b) may be kept during a criminal case, if the individual features of banknotes are important for proof.
Other conditions for the storage, accounting and transfer of certain categories of material evidence are established by the Government of the Russian Federation.
When a criminal case is transferred by a body of inquiry to an investigator or from one body of inquiry to another, or from one investigator to another, as well as when a criminal case is referred to a prosecutor or to a court, or when a criminal case is transferred from one court to another, material evidence shall be transferred together with the criminal case.
When passing a sentence or terminating a criminal case, the issue of material evidence must be resolved. Wherein:
- instruments of crime are subject to confiscation or are transferred to appropriate institutions, or are destroyed;
- items prohibited for circulation are subject to transfer to the appropriate institutions or destroyed;
- items that are of no value and not claimed by the party are subject to destruction, and in the event of a request from interested persons or institutions, they can be issued to them;
- money, valuables and other property obtained as a result of the commission of a crime, and income from this property shall be returned to the rightful owner;
4.1) money, valuables and other property obtained as a result of committing crimes, as well as used or intended for the financing of terrorism, an organized group, an illegal armed group, a criminal community (criminal organization), are subject to confiscation;
- documents that are physical evidence remain with the criminal case during the entire period of storage of the latter or are transferred to interested parties at their request;
- the rest of the items are issued to the rightful owners, and if the latter are not identified, they become the property of the state. Disputes about the ownership of physical evidence are resolved in civil proceedings.
Items seized in the course of pre-trial proceedings, but not recognized as material evidence, shall be returned to the persons from whom they were seized.
Protocols of investigative actions and court session are allowed as evidence if they meet the requirements established by the Code of Criminal Procedure (Article 83). The requirements for the protocol of the investigative action are set out in Art. 166 of the Code of Criminal Procedure: the protocol may be written by hand or made with technical means. When performing an investigative action, stenography, filming, audio and video recording may also be used. Transcript and shorthand recording, audio and video recording materials are kept in the criminal case.
The protocol specifies:
- the place and date of the investigative action, the time of its beginning and end to the nearest minute;
- position and surname of the person who drew up the protocol;
- surname, name and patronymic of each person who participated in the investigative action, and, if necessary, his address and other data about his personality.
The protocol sets out the procedural actions in the order in which they took place, the circumstances significant for the given criminal case revealed during their production, as well as the statements of the persons participating in the production of the investigative action.
The protocol must also indicate the technical means used in the performance of the relevant investigative action, the conditions and procedure for their use, the objects to which these means were applied, and the results obtained. In addition, the protocol must note that before the use of technical means, the persons participating in the investigative action were notified about this.
The protocol is presented for familiarization to all persons who participated in the production of the investigative action. They are explained the right to make comments to be included in the protocol. All comments, additions and corrections made to the protocol must be specified and certified by the signatures of these persons.
The protocol is signed by the investigator and the persons who participated in the production of the investigative action.
The protocol shall be accompanied by photographic negatives and photographs, films, transparencies, phonograms of interrogation, video cassettes, computer information carriers, drawings, plans, diagrams, casts and prints of traces made during the production of an investigative action.
If it is necessary to ensure the safety of the victim, his representative, witness, their close relatives, relatives and close persons, the investigator has the right in the protocol of the investigative action in which the victim, his representative or witness participates, not to provide information about their identity. In this case, the investigator, with the consent of the head of the investigative body, issues a decision, which sets out the reasons for the decision to keep this data secret, indicates the pseudonym of the participant in the investigative action and provides a sample of his signature, which he will use in the protocols of investigative actions carried out with his participation. The decision is placed in a sealed envelope and attached to the criminal case.
The protocol must also contain a record of explaining to the participants in the investigative actions their rights, duties, responsibilities and the procedure for conducting the investigative action, certified by their signatures.
Other documents are allowed as evidence if the information contained in them is relevant for establishing the circumstances included in the subject of proof in a criminal case (Article 84 of the Code of Criminal Procedure).
Documents may contain information recorded both in writing and in another form. These may include, among other things: photographic and filming materials, audio and video recordings and other information carriers received, requested or presented in the case in accordance with the requirements of the Code of Criminal Procedure.
Documents are attached to the case and kept for the entire period of its storage. At the request of their legal owner, the documents seized and attached to the case or their copies may be transferred to him.
Documents that have signs of material evidence are recognized as such.
Evidence in a criminal case is any information on the basis of which the court, prosecutor, investigator, interrogating officer, in the manner prescribed by the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, establishes the presence or absence of circumstances to be proved in the proceedings on a criminal case, as well as other circumstances that are important for criminal case.
From the above definition it can be seen that the evidence is not the circumstances themselves, but information about them contained in the sources provided for by law. Thus, the proof is the unity of their procedural form and actual content.
Evidence properties:
1. The admissibility of evidence is characterized the following signs:
- they must be obtained from sources provided for by law;
- must be respected general rules collecting and, in particular, fixing information, as well as the rules for conducting specific investigative actions;
- the information received must be reliable.
2. The relevance of evidence is understood to mean that their content contributes to the establishment of circumstances to be proven.
Classification of evidence:
1. Depending on the method of formation: personal and material. Personal - contained in the testimony of witnesses, the victim, the accused, the suspect, etc. Real - displayed on material objects.
