It
is an axiomatic fact that organizational culture and corporate strategy are of equal
great significance for employers aiming at attaining competitive edge.
Organizational culture can make or break corporate strategy, but a strong
organizational culture would prove to be pointless whether not supportive of an
effective and winning strategy. A clear line of sight must hence to be
necessarily established between the two in order to ensure strategic cohesion and
consistency, and secure organizational success.
Fostering
an appropriate, suitable corporate culture and developing a potentially
effective, winning, sustainable organizational strategy, notwithstanding,
cannot of their own ensure employers the attainment of their intended
objectives. Strategy definitely represents a complex and intricate
organizational component, whose main difficulties are associated not only with its
development, formulation or formation, but also with its implementation. Despite
corporate culture plays a significant role in strategy implementation, the
quality of execution is not indeed exclusively depending on and associated with
this; the two components need thus to be considered separately. Yet, appropriate
formulation and good execution have not to be regarded as mutually exclusive; in
contrast, these definitely need to coexist. Effective formulation coupled with poor
execution, like good execution combined with ineffective formulation will not
enable an employer to obtain any positive result.
Table 1 – The strategy mix paradigm
All
in all, it clearly emerges that it does indeed exist a strong relationship
between corporate culture, strategy formulation and strategy execution.
Nonetheless, the significance and worth of strategy execution and corporate
culture risk being overshadowed by the lack of quality of strategy formulation.
Whereas this has been developed with the aim of inadvertently taking the
employer to the wrong place, organizational culture and strategy execution
would finally prove to serve the wrong purpose.
Organizational success can be attained by employers only whether strategy execution is properly sustained by corporate culture; each component, nonetheless, plays a remarkable, fundamental role. In order for organizations to obtain the intended results all of these components need to work as a virtuous whole; employers need hence to do whatever they can to avert triggering a vicious circle in which organizational success may be hampered by any of these factors.
The
guiding role definitely rests with strategy development, whose aim is
essentially that of identifying and defining the business direction.
Strategy
implementation is not actually concerned with strategy definition or
alteration; the role it plays cannot be hence considered as a leading role.
Notwithstanding, since execution can definitely be regarded as a decisive
factor, which remarkably influences the final and practical outcome of strategy
development, the role this plays in the process can be definitely regarded as influential.
Corporate
culture does not indeed feature or hold any strategic relevancy either in that,
albeit being of paramount importance for an organization, this is not concerned
with the identification of the direction the employer should point in for this
to attain competitive edge, but rather with the most suitable behaviour and
approach which should be fostered within an organization to enable the employer
to achieve its intended objectives. As such, the role played by corporate
culture in the process can be deemed supportive; this helps and sustains the
employer throughout the process and aims at enabling this to smoothly achieve
its aim.
As
discussed earlier, all of these components need to act and operate as part of a
whole and need therefore to be aligned the one with the other in order to
ensure and secure the business strategic cohesion and consistency. By reason of
the importance this last feature assumes, its role can be considered as
normative.
Table 2 – Key factor in organizational
success
All
of these components are or should in theory be under the employer control, but
in practice this is not indeed invariably the case. The element mostly prone to
spin out of the employer control is habitually represented by organizational
culture. In some instances, corporate culture may indeed fail to yield the
expected results and prove to not properly serve the employer cause by reason
of the employer underestimating this factor or of this fostering a culture
inconsistent with the desired objectives. The unconditional, genuine support of
all the organization managers and executives can indeed help employer to avert
this undesirable occurrence to arise.
Someone may argue that organizational strategy, by reason of the increased pace change occurs in the exogenous environment, might more often than not spin out of the employer control, too. This viewpoint can be actually considered well-founded; nonetheless, employers should invariably take control of their actions and most of all of the direction these want to go to. It is hardly imaginable that a business management might properly execute a strategy this can only retrospectively identify and foster the appropriate culture under these circumstances. Nowadays, the increasingly faster pace of change undeniably makes an impact on organizational strategy, but change has to be intended as an exogenous force exerting a considerable pressure on organizations, prompting thus employers and their management to constantly adapt to and anticipate it but not to submissively undergo it.
Taking
for granted that an employer has identified and adopted the right strategy potentially
enabling this to gain competitive advantage over its competitors, strategy
execution and corporate culture gain a paramount importance for its effectual practical
pursuance. In this instance, the right direction has been correctly identified
by the employer; the successful attainment of the intended objectives hence
exclusively relies on the execution phase in which culture definitely plays a
crucial role.
Organizational
success can be attained by employers only and only whether these focus and
devote the required careful, constant attention to corporate culture and
strategy implementation and execution. This may represent somewhat of a basic
formula for organizational success, employers clearly need to take heed of many
other components to complete the formula, but it is highly unlikely that
organizational success may ever be successfully pursued whether these basic pillars
have not been previously properly managed and addressed by employers.
Prior
to develop and implement a plan of action aiming, for instance, at introducing
some changes into their business or developing specific programmes with the
intent of motivating and engaging individuals, employers should invariably
ensure that all of these fundamental components have been properly reviewed and
that the adjustments eventually necessary have been promptly made. The activities
performed and the efforts made by employers to attain their intended objectives
may otherwise risk resulting in a dismal failure, with the consequent wastage
of all of the resources deployed by the organization to pursue their plans.
Longo, R., (2015), The
Basic Pillars Underpinning Organizational Success; Milan: HR Professionals.
