ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE
Concern for the culture of the work group is not new. As we have seen, in the 1930s and 1940s,
both Elton Mayo (1945) and Chester Barnard (1938) were stressing the importance of work-group norms, sentiments, values, and emergent in teractions in the workplace as they described the nature and functions of informal organizational life by viewing organizations as institutions rather than merely rational organizations. Institutions, according to Selznick (1957) extended the analysis of organizational life by viewing organizations as institutions rather than merely rational organizations. Institutions, according to Selznick (1957, p. 14) are “infused with value beyond the technical requirements at hand.” This infusion of value producesa distinctive identity for the organization; it defines organizational character. Selznick (1957) continues: