ … managementhelp.org/org_thry/culture/culture.htm

Designed to provide informative definitions of what an organizations' culture is including a definition of its fundamental concepts and foundational elements, this site begins with a macro definition of organizational culture followed by a discussion of four dominant types of cultures. Academy, Baseball, Club and Fortress cultures are next defined with examples of each provided within the descriptions. This specific page ends with a listing of books organized by the topics of managing organizational change and growing your organization. The site itself is well balanced between informative content and the offers of books for sale. Navigation of the site is well designed with a left column for links specific to the content library, including guidance on how to add content and assistance in using the library. To the right side there is ample support for multiple search options. The site is well defined for its primary purpose of delivering content and promoting the works of the cited author. It is commercial yet also informational at the same time.

Symphony Orchestra Institute

http://www.soi.org/reading/change/culture.shtml

This site is well-balanced and provides well-define navigation along its left side and related links across the right. Designed to be viewed in a 640x480 screen format, all relevant links are located across the top fold of the page. The use of colors is also minimal yet effective, as is the content valuable. Quoting one of the leaders on organizational cultures, Edgar Schein, also brings credibility to the content as well. The author also cites Dr. Schein correctly at the bottom of the article as well. There are also links for support and forward- and backward navigation of the site as well. The site overall is easily used and navigable and carries credibility through the citing of well-known experts in the filed of organizational culture.

Organizational Climate http://www.haygroup.com/tl/Downloads/OCE_Fact_Card.pdf

The Hay Group is one of the most respected consultancies in the area of organizational climate surveys and the definition of strategies for creating more effective organizational climates. The organization of the PDF shown above illustrates the depth of expertise of Hay Group in defining the attributes of good leaders, and how their leadership includes organizational culture. The creation of Managerial Style Questionnaires (MSQ) and the graphical definition of how leadership contributes to a strong organizational climate is shown throughout the linked document. The design and aesthetics of the document further underscore the professionalism of the Hay Group and the integration of both their research instrument, the MSQ, to the ability of organizations to align managerial expertise with changes in culture. http://www.entarga.com/stratplan/culture.htm

This is a poorly designed site that looks as if someone took maybe an hour to create it. Black text against a brown background makes it difficult to read and appear unprofessional. The use of bolded and bulleted text makes it also appear to have been cut and pasted from another document. The use of the Yahoo groups button on the bottom of the page also contributes to an amateur appearance of the page. Links on the top of the page appear to just float by themselves, there is no clear sense of navigation. Lastly the content does not appear substantiated and validated by any other sources. All in all, this is the weakest page in the analysis to this point. http://www.lib.umd.edu/ocda/hanges_arlreport.pdf

This academic paper titled Diversity, Organizational Climate, and Organizational Culture: The Role They Play in Influencing Organizational Effectiveness by Paul J. Hanges, Juliet Aiken, and Xiafang Chen of the University of Maryland is well-written and rich with insights specific to organizational climate. There are 51 different references included in the analysis that support the two basic tenets of this paper, which are that the concepts of organizational climate and culture are critical for managing workforce diversity, and second, that workforce diversity is actually an organizational imperative in our rapidly changing environment. The paper concludes with practical insights into how practitioners can attain these two objectives. Included in the cited research are a series of key insights into how organizational climate can be turned into a competitive advantage relating to the development of new models of integrating workforce diversity programs.

The Significance of the Relationship Between a Leader and an Organization's Culture http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/ndu/strat-ldr-dm/pt4ch16.html

Structured in the form of a textbook page, this specific website has an abundance of content yet presents it in a form that makes it difficult to read. The continual use single-spaced paragraphs, varying font sizes and lack of white space make the page nearly impossible to read only. As one reads over the content, it is evident that it has been cut and pasted from another source. Further, this page, from a content standpoint, lacks any consistent approach to defining cited sources, even though they are shown in the text. It is a page then that is lacking on completeness; it does not specifically provide a complete summary of the content shown.

Basic Leadership Theories

http://www.nwlink.com/%7Edonclark/leader/leadcon.html

This specific site has an abundance of content and an innovative approach to navigation across the top of the page, yet does not have enough intuitively grasped cross-site navigation across the site. The content is not well organized enough to create an exceptional learning experience; like other pages in this example the page reads more a document than a website. The content has not been optimized for a website, yet again looks cut and pasted into place. The graphics shown in the flow of the text are also not as easily referenced from anywhere else on the site, they are in effect embedded in the text. In summary, this page, while it has an interesting navigation graphic across the top of the page, lacks customization as a website. http://changingminds.org/disciplines/leadership/theories/leadership_theories.htm very well designed website specifically developed to appear above the upper fold of PC and laptop monitors configured for 640x480 resolution. Website navigation standards included left-side navigation bars, use of a variety of permalink solutions shown in the Share This page: area of the site, and navigation across the top of the page all make this a well-designed site. The content definitions, all hyperlinked, also are well designed and intuitive.

This is a well designed site and easily navigable.

Learning Systems that Sustain Strong Organizational Cultures