Nonprofit Organizational Assessment

Research and Models
Several methods have been used to classify organizational culture. While there is no
single "type" of organizational culture and organizational cultures vary widely from one
organization to the next, commonalities do exist and some researchers have developed
models to describe different indicators of organizational cultures. Some are described
below:
Hofstede
Hofstede (1980) looked for differences between over 160 000 IBM employees in 50
different countries and three regions of the world, in an attempt to find aspects of culture
that might influence business behavior. He suggested things about cultural differences
existing in regions and nations, and the importance of international awareness and
multiculturalism for their own cultural introspection. Cultural differences reflect
differences in thinking and social action, and even in "mental programs", a term
Hofstede uses for predictable behavior. Hofstede relates culture to ethnic and regional
groups, but also organizations, professional, family, social and subcultural groups,
national political systems and legislation, etc.
Hofstede suggests the need for changing "mental programs" with changing behavior
first, which will lead to value change. Though certain groups like Jews and Gypsies
have maintained their identity through centuries, their values show adaptation to the
dominant cultural environment.
Hofstede demonstrated that there are national and regional cultural groupings that
affect the behavior of organizations and identified four dimensions of culture (later five)
in his study of national cultures:
Power distance (Mauk Mulder, 1977) – Different societies find different solutions
regarding social inequality. Although invisible, inside organizations power
inequality of the "boss-subordinate relationships" is functional and according to
Hofstede reflects the way inequality is addressed in the society. "According to
Mulder's Power Distance Reduction theory subordinates will try to reduce the
power distance between themselves and their bosses and bosses will try to
maintain or enlarge it", but there is also a degree to which a society expects there
to be differences in the levels of power. A high score suggests that there is an
expectation that some individuals wield larger amounts of power than others. A
low score reflects the view that all people should have equal rights.
Uncertainty avoidance is the way of coping with uncertainty about the future.
Society copes with it with technology, law and religion (though different societies
have different ways of addressing it), and according to Hofstede organizations
deal with it with technology, law and rituals, or in two ways – rational and nonrational,
with rituals being the non-rational. Hofstede listed some of the rituals as
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