Organisational Culture Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3500 words

Organisational Culture - Essay Example During the last days of Enron and WorldCom, there was no trace of any organisational culture (Cameron & Quinn, pp. 36-37, 2011). People would go on to establish their own boundaries, rules and approaches and a former employee at Enron labels those days as a â€Å"roller coaster ride at the height of craziness†. On the other hand, employees of companies like Google, Nike, UniLever, Procter & Gamble, Pepsi, Coca Cola, Wal-Mart, Merck, Levis Strauss and others are more likely to know what their companies stand for and what is their way of doing things (Yanow, Ybema & Sabelis, pp. 13-14, 2011). This paper is an attempt to explore the concept of organisational culture, more importantly, with the practical example of Semco, a Brazilian success story. Most of the paper will focus on introducing the company and explaining in culture with different elements of its culture. Furthermore, the paper will also briefly attempt to apply a few models and theories of organisational culture on t he company allowing having a better understanding of Semco’s organisational culture. Discussion Company History and Profile Semco was a small bureaucratic company from Brazil, founded in the year 1953, started off with specializing in the business of manufacturing centrifuges for the vegetable oil industry. During the1960, the company jumped into the business of hydraulic pumps, load pumps, axles and other components for the naval industry, considering the growth of Brazilian naval industry. Antonio Kurt Semler, an Austrian engineer and the founder of the company always wanted his son Richardo Semler to take interest in the company’s operations and take over... This essay stresses that Semco is a fascinating company and what makes it so interesting and attractive is its organisational culture, which is almost one of its kinds. Even as of today, there are many American and European companies which are researching on Semco, trying to understand the real cause of its success and planning to apply its concepts, approaches, theories and models in their organisations as well. Over the past three decades, under the leadership of Semler, Semco has created such an organisational culture, which is exactly in line with the ideas and vision of its founder. This report makes a conclusion that Semco is about realizing the true potential of individuals, helping them in being as creative as possible and doing something different. Even, when the companies, which are highly centralized and extensively controlled by the senior management, want to generate new ideas, be creative, and create something new, they make autonomous teams and allow them to work freely. Semler has just expanded that idea from a few occasional work teams to the entire company. Semco has successfully created an organisational culture, which has the capacity to support the organisational goals of the company. Ironically, the most important goal of the company is not to bind their employees with goals, targets and other managerial â€Å"mumbo jumbo†. Therefore, the company does not need any radical changes in its culture in the near future; however, the company has to ensure that it is also ready for circumstances.