Reference no: EM133175491

Organizational Identity and Diversity

Identity and the Organization

Learning objective 1: See how different approaches to the nature of organizations lead to different perspectives on organizational identity.

Learning objective 2: Understand the concept of organizational identity, both its roots in theories of individual identity and how the literature on organizational identity has developed to the present.

Learning objective 3: Differentiate between organizational identity, organizational culture and organizational image, and grasp the dynamic relationships between them.

Learning objective 4: See how organizational identity can be unstable and mutable, changing and adapting in response to external feedback or events that challenge an organization's image and reputation.

Learning objective 5: Understand the danger of self-referential auto-communication and the ethical challenges posed.

Quesiton 1: Think of an organization to which you have belonged. It might be a sports team on which you played, a club that you joined, a company where you worked, a church or mosque or synagogue where you have worshipped, or the college you now attend. What was (or is) its organizational identity? Now as you think of that identity, think of how it may have formed. How would you compare the formation of its identity to the way a person forms his or her identity? Are the theories of Cooley, Mead, and Goffman applicable to organizations? If so, how?

Quesiton 2: Consider again the organization you named in Exercise 1. Describe how (using Albert and Whetten's definition) its identity reflects its central character and the distinctive qualities it claims to possess, and how the identity has endured over time. Now, referring to Hatch and Schultz's theory, describe how its identity, culture, and image are interrelated. Finally, referring to Gioia, Schultz and Corley's theory of adaptive instability, describe how the organization's identity has changed in response to external feedback and events that have challenged its image.

Quesiton 3: Finally, think again of the organization you analyzed in Exercises 1 and 2. In what ways might its organizational identity-the way it sees itself-have shaped the problems it perceives and the solutions it formulates? Do you see, as Cheney and Christensen cautioned, any auto-communication in its advertising, marketing, and public relations? Explain your answer.