Introduction

Culture in any organisation occurs at both individual and group levels and due to this reason management of organisational culture is important for improving performance and relationships of the employees. Organisational culture is mainly a shared value, rules and beliefs that influences the way the employees act. Focusing in this aspect, the importance of organisational culture management and its impact on the employees and organisation itself are going to be evaluated in this essay. In this particular context, relevant theories are going to be used to justify the mentioned impact.

Organisational culture

Organisation culture refers to the collection of expectations, practices and values that guide as well as inform all the members of the organisation about their actions. In other words, organisational culture is a shared way of being, acting and thinking in a group of coordinated and collaborative people with reciprocal expectations (Serpa, 2016). On the other hand, it has been stated by Odor, (2018) that organisational culture is mainly a set of shared norms, beliefs and values that influence the ways the staff of the organisation think, behave and feel in the workplace.  Apart from that Thokozani and Maseko (2017) has viewed organisational culture as an orientation of the company towards its different stakeholders that forms the basic rules for guiding employees’ behaviours. From different views of different authors, it has been understood that organisation culture is one of the most important aspects in an organisation for improving and managing the workplace and employees. 

Impact of organisation culture on organizations and employees

Organisational culture is used as an effective tool of improving employee performance but in this context the culture needs to be developed and managed with proper awareness. Organisational culture is mainly of two types including weak and strong culture. According to Thokozani and Maseko (2017), in the case of weak organisational culture, beliefs and values are not widely and strongly shared within the organisation. Asa result, individual members of that organisation rely more on personal values, principles and norms. On the contrary, it has been argued by Odor (2018), that in awellculture-based organisation, employees adhere to organisational norms and regulations for not their satisfaction but because of fear of different adverse consequences. It also creates an environment in the workplace and it in turn influences the nature of long-term plan of the organisations to move towards specific visions and missions. Apart from that it has been highlighted by Al-Shurafat and Halim (2018) that in an organisation with weak culture, the employees are not clear with their pacific role and responsibilities. On the contrary, as per the findings of Thokozani and Maseko (2017), in case of strong organisational culture, the set of beliefs and values are strongly adhered by the employees as well as widely and strongly shared within the organisation. It has also been found that strong organisational culture is more successful compared to weak culture in achieving the overall goal because of perceived coordination between culture and motivation of employees. Supporting this aspect, it has been stated by Odor (2018) that a strong culture exists in an organisation when every individual of this organisation follows and adheres to an agreed pattern of behaviour that has been found to be beneficial for the entire organisation.

It has been found by Thokozani and Maseko (2017) that organisational culture and employee motivation are closely interrelated. According to the findings of this study, the culture of an organisation can either encourage or discourage them to give out their best to achieve the organisational goal. According to this study, organisational culture mainly provides five different sources of motivation for employees. For instance, it provides missions to give the employees inspiration to believe in the importance of their agenda control and work. In addition to that it also exposes shared value creation that involves employee rewarding for best performance or successful efforts, learning opportunities, reputation, promotion and so on. These aspects are mainly related to strong organisational culture. From this point of view, it can be stated that a strong culture of an organisation enhances its employee motivation. Similarly, it has been stated by Yusof, Said and Ali (2016) that employees become more effective and efficient in their own job roles and give their best potential when there is a strong interrelation between organizational culture and employee motivation. Supporting these findings, it has been pointed out by Rahardja, Moein and Lutfiani (2018) that strong organisational culture improves employee satisfaction, employee relationship and performance of the employees which also indicates that strong and effective organisational culture has positive influence on employee motivation. Similarly, it has been stated by Lubis and Hanum (2020) that stronger company culture improves employee engagement and engaged employees are more likely to stay motivated, happy, as well as committed to the organisation. As a result, their performance is improved to meet the specific organisational goals.

According to Paais and PATTIRUHU (2020), spring organisational culture is considered as an effective driven force of employee performance. As per the findings of this study, it enhances the commitment and self-confidence of the employees and reduces job stress. In addition to that, effective workplace culture improves the ethical behaviour of the employees. As a result, the employees become motivated and give their best efforts and performance. Thus, employee performance is impacted with the culture of an organization. On the other hand, it has been argued by Ogbeibu, Senadjki and Gaskin (2018) that organisational culture directly impacts its employee and overall organisational performance in three ways. For instance, effective workplace culture supports organisational goals, raises productivity and improves business performance. In such a culture, employees are encouraged to develop positive and effective relationships with other employees and the workplace. In this way, they are encouraged to work collaboratively to achieve the common organisational goals. In this way, the overall performance of the organisation is being improved. Supporting this aspect, it has been stated by Lubis and Hanum (2020) that culture is one of the key principal factors contributing to organisational success as it significantly influences employee behaviour. As per the findings of this study, culture is essential to create a sense of teamwork, mindedness, ownership as well as communication in the workplace that in turn influences overall productivity and performance of the organisation. From this point of view, it can be stated that organisational culture has a significant and positive impact on the employee as well as organisational performance and productivity.