2. Direct and indirect. The content of direct evidence completely coincides with the content of the elements of the subject of proof in a criminal case, the content of indirect evidence contributes to the establishment of the circumstances included in the subject of proof, but are, as it were, its intermediate stage.
3. Initial and derivative. The testimony of a witness who directly observed the crime, signs of material evidence seized from the scene, etc., belong to the initial ones.
Derivative proofs are a kind of transmission link from the original ones.
Types of evidence:
The following are allowed as evidence:
- testimonies of the suspect, the accused;
- testimonies of the victim, witness;
- conclusion and testimony of an expert;
- conclusion and testimony of a specialist;
- evidence;
- protocols of investigative and judicial actions;
- other documents.
The types of sources of evidence are strictly limited by law, and their list cannot be arbitrarily expanded at the discretion of the body conducting the criminal process. They are indicated in Part 2 of Art. 88 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, these include: protocols of investigative actions, court hearings and operational search activities, other documents and other media received in the manner prescribed by the Code of Criminal Procedure.
The concepts of "evidence" and "source of evidence" in criminal proceedings are not unambiguous. If evidence is factual data: facts, information about the facts to be established in the case, then the source of evidence is a carrier of factual information, a means of storing and transmitting such information.
As a source of evidence in the procedural sense, only such a carrier of evidentiary information can be used, which, firstly, is provided for by the Code of Criminal Procedure; secondly, it was mined in compliance with the established procedural form; thirdly, it can be subjected to verification and evaluation during the course of the proceedings.
Information obtained from sources not provided for by law, which do not meet the above requirements, has no evidentiary value, they are unacceptable.
29. Subject and limits of proof
Item evidence is a set of circumstances that are subject to mandatory establishment in each criminal case, regardless of its specifics and having legal meaning to decide the case on the merits. The subject of proof includes (Article 73 of the Code of Criminal Procedure):
- the event of the crime (time, place, method and other circumstances of the commission of the crime);
- the guilt of a person in committing a crime, the form of his guilt and motives;
- circumstances characterizing the personality of the accused;
- the nature and extent of the harm caused by the crime;
- circumstances excluding criminality and punishability of the act;
- circumstances mitigating and aggravating punishment;
- circumstances that may entail exemption from criminal liability and punishment;
- circumstances confirming that the property subject to confiscation in accordance with Art. 104.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, received as a result of a crime or is income from this property, or was used or intended to be used as an instrument of crime or to finance terrorism, an organized group, an illegal armed group, a criminal community (criminal organization). It is also necessary to identify the circumstances that contributed to the commission of the crime (Article 73 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation).
In cases of minors, along with proving the circumstances specified in Art. 73 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, are established:
- the minor's age, date, month and year of birth;
- the conditions of life and upbringing of a minor, the level of mental development and other features of his personality;
- influence on the minor older persons.
In the presence of data indicating a lag in mental development not associated with a mental disorder, it is also established whether the minor could fully realize the actual nature and social danger of his actions (inaction) or manage them (Article 421 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation).
In cases of socially dangerous acts of the insane, as well as the crimes of persons whose mental disorder occurred after the deed, in addition to the circumstances established in all cases, it turns out:
- time, place, method and other circumstances of the committed act;
- whether an act prohibited by criminal law has been committed by the specified person;
- the nature and extent of the harm caused by the act;
- availability this person mental disorders in the past, degree and nature mental illness;
- whether the mental disorder of the person is associated with a danger to him or other persons or the possibility of causing them other significant harm.
The circumstances of the crime as facts of the past in relation to the moment of their investigation and consideration are established with the help of evidence. The body of evidence sufficient to establish the circumstances relevant to the case characterizes limits proof.
Correct Definition the limits of proof depends on the activity of the subjects of proof, on the quality and quantity of evidence, on the circumstances to be proved at a certain moment.
To establish all the circumstances in the case, both included in the subject of proof and not included in the subject of proof, but relevant to the case, the necessary and sufficient evidence must be collected. Their types, necessary and sufficient number are determined by the person conducting the proceedings.
Thus, the limits of proof depend on: 1) the range of factual circumstances included in the subject of proof in a particular case; 2) other circumstances relevant to the case (side, intermediate circumstances), and therefore to be established: 3) necessary and sufficient evidence to establish the above circumstances.
In a particular case, the limits of proof at the preliminary and judicial investigation may be different. The limits of research during the preliminary investigation may be wider than during the trial. This is explained by the fact that in the course of the investigation circumstances may be clarified that will not subsequently be investigated in court as irrelevant to the case. Therefore, the so-called "costs of production" are possible in investigative work. Correctly focusing on the issue of the subject of proof and the limits of the study, the investigator can reduce them.
The court is not bound by the range of evidence collected in the course of the preliminary investigation of the case and presented by the prosecutor. He may, at the request of the accused, defense counsel or other participants in the trial, investigate new circumstances and evidence necessary to resolve the case.
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The main characteristics of the organizational (corporate) culture.
In any McDonald's restaurant, no matter where in the world it is located, you can see a familiar environment, an identical menu - all these are part of the image of one of the most successful organizations in the world. The success of this company is due not only to the taste of food, but also to a strong organizational culture. Each employee of the company is well acquainted with the norms of behavior adopted in it. High quality, qualified service and cleanliness - these are the main conditions for success. Do not compromise the company, use only the best ingredients for cooking - that's fundamental principles companies.
