ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE Organizational Culture and Leadership, 3rd Edition

ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT MANAGING INTERNAL INTEGRATION 121characteristics such as the ability to negotiate, to convince, and tobe proved right by circumstance were emphasized. The formal systemof status was deliberately de-emphasized in favor of an assumptionthat everyone has a right to participate, to voice an opinion,and to be heard, because it was assumed that good ideas can comefrom anyone. As previously mentioned, however, because no onewas considered smart enough to evaluate the quality of his or herown idea, one always had to get buy-in if others were involved inthe implementation of that idea, and anyone had a right and obligationto challenge it. Aggression was thus channeled into the dailyworking routines but directed at ideas, not people. The furtherassumption—that once one was in the organization, one was amember of “the family” and could not really lose membership—protectedpeople from feeling personally threatened if their ideas werechallenged.Ciba-Geigy, in contrast, had a very formal system of allocatingpower: a system based on personal background, educational credentials,seniority, loyalty, and successful performance of whatever jobswere allocated to the person by higher authority. After a certainnumber of years, an employee acquired a rank similar to the kind ofrank one acquires with promotion in military service or the civil service,and this rank was independent of particular job assignments.Status and privileges went with this rank and could not be lost evenif the employee was given reduced job responsibilities. The workingclimate emphasized politeness, formality, and reason. Displays ofaggression were taboo, but behind-the-scenes complaining, badmouthing,and politicking were the inevitable consequences of suppressingovert aggression.Both organizations could be labeled paternalistic from somepoints of view in that they generated strong family feelings and adegree of emotional dependence on leaders or formal authorities.However, the drastic difference in how the rules of power allocationactually worked in these two organizations serves to remind us howvague and potentially unhelpful broad labels such as autocratic orpaternalistic are in characterizing particular organizational cultures.