Cultural domination: the key to market‐oriented culture?

Abstract

The key to a market-oriented culture? 355Given such goals the audience of this paper is marketing academics and executives as well as those researchers who are interested in the interface between organizational behaviour and marketing.So, what is organizational culture? Cultural theorists propose and develop multiple perspectives of organizational culture, the diversity derived from discrepancies in the assumptions which researchers make about both "organization" and "culture" (Martin, 1992;Smircich, 1983). Smircich (1983, pp. 343; 347) examines the intersection of organizational culture and organizational theory and contends that researchers in the area can be divided along two dimensions; those which view culture as a "root metaphor" and those which emphasise culture as a "variable" of analysis. Briefly, researchers who view culture as a variable either present culture as an independent variable which is imported into the organization or as an internal variable which is created and maintained by the organization. Culture viewed as a root metaphor, presents organizational culture as either generated by cognitions, constituted of symbols or as an expression of unconscious processes (respectively being cognitive, symbolic and psychodynamic perspectives of organizational culture). The framework developed by Smircich (1983) is applied to research in marketing in the seminal paper of Deshpande and Webster (1989). Utilising the fivefold classification of Smircich (1983), for each perspective, Deshpande and Webster (1989) develop implications for marketing research and methodology.This paper is a response to the suggestions of Deshpande and Webster's (1989, p. 13) that marketing researchers first, "delve into the rapidly developing literature on organizational culture" and second, "develop theoretical structures" to gain greater understanding of marketing phenomena. Overall, Deshpande and Webster (1989) echo the conclusion of Smircich (1983) that researchers use different themes and perspectives for, contrasting reasons, the theme being dependent on the particular needs of the researchers. Consequently, for the purposes of this paper, organizational culture is defined as a dynamic set of assumptions, values and artefacts whose shared meaning can be acquired by members of the organization. This definition is synthesised from the definitions of Schein (1985) which focuses on the components of culture, DiBella (1993) which concentrates on shared meaning, and Hatch (1993) which emphasises the processual dynamics between components of organizational culture. Hence, the presented definition illustrates three major ramifications of contemporary organizational culture theory -that culture is composed of distinguishable components (assumptions, values and artefacts), that components are dynamic (that is linked by two-way processes) and that culture is not a unitary concept. These implications are discussed in turn below. EuropeanJournal of Marketing 32,3/4 356The components of culture Schein (1985) presents a view of culture o...

Market Orientation and the Performance of Small and Medium-Sized Manufacturing Enterprises in the Accra Metropolis

“…7, No. 3;2015 Although some investigators (Harris, 1998) argued that MO dimensions might not be applicable in small business sectors, others (Pelham & Wilson, 1996) found positive links between MO and performance in small US firms. Slater and Narver (2000) recommended that additional studies with substantive modifications of conceptual and methodological methods to increase confidence in previous findings be undertaken.…”

Expertise, Leadership Style and Communication in Interfunctional Coordination

“…Harris (1998) shows that a directive leadership style has a negative influence on the implementation of market orientation. Harris and Ogbonna (2001) extent the previous research; directive leadership style has a negative influence on the implementation of market orientation and participative leadership style has a positive influence on the implementation of market orientation.…”

Market orientation and strategic behaviour at high-tech companies

“…Shareholders can find out if the company wants to stay for a long time on the market according to their mission and goals. [30] mentioned that companies without mission, goals and strategy do not apply strategic management which in turn leads to only short-term ambitions. These companies want to make money and then leave their position on the market.…”

“…The managers should want to gain new information and knowledge. [30] stressed that managers play the main role in implementing of market orientation conception. If the managers do not believe that market orientation can help a company, the conception of market orientation is not enforceable.…”

“…[14], [51], [15]; and stakeholder orientation (e.g. [30], [17], [3], [54]). The method for measuring market orientation was prepared in accordance with this approach.…”