Managers used to believe that successful organizations have one, strong, dominant culture. Every employee was supposed to know and believe in the values of the one organizational culture. Today’s best managers know that organizations can have a mixture of many subcultures each with their own strong values and beliefs. Some of these subcultures support and some conflict with other sub-cultures, but that is OK. Today’s best managers don’t get in the way of these subcultures, but help them co-exist and that makes employees happier and more productive, and makes the organization stronger.
Source: Morgan, P. I., & Ogbonna, E. 2008. Subcultural dynamics in transformation: A multi-perspective study of healthcare professionals. Human Relations, 61, 39-65.
