| Gerald L. Barkdoll |
The proposition explored in this article is that there are theoretical and empirical reasons to believe that individuals attempt to (and sometimes manage to) shape the culture of their organizations to fit their personal preferences. This proposition is an element of the larger debate over the relationship between individual personality and organizational culture. The nexus of individual personality and organizational culture explored in this article is behavior.
This article will briefly review contemporary attempts to define personality and culture with special emphasis on linkages between these two concepts. The nature and extent of these linkages will identify opportunities for individuals to shape organizational cultures to correspond to their preferences. During the course of this review we will also look for motives for individuals to shape cultures. In keeping with the "opportunity and motive" courtroom motif we will then look for anecdotal and more rigorous evidence that support the argument that individuals act on their preferences to shape the culture of their organization.
The final section of the analysis explores the weight of the evidence with respect to a final "verdict".
Culture
"The way we do things around here" is an efficient and frequently cited common sense definition of culture. Although this is an expedient definition it misses many powerful underlying concepts (1) including:
• Cultures are collective beliefs that in turn shape behavior. They are a form of a shared paradigm.
• Cultures are based in part on emotion which are particularly conspicuous when change is threatened.
• Cultures are based on a foundation of historical continuity. The potential loss of continuity in part explains the resistance to change.
• Cultures are defined by, and subsequently define symbols.
• Although cultures resist change, they are constantly changing. This paradoxical condition limits the speed of change and consumes large quantities of energy.
• Cultures are more probabilistic than deterministic . . . a set of fuzzy imperatives.
The perceived impact of organizational culture on individual behavior has been articulated for many years. M. P. Carrol observed in 1982 that culture, like morals, laws, and customs; shapes behavior, and is something that older generations hand down to younger ones.(Carrol, 1982) Hofstede likened culture to a collective programming of the minds of one group that differentiates them from other groups. He believes this programming derives from one’s social culture. (Hofstede, 1991) The advent of the computer has provided additional convenient metaphors for explaining the impact of culture on individuals. Hall likened culture to a large complex computer that programs the responses and actions of people. He argues that individuals must learn the programs of their organization’s culture if they are to make the system work. (Hall, 1987)
The impact of culture on behavior has been postulated for many years and its impact continues to be demonstrated. For example, 103 human resource professionals at major U.S. based organizations were asked to identify the most important factors influencing the management development programs in their organizations. (The Conference Board) Four factors were mentioned by over two-thirds of the respondents:
The Chief Operating Officer’s vision and values
The organization’s strategic plan
The operating needs of the line organizations, and
The organization’s culture
The potential impact of individuals on culture is a newer topic that is receiving increased interest as change, and change management, have emerged as important activities. Conner describes the transformation:
In the early 1970s, there were only a few organizations that were earnestly attempting to shift some aspect of their cultures. In the past ten years, as corporate culture has become a hot topic in the business press, the number of organizations intrigued with attempting some form of culture change has steadily increased. In fact, the idea of changing one’s corporate culture is now so in vogue that it would be embarrassing for an upwardly mobile manager to show up at a cocktail party without being able to engage in conversations about the latest "culture project". . . .What I find interesting is the number of executives who are earnestly depending on radical cultural transformation to save their job or even their company’s future. (Conner, 1993, p. 162)
Personality
The concepts of personality and culture are both pragmatic mechanisms for describing, explaining, and understanding human behavior. Both concepts attempt to answer a myriad of questions about observed, predicted, and controllable human behavior. They differ in their perspective in terms of the unit of analysis (individuals versus organizations), but they share many characteristics. The taken-for-granted set of assumptions that are held by the majority of members of an organization are the principle determinants of the culture. (Schein, 1996) A review of some of the better known mechanisms for categorizing individual personalities provides a glimpse into their diversity, potential applications, and relevance to culture.
Social Styles describes the behavior of individuals in terms of four general categorizations: 1. Amiables, 2. Analyticals, 3. Drivers, and 4. Expressives. (2) These categories are determined through the recorded observations of others, and subsequent confirmation by the individual. Each of the styles is expected to "work best" in a particular set of circumstances that may be directly related to organizational culture. Examples of these circumstances include:
• The Analytical style personality works best when the elements of a situation are organized and directions for implementing are provided by others.
• The Driver style works best when the climate is not constrained.
• The Amiable style works best when the climate is free of time constrains and pressure.
• The Expressive style works best in an open climate in which interactions with others are important.
Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation (FIRO) measures personal needs in three dimensions: 1. Inclusion, the degree of contact and prominence an individual desires, 2. Control, the extent of power dominance an individual seeks, and 3. Affection, the degree of closeness an individual seeks. FIRO includes two dimensions, inclusion and affection that may correspond to positive or negative traits of some organizational cultures. The control dimension of FIRO relates directly to the principle focus of this article since individuals with high control needs could be expected to actively work to change cultural attributes that do not meet their personal preferences. Later in this article we will explore the relationship between individual personality, and the reasons people are attracted to join, or motivated to leave organizations.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is recognized as the most widely used personality inventory in the world with about two and a half million individuals being "typed" in 1995. It is "designed to make Jung’s theory of psychological types understandable and useful in everyday life." (Myers, 1993, p. 1) It attempts to differentiate personal preferences on four scales:
Extroversion-Introversion (E versus I)
Sensing-Intuition (S versus N)
Thinking-Feeling (T versus F)
Judging-Perceiving (J versus P)
The relationship of characteristics measured by MBTI to culture are apparent when one reads the description of the 16 personality "types" it identifies. For example Introverted/Sensing/Feeling/Judging individuals may "become rigid in supporting hierarchy, authority, and procedures, and. . . .be uncomfortable applying impersonal logic to decisions, even when it is needed." (Myers, 1993, p. 9) There are similar preferences in the remaining 15 types that are likely to conflict or conform with cultural norms.
For a variety of reasons, the 16 MBTI types are sometimes divided into just four categories called temperaments. The four temperaments correspond somewhat to classifications first postulated in ancient Greece. (Keirsey and Bares, 1984) The MBTI based temperaments include:
• SJ (Sensing-Judging)—whose key focus and emotional needs include responsibility, tradition and a desire to maintain order.
• SP (Sensing-Perceiving)—whose key focus and emotional needs include independence, spontaneity and a desire to have fun.
• NT (Intuitive-Thinking)—whose key focus and emotional needs include competence, knowledge and a desire to lead and control.
• NF (Intuitive-Perceiving)—whose key focus and emotional needs are meaning and significance, to search for self (to become), and a desire for harmony.
The "Big Five" model has been proposed as a replacement for MBTI. The five factor personality model attempts to measure 1. Negative Emotionality, 2. Extroversion, 3. Openness, 4. Agreeableness and 5. Conscientiousness. There are six facets that further define each factor thus producing 5 times 6 or 30 distinct personality dimensions. (Howard and Howard, 1995) A substantial number of these 30 dimensions, including compliance, excitement seeking, warmth, trust, and order, are characteristics that may be nurtured or ignored in organizational cultures.
Opportunities for individuals to shape organizational culture are increased by the fact that certain personality types (as measured by MBTI) tend to cluster into disciplines and fields of employment. For example, a disproportionate number of extroverts are found in the fields of marketing, public relations and acting; while a disproportionate number of introverts are found in the fields of engineering, library work, and computer programming. Similarly, a disproportionate number of police, detectives and farmers are sensing types while a disproportionate number of writers, social scientists and research assistants are intuitive types. Thinking versus Feeling, and Perceiving versus Judging types are also unevenly distributed in other occupational areas. The net result is that many organizations are inhabited by a non-random population of individuals with similar preferences. This homogeneity provides increased impetus and decreased resistance to the shaping of a desirable culture.
Motives
By definition, personality typing addresses the preference of individuals. Personality preference is often compared to the preference for writing with one hand versus the other. It is possible to write with either hand, but one hand is more normal and comfortable to use. MBTI preferences are similarly described as: 1. preference of attention focus—inward or outward, 2. preferred source of information—their senses or their intuition, 3. preference of decision making, and 4. orientation to the outer world—judging versus perceiving. David Noer argues that the rugged individualism of the U.S. is in conflict with the confining aspects of culture. (Noer, 1993, p. 195) In a country that exalts the individual over the system, it would seem natural to find individuals attempting to change "the system" to meet their needs.
There are many ways individuals can act to satisfy their preferences because there are many activities and practices that collectively define a culture. Changes can be brought about by: 1. replacing key (and highly visible) employees, 2. reorganizing, 3. initiating new (or eliminating existing) forms of communication, 4. establishing new reward and recognition systems (including changes in the behavior that is rewarded), and 5. changing management processes, including meeting frequencies, attendance, and agendas. Although the prerogative to make many of these changes lies principally with the organization’s formal leadership, there are also many indirect ways for others with less formal power to bring about changes in the organization’s culture.
