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1. Chapter 8
Cultural Control, Diversity, and Change

2. Cultural Control, Diversity
and Change
• Cultural Control
• Organizational Culture and Diversity
• Traditional Perspective
• Interpretive Perspective
• Critical Perspective
• Ethics of Diversity

3. Cultural Control
• Limits of Managerial Action
• Ideology
• Organizational Assimilation and
Socialization

4. Limits of Managerial Action
• The culture of an organization arises from and
can be changed by many complex economic,
technological, and social forces including the
diversity of the workforce
• Today, such forces are reshaping organizational
cultures
• Although managers and all organization
members should plan for these changes, the
changes will occur whether or not management
wants them

5. Limits of Managerial Action
What can managers do to exert their influence?
• Systems of concertive control: management produces a
value-based corporate vision that guides member behavior
and decision-making (e.g., Saturn Corporation’s founding)
• The value and factual premises linked to this vision
statement are accepted by employees in exchange for
incentives such as continued employment, wages, and
salary
• Workers then exhibit their identification with this vision
when, in making a decision, they perceive the
organization’s values and interests as relevant in
evaluating alternative choices (Tompkins & Cheney,1983).

6. Limits of Managerial Action
What can managers do to exert their influence?
• Codification of values and beliefs, promotion of
interaction and close ties among employees,
taking care of newcomers through socialization
activities, and carefully monitoring the extent to
which corporate values, norms and practices are
received and put into use by employees (Van
Maanen & Kuda, 1989)

7. Ideology
• Ideology: the body of ideas that reflect the social
needs or world-view of an individual, group, or
culture.
• Two approaches to understanding ideology: interest
theory and strain theory.
• Interest theory: ideologies emerge “against the
background of a continuous struggle between various
groups who vie for power in society; the most
powerful group is the one which is able to
institutionalize its own particular world-view or
ideology.” (Mumby, 1989)

8. Ideology
• Strain theory: people accept a particular ideology
because it provides them with the means of dealing
with the strains associated with a social role.
• A subordinate may accept a manager’s
interpretation of a work rule because it both meets
the manager’s expectation of what “good
performance is” (enhancing the manager’s
evaluation of the subordinate) and it prevents a
troublesome conflict from surfacing between them.

9. Ideology
• When managers attempt to persuade workers to
adopt certain values, norms and ideas about what is
good, important, and praiseworthy; they are engaging
in a form of ideological control (Alvesson, 1993)
• Even if managers dominate ideology formation,
counter-meanings can surface to challenge their
dominance.
• One group cannot impose an ideology on another
without expecting some sort of challenge. Alternative,
resistant interpretations are always possible (Mumby,
1989)

10. Organizational Socialization
and Assimilation
Jablin’s (2001) Four-Stage Model
• Anticipatory Socialization
• Organizational Anticipatory Socialization
• Organizational Entry and Assimilation
• Organizational Exit

11. Anticipatory Socialization
• Children learn about how they should act in
organizations based on conversations they have with
family members (listening to dinner table talk when
their parents talk about their jobs).
• Information about what to expect in organizations is
gleaned from lessons at school that describe work in
different types of jobs and companies.
• Peers and friends, as well as the media may
influence our thinking.
• Part-time employment provides insights into what to
expect when working in an organization.

12. Organizational
Anticipatory Socialization
• Workers receive information based on formal or
informal recruitment strategies used by organizations
(advertisements, articles in trade publications, and
initial contacts with organizational representatives).
• During a selection interview applicants are exposed to
information about the organization (May be distorted by
exposure to exclusively positive information).
• The employee may also be exposed to messages that
start to give insight into the culture of the organization
and “the way things are done around here.”

13. Organizational Entry and
Assimilation
• Orientation sessions (may include description of
culture)
• Job-oriented training
• Formal/Informal socialization from experienced
co-workers and managers
• Actively seek out information
• Assimilation: seeking information to carve out
space for individual control and personal
empowerment (changing the organization)

14. Organizational Exit
• Although an employee may leave an
organization for reasons other than being
controlled or manipulated by its culture (e.g.,
retirement, a more lucrative offer, etc.), exit
may characterize an employee’s
dissatisfaction with having his or her needs
met.

15. Organizational Culture
and Diversity
• Workplace diversity exists when an organization
employs members of different demographic
characteristics (gender, race and ethnicity, age, and
physical ability)
• Expanded interpretation: diversity involves not only
variation in demographics, but also variation in modes
of thinking, feeling, and acting
• Contemporary organizations operate in an increasingly
complex global environment. Success in this
environment requires creative thinkers who approach
issues or problems from multiple perspectives .

