Organizational Culture Survey Case Study

- A Global Consulting Firm

Situation:

Company A is the Greater China branch of a global consulting firm. It has envisioned a fast growing market in China and a booming business for the past several years. However, the former China CEO, together with a few other executives resigned suddenly within a short period of time, and the company was immersed into rumors about this personnel change and even the possibility of being acquired by other companies. New CEO was designated to confront this uneasy organizational atmosphere, along with some other left-behind problems and challenges to compete with rivals in this ever growing competitive country.

Solution:

MGP suggested using Denison Organizational Culture Survey (DOCS) to diagnose the current organizational status. Denison Organizational Culture Model has been applied to above 1,500 organizations in the world and has been proven by 20 years empirical researches to be a highly effective tool in projecting organization's strengths and weaknesses. In this case, despite that the new China CEO of Company A was the Vice President thus being very familiar with the organization, he found it highly imperative to obtain a sense of the post-change atmosphere that exists in large population, the employees' perception of the company, and the development needs the company has to focus on.

Due to the level of urgency required by company A, MGP initiated and completed the survey within 1 week. The survey covered 20% of the total headcount, stratified sampled from every division and every location. The result of this survey, illustrated in a composite culture profile and ten segment culture profiles, which compare the differences among each unit, was presented to the leadership team during the company's annual leadership team retreat. The model acquired great attention and the result – the culture maps, aroused a lot interesting and reflective discussion, facilitated by MGP senior consultant Dr. William Mobley.