Some observers have suggested that the motivation of individuals to create their preferred environment actually creates organizations with characteristics similar to personality types. For example, William Bridges argues that the four MBTI dimensions provide a powerful construct to consider the "character" of organizations. (Bridges, 1992) The relationship between individuals is also demonstrated by team/group assessment instruments designed to "provide a description of the group’s type, team strengths, and weaknesses, [and] its problem-solving and conflict management style." (CCP, 1996, p. 14)
Daryl Conner contrasts two ways cultures are shaped: evolutionary and architectural. (Conner, 1993) The evolutionary model occurs when the culture is allowed to be shaped by random events. The architectural model is based on proactive, interventionist activity by leaders and managers. It is easy to predict Conner’s counsel based on the subtitle of his book "How Resilient Managers Succeed and Prosper Where Others Fail".
The importance of managing the organization’s culture and the ability of management to do so was emphasized in a conference hosted by the Conference Board in 1993. The published highlights of the conference included the following observation:
In the past few years, top executives’ interests in corporate culture has moved out of the realm of theory and into the realm of actual applications. Many managers are beginning to believe that successful innovation entails change in corporate culture—the company’s traditional values, beliefs and ways of doing things. Change the culture, they argue, and the organization can be reshaped. (Berman, 1986)
The concept of culture applies to multiple organizational levels. The concept is equally applicable to the engineering staff, the budgeting department, the agency, the department and the federal government. Similarly, the power to change an organization’s culture may reside in a critical mass of employees, the organization’s leadership or an external force, e.g., a Congressional threat to eliminate the organization unless it "changes its ways." Three examples of cultural changes based on personality preferences are described below. The first two are anecdotal and based on the direct observation of the author. (Some details have been modified to protect personal identities. The third example is based on research specifically designed to test the relationship between personality type and preferences for specific management processes.
The Evaluation Staff
Many government agencies have an evaluation staff whose job it is to review the activities of the agency. This program evaluation responsibility is approached from a variety of paradigms by different evaluation staffs including: 1. the auditing paradigm that focuses on the program's adherence to prescribed rules and regulations, 2. the prescriptive paradigm that focuses primarily on developing and promoting specific decisions and processes, and, 3. the research paradigm that focuses on discovering new insights about the program and its environment that will enable the program manager to make more informed decisions.
One evaluation staff had a long history of operating in the auditing mode. Observers of this particular staff reported they sometimes behaved like investigative reporters hoping to identify and publicize errors and problems. The staff’s culture matched their behavior. A new manager was put in charge of the staff. The new manager was an INTJ in MBTI terms and was most comfortable with evaluation processes that resembled research and open, shared discovery of new insights and learnings. The new manager was an "Analytical" in Social Style terms. The Analyticals' typical approach is to learn as much about a situation as possible before making a recommendation or suggestion. Analyticals are typically perceived as approaching goal achievement with maximum information and minimum risk.
In less than two years, the new manager had changed the evaluation staff’s approach from auditing to research. The prescribed relationship with program managers changed from that of "target" to "client." Evaluation activities changed from closed and secretive to open and sharing, and the development of new insights based on rigorous analysis became the basis for recommendation and change. The change involved staff turnover, reorganization, and behavior modification; but in the end the new manager was comfortable with the new climate he had created.
The Bureau
The leadership of the bureau had changed six times over 14 years, but each new bureau director had accepted the exiting organization structure that included a deputy bureau direct, six line organizations, six staff offices and a fluctuating number of special assistants. Bureau management processes and activities had been designed to employ and support the bureau’s "Management Counsel" that included the 13 to 17 employees who reported directly to the bureau director. A variety of routine meetings, annual goal setting and resource allocation processes had been established to manage ongoing operational, ad hoc issues and policy review and development.
When a new director took over the management of the bureau, experienced observers immediately recognized him as a strong (MBTI) introvert. (3) Although there was no substantial change in the bureau's assigned functions, available resources, primary activities or personnel; there was a dramatic change in the bureau’s culture. In about a year, the bureau’s structure had been reorganized so that only five people reported directly to the bureau director. The new director typically avoided Management Counsel meetings and repeatedly expressed his desire for small rather than large meetings. The "way of doing business" and many other cultural characteristics changed.
The linkage between the new director's introverted preference and the reorganization was clearly evident in the papers announcing and justifying the new organization arrangement. The formal justification included arguments for reduced span of control, and argued that the current structure required one person to directly oversee too many functions and activities. The number of functions and activities were established by legislative mandate and did not change, but the number of different people the new director faced on a day to day basis dropped dramatically.