This corporate culture was formed by R. Kroc, who headed the company until 1984. After his death, the company's position on the market remains stable. Today's leaders, fully imbued with the philosophy of R. Kroc, usually come to decisions that are in many ways similar to those that Kroc took during his leadership. This largely explains the McDonald's phenomenon, which symbolizes stability and harmony.
Corporate culture is an elusive, intangible, unexpressed category, the existence of which does not require proof. Every organization develops a set of rules and regulations that govern the day-to-day behavior of employees in their workplace. Until newcomers learn these rules of conduct, they will not be able to become full-fledged members of the team. Following them is encouraged by the administration with appropriate rewards and promotions. For example, it is no coincidence that employees of the Disney company are perceived by everyone as charming, always fit and smiling people. This is the image of the company, supported by all its employees. That is why it is quite obvious that, having received a job in a company, employees will try to behave in accordance with the rules that are accepted in it.
According to modern theoretical approach, an organization, like any social group, has its own rules of conduct, roles. rituals, heroes, values. The culturological approach considers both the organization and its members as carriers of common values and performers of common tasks. Like citizens of one country, workers must contribute to the growth and prosperity of their organization. On the other hand, they also enjoy the fruits of this prosperity. Thus, the productivity of the members of an organization and their morale are inseparable.
Every organization has its own culture. Corporate culture is similar personal characteristics of a person: it is a kind of intangible, but always present image that gives meaning, direction and basis to its life activity. Corporate culture- these are the values, ideas, expectations, norms shared by all, acquired as you enter the company and during your work in it. Just as character influences human behavior, organizational culture influences the behavior, opinions, and actions of people in a company. Corporate culture determines how employees and managers approach problem solving, serve customers, deal with suppliers, respond to competitors, and how they generally operate now and in the future. It determines the place of the organization in the world around it, personifies those unwritten laws, norms and rules that unite the members of the organization and bind them together.
Corporate culture develops over time like national or ethnic cultures and in the same way develops its values and behavioral norms. Certain behaviors are supported in some organizations and rejected in others. Some organizations, for example, create an "open" culture where it's okay to question everything and come up with new ideas. original ideas. In others, novelty is not supported and communication is kept to a minimum. It is more pleasant for someone to work in an organization with a “closed” culture: a person comes to work, does his job individual task and returns home to his personal life, unrelated to work, someone needs a family-type organization in which personal life and work are closely connected.
An organization usually creates traditions and norms that contribute to its corporate culture. For example, a performance awards ceremony affirms the value of hard work and creativity in an organization. In many companies, it is a common tradition on Fridays not to wear a jacket and tie to work, but to come in looser clothes, which helps to create an atmosphere of informal communication and rapprochement of the team. In other organizations, this is even impossible to imagine: all members of the work team adhere to formal rules in clothing, which, in turn, leaves an imprint on the forms of communication.
Corporate culture determines the degree of risk that is acceptable in an organization. Some companies reward an employee who strives to experience new idea, others are conservative, they prefer to have clear instructions and guidance when making any decision. Attitude towards conflict is another indicator of corporate culture. In some organizations, conflict is considered constructive and viewed as component growth and development, in others - they seek to avoid conflicts in any situations and on any organizational levels.
There are many approaches to highlighting various aspects that characterize and identify the culture of an organization, both at the macro level and at the micro level. So, S. P. Robbins suggests considering corporate culture based on the following 10 criteria:
Personal initiative, i.e. the degree of responsibility, freedom and independence that a person has in an organization;
The degree of risk, i.e. employee's willingness to take risks;
Direction of action, i.e. the establishment of clear goals and expected results by the organization;
Consistency of actions, i.e. the position in which units and people within the organization interact in a coordinated manner;
Management support, i.e. ensuring free interaction, assistance and support to subordinates from management services;
Control, i.e. a list of rules and instructions used to control and monitor the behavior of employees;
Identity, i.e. the degree of identification of each employee with the organization;
The system of remuneration, i.e. the degree of accounting for the performance of work, the organization of the incentive system;
Conflict, i.e. willingness to openly express one's opinion and go to conflict;
Interaction patterns, i.e. the degree of interaction within the organization.
Evaluating any organization according to these criteria, you can make complete picture organizational culture against which the general idea employees about the organization.
What makes organizational culture an organizational culture? Why organizational culture is not a psychological climate? Why is organizational culture not a set of traditions and rituals?
© Anton Zrodnikov
Essential characteristics of organizational culture
Consistency
The most important property of organizational culture, as a complex system that combines individual elements into a single whole, guided by certain priorities, is consistency. The elements that make up the organizational culture are strictly structured, hierarchically subordinated and have their own priority.
The superficial study of organizational culture begins with the first, “surface” or “symbolic” level, which includes such visible external factors as the technology and architecture used, the use of space and time, observable patterns of behavior, ways of verbal and non-verbal communication, slogans, etc., or everything that can be felt and perceived through the known five senses of a person. At this level, things and phenomena are easy to detect, but they are quite difficult to interpret in terms of organizational culture without knowing its other levels. Those who try to explore organizational culture more deeply affect its second, "subsurface" level, at which the values, beliefs and beliefs shared by the members of the organization are studied, in accordance with the extent to which these values are reflected in symbols and language, how they carry the semantic explanation of the first level. The perception of values and beliefs is conscious and depends on the desire of people. The second level of organizational culture was called "organizational ideology" by Shane. Here the role is emphasized life credo company leader. Researchers often limit themselves to this level, since the next level is almost insurmountable.