16. Organizational Culture
and Diversity
• How does workplace diversity influence and change
organizational culture?
• The most undeniable source of change at the
moment is the increasing diversity of people who
make up the workplace.
• The emergence of alternative, resistant ideologies is
more likely to occur when an organization employs
members who have different perspectives or
worldviews.

17. Organizational Culture
and Diversity
• Workforce 2000: predicted radical changes in the
composition of the twenty-first century American
workplace due primarily to the entry of vast numbers
of women and minorities into the labor market.
• The predictions made in this report started to occur in
the 1990s and continue today.
• Organizational discussions have shifted from
“changing corporate culture” through cultural
engineering to diversity management, and learning
how to value diversity.

18. Traditional Perspective
• Management should control a diverse corporate
culture in ways that promote efficiency and
productivity, harnessing diversity to benefit the
organization
• Diverse worldviews may increase the pool of
creative ideas in an organization, so diversity may
improve the quality of group decision-making
• Concerned with pursuing diversity in ways
consistent with federal mandates and the
guidelines set forth by the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission

19. Traditional Perspective
• Affirmative Action and Its Misconceptions
• Managing the Diverse Organization

20. Affirmative Action
• Coined by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965
when he issued Executive Order 11246
prohibiting federal agencies from contracting with
firms that were not committed to affirmative
action.
• Companies must engage in “vigorous efforts to
bring people of color into jobs from which they
had previously been excluded” (ACLU, 1995).

21. Affirmative Action
Misconceptions
• First, affirmative action is often linked to
quota systems.
• In fact, quotas are illegal.
• Second, affirmative action promotes
preferential treatment.
• Conversely, affirmative action is “an equalizer
that accommodates people whose gender
and color have long been viewed as proxies
for incompetence” (ACLU, 2000).

22. Affirmative Action
Misconceptions
• Third, affirmative action programs force employers to
hire and admit unqualified people just because they are
non-white or female.
• In fact, affirmative action has never been about hiring
people solely because of their color or sex without
concern for their abilities.
• Fourth, reverse discrimination penalizes white males.
• Restructuring a discriminatory status quo to create a
nondiscriminatory environment isn’t reverse
discrimination. It may feel that way because something
is being lost: white favoritism (ACLU, 1995).

23. Supreme Court Cases
• Gratz v. Bollinger (2003)
University of Michigan
College of Literature, Science and the Arts (LSA)
The LSA program was found to be improper because
the admissions department automatically awarded 20
points (out of a possible 100) to every
underrepresented minority applicant solely because
of race

24. Supreme Court Cases
• Grutter v. Bollinger (2003)
University of Michigan Law School
The Law School’s program was supported
because of its“holistic and individualized
assessment where admissions officers and law
school deans, count race as one of many
relevant factors as they select a law school class”
(Guinier, 2003)

25. Grutter v. Bollinger
(2003)
The Supreme Court also supported the
argument that diversity may be considered a
“compelling government interest” and that
“educational institutions have the authority to
decide that diversity is essential to their
missions”

26. Managing and Valuing
Diversity
• In order to successfully manage diversity, groups
must be willing to share power.
• Minority group members should be encouraged
to innovate their work roles by engaging in
behaviors that are more consistent with their
cultural heritage.
• Institute programs that value diversity
emphasizing that people who are different should
be able to maintain their cultural and ethnic
identities in a pluralistic society.

27. Valuing Diversity
• Valuing Diversity means integrating the
perspectives and behaviors of racial and
ethnic minorities into the workplace so no
single ideology silences the voices of those
who can make important and meaningful
contributions.
• Valuing diversity means that minority group
members are a part of the organization’s
leadership team.

28. Managing the Diverse
Organization
• Exhibit a global perspective
– Learning about people representing diverse groups including their
perspectives, tastes, trends, technologies, and approaches to
business and communication.
• Transition and adaptation
– Develop specific knowledge of various diverse groups and
learn how to adapt your thinking and behavior to respond
and work effectively with these new workers.
• Lived cultural experience
– Ultimately, managers must be comfortable living among
workers representing diverse groups. Taking an assignment
in an organization’s overseas affiliate to learn more about
the culture of a particular group.

