Shhh.... it's TRUE!

oh its so true. And the cultures can be seen over and over agin - the blaming vs the problem solving. the impulsive vs the ruminative. the indivudualistic vs the consensual. once you know the organizational culture your are dealing with, you can predict fairly accurately the strategies they will adopt. Has anyone ever done a Myers-Briggs type of classification for organizations?

Concerning the Myers Briggs for Organisations, a few years back a researcher conducted a study of the 'personality' of businesses and came to the conclusion that they are psychopathic. No classification as far as I remember but still an interesting find.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0120-03.htm

Interesting viewing!

Yes, organizational culture is crucial. I learned that in the business world and carried it over with me to the political world. There has been a recent discussion about non-profits learning from campaigns and I think this is an area where campaigns and nonprofits can learn from the business world on this. For more thoughts on this, check out my recent blog post about managing transition.

Its not a trend actually, but rather reflects the psychological state of being of an organization -- which after all is a living organism representing the psyche's and labor of all its staff and extended family of interns, consultant's fellows etc...

Changing an organizational culture is a significant phsychic shift. You can do it using various methdologies (cognitive, behavioral, etc...) by modifying management practices wholesale and accordingly -- not an easy (and potentailly impossible) job for any outside consultant unless they have sr. management's complete buy-in.

Or you can define the dysfunction and develop strategies around it
that recognze the problems. Perhaps these strategies may be imperfect, but they have the benefit of being implemented if you have successfully navigated the cultural landmines that would normally destroy them.

Sorry...not sure what the expression means. Does it mean destroys or nullifies? Yet the others commenting seem to say that one simply strategized AROUND a dysfunctional culture.