Organisational Context and Culture

Organizational innovation through professional subcultures

The dominant organizational culture is maintained at the group level and serves to limit or guide behavior at the individual level. Conversely, professional subcultures are created through the influx and interaction of experts into an organization and can influence the dominant organizational culture. Experts with a diverse repertoire of cultural knowledge verify the cultural repertoire by meeting within the organization or interacting with colleagues outside the organization. This sharing of experiences and beliefs leads to the development and maintenance of a professional subculture that compliments, opposes, and balances the existing culture, influencing the status quo, improving and modifying existing belief systems, or major changes.

The stability of the organization's operating environment allows professional subcultures to either promote radical change or limit the gradual improvement of the dominant organizational culture. Professional subcultures may not be evident until the organizational context becomes unstable. In these circumstances, professional subcultures can gradually increase their level of control over the organization. Through their professional values, beliefs and practices, they gain group support and cohesion, occupy a dominant position over other groups, and legitimize their professional goals and actions. This allows professional subcultures to maintain the status quo, improve or modify existing belief systems, and influence major changes within organizations.

Figure 1. A Conceptual Framework for Understanding Organizational Culture

Source: Bloor and Dawson (1994), p. 280.

Subcultures can be divided into four main types. Enhancing subculture supports the status quo and reinforces the dominant organizational culture. Dissenting subculture opposes the dominant organizational culture and offers or advocates for alternatives and work practices that can achieve the organization's core values. Orthogonal subculture has their own beliefs and at the same time support the dominant organizational culture. Finally, Deferential subculture show respect for the dominant professional group and distance themselves from it. These four subcultures shape the dominant organizational culture in various ways. For example, enhancing subcultures and deferential subcultures have been shown to be compatible with dominant organizational cultures, and dissenting subcultures can provide organizations with the potential for innovation and change. And orthogonal subcultures have the potential to redefine the shared values of an organization through progressive adjustment.

Figure 2: A Provisional Model for Understanding Professional Culture in Organizational Context

Source: Bloor and Dawson (1994), p. 288.

Subculture is an essential element for innovation that allows an organization to break away from the existing dominant organizational culture and accept a new culture. Organizations need to nurture dissenting subcultures or orthogonal subcultures for innovation that changes organizational culture, and need to contain and avoid enhancing subcultures or deferential subcultures.

What helps and what hinders innovation

As new products, services, and processes emerge at an accelerating pace, organizations must prepare management capabilities, structures, and tools to adapt to new circumstances and anticipate changes in the external environment. In this sense, the innovation capacity of an organization can be seen as an essential factor for the success of an organization through competitive advantage. Various factors in an organization's innovation process can have a positive or negative effect on the innovation process. It can be divided into 10 factors that help the innovation process and 12 factors that hinder the innovation process. Not all of these elements are necessarily required or excluded, and the interrelationships of these elements vary from organization to organization, so the competence of those who manage the process in an uncertain innovation process is also important.

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Factors that help the innovation process

Support of senior managers refers to actions and strategies by senior managers that demonstrate clear goal definition, employee initiative, willingness to provide orientation, conflict resolution, and willingness and confidence to innovate. Support of mid-level managers is an action by mid-level managers that encourages employees to embrace innovation, acts as a bridge between ideas and end products, thereby empowering middle managers to affirm the value of innovation, build relationships of trust, and foster dialogue and coordination among employees. etc. are included. Support of working groups and employees refers to the support of working groups and employees for the innovation process, including employee engagement, acceptance, motivation, collaboration and engagement, and acceptance of new ideas and practices. Diversity of competencies of the group responsible for implementation includes diversity of knowledge, skills, and attitudes for innovation implementation, synergistic effects, approaches to innovation, creative solutions, and flexibility. Disclosure of information regarding innovation is to provide employees with clear, up-to-date information about innovation and to enable employees to embrace and participate in the innovation process through transparency and visibility. Strategies for incorporation of innovation in organizational routines refers to an organizational routine that facilitates, include linking between new and existing organizational structures resulting from innovation, integrating new ideas and existing practices, developing strategies and mechanisms, adapting to innovations and learning new practices. Participation of outside consultants and new employees utilizes external experts to meet human resources and capabilities that cannot be met within the organization, and strengthens the neutrality of the innovation process through hiring new experts or consultants. Planning of actions necessary to implementation is a detailed planning activity that effectively manages processes, gathers information, diagnoses, identifies best practices, and allocates resources to test, prototype development, and detailed plans to implement new ideas. Recognition of the value and need for innovation is the ability to overcome resistance to new ideas and practices, seize opportunities to elicit support, and minimize threats from the external environment. Finally, the Systemic perspective of innovation and interactions of organizational units is a systemic perspective of the innovation process, the process of implementing new ideas and practices through the development of concepts about interactions to establish cohesive strategies, optimize resources, and standardize procedures. and promote duplication of effort, strengthening of identity among working groups, and joint action of organizational units.

Impediments to the Innovation Process

Skepticism about innovation is a negative perception of innovation as distrust and skepticism permeate within the organization due to doubts and contradictions about the success of innovation. Difficulties of Inter-functional integration are obstacles that impede the joint action of organizational units that impede intra-organizational communication, adoption of standardized procedures, or organizational effectiveness. Excess of activities and lack of time is the lack of time spent on innovation, resulting in work failures, process planning failures, lack of training and experimentation time, and staff feeling pressured. Lack of support from senior managers is a lack of effort and action by senior managers to support innovation, a lack of will to resolve conflicts, and a reluctance or refusal to invest in innovation. Limitations in terms of human resources are factors that result from a lack of human resources, such as a lack of knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary for innovation, a lack of staff, and a lack of qualifications. Limitations in terms of financial resources are difficulties that arise from a lack of financial resources, such as funds, investments, and creditworthiness. Limitations in terms of technological resources are the lack of skills needed to implement new ideas and practices. Obstacles from the external environment are external obstacles that cannot be controlled, such as regulation, economics, predatory competition, and social disruption. Prioritization of end and/or short-term activities is the prioritization of short-term activities that provide immediate returns, making long-term innovation and growth difficult. Fear of the consequences of innovation is fear of innovation, which hinders innovation by feeling pressure, anxiety, or fear about new ideas and practices. Resistance to innovation because of loss of power occurs when there is action against new ideas and practices due to the threat of change in official and informal relationships among employees. Resistance to innovation due to a sense of accommodation is beliefs and values, cultural contexts, and rigid structures that do not support new ideas.

Figure 3: Checklist for Innovation Factors in the Organisational Context

Source: Souza and de Fátima (2013), pp. 115-120.

Through the 22 factors examined above, it can be seen that all members of the organization and the appropriate use of external personnel play an important role in the success of innovation. For the effective success of organizational innovation, it is necessary to accurately understand the characteristics and influence of each element. In order to implement new ideas and practices, it is necessary to properly reflect the factors that can help and hinder innovation, taking into account the unique characteristics of each organization.

References

Barley, S. R. (1983) ‘Semiotics and the study of occupational and organizational cultures’, Administrative Science Quarterly, 12(1), pp. 393-413.

Bloor, G. and Dawson, P. (1994) ‘Understanding professional culture in organizational context’, Organization studies, 15(2), pp. 275-295.

Souza, J. C. and de Fátima, B-F. M. (2013) ‘The innovation process in the organizational context’, Brazilian Business Review, 10(3), pp. 108-129.