29. Interpretive Perspective
• How Diversity Effects Organizational Culture
• Age

30. Diversity and Org Culture
• Diversity in an organization produces differences in
the worldviews that are represented, creating a more
complex and diverse social construction of reality.
• Prejudices may lead some experienced employees to
devalue the contributions of new group members and
do everything they can to make adjustment difficult
for them. This creates a culture dominated by
struggle for diverse workers.
• Increased conflict related to broadening the
worldviews present within an organization as more
diverse members join the ranks.

31. Diversity and Org Culture
• Creativity is often inspired by the blending or
juxtaposition of differences to produce a new way of
seeing a problem
• When an organization employs people from diverse
groups a statement is being made about how that
organization respects, celebrates, and values
differences among people. This impacts how
employees from diverse groups feel about working
for a company.
• Employees from dominant groups may feel positive
about working for an organization that supports and
respects people from many different groups.

32. Age and Culture
Age
• Age differences among employees will add to cultural
diversity because of unique values and worldviews
embedded in varied age groups.
• The workplace of the next decade or so will be
inhabited by four basic age groups: Traditionals,
Baby Boomers, Generation X, and Millennials
• The values and needs of these four groups are not
especially compatible, and organizations will need to
creatively reconstruct the workplace and work
processes to maximize the effectiveness of each
group and achieve levels of mutual tolerance.

33. Traditionals
• Born between 1925 and 1945 and influenced by
the history of catastrophic events such as the Great
Depression and World War II. They tend to regard
Baby Boomers as disrespectful, too blunt, yet also
too "warm and fuzzy." They regard Generation X
as impatient and unethical and Millennials as too
distracted by technology.
• Former President George Bush, and
Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy

34. Baby Boomers
• Born between 1946 and 1964, they comprise the
enormous post-World War II generation that
created, or, grew up under the influence of the
1960s counterculture. They tend to see
Traditionals as too cautious, too conservative,
and inflexible. They regard Generation X as
selfish and manipulative, and Millennials as
lacking focus.
• Bill and Hillary Clinton and Rush Limbaugh

35. Generation X
• Born between 1965 and 1976, are in numbers a
much smaller generation than the generation of
Boomers that preceded them.
• Brings a new set of concerns to the workplace,
especially an emphasis on quality of work life,
including the work environment and the nature of the
work itself.
• More likely to view work as a means to support their
current lifestyle interests (skiing, kayaking, travel)
versus viewing work as a means to support
retirement activities.

36. Generation X
• Sees Traditionals as rigid, old, and over-the-hill,
regard Boomers as disgustingly “New Age”
workaholics, and Millennials as too optimistic and
insufficiently rule-governed.
• Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin
and actress Drew Barrymore are members of this
generation.

37. Millennials
• Born between 1977 and 1998. They celebrate
diversity in all forms and they are both optimistic and
realistic in their worldview.
• Pride themselves on being self-inventive and
individualistic. Rather than following or rejecting rules,
they seek to rewrite the rules that will govern their
lives.
• Have grown up in an environment where change is
rapid and they believe organizing will be much more
spontaneous in the future. As a result, they do not so
much reject institutions as see them as increasingly
irrelevant (federal government and Katrina disaster)

38. Millennials
• Technology is not something to be used (as it
is for Generation X); it is what life is all about.
They assume a technology-dominated world.
• They do not merely multi-task, they multi-task
fast.
• Because their parents nurtured them, they
expect nurturing organizations.
• Race car driver Danica Patrick and England's
Prince William

39. Critical Perspective
• Powerful groups (e.g., European American men) will
sustain power no matter how much diversity is
present in an organization. Those groups with
historical access to power have more resources and
experience at manipulating power relations and
holding on to control.
• If diversity is genuinely celebrated in an organization,
groups historically excluded from participation and
power relations become equal participants who are
empowered. A person’s skills, abilities, and
contributions determine their success rather than
their demographic classification.

40. Critical Perspective
• Gender
– Sexual Harassment
– Glass Ceiling
– Feminine Styles of Leadership and Communication
– Women, Feminist Philosophy, and Cultural Change
– Sexual Orientation
• Race and Ethnicity
– Controversies and Possible Solutions
• Class
• Physical Abilities

41. Gender
• In 2005 women comprised 46% of the
U.S. workforce
• By 2012 women are projected to
comprise 47% of the U.S. workforce
U.S. Department of Labor (2006)

42. Sexual Harassment
• Sexual harassment is pervasive in the U.S. workplace,
and women usually are the victims
• Seventy to ninety percent of working women report
having experienced sexual harassment according to the
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)
• American Association of University Women reported that
in 2005 nearly two-thirds of all college students
experience sexual harassment at some point during
college
• In fiscal year 2005 the U.S. EEOC reported 12,859
charges of sexual harassment that resulted in $47.9
million in settlements for the charging parties