The third, “deep”, level includes new (“fundamental”) assumptions that are difficult to realize even for the members of the organization without special focus on this issue. Among these, taken for granted, hidden assumptions that guide the behavior of people in an organization, E. Shane singled out the attitude to being in general, the perception of time and space, general attitude to people and work.
According to which of these levels are studied, there is a division of organizational culture into objective and subjective. Subjective organizational culture includes values shared by all employees, beliefs, expectations, ethical norms, perception of the organizational environment, as well as a number of elements of the spiritual part of the “symbols” of culture: heroes of the organization, myths, stories about the organization and its leaders, organizational rites, rituals and taboos, perception of the language of communication and slogans.
Objective organizational culture is usually associated with the physical environment: the company building and its design, location, equipment and furniture, technology used, colors and amount of space, amenities, cafeteria, parking lots and cars themselves, uniforms, information stands, brochures, etc. All of these, to varying degrees, reflect the values that the organization adheres to.
According to another typology, any culture can be represented as a two-component structure - the core of culture and a protective belt.
The core of culture concentrates the norms, standards, standards and rules of activity, as well as the system of values developed in real history organizations. These specific standards, rules, etc. are related to the history of the company, its victories and defeats, the real conditions in which it was formed, the specifics of the surrounding social environment. The structures in which the core of culture is realized are, first of all, mythology, prejudices, rituals, habits, rules of conduct, and traditions. The main function of the core of culture is the preservation and transmission of self-identity; it has high stability and minimal variability. The core of culture performs the function of social memory, storing information about history, stages of formation, conditions of life and activity. This information, accumulated in the core, is transmitted to the organization through the system of socialization, the mechanism of social “remembering”, and this is what guarantees its self-identity. In order to preserve the core of culture in the process of development, a special cultural protective belt arises. It performs the function of a filtering mechanism that passes directive information coming from the core of the culture and monitors and absorbs information impulses that enter the organization from other cultures. These impulses, especially if they threaten the core of the culture, are neutralized and even dissolved in the protective belt. At the same time, it also provides another function - adaptation to the external environment. However, the core of culture, for all its stability, cannot remain unchanged. Representing an information structure, it must change, because by definition, in its essence, information is a way of fixing and transmitting changes. Speaking about the stability of the core of culture, its stability, we fix the fact that the core of culture as an information formation changes and transforms incomparably more slowly than the protective belt, and even more so than the real environment. Therefore, we are talking about different rates of change, and the rates of change in the core are so insignificant compared to the rates of change in the protective belt and the medium that in practice they can be ignored over rather large time intervals. This allows us to speak about the stability of the core of culture, although it is rather relative. However, in the event of a sudden change in conditions external environment, with its deep transformations, the stability of the core of culture can turn out to be a purely negative phenomenon, hindering the adaptation of the organization to new conditions of life and thereby pushing it to self-destruction.
dialectic
Organizational culture possesses the property of dialectics, since it is not a “thing in itself”, but constantly correlates its elements as with its own own goals, so with surrounding reality, other organizational cultures, while noting their strengths and weaknesses, reviewing and improving certain parameters.
Organizational culture is a contradictory unity of the meaning of activity and its result, constantly updated by the organization, the program of this activity. At the same time, it is also the basis of social relations.
Organizational culture and organizational relationships are two aspects of organizational performance. Organizational relations, ultimately recreated by the organizational culture, are at the same time a system of communications, specialization and integration of organizational activities for the exchange of resources, information in the process of implementing organizational goals. They are accepted through norms, customs, rituals, etc. Social relations exist not only within a single organization, but also within ,
groups, i.e., its subsystems, constituting a certain integrity, having specific experience that forms subcultures. These groups, as well as the organization as a whole, can exist if the activity of their members resists permanent destructive factors, and their activity is ultimately reduced to solving the problems of internal integration and external adaptation.
The unity of subcultures and social relations is ensured by the activities of groups of the organization, which consists precisely in solving the above problems. The key factor that ensures the dynamic homeostasis of the social relations of the organization of the company is, first of all, the ability of people to transfer social relations from the past to the future, restore the destroyed, avert real and potential threats, maintain the viability of the organization, which is realized within the communicative environment of the organizational culture.
Consequently, the essence of social relations can be understood as a certain system of meaningful human relations, both as a social integrity and as an active ability of the people included in it. Activities to solve the problems of external adaptation and internal integration oppose the constant process of destruction, culture, social relations, the constant trend of growing disorganization.
The process of solving the problems of internal integration and external adaptation -
the only barrier to social entropy that can not only stop it, but also reverse it. Entropy is an inevitable consequence of organizational problems, while their solution leads to the manifestation of the negentropy effect. This becomes especially evident when analyzing the emergence of contradictions in organizational activities. The difficulty lies in the fact that in the organization there are constantly contradictions between social relations and culture, i.e. socio-cultural contradictions .