On the contrary, many studies have found ineffective management of organisational culture creates discrimination and unproductiveness in a workplace (Erikson and Verge, 2020). Workplace discrimination refers to a state where some employees are treated less favourably due to their culture, language, disability, value, race, education, gender, sexual orientation, national origin and so on (Webster et al. 2018). In order to avoid this kind of discrimination, the Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory can be implemented by the management team of an organisation.

Hofstede model of organisational culture

This theory of cross-cultural communication proposed by Geert Hofstede to identify five problem areas or dimensions in the context of differences among national cultures (Szydło and Grześ-Bukłaho, 2020). As per this theory, the five key dimensions include power distance, individualism/collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, long-term orientation and masculinity/femininity. In the individualism/collectivism dimension, individuals’ interest in the group prevailed. In this particular context, individuals are loyal and universal values applied to all in individualism while loyalty to groups and different values are given to different groups in collectivism. In case of masculinity, the organisational culture is more rigid in gender roles where the employees are motivated by material rewards (Webster et al. 2018). On the contrary, in case of femininity-based culture, the employees are motivated by quality of life and the workplace is more flexible in distributing roles on the basis of gender. On the other hand, in the case of power distance, the subordinates would not bypass or question the boss and as a result, the organisation can ensure high power distance. Thus, it becomes possible to value equally to all employees and avoid any kind of discrimination from the workplace (Diedericks and Visagie, 2018). Moreover, by accepting formal structures and rules, providing career stability, the organisations have become able to avoid uncertainty. Taking it into consideration, it can be stated that by implementing this theory, it can be possible to avoid different types of cross-cultural issues in managing organisational culture.

Conclusion

In the end, it can be concluded that managing organisational culture is important for improving overall performance and productivity of the employees and overall organisation. Organisational culture is mainly the norms and ways of thinking and acting of the employees. Strong organisational culture motivates employees to give their best effort and performance. However, by implementing the concepts of different cultural theories, such as Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory can be effective to avoid any kind of discrimination from the workplace. From the organisational cultural viewpoint, it can be said that maintaining the group dynamics is an important aspect for effective team performance.

Question 2

Introduction

Group dynamics is a combination of psychological processes and behaviours within a social group like within an organization. The behaviour, reaction, communication style and interactions of one group member with another are included in the basic concept of group dynamics (Gren and Lindman, 2020).  During the group discussion process valuable argumentative opinions of group members pave out the new ways of problem resolution. Focussing on the group dynamics presented in the Moneyball script and analysing the ways group dynamics can affect effective decision making is the main thesis statement of this essay.

Argument of the roles of a leader in maintaining group dynamics

In the Moneyball script, it can be seen that Billy is discussing the future strategies of their baseball team with the scouting department. There is a difference of opinion among the team members regarding the team selection for the next season. Billy is the team leader here and he has tried to clear out the exact problem ahead of his team members. Multiple times Billy has asked a single question, “Can He hit?” and kept asking the question to different team members until he has realized that team members are not concerned about the actual problem.

As indicated by Lin and Sun (2018), it can be said that transformational leaders are visionary and help the subordinates or the team member to place their points. Aligning with this concept, Billy has asked for the valuable opinion of all the team members which means that he is open to discussion. This scenario indicates that Billy is a transformational leader. Communicating mission and values with the team members is the basic feature of transformational leaders (Khattak, Zolin and Muhammad, 2020). As soon as Billy has understood that his team members have failed to address the actual problem, he has clarified the problem to them that they have to find a way out from the instance of unfair games where their team members are being grabbed by richer teams like the Yankees. Clear objective and vision of Billy can be understood from this.

In order to execute a change in an organization, intellectual stimulation is important. Questioning the assumptions or viewing a problem from different angles is a core speciality of a transformational leader (Yaslioglu and SelenayErden, 2018). Due to this reason Billy has provided equal chances to all its team members to describe the problem the basketball team is facing currently.

Transformational leaders can successfully maintain productive group dynamics as they keep switching the leadership styles based on the situational demand. While describing the problem to the team members Billy has become coercive in nature and directed the team members about his decision reading what is going to be done. On the other hand, the approach of discussing a problem with others is democratic in nature (Javanainen, 2021). Thus, it can be said that only in a single conversation Billy who is being identified as a transformational leader has switched his leadership style two times to take proper decisions.