43. Sexual Harassment
• Quid pro quo: This for that harassment occurs
when employment conditions such as raises,
promotions, or job security are contingent upon
sexual favors
• Hostile Environment: may include behavior such
as sexual propositions, sexual jokes, lewd
comments, displays of pornographic materials,
fondling, and even nonsexual actions directed at a
person because of that person’s sex, but it must
be unwelcome and constitute an environment that
a reasonable person would regard as offensive

44. Sexual Harassment
Responding to Sexual Harassment
• Tell your harasser to stop the offensive behavior and
make clear that you do not want sexual attention
from him or her. If the person persists, you should
write a letter telling the harasser to stop and you
should make a copy of that letter for your records.
• When you are harassed you should write down
exactly what happened whether it is inappropriate
language or touch. The time, date, and place of the
occurrence should be recorded as well as the names
of any witnesses. These notes should be kept at
home.

45. Sexual Harassment
• Seek out support from friends, family, and co-workers.
• If you are a member of a union, you should talk to your
union representatives about your options.
• Talk to your employer because all organizations should
have written policies against sexual harassment. If the
manager you speak to is uncooperative, talk to staff in
personnel or in your equal employment opportunity
office.
• Keep an accurate record of your work performance
including performance evaluations and any informal
statements (e.g., e-mails, memos) that speak to the
quantity and/or quality of your work.

46. Sexual Harassment
• Recognize that you have the right to file a
charge with the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission (EEOC), a federal
agency created for your protection. The
EEOC may be contacted toll free at 1-800-
669-EEOC.
• Find out more about your legal rights by
talking with a lawyer who specializes in sex
discrimination.

47. Glass Ceiling
• In 2005, women held half of all entry-level
management and professional positions (Bureau of
Labor Statistics, 2005).
• In 2005 only eight women were CEOs in the Fortune
500; an additional nine were CEOs in Fortune 501-
1000 companies.
• Women account for only 14.7 percent of all Fortune
500 board seats, and only 7.9 percent of positions
with the title of Chairman, Vice Chairman, CEO,
President, Chief Operating Officer, Senior Executive
Vice-President, and Executive Vice-President
(Catalyst, 2006).

48. Glass Ceiling
• Is the Glass Ceiling a result of discrimination or
because large numbers of women are still in the
process of gaining the experiences that ultimately
will bring promotions to senior management?
• Marion Sandler, president of Golden West
Financial Corp., “It’s the power structure that
doesn’t allow women entry.”
• Carleton Fiorina, a vice president with AT & T, “I’ve
never felt that my sex has been a disadvantage to
me.... No one can expect to be handed power.”

49. Feminine Styles of
Leadership
• Men are more aggressive than women. It shows
up in 2-year-olds ... persists into adulthood.... And
there is little doubt that it is rooted in biology”
(McLoughlin, 1988).
• Sally Helgesen (1990) not only contends that
women differ from men in their ways of leadership,
but also calls this difference the female advantage.
• Many feminists have relied on this presumption to
advocate nonhierarchical, democratic, collective life
in organizations (Ferguson, 1984)

50. Feminine Styles of
Leadership
• Most studies report either no differences between
men and women in leadership positions or that
gender has a trivial, almost nonexistent influence on
that behavior.
• Explanation: Male behaviors represent the norm to
which organizational members must adapt. Women
copy the behaviors of men in order to gain
acceptance and succeed in their careers.
• If this is indeed the case, organizations are losing out
on the benefits of gender diversity in the workplace.

51. Women, Feminist Philosophy,
and Cultural Change
• Male values: self-assertion, separation,
independence, control, competition, focused
perception, rationality, analysis, clarity, discrimination
and activity
• Female values: interdependence, cooperation,
receptivity, merging, acceptance, awareness of
patterns, wholes and contexts, emotional tone,
personal perception, being, intuition, and
synthesizing”. The underlying themes linked to these
values are openness to the environment,
interconnection, and mutual development. [Marshall, 1993]

52. Women, Feminist Philosophy,
and Cultural Change
Four feminist themes relevant to
organizational communication:
• Cooperation
• Caring and concern for relationships and
community
• Viewing humans as significant holistic beings
• Recognizing the value of pursuing
possibilities and creative alternatives
[Buzzanell, 1993]

53. Sexual Orientation
• Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered
individuals
• Difficulties faced by people of diverse sexual
orientation are wide ranging: exclusion from
groups, derogatory jokes, discrimination, hateful
language, and violence
• Sexual orientation discrimination is not covered by
the federal laws that generally prohibit
discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex,
religion, national origin, age and disability for
private employers (Workplace Fairness, 2006).

