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Generally
speaking, the first and foremost duty of a leader is to inculcate and promote
just and fair business culture in the organization. Commitment shown in this
regards not only builds trust of employees on the leadership but also paves way
to a systemic improvement in co-ordination and collaboration within
organization. Enhanced co-ordination and collaboration can be nurtured to
improve value creation within the organization, which gradually improves
quality of products and services (offered to customers). Eventually all of
these add up towards consolidation of brand perception for the products and
services offered by the organization.
In
this regards, it may be noted that justice
culture is a shared set of symbols and meanings attached to objects related to
experience of fairness in an organization. These meanings and symbols are used
by employees to navigate the justice landscape across time and situations. The
justice culture remains as employees apply information from past events in the
understanding of new experiences with unfair or fair treatment. Organizational
storytelling and reputation act as medium of passage of information across
individuals and over time. (Reference - The Oxford Handbook of
Organizational Climate and Culture - By Karen M. Barbera)
Thus,
we can say that establishing justice culture is evolutionary in nature, it
deals with human experiences and with human interactions (passage of
information across individuals). Together all of these attributes, make cultural
change (for enhancing justice culture) a matter of consensus and a matter of establishing
trust over a period of time. Therefore, every leader knows that it is not easy
to change prevailing culture in any organization (more so, if term of the leader
is short and pressure to perform is high). If circumstances permit,
introduction of design
thinking ways to generally tune the organizational culture to the strategic
requirements of the organization could offer controlled, calculated and
conscious cultural transformation. Professional implementation of design
thinking to organizational change would enable a leader get a feel of
transformation all along the life-cycle of transformation. For example, it may
be possible to understand the way interactions are shifting human
behavior or to minutely understand the way employees adapt with the newly introduced
changes or (say) the way the cognitive bias of employee’s impact on gong change
management.
Resistance
to cultural change is an inherent feature of an organization. It is usually
observed, within most organizations, there exists an ecosystem functioning in
equilibrium serving to the (vested) interests of key stakeholders of the
organization, which is usually very well synchronized with prevailing culture
of the organization. Many times the vested interests of key stakeholders are
aligned to the long term strategic interest of the organization but on certain occasions
this alignment had withered away due to gradual changes in the environment. The
withering away of alignment is often associated with increasing personal
interest of dominant players, which creates hidden power centers influencing
the organizational decision making and organizational governance. In such
circumstances, realignment of with new culture is coupled with enhanced resistance
to change.
A
sensible leader quickly identifies different actors in the work environment, develops
understanding on different aspects like the organizational design, the
mechanism of operations, the characteristics of organizational dynamics and
most importantly her own role in the entire gamut of things (along with her
privileges and her limitations). Once a leader has got into grooves and positioned
herself into the leadership position, she should give deep thought about how to
streamline the organization towards achieving its objectives following the
practice of a just and fair culture. Usually, it is left to leader to deal with
the circumstances (both internal to the organization and external to it) and to
execute cultural changes required for achieving business objectives of the
organization.
In
present landscape of business world, the design of organizational
administration still appear to be influenced with classical
organizations confirming with Fordism
and Taylorism.
So, it is expected from the leaders to control the organization by adhering to
administrative framework laid out in organizational rules and by practicing
administrative privileges. However, sensible leaders know very well that
forceful measures to make the things fall in place through administrative
privileges (enjoyed by the leader) do not result in institutional change
and do not work towards consolidation of the organization as a cohesive force
adhering to the organizational strategy for value creation. Mostly, in this regards, experts suggest that exploring possibilities for ways to increase pay-offs from just and fair practices within the organization works in the larger interest organization.
Perhaps, organizational change could be considered for promoting characteristic changes to the organization. In response to dynamically changing external and internal factors,
organizations are consistently challenged to keep on changing (mostly for
excellence or at times for existence). Usually, organizational transitions in
response to such changes are planned, controlled and incremental in nature but
on certain occasions, organizations have to respond with major transformations,
which could be characterized as rapid, random and voluminous. These transitions
and transformations bring opportunity to re-orient existing shared values of
organization and to establish new normal with redefined benchmarks and
realigned processes (in line with core organizational values). While managing
such transitions and transformations to the organization, sensible leaders make
conscious efforts to bring intended cultural change and to re-enforce key
cultural values.
In
my opinion, one key differentiating factor amongst those leaders who get
success in ensuring just and fair business culture in organization and those
who do not, is the passion to build an ethical organization, which can bring
change to the business landscape through excellence.
But,
what could possibly be a few most dominant characteristics of an organization
broadly having achieved just and fair work culture? There could be many
peculiar characteristics people suggest, however the ones I found most
appealing, are as under:-
a. Fair Processes
with functioning Organizational Checks and
Balances
b. Transparency within the Organization
c. Policy Driven Distribution of Organizational Resources
d. Mutual
Trust and Fair Competition amongst the Employees
e. Sense of Ownership and Responsibility within Organization
References and Other Related Materials:-
1. How
to use design thinking to change cultures
2. Getting
beyond the BS of leadership literature
3. EU
Charter for Fundamental Rights – Article 31
4. Why
It’s So Hard to Be Fair
5. Proof
That Positive Work Cultures Are More Productive
