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Organizational structure and Culture both leading to project success?

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 hg93
(@hg93)
Posts: 15
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As Dr.Simon have mentioned there are different types of organizational structures. Any project is affected by project management system, culture, style, organizational structure and also project management office can influence the project.According to me, organizational structure is responsible for organizational culture.It plays a significant role in the creation of work environment, works ethic and view of an authority relationship.I believe the modern composite type of organization structure may lead to great work culture.It is because such kind of structure involves various levels of the organization together which is beneficial for building and developing healthy work culture in the organization.

Question for all, how organizational culture and structure both are correlated and influence project? Is composite organization structure is suitable for critical projects or all type of projects

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 6:50 am
 pt58
(@pt58)
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I agree organization does influence company culture to an extent. However, I do think work culture is a big part of retaining employees. You want your company to do well overall and employee satisfaction can be essential to their individual output. I have definitely seen both sides of the spectrum, I worked for a company that had a very welcoming culture and one that was not as welcoming and very isolated. I preferred the company with the welcoming culture. I definitely felt like I was involved and it really came down to a great balance of work and play. The work was challenging but the community that you were a part of just made you feel like you wanted to be there. Whereas at the other company I felt it was very competitive and it made it hard to form relationships because you constantly had to fend for yourself and out preform your coworkers. Both companies I worked for had a matrix organization but the main difference between the two came down to how the managers implemented team building.

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 7:33 am
(@jp582)
Posts: 51
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Very interesting question. To be successful in the project, culture organization has a huge impact on your success rate. Your organization structure can help or hurt project success, it is easier to change organization structure than culture organization for a large organization. If employees are not following project management process set by head of the organization or project manager, more likely project would fail to accomplish goals.
Composite organization involves all or combination of the functional, matrix, and projectized types of organizations. For instance, same project is assigned to different groups the result to overlapping of resources. It completely depends on project because some project works best on functional organization and other on matrix organization and so on.
http://www.techrepublic.com/article/organizational-culture-and-structure-influence-project -management-more-than-you-realize/

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 9:28 am
(@ds654)
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I agree there will be an impact of culture on organizational Structure. Organisations can change with time. What was once a very informal office atmosphere may have to become more formal as the size and scope of the business expands. Understanding organisational culture and structure helps decision-makers do the right thing. Those executives must do some prior planning instead of just deciding on the spur of the moment to add new structural elements.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/relationship-between-organizational-culture-structure-kabelo

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 2:38 pm
(@alm8)
Posts: 14
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I definitely agree with this. Although I haven't had any experience in a non-welcoming culture, I definitely feel a welcoming culture promotes better work and employee retention. No matter how hard the work got, I at least did not have to deal with feeling isolated in the huge company. As an intern working in 3 different departments for 3 summers, there was not one person I did not get along with. This left a great impression of the company on me as a whole.

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 2:39 pm
(@grzegorzgalka)
Posts: 15
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I also haven’t had any experience in a non-welcoming culture myself. I saw a struggle of another Engineer who was shy, quiet and couldn’t make his point. Based on my assumptions the non-welcoming might happen more often in smaller companies with low benefits were people are just unhappy. They pass their frustration on others. I also noticed that some older people have hard times of listening to new younger bosses. I believe that organizational culture plays important role in the work environment. Employees are more motivated when they enjoy coming to the work.

Thanks

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 3:09 pm
 neb2
(@neb2)
Posts: 49
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I also agree that organizational structure and organizational culture do influence the success or failure of a project. Organizational structure is the foundation of how business is conducted internally and externally. It show us how operations are carried out daily and how projects are integrated within daily operations. While organizational culture is not only how the organization structures itself, but also its management style, its personality and attitude towards executing daily operations. An organization could have a reputation in the industry by its personality and how it conducts business. Its organizational personality is found at the departments and project levels. In an organization, personality and attitude starts from the top and rolls down even to the area of managing projects. This is why organizational leadership is an important influence that must be added to the success and failure of a project and is also correlated with organizational structure and culture. It is important that executive management understand their role in leading by example. They also must understand the impact their leadership can have on the organization if it is not performed at the highest level of integrity, professionalism, and cooperation among themselves and with those reporting to them. It is also important that they understand their actions are seen not only by those reporting to them but by everyone in the organization; and their leadership are part of the organizational culture. The impact on projects of an organization starts with the general structure of the organization, their leadership as a large part of the culture established within the organization and its management personality styles of those overseeing projects.

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 3:32 pm
(@sa596)
Posts: 15
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I agree with pretty much everything you said. I believe organizational structure can have an affect on the culture, but I think it's mainly there to define the goals of the employee. Depending on the structure, the employee will be able to map out his/her advancement in the company and that would consequently affect their motivations. The work culture is, as you said, the determining factor of the majority of the culture. If the work environment is good and welcoming, and the structure of the organization is suited for advancement, these two will lead to an overall better work culture

- Saad Ali

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 3:40 pm
(@nk229)
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I agree with what everyone has said about culture playing an important role in the success of an organization. For me it is crucial since my research heavily depends on cooperating with another group. The work requires planing, sharing information and heavy interaction with whoever you are working with for a project. Better work culture usually means that you get along with your coworkers and that is not only crucial to get work done, but to do better work. When doing research a lot of ideas come through discussion and the better the relationship with a person the better our work is.