They appear as a result of the existence of entropy processes, i.e. errors, disorganization in the development of culture, the loss of certain of its elements, as well as attempts to establish inefficient relationships, which gives rise to a discrepancy between the accumulated culture and the emerging relationships.
The socio-cultural contradiction is found in the emergence of cultural programs that shift organizational activity in such a way that vital social relations become non-functional as a result. This contradiction manifests itself in conflicts between the historically established and the innovations that change it, between the usual and new political relations, which is ultimately caused by contradictions within organizational activities.
As stated above, an effective organization must, in order to exist, reproduce, renew its culture, its social relations, ensure their unity, interpenetration, removing constantly emerging socio-cultural contradictions, preventing their growth to a critical level. The possibility of a socio-cultural contradiction is connected with the fact that changes in culture and changes in social relations are subject to different patterns. A change in social relations in principle always entails a change in the effectiveness of organizational activity. Therefore, there are restrictions, prohibitions on many relationships that reduce this efficiency below a critical threshold.
Organizational culture, in contrast to social relations, changes according to other laws. Culture always carries an assessment of any real or possible phenomenon in terms of a certain set of values, regardless of the ability to embody these values.
In culture there are also limitations, but their nature is not the same as in social relations. Limitations in a culture are always just one aspect of its content. Moreover, the nature of the prohibitions is somewhat ambiguous, since they themselves are constantly turning into the content of human thinking. It is well known that what is forbidden attracts increased attention. Not allowing to show deviant behavior, culture thus forces people to think in such representations.
Dynamism
In its movement, culture goes through the stages of origin, formation, maintenance, development and improvement, cessation (replacement). Each stage has its own "problems of growth", which is natural for dynamic systems. Different organizational cultures choose their own ways of solving them, more or less effective. Fast-growing organizations are focused, as a rule, on the successful achievement of their goals. The priorities of the organizational culture of such enterprises are: professional competence, self-confidence and self-confidence, desire for self-improvement, "equality of chances" when moving up the career ladder, reliability and speed of information, high quality requirements. Achievements of employees must be taken into account and paid. All this gives rise to job satisfaction, commitment to the organization and its organizational culture. In order to contribute to the successful growth of such a fast-growing enterprise, the organizational culture must have increased dynamism, flexibility and high ability to change. Slowly growing organizations are guided, as a rule, by bureaucratic norms and values, primarily by power and status, self-affirmation, hierarchy, unity of command. Such a bureaucratic culture can exist for quite a long time without changes and movement forward, until some really serious contradictions lead to the need to change it.
The nutrient medium in which culture is formed, realized and reproduced is the naturally occurring historical movement. Representing a mechanism for preserving and transmitting what has been achieved, culture provides the possibility of systematic reconstruction of individual events in organizational history into context, and, consequently, into one or another vision of historical trajectories, certain movements, as sequential (logical) chains of events-shifts.
When studying culture, it is important to understand it as a unity of two opposite, but passing into each other poles, as a constant process of their mutual penetration. On the one hand, culture is something corporate. But, on the other hand, it is always personal. For the individual, the culture accumulated by the organization is a real object, the characteristics of which the individual turns into the content of his consciousness and activity.
Heterogeneity
A distinctive feature of a particular culture is the priority of the basic characteristics that form it, indicating which principles should prevail in the event of a conflict between its different components. In this context, it is not necessary to speak of organizational culture as a homogeneous phenomenon. In any organization, there are potentially many subcultures that reflect the differentiation of culture by levels, departments, divisions, age groups, national groups. A subculture can be in the same dimension as the dominant organizational culture, or create a second dimension in it, as it were.
In fact, any of these subcultures can become dominant, i.e. the actual organizational culture, if it is purposefully supported and used by organizational authorities as a tool for consolidating individual goals in the direction of a common organizational goal.
A subculture is a set of symbols, beliefs, values, norms, patterns of behavior that distinguish a particular community or any social group. At the same time, organizational culture is understood as one culture that prevails in the entire organization and the culture of its parts. Often (though not always) the structure of subcultures repeats the culture of the organization itself.
The carriers of subcultures are individuals expressing similar interests. At the same time, subcultures repeat the structure of the enterprise itself: departments, departments, and the administration of the enterprise will have different subcultures. If there is an appropriate learning potential, new norms and patterns of behavior develop that were not previously introduced into the organization by anyone, a new, strong culture arises.
One or more subcultures in an organization may, by their nature, be in the same dimension as the dominant culture in the organization, or create, as it were, a second dimension in it.
The first type of relationship includes, for example, the subculture of the central administrative apparatus, the subculture of top managers, etc. - it will be an enclave in which adherence to the core values of the dominant culture is manifested to a greater extent than in other parts of the organization.
In the second case, the core values of the dominant culture are accepted by members of one of its groups at the same time as a separate set for themselves of other, as a rule, not conflicting values. Subcultures are a consequence of the problems and experiences that the divisions of the organization have gone through. Countercultures can be in direct opposition to the dominant culture, in opposition to power structures and management bodies, or in opposition to certain elements of the overall organizational culture, its structural components, norms of relationships, values, etc.
This usually takes place in the subculture of the central office of an organization or system of government. This can be observed at the periphery of the organization or in territorial bodies management. In this way, adaptation to the specifics of activity (functional services) or local conditions (territorial departments) can go.
