cameron and green making-sense-of-change-management

7Cultural changeIf you were asked to give a new recruit some words ofencouragement on how to be successful within your organization,what would you say? You might give some formaladvice about carrying your ID at all times, but you mightalso make some of the following suggestions:Keep your head down.It’s OK to make mistakes here, as long as you don’t repeat them.The boss likes to see you working really hard at all times.We work hard but play hard. The people who get on here worklong hours but enjoy themselves in the pub afterwards.It doesn’t pay to ask too many questions.You’ll find everyone pulls together here and will want to see you as part ofthe team.With this helpful advice, you begin to educate the person about the waythings get done around the organization. You also reveal what some ofthe required behaviours are, and thus you actively reinforce theprevailing culture.As Schein (1990) says, culture is the ‘the pattern of basic assumptionsthat a given group has invented, discovered or developed in learning to255