Impact of group dynamics in implementing change management

From the Moneyball script, it can be noticed that the majority of the scout members have failed to identify the exact problem and they are not concerned about the unfair competition. Majority of the group members think in a traditional way while the leader Billy has approached a new way to win the lost game. The need of changing the organizational culture can be understood here. Cultural change within an organization or a team proceeds through several stages including Unfreezing, Change and Refreezing (Burnes, 2020). In the unfreezing team members need to realize the needs of changing culture in team decision making. As observed in the Moneyball script, high conflict among the team members is being experienced related to team member selection. It denotes that the team is entering the unfreezing stage of cultural change. 

Applying the key concept of the Big 5 model of personality trait, it can be said that inherent traits of the team members help in providing positive impact in executing a much-needed change within a team. Behaviour and roles of the group members have a direct impact on group dynamic during a need change (Hopwood and Back, 2018). Analysing the key traits of the team members as per the Moneyball script, it can be said that which members are good for the chase and who are not. Openness is the trait of Billy who is thinking differently and trying to change the situation with black horse players instead of referring to the valuable players whom they cannot afford. Conscientiousness refers to the members who refuse to adapt to change (Tedesqui and Young, 2018). Grady is an example of this kind of member who is not supporting the inclusion of Bill James as he is a security guard and does not meet the traditional player criteria. Extroverted people are emotionally expressive but impulsive in nature. All of the team members described in the script other than Billy are extroverts and all of them are impulsive. Therefore, an effective decision making cannot be expected from them. Emotional stability is an effect of a successful leader (Hadlington and Scase, 2018). It is the clear-cut viewpoint exerted by Billy that he is determined what he wants to do and guides the team in that way. Thus, it can be said that the team represented in the Moneyball script has mixed dynamics and the roles of different team members are affecting the team in different ways that is why so much conflict is being observed.

Applying the concept of group thinking in team decision making

Out of box thinking is similar to innovation and applying the group thinking is essential to execute any innovative change in a team or an organization (Jain and Jain, 2018). In a team like the Moneyball script, where people from different thoughts belong, the Hofstede cultural model fits to justify the decision-making process. The team in Moneyball has a low power distance. Billy as a team leader considers the opinion of the team members valuable. Team members in a low power distance enhanced team can question the boss about the actions. Uncertainty avoidance is high among the Moneyball team members. Accepting traditional rules, rejecting innovative ideas are indications of high uncertainty avoidance. On the other hand, Billy as a leader has low uncertainty avoidance. Avoiding formal rules, encouraging innovative ideas are the indicators of low level of uncertainty avoidance (Iqbal and Rasheed, 2019). Thus, in this case the group dynamics is varied and the difference of opinion has created conflict among the team members and the leader.

Importance of group dynamics in critical decision making

The understanding of the intragroup process reveals that individual thinking of individuals is different from the ways they exert while residing in a group (Katz, Sosa and Kovack, 2018). Sometimes people lose their individuality to align with the majority portion of the group. This trend can be observed in case of the common group members of the Moneyball team. None of them are willing to think out of the box as they fear about the uncertain outcomes. On the other hand, some people like to stand out while being in a group. Billy is the kind of person who has not lost his individuality even after being a member of a traditional group. Thus, it can be said that difference of opinion has impacted the equilibrium of the group dynamics in the Moneyball script. This also indicates that the group is going to be engaged in high conflict in the later stage of cultural change (Schein and Schein, 2018). As per the script, the cohesiveness of the team is not impactful and negative behaviours can hamper the group dynamics in the Moneyball team.

Conclusion

Group dynamics are important parameters of group conflict resolution. It can be used as a way of problem solving. At the initiation of anu change the rigid members of the group oppose the new ideas. It is the key responsibilities of the team leader that he/she discusses with the team members about the destined changes. Referring to the Moneyball script, it can be said that the leader Billy is open to discussion and provides ample chances to the team members to place their viewpoints. Rigidity of the team members, reluctance of accepting new changes, clash of traditional and innovative approaches of game strategy are some of the issues can be understood from the scene. Differences of opinion of the team members are creating conflict with the team leader. Here the leader is open minded to innovation but the team members are orthodox. Therefore, it can be said that the team is in the unfreezing stage of perceived change. Thus, it can be concluded that the thesis statement of the essay aiming towards the discussion of group dynamics in light of the Moneyball scene has been successfully achieved. The key issues that the group is facing now have been successfully identified as well. Thinking different is the key of success for the present group scenario as stated in Moneyball.