Organizations may have a third type of subculture that is quite persistent in rejecting what the organization as a whole wants to achieve. Among these organizational countercultures, the following types can be distinguished:
- direct opposition to the values of the dominant organizational culture;
- opposition to the power structure within the dominant culture of the organization;
- opposition to patterns of relationships and interactions supported by organizational culture.
Countercultures in an organization usually appear when individuals or groups are in conditions that they feel cannot provide them with the usual or desired satisfaction. IN in a certain sense organizational countercultures are a call for help in times of stress or crisis, i.e. When existing system support has collapsed, and people are trying to regain at least some control over their lives in the organization. Some "countercultural" groups can become quite influential in the course of large-scale transformations associated with significant changes in the nature, design and nature of the organization.
Value consolidation
Value consolidation is another the most important property organizational culture. Any organization grows by attracting new members coming from organizations with a different culture. New members of the organization bring with them a load of past experience, in which the "viruses" of other cultures often lurk. The immunity of an organization from such "infections" depends on the strength of its culture, which is determined by three points:
1) "depth";
2) the extent to which it is shared by members of the organization;
3) clarity of priorities.
The "depth" of organizational culture is determined by the number and persistence of the most important beliefs shared by employees. Cultures with many levels of beliefs and values have a strong influence on behavior in an organization. In some cultures, shared beliefs, beliefs, and values are clearly ranked. Their relative importance and interrelation does not lessen the role of each of them. In other cultures, relative priorities and links between shared values are blurred. A clear priority of beliefs has a greater effect on people's behavior, since they know for sure which value should prevail in the event of a value conflict.
Thus, a strong culture has deeper roots in people's minds, it is shared a large number workers and it more clearly defines priorities. Accordingly, such a culture has a deeper impact on the behavior of employees in the organization.
A strong culture not only creates benefits for an organization, but can also act as a major barrier to organizational change. The “new” in culture is always weaker in the beginning. Therefore, a moderately strong organizational culture seems to be optimal for reorganization. It should be emphasized right away: every enterprise has a culture, even if it is expressed solely through mutual distrust. Although there is an opinion that one should talk about culture only where the group has managed to achieve stability and when it is possible to turn to the general history of development. This judgment is valid for groups, but not for large organizations, which themselves consist of small communities that are simultaneously at different stages of development and thus have signs of strong or weak organizational cultures. To characterize culture as strong is to allow for the possibility of misunderstandings: strong as dominant, powerful, insensitive, with a huge facade, all from one monolith, suppressing feelings and moods, inanimate, unified, ignoring gray tones overwhelming individual differences, shapes and nuances.
The stronger the organizational culture, the more easily it resists attempts to destroy it by external forces or countercultures, and the more easily such a strong culture adapts to any kind of change. A strong culture is the pride of the staff; it is open, alive, indisputable, easily recognizable. Participation in such a culture in itself becomes a powerful tool for motivating staff, meeting their needs for success, self-realization, goal achievement, morality and ethics, high culture business relations, constantly moving forward. Personnel in such a culture require constant self-actualization, improvement and development of their abilities, a desire not only to proclaim norms and values, but also to actually follow them in their development.
Strong cultures, if immediately recognizable, are undeniable, open, alive—the way people live. They can be recognized by the fact that the enterprise has adopted a small number of values that are understood, approved and nurtured by all members of the organization.
Two trends are constantly expressed in the content of these core values: pride and style. Because in many cases, the core values represent the program of what they want to present and achieve, on the one hand, in the external sphere, that is, for example, in the market, in society. On the other hand, these core values go to a large extent on the question of what kind of relationships are desirable within an organization. An undeniable culture is a decisive element of motivation: pride in your own enterprise and the feeling that, based on the communication style you practice, you are at a high level.
The productive aspect is expressed, despite all failures, failures and proclamations, in a constantly pursued goal, the desire to be the first, dominant in the market or simply the best in a certain area, in a certain area, in a certain market niche or, if this has already been achieved, by the desire to expand and retain these positions. The indisputable cultures of enterprises develop strong self-dynamics, they instill immunity in cultural subjects and thus provide an essential support for the development of self-understanding.
Another characteristic of a strong culture is that the basic ideas about how to treat each other are undeniable. Strong cultures are characterized by a broad area of shared assumptions and values that influence people's actions more than non-cultural motives.
Organizational cultures are considered weak if they are very fragmented and not tied together by shared values and beliefs. A company can suffer if the subcultures that characterize its various divisions are unrelated or in conflict with each other. Copying norms of behavior in informal groups can play an important role in the development of these various subcultures. A company in which common deeds, statements, events and feelings are not obvious does not have a clear culture at all.
A weak culture can be recognized based on the following symptoms:
- there are no clear values and shared beliefs about how to achieve success in a certain industry, a certain situation or in a certain business. Helplessness spreads, salvation is sought in the setting of short-term production goals, long-term goals are absent, and figuring out a comprehensive enterprise philosophy is seen as simply a luxury;
- in general, there are ideas about values and beliefs, but there is no agreement that in currently is correct, important and effective. This condition turns into a complicating problem when the lack of determination comes from the management of the enterprise. Contradictions accumulate and continue at the lower levels of the organization. The consequences of this may be wars between deputies and a hidden struggle between the "strong in the enterprise";
- separate parts of the organization are unable to come to an agreement among themselves: mainly different points of view are presented, there is no complete picture. First of all, we have in mind the traditional frontal positions, which can act between the headquarters and the line, technicians and merchants, marketing and production, internal and external services, regional organization and center, etc.;
- leading figures emerge and act rather demotivatingly and do nothing to promote development common understanding what is important and what is not.
