What are the main features of the Organisational Culture of Management within The Technical Studies Institute ? Investigating staff attitudes to present management styles and management related issues.

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What are the main features of the Organisational Culture of Management within The Technical Studies Institute ? Investigating staff attitudes to present management styles and management related issues.

Name : Ayaz Iqbal.

Registration Number : 5080.

Module Name : Leadership and Strategic Management.

Tutors Name : Mr. Jeremy Edward Salisbury.

Date of Submission : 1-9-2002..

CONTENTS.

Introduction …………………………………………….…….…3

Literature review………………………………………..……….6

Investigation……………………………………………………13

Analysis………………………………………………………...16

Conclusion…………………………………………………...…27

Appendices……………………………………………………..30

References……………………………………………………...36

INTRODUCTION.

Many lecturers at the Technical Studies Institute would often sit together in their free time complaining about management, a management who has organised one of the easiest working days of an educational establishment, but also one of the highest paid jobs too. It is also curious that a noticeable group of these lecturers have been there for at least ten years.

There was a need to find out the nature of complaints by so many lecturers, whether they were venting or did they have genuine reason for their complaints. This study was to focus on the organisational culture of management at TSI, from the lecturers’ perspective. Hopefully to create a fuller understanding of the prevalent culture, then presenting findings to management indicating change is required, and/or highlight to staff that they are complaining unjustly.

The Technical Studies Institute itself is a military college in the United Arab Emirates, governed by rules laid down from the armed forces General Head Quarters.

TSI has the following mission statement :

        ‘The mission of the Technical Studies Institute is to train and produce academically and practically competent generations of national technicians in accordance with the most developed scientific techniques to operate and maintain the various equipment of the armed forces.’

This has been translated in practice into an institution that prepares students in achieving both internally set and external city and guilds qualifications in the fields of electrical and mechanical engineering. Then successful students are passed on to a specialist training department to develop their practical skills on military equipment. All lectures are conducted in English, except their requirements of Islamic and Arabic classes. Some students go on to do a B.eng. programme from universities overseas such as UK, USA, Australia and some in the UAE itself (which even though have mainly lecturers from the previously mentioned countries are not considered as prestigious).

The TSI is one of the units situated in a purpose built military city in the desert, approximately 80 km from the nearest city (Abu Dhabi). There are about 1500 students ranging in age from 16 to 28 who are expected to stay on the military base during the week, and are allowed to visit their families on the weekends (Thursdays and Fridays). The older students are allowed to visit Abu Dhabi as a privilege during the evenings for a few hours.

The staff at TSI comprise of an interesting mix of nationalities. Only UAE nationals (‘locals’) hold military officer status. They often hold administration and management jobs with a wide range of responsibilities from the mundane to the intricacies of running an institution. United Kingdom citizens often hold academic advisory posts, section supervisor posts (with restricted powers contributing to the function of management) and mostly lecturing posts. Sudanese, Jordanian, Syrian, Palestinian citizens (and a few from other Arabic speaking countries) are well represented, they hold lecturing posts and technician posts in the main. Pakistani and Indian citizens generally hold technician posts and some curriculum design posts.

Staff have living quarters in Abu Dhabi (80km away) or Dubai (150km away), and travel each day to and from work.

LITERATURE REVIEW. 

From the Business world, management is often defined as

The attainment of organisational goals in an effective and efficient manner through planning, organising, leading and controlling organisational resources, (Daft 2000, p.7)

Where the four management functions are summarised as

Planning:         Setting goals for future performance and deciding ways in which to attain them; What tasks, What resources.

Organising:        Organising the tasks, grouping them into departments and allocation of resources to the departments.

Leading:        Using influence to achieve the organisational goals, creating a shared culture and value system, communicating goals to the staff, motivate staff to perform at a high level.

Controlling:        Controlling staff activities, checking whether the organisation is on target with its goals, making corrections where necessary.  

        

This definition seems to be taken on-board when Everard and Morris, (1990) identify their five stages of educational management

  1. Setting direction, aims and objectives.
  2. Planning how progress will be made or a goal achieved.
  3. Organising available resources (people, time, materials) so that the goal can be achieved in the planned way.
  4. Controlling the process (i.e. measuring achievement against the plan and taking corrective action where appropriate).
  5. Setting and improving organisational standards.

