This monograph presents various approaches to understanding the multiple levels, layers, and definitions of culture, cross-cultural research, cross-cultural competence, the role of culture in organizations, organizational culture, and the role of multiple culture layers in individual workers’ workplace attitudes, performance, and general experiences. Inaugurating the new series SpringerBriefs on Culture, Organizations, and Work, it establishes both fundamental and controversial ideas related to the myriad ways of studying these topics. It highlights the wide variety of conceptual approaches for studying culture, organization and work and brings to light some of the critical questions related to culture (at all units and levels of analysis) and their effect on both the workplace and the worker in order to present a coherent educational resource for practitioners and researchers alike.

It is now widely recognized that countries around the world are becoming increasingly interconnected, and that both public and private organizations are of necessity becoming increasingly global. As political, legal, and economic barriers recede in this environment, cultural barriers emerge as a principal challenge to organizational survival and success. It is not yet clear whether these global realities will cause cultures to converge, harmonize, and seek common ground or to retrench, resist, and accentuate their differences. In either case, it is of paramount importance for both managers and organizational scholars to understand the cultural crosscurrents underlying these changes. With contributions from an international team of scholars, this book reviews, analyzes, and integrates available theory and research to give the best information possible concerning the role of culture and cultural differences in organizational dynamics.

This book challenges traditional organizational theory, looking to representations of work and organizations within popular culture and the ways in which these institutions have also been conceptualized and critiqued there. Through a series of essays, Rhodes and Westwood examine popular culture as a compelling and critical arena in which the complex and contradictory relations that people have with the organizations in which they work are played out. By articulating the knowledge in popular culture with that in theory, they provide new avenues for understanding work organizations as the dominant institutions in contemporary society. Rhodes and Westwood provide a critical review of how organizations are represented in various examples of contemporary popular culture. The book demonstrates how popular culture can be read as an embodiment of knowledge about organizations – often more compelling than those common to theory – and explores the critical potential of such knowledge and the way in which popular culture can reflect on the spirit of resistance, carnivalisation and rebellion.

Dr. Deepak Pralhad Raverkar is presently working as Principal of Sundarrao More Arts, Commerce & Science College, Poladpur Dist Raigad of Maharashtra (India). Dr Ravekar is a renowned academician having extensive teaching experience of 37 years at UG and PG level. He has also worked as Vice Principal and Head, Department of Commerce in Dr. Chintamanrao Deshmukh College, Roha-Raigad.With his commendable contribution in the three important areas of education namely, teaching, research & extension activities, Dr Raverkar has achieved excellence and is being respected for the same. He has also been contributing as a member of Board of Studies in Commerce, University of Mumbai since 2008. He is also working as a Member of Mumbai University's NSS Advisory Committee for the last two years. Presently, he is offering his expertise as a member of Board of Studies in Commerce formed by Mahaveer College, an autonomous institution of Kolhapur-Maharashtra Dr. Deepak Raverkar is a very passionate and prolific writer who authored 21 text and reference books through Sheth Publication of Mumbai and Mumbai University's IDOL department. The thrust area of his writing is HR management and commerce, as it aims to help the student community by explaining various critical concepts through lucid and eloquent language. His passion for academic writing also reflected in the research field as he has penned 25 research papers in the peer reviewed and UGC journals. He has also presented a number of research papers in national and international seminars and conferences. Under his experienced guidance, four students are pursuing their Ph.D presently. He has also worked as External Examiner and Referee of Ph.D Viva for Pune & Nagpur University. He has also worked as Resource Person & also chaired sessions in various national as well as international conferences & seminars. He has also given his contribution by offering his expertise as a Chairman and member on various University committees like LIC, Teacher Selection, CAS. Avishkar Referee Panel, etc. Recently, he has been appointed by University of Mumbai as a Convener of Poladpur Cluster under which 12 colleges have been successfully conducting online University examination during the period of Covid-19 pandemic. He has a very keen interest in industrial relations and HR development. With his multifaceted talent, Prin. Dr Deepak Raverkar is always eager to offer his expertise in the field of Higher Education by working relentlessly and devotedly for the betterment of the student community.

The purpose of this book is to reimagine the concept of culture, both as an analytical category and disciplinary practice of dominance, marginalization and exclusion. For decades culture has been perceived as a ‘hot topic’. It has been written about and deployed as part of ‘a search for excellence’; as a tool through which to categorise, rank, motivate and mould individuals; as a part of an attempt to align individual and corporate goals; as a driver of organizational change, and; as a servant of profit maximisation. The women writers presented in this book offer a different take on culture: they offer useful disruptions to mainstream conceptions of culture. Joanne Martin and Mary Douglas provide multi-dimensional holistic accounts of social relations that point up similarity and difference. Rather than offering totalising or prescriptive models, each author considers the complex, polyphonic and processual nature of culture(s) while challenging us to acknowledge and work with ambiguity, fluidity and disruption. In this spirit writings of Judi Marshall, Arlie Hochschild, Kathy Ferguson, Luce Irigaray and Donna Haraway are employed to disrupt extant management cultures that lionise the masculine and marginalise the concerns, perspectives and contributions of women and the diversity of women. These writers bring bodies, emotions, difference, resistance and politics back to the centre stage of organizational theory and practice. They open us up to the possibility of cultures suffused with multifarious potentiality rather than homogeneity and faux certainty. As such, they offer new ways of understanding and performing culture in management and organization. This book will be relevant to students and researchers across business and management, organizational studies, critical management studies, gender studies and sociology.