This may, for example, mean that leading cadres are unconsciously mixed, i.e. conflicting decisions. In identical situations, they react completely differently. In case of success, the excess of authority by the employee is encouraged as entrepreneurialism; in case of failure, it is punished as indiscipline.
However, in last years opinions regarding the significance of this characteristic and its role in organizational processes are divided. Thus, the assertion that the presence of a “strong” culture in an organization is good in itself is now considered controversial for a number of reasons, which, according to A. Brown, refute this:
1) a strong culture makes it easier to achieve goals, but their setting within the culture is not always positive when these goals are unethical or do not encourage excellent economic activity;
2) a strong culture affects the motivation of employees in two ways, i.e. may encourage very different attitudes towards the organization or work, and not always exclusively positive;
3) an organization that highly values its past and fixes information about it in stories and stories has an advantage over a similar company that does not adhere to such rules. At the same time, there is a subtle line between the ability to draw conclusions from the lessons of the past and blind obedience to it;
4) it is very difficult to identify the determining reason for the success of companies with a strong organizational culture, because it is quite possible that it is the successful economic activity that leads them to the establishment of a strong culture, and not vice versa. The success of an organization often combines the beliefs and values asserted by the culture, and, therefore, it is economic success that strengthens the organizational culture.
Organizational culture as a whole consists of several relatively independent parts- local subcultures that can concretize and develop a common organizational culture, can peacefully exist along with it, or can contradict it (the so-called countercultures).
Organizational culture has a specific structure, being a set of assumptions, values, beliefs, and symbols that helps people in an organization cope with their problems. So, E. Shein proposed to consider organizational culture at three levels.
Knowledge of organizational culture begins at the first, "superficial" or "symbolic" level, including such visible external facts as the technology and architecture used, the use of space and time, observable behavior, language, slogans, etc., or whatever what to feel and perceive through the known five senses of a person (see, hear, taste and smell, touch). At this level, things and phenomena are easy to detect, but they can not always be deciphered and interpreted in terms of organizational culture.
Those who try to understand organizational culture more deeply affect its second, "subsurface" level. At this level, the values and beliefs shared by the members of the organization are examined in accordance with the extent to which these values are reflected in symbols and language. The perception of values and beliefs is conscious and depends on the desire of people. Researchers often limit themselves to this level, since next level there are almost insurmountable difficulties.
The third, "deep" level includes basic assumptions that are difficult to understand even for the members of the organization without special focus on this issue. These hidden and taken for granted assumptions guide people's behavior, helping them to perceive the attributes that characterize organizational culture.
According to which of these levels are studied, there is a division of organizational cultures into subjective and objective.
Subjective organizational culture comes from the patterns of assumptions, beliefs and expectations shared by employees, as well as from the group perception of the organizational environment with its values, norms and roles that exist outside the individual.
Consider the elements of subjective organizational culture (Fig. 1).
Rice. 1
organizational culture structure company
Organizational values are the properties of certain material or spiritual objects, processes or phenomena that have emotional attractiveness for members of the organization. This allows them to serve as models, guidelines, a measure of behavior in general and in specific situations. Values include goals, the nature of internal relationships, the orientation of people's behavior, compliance with laws and regulations, innovation, initiative, work and professional ethics, ways of distributing income.
Values can be both positive and negative.
Positive values:
work can only be done perfectly;
truth is born in a dispute;
the interests of the consumer are above all;
the success of the company is my success;
work in the company is an opportunity for creativity and self-realization;
mutual assistance and maintaining good relations with colleagues at work;
not competition, but cooperation in working towards a common goal.
Negative values:
you can’t trust the authorities, you can only trust friends;
you are the boss - I'm a fool, I'm the boss - you're a fool;
don't lean out;
working well is not the most important thing in life;
buyers (clients) are random people, they only cause inconvenience;
you can't do all the work.
The next element of subjective culture is ritual. A ritual is a set of rituals (regularly repeated actions) that have psychological impact on the members of the organization in order to strengthen loyalty to it (employees of many Japanese companies, for example, start the working day by singing hymns), increase cohesion, create psychological comfort, teach organizational values and form the necessary beliefs.
Rituals support ideological ideas, concretizing them. Rituals serve as a means of visual demonstration of value orientations.
The degree of formalization of rituals varies. The regular and informal chatter over beers on Friday nights exemplifies a very little formalized ritual; the annual general meeting of a corporation is an example of a well-organized and stylistically perfected ritual. Most official events of this kind are aimed at maintaining harmony and order; most informal rituals are aimed at maintaining relationships.
Good rituals reinforce the positive values of the culture, bad or stupid rituals waste time and annoy people. Ritualization processes include Monday morning work meetings, annual debriefing meetings, job interview schemes, recruitment, safety committee activities, and so on. the occurrence of evil rituals.
