2.0 Issues analysis 分析问题

2.1 Organizational Culture 组织文化

组织文化是指以信仰的方式，对价值观和学习经验进行总结分析。这往往体现在安排和组织成员的行为。

‘Organizational culture refers to the pattern of beliefs, values and learned ways of coping with experience that have developed during the course of an organization's history, and which tend to be manifested in its material arrangements and in the behaviors of its members.’

—— (Brown, 1998)

组织文化有着不可估量的意识。

Based on this belief, organizational culture is more like an intangible and immeasurable consciousness. Organizational culture comes from organization's history, the source which builds up certain values and behavior pattern for all people in the corporate. It is deeply rooted in every aspect of the organization but not considered as being open to discussion and criticism (Gagliardi, 1986). Therefore, organizational culture has a significant impact on the organization's performance and its members' life. However, organizational culture is hard to change especially in a company which has its own culture and value already.

组织文化有四层含义

There are four layers of organizational culture. The first layer is value, which is easy to identify in an organization, though it is always vague. Value is intangible but some particular objectives such as organization’s mission, objective and strategies often depend on the value of the culture. The second layer is belief, which is more specific, but still stays at the talking issues. Belief is kind of convictions about objective of real life of which people are aware, or can be made aware. The third one is behavior, which is related to the organization’s day to day operation. The last one is paradigm, which is the set of assumption held relatively in common and taken for granted in an organization (Johnson, Scholes & Whittington, 2008).

此外还强调有形和无形的企业文化

Furthermore, Schein (1990) emphasizes that there are visible and invisible levels of corporate culture (the ‘culture iceberg’ analogy) - the visible levels surface manifestations of the ‘culture iceberg’ incorporate observable symbols, ceremonies, stories, slogans, behaviors, dress and physical settings; the invisible levels of the ‘culture iceberg’ include underlying values, assumptions, beliefs, attitudes and feelings.

西南的口号是我们表现的可以看到的部分

For the visible part, the slogan of Southwest is ‘Our performance, our people, and our planet”, which fit the Southwest airline key culture including love, fun and hard work (Southwest airline Report, 2010). Southwest refers to itself as the “Love” (LUV) airline, which means the company loves its customers and the employees as well. And the key element of its culture is communication, so the organization focuses on the relationship among customers, staffs and managers (Gittel, 2003). And the glue to make communication stable is the special business environment of Southwest. Gittel (2003) found out the share goal, share knowledge and mutual respect help the organization get success. Share goal helps employees respond in a coordinated way whenever new challenges arise or new information becomes available. At Southwest, everyone knows the whole working process in the organization, and they also understand the link between part to part in management; share knowledge increases cooperation and innovation (Southwest airline Report, 2010), and the big secret of knowledge is all parts are equal and no one will be ignored. Based on the second environment, the Southwest has a culture in which each employee treats others with respect. They are all acknowledging that each part of the plan is indispensable. Southwest is the only airline company which provides services allowing the bags to fly free (Southwest Report, 2010), and the company looks up to customers very much; therefore, compared to its competitors, the Southwest has an unique culture which is called "goofiness", and this kind of culture encourages some individuals and keeps the morale of its employees high (Smith, 2005). Southwest not only provides efficient service to customers, it also pays attention to its own employees (Southwest Report, 2010). With employee service or contribution to customers, Southwest airline roots brand into customers’ mind (Miles &Mangold, 2005). Through employee branding, the behaviors of its staffs seem like the beliefs and attitude of Southwest to their customers and these behaviors will influence the reaction of customers.