54. Sexual Orientation
• In different parts of the federal government and in
various state governments employees are covered
by provisions in the Civil Service Reform Act of
1978 that prohibits sexual orientation discrimination
(Workplace Fairness, 2006).
• In 1998, President Clinton issued Executive Order
13087, reaffirming the Executive Branch’s
longstanding internal policy that prohibits
discrimination based on sexual orientation within
the Executive Branch for civilian employees (U.S.
Office of Personnel Management, 1999).

55. Race and Ethnicity
• Only 1.5 percent of women managers are African-
American, and 1.5 percent are members of other
minorities (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2006).
• Although affirmative action programs have helped
millions of African-Americans to enter the
mainstream economy, millions more have been left
behind.
• 34 percent of all African-American children live in
poverty (NCCP, 2006) and 28.5 percent of African
American men have a chance of being incarcerated
in their lifetime (Joint Center for Political and
Economic Studies, 2003).

56. Race and Ethnicity
• African-American representation in the
workforce continues to increase.
• Total workforce participation for African
Americans was 15.3 million in 2005 (Bureau
of Labor Statistics, 2006).
• The numbers of Asians and Hispanics in the
workforce was 6.2 million and 18.6 million,
respectively (Bureau of Labor Statistics,
2006).

57. Race and Ethnicity
• As for those minorities who are not invisible,
there is a real possibility that they will confront
insidious forms of racism, hostility, and even
hatred as their numbers increase in the
workplace.
• Solomon (1992) reports that racial and ethnic
minorities face behaviors ranging from racial
slurs (not only in conversations but also in hate
mail, graffiti, and even hate faxes) to sabotage of
computer files or work projects, and even
outright physical assaults.

58. Solutions
Recognize Strategic Rationale to Support Racial
and Ethnic Diversity
• Selig Center for Economic Growth, 2007 estimate:
purchasing power will reach the following levels for the
three major racial minority groups in the U.S. in 2007:
African Americans $847 billion, Hispanic Americans
$863 billion, and Asian Americans $420 billion
• Although workplace diversity may have been a moral
issue 30 years ago, today, it is a strategic issue. Simply
stated, diversity in the workplace will help American
organizations compete successfully in a global
economy.

59. Class
• Problems related to class diversity are not due
inherently to the presence of different classes but
on how people belonging to particular classes
perceive they are treated.
• Very often problems occur when people
performing mundane tasks for low pay perceive
they are mistreated or disrespected by
employers or employees who are paid much
higher salaries.
• Every person deserves to be treated with respect
no matter what job they work.

60. Class
• Too many workers in the U.S. and in other
countries are not paid a living wage for full-time
work.
• As Barbara Ehrenreich (2001) explains in her
best-selling book Nickel and Dimed: On (Not)
Getting by in America, millions of Americans
work full-time, year-round for poverty level
wages.
• These workers labor as wait staff, cleaning
people, nursing home aides, and department
store sales clerks.

61. Physical Abilities
• There are at least 54 million Americans with disabilities
(The White House, 2006).
• Until 1992, many were kept out of employment because
employers had done very little to accommodate the
workplace to their needs (Solomon, 1992).
• The federal government then implemented the
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), "the most
sweeping civil rights legislation since 1964" (Solomon,
1992).
• The ADA requires employers to make "reasonable
accommodations" for the workplace needs of the
disabled and prohibits discrimination against the
disabled in regard to all employment practices.

62. Physical Abilities
• Making reasonable accommodations will require
close attention to job descriptions, supervisors'
responsibilities, employee etiquette, and training
programs not only for the people with disabilities,
but also for those who need to know what kinds of
accommodations to make and how to make them.
• Patricia Morrissey, vice president of Employment
Advisory Services, has observed that effectiveness
in complying with the ADA will center on the quality
of interaction that occurs between disabled
employees and those who are receiving them into
the workplace (Solomon, 1992b).

63. Ethics of Diversity
• Organizational commitment to diversity means more
than opening the doors for entry into an organization.
• From an ethical standpoint, organizations must also
provide support for people who belong to diverse
groups.
• Anticipating conflicts between different groups and
preparing employees for them so they will learn how
to work together rather than fight against one
another.
• Promoting diverse members based on their
contributions to the organization.