Climbing out of organisational depression : culture change project after a toxic leadership episode

• Main Author: Ciuk, Sylwia
• Published: Oxford Brookes University 2011
• Subjects: 158.7
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.543813

The thesis aims to offer a culturally sensitive analysis of a culture change intervention undertaken in a Polish subsidiary of a North American Pharmaceutical corporation. This is achieved by first of all examining the context in which the initiative was undertaken and subsequently the many facets of its development and implementation. More specifically, the thesis investigates the underlying assumptions of the cultural intervention, its design and implementation, as well as the experiences and perceptions of different organisation members regarding it. The findings come from a longitudinal qualitative study. The data collection methods comprise eighty five semi-structured interviews, photo and word collages, observation and documentary analysis. Based on a constructivist ontology and interpretivist epistemology, the study pays special attention to the storied version of organisational reality as narrated by different participants. The study extends the previous work on the topic by offering insights into a relatively under-explored context of a traumatised Eastern European organisation which attempted to climb out of organisational depression by reinvigorating and promoting its long standing values. The study illustrates how the local situateness of the organisation, such as the communist history of the country, and the changes in the Polish political arena, affected the way participants perceived attempts at cultural manipulation. Furthermore, the thesis discusses how cultural interventions can perpetuate organisational delusion without necessarily leading to the desired behavioural changes. Finally, the findings highlight the instrumentality with which the espoused organisational values are approached and responded to by different organisational actors. To this end, the thesis puts forward the notion of the political reengineering of values to discuss how organisation members, both the agents and targets of change, can creatively engage in the official discourse to promote their individual or group interests.