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 4:45 pm
(@jej7)
Posts: 15
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I also agree with this. The way managers and directors express their direction promotes the team building within the department. I have experienced both sides of the coin and like you I do prefer the welcoming work culture. Even though all the companies I've worked for utilized an organizational matrix, it is really easy to feel left out on a day to day basis if the company has a poor culture. This is especially true if you are rotated into a competitive department. On the flip side making the best of a situation is a useful skill to have. Like you said, striking that balance of work and play would be ideal.

 
Posted : 27/11/2016 5:59 pm
(@smk45)
Posts: 53
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Interesting viewpoint here! Being part of an open and welcoming company culture motivates employees to perform better. Instead of fending for yourself, you are more inclined wanting to better your contribution to the overall company community. A good company culture entails good organization that is based on collaboration to ensure a win-win situation for all parties or departments involved. Also, if anything were to go wrong in the company, having a well integrated company culture will prompt employees to work together in resolving the situation instead of pointing fingers at individuals as the reason for the problem.

 
Posted : 28/11/2016 11:35 am
(@gp232njit-edu)
Posts: 25
Eminent Member
 

I have to disagree with the first post that organizational culture plays a significant role in the creation of work environment, ethics, and the view of authority. I believe the best teams can be established however; without proper leadership and organizational behavior boundaries, projects can fail. Attitudes and ethics play a large role in the success of an organizational structure. No matter how much management may disagree and think everyone should just get along, that is not how organizational culture works. This is why organizations will restructure themselves, to shift key roles and people around in an arrangement that may work better.

 
Posted : 13/12/2016 7:37 pm
(@gaberuiz13)
Posts: 35
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I agree with the notion that an organizational structure leads to certain cultures within the work place that may make or break a potential project. In a functional organization, each department is divided and controlled by different functional managers. This type of organization can lead to information silos and it can prove difficult to coordinate with different departments if the company is too large. Essentially, departments may keep information to themselves and potentially hurt the project unless other departments go out asking for this information. In a project-based organization, departments are divided by projects and are assigned a project manager. The culture that could develop from this is one where one project team refuses to coordinate with the others; thus, leading to a detrimental culture where project development becomes inefficient. Finally, a matrix-organization is a hybrid of the other two organization types and this tends to eliminate information silos and uncoordinated teams; however, this can lead to multitude of other problems separate from problems that arise from work culture. Overall, different organizational structures can lend to different types of work cultures, but the success of project depends on how the staff in a given company work together in that structure.

 
Posted : 26/11/2017 7:30 am
(@alexandrabuga)
Posts: 149
Estimable Member
 

I agree with @gaberuiz13 that the organizational structure can lead to different company cultures and those in turn can have an affect on projects. There are many different types of companies and projects some might foster a better company culture in a functional organization or maybe a collaborative teams in a project-based organization or maybe a hybrid in the matrix organization. There is an interesting article in the New York Times "What Google Learned from Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team". In 2012 Google's initiative to find what makes a perfect team was called "Project Aristotle" and through all there data no matter how the researchers arranged it, it was hard to find patterns. However, they found that "psychological safety" pointed to particular norms that are vital to success. "Project Aristotle is a reminder that when companies try to optimize everything, it’s sometimes easy to forget that success is often built on experiences — like emotional interactions and complicated conversations and discussions of who we want to be and how our teammates make us feel." I think this article is interesting because after analyzing 51,000 employees it came down to how project groups made one feel. I think that the organizational structure directly relates to the company culture and that the company culture directly relates to how an employee feels. I think for a successful project there has to be a good company culture where the employees feel they can voice their opinion and be supported rather than have negative competition. I think all organizational types can lead to successful projects if the right leadership and culture are implemented to foster successes not just with projects but down the individual employees.
nytimes/2016/02/28/magazine/what-google-learned-from-its-quest-to-build-the-perfect-team

 
Posted : 26/11/2017 9:18 am
(@dipanpatel)
Posts: 71
Trusted Member
 

Corporate culture represents the professional values a company adopts that dictate how it interacts with employees, vendors, partners and clients. An effect organization in a corporation can lead to a positive company culture. Culture relates to the people of the company and how they are and act. This has a direct effect on their performance and attitude/approach to their work and other people. For example, if a project manager is more approachable, open-minded to other people and their ideas and shows appreciation: his workers will be that much more proactive then a stereotypical sit-com boss with a terrible attitude and inefficient workers. Therefore, having a structure is important, but establishing a company culture that work will lead to efficiency, innovative work and employee retention.

 
Posted : 26/11/2017 1:16 pm
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