South Africa is celebrating its first decade of democratic freedom. It therefore seems appropriate to examine in more detail how South Africa has tried to restore some of the many social injustices caused by the former apartheid regime. This book offers a view into the world of organisation and management from a cultural perspective. The authors investigate how initiatives and policies with the aim of generating more employment equity have been developed, implemented and have worked out in various sectors of the South African economy. The various chapters present in-depth case studies that deal with the South African government, local NGOs, universities and tourism. The book reveals in detail the local struggles of the historically disadvantaged and the "powers-that-be", to try and live up to the ideals of the New South Africa.

In this book Linda Holbeche offers an historical narrative on the changing landscape of work since the 1980s and considers how definitions of organizational effectiveness have changed over time. She considers the characteristics and effects of the neo-liberal work culture of new capitalism, and how HRM practices have contributed to shaping this work culture. Influencing Organizational Effectiveness challenges mainstream thinking around business strategy, change and organizational effectiveness, and about the roles of HRM and management. While the overall tone of the book is critical, Holbeche argues that HRM can play an active role in giving voice to employees and advancing organizational effectiveness. Grounded in research, this book includes reflective questions, case studies and helpful guidelines to support HRM and organizational development professionals and master's-level students. It illustrates what ‘better’ might look like and how HRM can contribute to a new definition of effectiveness which is aligned to the needs of modern organizations.

Understanding Organization Through Culture and Structure: Relational and Other Lessons From the African American Organization presents an innovative view of organizations and the communication processes that constitute them. Arguing that human beings are communicatively embedded in their cultures, Anne Maydan Nicotera and Marcia J. Clinkscales, working with Felicia R. Walker, examine issues concerning task and relational orientations and the ways they and other cultural dimensions connect with organizational structure and function for predominantly African American organizations. Utilizing the results of their own research on organizations, they develop a set of humanistically-based models that illustrate how hidden cultural processes suffuse organizational life and are manifest through communication. Emphasizing the development of alternative theories and models of organizing which are rooted in African-American culture, such as team-based versus hierarchy-based interactions, this book explores such organizational functions as leadership and management, power, authority and control, communication and interpersonal dynamics, and cultural identity and human development. Applying their findings in a broader analysis of contemporary practices in organizational restructuring, the authors present research that serves as the foundation for generating several emergent models with significant implications for organizational systems. Understanding Organization Through Culture and Structure stimulates and inspires current researchers of organizational communication, and is certain to raise greater awareness of the operation of culture in organizing. The text is intended for scholars and students in organizational communication, management, organizational psychology, African studies, and related areas.

“Culture eats strategy for breakfast”. Peter Drucker’s provocative statement points to the importance of culture for organizations. Depending on its characteristics, culture contributes significantly to the success or failure of for-profit and not-for-profit organizations. Hence, managers and leaders need to have an understanding of this important concept for best results. This book provides relevant knowledge about the concept of culture. This includes its major characteristics and dimensions, the way culture functions and influences both the internal life of an organization and the resulting performance. The book describes the emergence and development of culture over time as well as the formation and influence of subcultures. Even though culture is always present, certain situations call for specific attention such as fast growth or stagnation, strategic alliances, M&As or situations of change. The book describes how to go about understanding and assessing an organization’s culture as a basis for culture change interventions as well as culture-sensitive and culture-mindful management and leadership.

Culture, Leadership, and Organizations reports the results of a ten-year research program, the Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness (GLOBE) research program. GLOBE is a long-term program designed to conceptualize, operationalize, test, and validate a cross-level integrated theory of the relationship between culture and societal, organizational, and leadership effectiveness. A team of 160 scholars worked together since 1994 to study societal culture, organizational culture, and attributes of effective leadership in 62 cultures. Culture, Leadership, and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Societies reports the findings of the first two phases of GLOBE. The book is primarily based on the results of the survey of over 17,000 middle managers in three industries: banking, food processing, and telecommunications, as well as archival measures of country economic prosperity and the physical and psychological well-being of the cultures studied. GLOBE has several distinguishing features. First, it is truly a cross-cultural research program. The constructs were defined, conceptualized, and operationalized by the multicultural team of researchers. Second, the industries were selected through a polling of the country investigators, and the instruments were designed with the full participation of the researchers representing the different cultures. Finally, the data in each country were collected by investigators who were either natives of the cultures studied or had extensive knowledge and experience in that culture. A unique feature of this book is that while it is an edited book and many experts have written the different chapters, unlike other edited books, it is a fully integrated, seamless, and cohesive book covering the many aspects of the theory underpinning the GLOBE.