The ceremony ties together a series of rituals. This is a special scheduled event held for the public. Managers hold ceremonies to show bright examples company value criteria. For example, Quaker State Minit-Lube Inc. a competition followed by an awards ceremony. This highlights the importance of fast and quality customer service. The competition consists in the fact that all actions related to the replacement of automobile oil in the car must be completed within eight minutes. The award ceremony presents big interest. Competitors arrive in a luxurious white limousine, walk down the red carpet, greeted by cheers from the crowd and the music of a jazz band.
Ceremonies both strengthen the organization and create opportunities for fun and emotional release.
Myths are the explanation of past events, the cultural content of which can be very important. Myths are true and invented. This is not so important, since they do not have to be truthful. They sound true to those who want to believe them, but to others they may sound like a tall tale. In the center of the myth there is always some theme, presented in several short stories about people or events.
Myth gives a visual form to ideology.
Myths use important information. They clarify or hide paradoxes, mask contradictions, block further search for explanations, reconcile opposing forces, add drama to ordinary events, and stimulate an emotionally and rationally acceptable understanding of reality.
There are myths in connection with dangerous and harmful products (cigarettes, alcohol, weapons). Stories about how much good the companies that produce it do for society (supporting sports, funding medical research, operas, ballets, etc.) allow their employees to avoid remorse.
Legends are partly true stories about people or groups of people. Legends are partly based on facts and partly on a free and emotional interpretation of these facts.
Legends allow you to create an internal exclusive image of the company, define its face, recreate the history of the emergence and development of the company. These legends are told to new employees and keep the core values of the organization alive.
R. Rüttinger makes the following division of all legends according to the main themes underlying them.
The boss is also human. This theme is revealed in the legends in which a member of the top leadership finds himself in an everyday situation along with a simple worker. If the boss overcomes the hierarchical distance by his behavior (for example, the first one starts a conversation), then he is further considered a normal person. Of course, the meaning of the boss's speech is also important. If the boss is impregnable (for example, does not respond to a greeting), then the employees still have doubts about his human qualities.
A simple employee becomes a member of senior management. These types of legends list the criteria on which promotion depends. It is emphasized how much promotion depends on the results of work and abilities, and how much on formal education and patronage.
Dismissal. A layoff is always a dramatic event. The most exciting legends can be told about him, focusing on the reasons and circumstances of the dismissal, which makes it possible to recognize the style of the enterprise.
The boss's reaction to mistakes. There are two usual endings: either the boss forgives or he doesn't. However, there is also an intermediate option: an employee is punished for a mistake, but, since his actions ultimately led to success, he is simultaneously encouraged.
Consequences of the disaster. Any extraordinary circumstances are meant, as caused by external forces(fire, war, etc.) and employees' mistakes (failure of the sales plan, etc.). As a rule, such legends are very beautiful and heroic (for example, after the Second World War, everything had to be created anew).
Legends like "The boss is human" and "An ordinary employee becomes a member of senior management" reflect the disparity in status. In a society that promotes equality, the hierarchical structure of the enterprise leads to an unpleasant collision with inequality. Through such legends the conflict can be resolved; the boss is also a person, and his status was preceded by personal bestowal.
Legends such as "Firing" and "Chief's reaction to mistakes" reflect individual insecurities caused by the ability of management members to change lives as individual person and the organization as a whole. On the one hand, the sense of security is prerequisite good work of many people. On the other hand, the organization must retain the right to compromise the safety of the individual if it is to survive as a whole. A happy ending means that the company takes into account the need of employees for safety and tries to satisfy it.
In the legends of the type "Consequences of the catastrophe" it turns out how prepared the enterprise is for the unexpected. Positive versions strengthen the belief that the enterprise is so strong that it will cope with any difficulties and find a way out of the current situation.
Stories are important not only for the content of the implied values, but also in themselves, as carriers of the multiplier effect.
The stories tell about the "heroes" of the company, setting an example for successful work.
Customs (traditions) are forms of social regulation of the activities and relations of people, adopted from the past and transmitted by members of the organization from generation to generation without any changes.
Slogans (calls, mottos, slogans) in short form reflect the main objectives of the organization.
All Microsoft offices have the slogan "Think". Microsoft is interested in employees who are focused on intelligent ways to solve problems.
Anatoly Karachinsky, President of the IBS group of companies, believes that successful manager should follow the motto: “It is said - done. And that's how it's been proven."
Today, its mission is often formulated in the form of a slogan.
Language. By learning the language, the newly arrived employees demonstrate their recognition of the culture and thus support and preserve it. Organizations also tend to develop unique terms to describe equipment, offices, employees, suppliers, customers, and products, i.e. everything that is directly related to the scope of the organization. Newcomers are introduced to the jargon that exists in the organization. A common terminology, or language, connects people within a single organizational culture.
Mentality - the way of thinking of the members of the organization, determined by the traditions, values, consciousness of the members of the organization, which has a huge impact on their daily behavior and attitude to their duties.
Subjective organizational culture serves as the basis for the formation of a managerial culture, i.e., leadership styles and problem solving by managers, their behavior in general.
Objective organizational culture is usually associated with the physical environment created in the organization: the building itself and its design, location, equipment and furniture, colors and amount of space, amenities, cafeteria, reception rooms, parking lots and cars themselves. All this reflects to some extent the values that this organization adheres to.
