Corporate culture: institutional regulation and practical implementation experience

Koval'zhina Larisa Sergeevna PhD in Sociology Associate professor, Department of Management in Fuel and Energy Complex, Tyumen Industrial University 625000, Russia, Tyumenskaya oblast', g. Tyumen', ul. Volodarskogo, 38 kls77@mail.ru Other publications by this author     Saitmametova Elina Azatovna Graduate student, Tyumen Industrial University 38 Volodarsky str., Tyumen, Tyumen region, 625007, Russia elen-doc93@mail.ru

Yurko Viktoriya Alekseevna Student, Department of Botany and Landscape Architecture, Novosibirsk State Agrarian University 630039, Russia, Novosibirsk region, Novosibirsk, Dobrolyubova str., 160 urkoviktoria13@gmail.com

The rapid changes in the external environment of the organization stimulate the growth of interest in corporate culture. This is primarily due to the understanding of the impact that the phenomenon of culture has not only on the socio-psychological state of the team, but also on labor productivity and the effectiveness of the organization as a whole. Numerous studies show that actively developing and successful organizations are distinguished by a high level of culture, which is formed as a result of a purposeful social policy aimed at developing values and corporate norms for the benefit of all stakeholders ^{[1; 2; 3]}.

In relation to organizations, the term "corporate culture" covers a large area of phenomena of the spiritual and material life of the collective, such as the moral norms and values dominating in it, the adopted code of conduct and appearance of the staff, the sign-symbolic system, entrenched rituals, established quality standards. Corporate culture is a distinctive marker of one organization from others. It focuses all employees on what is valuable and important for the organization, on what behavior is considered acceptable, and reflects the foundations and meaning of the organization's functioning.  Corporate culture is often perceived as an ideology, a management philosophy, the basis of which is formed by value orientations, beliefs and corporate norms of employee behavior.

The value system is the main philosophical positions and ideas adopted in the organization, which determine the direction of the team's activities, ensuring success. In relation to the conditions of the organization's functioning and involvement in the process of joint activities of employees with different ideas about relationships, issues of corporate culture, as a factor of the internal environment of the organization, acquire special importance. The values and philosophy of an organization can be viewed as a code within the organizational rules of employee behavior.  Each organization has its own distinctive ceremonies, rituals, and ways to highlight and highlight honored workers. These important elements form the corporate culture, and, accordingly, the culture of work, management and internal communication of the company.

There is a close connection between corporate culture and strategy. The company's strategy orients the staff, indicating the vector of development and movement, and the corporate principles being developed provide employees with a system of laws that orient them when working on their own tasks. Therefore, employees do not waste time establishing what and how they need to do. An effective corporate culture as an institutional mechanism is built as an integral system of laws and sanctions, specific attitudes that translate into the formed habits and behavioral patterns of employees. 

Another difference between a developed corporate culture that supports the company's strategy is the education and motivation of employees to perceive work in the company as a way of life, ensuring staff commitment to the ideas and values of the organization and forming an understanding of what needs to be done and what should not be done so that the company develops and achieves its goals ^[4]. In organizations with a low level of culture and strategy, staff may develop indecision when making the right decision, which leads to a decrease in labor productivity and job satisfaction in general ^[5]. Thus, in order to achieve the goals of the organization, the compatibility of corporate culture and strategy is important.

Considering the culture of the company in the context of material and spiritual culture, we note that at the material level, visible signs can be observed, for example, clothing, corporate symbols, organizational ceremonies and attributes, working environment. At a deeper level, there are values and norms that define and regulate the behavior of employees in the company. Values are closely related to visual patterns (slogans, ceremonies, style of business clothes, etc.), they seem to follow from them and denote the internal philosophy of the company. By creating and maintaining norms and patterns of corporate behavior, corporate culture is used to manage not only the behavior of staff, but also their value orientations and work motivation and, to some extent, the socio-psychological climate in the team, defining the framework and forms of interpersonal interaction between employees of the company. Thus, corporate culture acts as an institutional management tool.

Corporate culture is characterized by the following common features:

· a set of corporate values;

· the presence of a unifying image;

· the ratio of possible and proper behavior of employees in relation to this image;

· The safety of the organization's activities and the safety of employees and patients ^[1].

Reflecting on the conditions for the formation of corporate culture, we note the importance of external and internal sides. From the outside, we see the image of the organization, its positioning among others. For example, customers are currently paying attention to details such as the availability of parking spaces for customers, the interior of the premises, the landscaping, advertising materials and content that the organization publishes. The inner essence of culture is revealed through the collective of the organization, its general internal ideology, encouraged or condemned behavior model. Culture unites the employees of the organization, forcing them to adhere to certain rules and follow the mission of the organization, which is visible to customers (partners and other actors) and manifests itself through behavior, interpersonal and corporate communication and communication.

Among the indicators that indicate the presence of a high corporate culture, one can highlight the attractiveness of an organization as an employer, how much an employee values working in this particular company; the level of staff turnover; basic values – loyalty, dedication; attitude to work, increased responsibility for its quality and satisfaction with results; reputation of employees and the organization as a whole effective interpersonal and industrial relations; effective strategy of behavior in difficult situations; adequate stimulation and motivation. Undoubtedly, the positive image of the organization and the formed corporate culture represent an invaluable resource for effective management of the organization ^[6].

Let's consider the features of corporate culture on the example of the organization of the healthcare system. Its distinctive feature is the special importance of working to preserve the health of the population, which forms public health. The staff of medical institutions, from junior medical to administrative and managerial personnel, are the face of the institutions and characterize, in the eyes of the patient, the industry as a whole. The corporate culture of medical organizations is poorly represented in the scientific community.  Nevertheless, the relevance of the development of this culture in medical institutions is explained by the significant communicative and "human" component in the service provided and the high demand of the population for high-quality medical services. The peculiarity of these organizations is the value relationship "doctor – patient".