The Federal Government
Sequential management paradigms are not a new phenomenon to the federal government. Planning-Programming-Budget-System (PPBS), Zero Base Budgeting (ZBB), and Management By Objective (MBO) are all familiar terms to seasoned practitioners and students of Public Administration. Each of these paradigms was in vogue for a period of time during the 60s and 70s, and were developed, tested, used and finally replaced in what is now recognized as a relatively orderly progression. Recent experience stands in stark contrast with multiple management paradigms being simultaneously touted as the best way to run the government. Reengineering, Total Quality management and the various activities encompassed in the Government Performance and Results Act are three paradigms competing for official recognition and universal application.
Implementation of these management paradigms have a direct impact on organization culture. Most, if not all, of the contemporary management paradigms focus specifically on changing the culture of the organization through client orientation, doing more with less, and increasing accountability through the use of performance indicators and other initiatives.
What precipitates these new culture modifying initiatives? This is a question that is frequently asked as mangers attempt to understand, select and utilize the paradigm of greatest relevance and value. One possible answer is the basic premise of this article; management initiatives come from the personal preferences of individuals or groups of individuals. In essence, the dueling management paradigms may just be tangible evidence of the different personality preferences of individuals or groups.
A research effort was conducted to determine if government executives with different personality preferences were attracted to different management paradigms. There was particular interest in discovering differences between executives who represented two different MBTI personality temperaments, the SJ’s and the NT’s. Approximately 85 percent of federal executives are NTs and SJs. The preponderance of these two personality types and their contrasting preferences sets the stage for conflict.
One hundred and thirty one executives completed a questionnaire that asked for their reaction to eight different management activities including:
• Developing an annual performance plan, including outputs and outcomes.
• Developing an annual performance report, including goals met and not met.
• Working to constantly improve the organization’s operations through analysis and change.
A panel of MBTI experts had predicted that the SJ executives would be more attracted to developing an annual performance plan, and producing an annual report than the NT executives. As one member of the panel observed, "SJ’s just love to make lists of things to be done, and then check items off as they are completed. They think everyone else should make lists and check them off too." The NT executives were expected to be more partial to the idea of constant change than the SJ executives because the NTs tended to focus on the future and on what is possible rather than what is current reality. The analysis of the 131 responses supported the predicted preferences although only the two predictions about the SJ preferences were statistically significant.(4)
Recent high profile court cases have demonstrated how the levels of evidence are related to the seriousness of the "charge." There is a corresponding scale of "evidence" related to verdicts about behavioral hypotheses. Reaching a verdict about the overall relationship between individual personality and organizational culture requires more evidence than has appeared to date. In fact, reaching some agreement about this complex relationship has been confounded by the presentation of persuasive but contradictory arguments. Much of the debate has focused on identifying the dependent and independent variables in the equation. Some have argued convincingly that an organization's culture determines the nature of its members, while others have argued just as convincingly that the organization's members shape the culture. Schein posits that the impact of culture on behavior has not been adequately recognized. He states "We did not grasp that norms held tacitly across large social units were much more likely to change leaders that to be changed by them. We failed to note that ‘culture’ viewed as such taken-for-granted, shared, tacit ways of perceiving, thinking and reacting, was one of the most powerful and stable forces operating in organizations." (Schein, 1996) Schneider on the other hand argues the ". . . organizations are the people in them . . . people make the place . . . we have tried to change organizations by changing their structures and processes when it was the people that needed changing. With changes in people, the necessary changes in structure and process will occur." (Schneider, 1987)
This argument about the "real" relationship between individual personality and culture will probably go on indefinitely because of the complexity of both entities and their interactions. Even simplifying the discussion to focus on the personality preferences of an organization's leaders does not provide an opportunity to reach a comfortable verdict. The answer always is . . . "it all depends." The power of the culture to change the leaders and vice versa depends on: 1. the extent of congruency between the values and norms of the organization and the leaders (small changes are easier than big ones), 2. the breadth, depth and uniformity of the organization's cultural norms and values, 3. the size of the organization, 4. the skill, determination and tenure of the leaders, and increasingly, 5. the recognized urgency for the organization, or the leaders, to change in order to thrive or survive.
Fortunately, it is much easier to reach a verdict on the more narrowly focused "allegation" presented in this article. Do individuals attempt to (and sometimes manage to) shape the culture of their organizations to fit their personal preferences? The verdict is clearly "guilty as charged." The evidence demonstrates that the leaders of organizations have already concluded that people shape cultures as they set about to reshape the culture of their organizations.