It is interesting to notice a dichotomy here in that according to Everard and Morris, (1990), leadership is not encompassed within management, but is considered a distinct entity.

Leadership is said to be related to vision and values and management to processes and structures. A leader would have qualities such as being a visionary, passionate, creative, flexible, inspiring, innovative, courageous, imaginative, experimental, initiates change, have personal power. A manager would have qualities such as being rational, persistent, consulting, problem solving, tough-minded, analytical, structured, deliberate, authoritative, stabilising, have position power, (Capowski 1994).

According to Schon, (1984), one can be a leader without being a manager, and a manager can manage without being a leader, but more often than not managers are expected to lead, and becomes acceptable to treat management and leadership as one.

Below shows a summary of the differences in the five models of management adapted from Bush (1995, p.147)

Organisational culture

Organisational culture is considered the sixth management perspective. It constitutes those informal relationships and values which represent the practice and aspirations of individuals. These are manifested through symbols and rituals rather than the formal structure of the organisation (which constitute the official goals and formal relationships). Often managers are expected to shape ritual and tradition in educational establishments in order to improve organisational effectiveness.

Cultural models assume that beliefs, values and ideology are at the heart of organisations. Individuals hold certain ideas and value-preferences which influence how they behave and how they view the behaviour of other members. These norms become shared traditions which are communicated within the group and are reinforced by symbols and ritual. (Bush 1995, p.130)

It has become important for managers to understand culture and identify those unofficial and intangible elements that affect the functioning of an organisation. Only after shared values and beliefs are understood, can we successfully consider effecting educational improvement. Gone are the early days of looking solely at the very formal bureaucratic classical perspective of management, where the needs of the individual in a social context were ignored, nowadays uniqueness is considered a virtue and that culture as a whole should be valued and fostered.

It has been the aim of the UK government to produce ‘self-managing’ schools since the early 1990’s. This ultimately will result in unique entities and a stronger appreciation of culture that will affect the character of these unique educational establishments.

O’Neill (1994, p.105) refers to Deal’s (1988) discussion of several elements of culture which are enacted in a variety of ways:

  • Shared values and beliefs expressed in written form.
  • Heroes and heroines who typify desirable organisational behaviours and personal qualities.
  • Rituals that allow members to come together and reinforce core values.
  • Ceremonies that celebrate those values
  • Stories, which communicate and disseminate philosophy and successful practice.
  • An informal network of cultural players which serves to maintain the culture in the face of pressures for change.    

Values and Beliefs – Individuals of an organisation will bring their own values and beliefs to it. When values are shared by individuals the organisational culture has been created. When the culture is widely known and understood, the organisations members constantly reinforce it through their discourse and their actions. Events and behaviours are interpreted using cultural norms. Conformity with these norms may be ‘rewarded’ by approval or ‘membership’. (Morgan 1986, p.128).

In reality, in most large organisations there are separate and often competing groups creating subcultures that share different values from each other and the organisation as a whole, called a ‘balkanised’ culture by Fullan and Hargreaves, (1992, p.71)

‘Teachers in balkanised cultures attach their loyalties and identities to particular groups of their colleagues. They are usually colleagues with whom they work most closely, spend most time, socialise most often in the staff room. The existence of such groups in a school often reflects and reinforces very different group outlooks on learning, teaching styles, discipline and curriculum’.          

Shared norms and meanings – Nias et al. (1989, p.39) shows how group norms were established from their case study of primary schools:

        As staff talked, worked and relaxed together, they began to negotiate shared meanings which enabled them to predict each others’ behaviour. Consequently each staff developed its own taken-for-granted norms. Because shared meanings and ways of behaving became so taken for granted, existing staff were largely unaware of them. But they were visible to newcomers… Researchers moving between schools were constantly reminded of the uniqueness of each school’s norms.

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Rituals and ceremonies – Schools are full of rituals and ceremonies, which are often used to develop and maintain its organisational culture according to its members. The organisation has opportunities both internally and to the external environment to promote its goals, values, beliefs and examples of ‘good’.

O’Neill (1994, p.104) talks about schools and colleges needing to relate successfully to their external environment and that changes in behaviour of the organisational culture help modify established norms and values. He goes on to say that tangible manifestations of culture are of primary importance within the organisation. They help to ...

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