Considering the mission of a medical organization, we note that it traditionally reflects the following aspects: the scope of activity; what the organization strives for; values and principles; what technologies in the field of production and management the organization uses; the image that the organization possesses ^[7]. The mission of medical organizations can be formulated based on their following goals and guidelines: "providing affordable high-quality primary health care and specialized care to the attached population, aimed at continuously improving the health of citizens, to ensure an increase in life expectancy and quality of life based on preventive measures to preserve and strengthen the health of patients, with the provision of new diagnostic and treatment methods" ^[2].

An interesting example of the symbiosis of the value system, corporate and organizational culture is the private American Mayo Clinic, one of the largest private medical and research centers in the world, which has the highest title and authority among the global professional community.

It is known from the history of the clinic that Dr. William Mayo, the head of the temporary hospital opened in Rochester on the occasion of the aftermath of a severe hurricane in the summer of 1883, impressed everyone with his skill and became widely known as a great doctor and surgeon, and the abbess of the monastery of St. Francis offered to finance the construction of a permanent hospital in Rochester, provided that it was headed by a doctor Mayo and his sons ^[8]. So in 1889, St. Mary's Hospital opened in Rochester, headed by Mayo's father and sons. Today, the clinic consists of three centers: the main base in Rochester, Minnesota, branches in Jacksonville, Florida, and Phoenix, Arizona.

The mission of the clinic is as follows: "to inspire hope and contribute to the maintenance of the health of each patient by providing the highest quality medical care through the integration of clinical practice, education, and medical science" ^[8]. The clinic's charter says that this is an "organization of three shields" – on the organization's logo, the central and largest shield symbolizes patient care, the shields on the sides represent science and education.

The image of the ideal doctor for the founders of the Mayo clinic is similar to the description of the medieval Persian scientist, philosopher and physician Avicenna: "a doctor must have the gaze of a falcon, the hands of a girl, the wisdom of a snake and the heart of a lion" ^[8]. Similarly, the Mayo clinic emphasizes that medical care is inevitably individual, therefore they believe that "a doctor should be an engineer and an artist at the same time: have a set of special professional knowledge and a set of humanitarian skills of emotional impact" ^[8].

The corporate culture of the Mayo Clinic is based on the following principles of work, such as ^[8]:

1) Safety for staff and patients, which is ensured by:

· compliance with medical care regulations (prompt decisions in the work of both emergency and scheduled services, sorting patients according to the severity and urgency index of care, striving for timely response to events as part of improving employee time management);

· local regulations of the organization, which determine not only the list and scope of services provided, but also regulate the developed methods and forms of execution of tasks.

2) Teamwork (the clinic's specialists are evaluated not only by professional competencies, but also by personal qualities, since vanity, greed for profit, arrogance in the selection of personnel are not welcome. Due to the fixed salary, the clinic's doctors have no financial reasons why they would seek to keep the patient at home and not send him for treatment to a colleague who is more competent in solving a specific issue. The position of the head does not imply a salary increase).

3) Honesty and fairness (the administration is obliged to provide a psychologically safe environment for communication and discussion, so that everyone can express their point of view in the interests of the patient, since the risk of mistakes increases in the absence of transparency and strict administration, also a positive point is to reduce subjectivity due to the collegiality of decisions made, discussion of serious medical cases is welcome).

4) Management is in the hands of senior medical personnel working directly at the clinic (heads of all levels are selected from the staff of doctors for a period of 4 to 8 years, their leadership qualities serve as the selection criterion).

Compliance with the rules of interaction and corporate culture at the Mayo Clinic generates a high degree of patient orientation.

Representatives of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Tatarstan and the Educational Center for High Medical Technologies came to interesting conclusions after communicating with experts from the Mayo Clinic ^[9]:

1) Quality is a religion. You need to talk about values endlessly.

2) All levels of management and employees must learn to speak the same correct words.

3) Staff resistance is the result of poor quality management. The degree of resistance of the staff depends on the position of the head of the department, institution, leader.

4) It is necessary to establish cooperation in the fields of science, education, practice.

5) In order to combat staff turnover and preserve the traditions of corporate and organizational culture, it is necessary to develop a motivation system for key employees (for example, at the Mayo Clinic, doctors working on a full-time basis and full-time are entitled to tuition fees).

6) The creation of a committee to resolve conflicts between the manager and the employee, so that the employee feels protected.

7) The training school (an analogue of mentoring) helps to instill values and norms in newly arrived employees.

8) When analyzing defects, compliance with the "principle of the administrator, auditor": We don't want to be good, we want to be honest and objective. The committee assembled to review the defects decides the question: are these problems in the system? Are these problems of unconscious behavior (voluntary delusion)? Or are these problems of conscious behavior (negligence)?

The reviewed rules and regulations show that despite the strict regulation of medical activities, issues of mutual assistance, human participation, humanistic sentiments, and the pursuit of the highest ideals of medical services are paramount for building a high-quality corporate culture that can become a powerful engine for the development of a successful medical organization, using the example of the Mayo Clinic.

Thus, the formation and development of corporate culture is not just a tradition, but the key to the effective operation of the company. As well as a guarantee for leadership and sustainable development, not only in their own interests, but also for the benefit of customers and society. The peculiarities of the corporate culture formation process should be the high importance of the value component based on the company's development strategy and the system of corporate norms and sanctions for their violation created on its basis.