Edgar Schein a former Professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management is known for his work in the field of organizational development, more so in areas such as career development, talent management, group dynamics and cultural developments. Edgar Schein‘s model of organizational culture originated in the 1980s. Edgar Schein identified three distinct levels in organizational cultures: artefacts and behaviors, espoused (adopted) values and assumptions which came to be known as Edgar Schein’s three levels of organizational culture.

This paper highlights on importance of artefacts in showcasing organizational culture.

Artefacts

Artefacts are the apparent and obvious elements of an organization. They are typically the things which even an outsider can see, such as furniture in the office layout, dressing norms, inside atmosphere, jovial and helpful. Free food, birthday celebration, annual holidays is also artefacts. A beautifully decorated reception area with artistic furniture and aesthetic fixers showcase the organization’s culture. Artefacts can be easy to observe but sometimes difficult to understand, especially if your analysis of a culture never goes deeper. The Palo Alto office of IDEO famously has an airplane wing jutting out from one wall, a surprising and puzzling artefact if one doesn’t understand IDEO’s culture of playful experimentation and free expression.

For some Microsoft engineers in India, working in tech-driven infrastructure merged seamlessly with the local cultural influence is a pleasant experience. Spread across the top three floors of a six-story building in Noida, a satellite town of India’s capital New Delhi, in their newest Microsoft India Development Centre (IDC). What sets the space apart from regular corporate workspaces is the historical context it draws from. In simmering ivory white and dotted with jaali work typical Mughal architectural style of perforated stone or latticed screen, arches, and domed ceilings, the IDC Noida campus’ architectural reference points, inspired by one of the world’s biggest architectural wonders, the Taj Mahal, are hard to miss. Microsoft wants to portray that it respects Indian heritage and wants to enrich its endeavour in India that’s what the office portrays.

In psychology a first impression is an experience when one person first comes across another person, a house, a building, an office so on. The person forms a rational image or an impression of that person or place. The interior and the exterior speak a lot about the organization or family, though they remain silent. The impression need not always be accurate; it varies depending on the observer’s frame of mind and the target person, place, object, scene, etc. being observed. It has been proved that it takes just one-tenth of a second for us to judge something. Imagine, how much time is one tenth of a second – and in that we form an opinion – some very important and some not so important.

Artefacts include any tangible, evident or verbally identifiable elements in an organization. These include the architecture, beautification of workplace, careful design, layout, fitting and maintenance, built-in space for movement (space, sound, and acoustics), functionality, attractive visuals, elegance, furniture etc. Artefacts include dress codes – explicit dress codes speak a lot about workplace culture. They are varied as workplaces are. It differs as per the nature of the workplace; it is the starting point of defining and determining a dress code. Wearing I-Card and clean dress, well-groomed employees speak a lot about organizations.

The key to a successful organization is to have a culture based on a strongly held and widely shared set of beliefs that are supported by strategy and structure. When an organization has a strong culture, three things happen: employees know how top management wants them to respond to any situation, employees believe that the expected response is the proper one, and employees know that they will be rewarded for demonstrating the organization’s values.

There are six major types of artefacts: symbols, physical structures, language, stories, rituals, and ceremonies.

On the most basic level, a good interior design improves a space by making it better suited to its purpose. Interior design is a process that provides people working in an organization with a set of aesthetically pleasing, pleasant atmosphere for giving efficient solutions for a better use of the space in question. The goal of interior design is to improve the user experience by better managing the space available for the interdependent processes in the working environment of an organization.

A well designed office is a nice place to work. It gives the facelift to renowned companies for their creative culture and attempt to emulate what they’re doing, but without understanding the dynamics of culture, we may only mimic its surface-level elements and fail to make lasting cultural change. For example, it’s easy to look at tech companies and notice foosball tables or beer carts and lots of free food. But such objects are only part of the picture.

Established in 1990, in chaotic commercial hub of Nehru Place in Delhi is the Paharpur Business Centre with an exterior tall, greyish-white with rectangular windows spread over 50,000 square feet and six floors. When you step inside you are taken aback with the multitude of money plants that fill your vision. It is not an ordinary office.

The Paharpur Business Centre was declared as the Capital’s healthiest working place from environment point of view in a city. As such Delhi is notoriously famous for being the most polluted city in the world. This building manufactures its own air that is supposedly of ‘mountain-fresh’ quality and free of any toxins. The building is house for 1200 plants such as areca palms and snake plants which are placed everywhere. There are 4 plants for every employee on an average. The air inside this quiet building smells slightly medicinal and is completely still. It is only after some time that you realize why the gentle breeze and general hum of air conditioning units that are present in other offices or homes are missing here. It seems air conditioners are switched on only on the weekends to give the plants some rest.

The employees are organization’s first brand ambassadors.  Law firms are different from IT firms, hospitals are different from hospitality, manufacturing is different from retail and back office work is different from client-facing work. Dress codes, languages, selection of courteous language, office jokes, all exemplify organizational artefacts. Artefacts are the visible elements in a culture and they make the first impression on outsiders. Lazy, shabbily dressed, sloppy employees mar the image of the organization. When we meet gossiping, paying no heed to customers and lost in their old world employees, we lose interest in transacting with those organizations.

From the entrance of an organization a person feels a strong or weak culture. While designing an office, weightage is given by the management to cultural priorities. Values focus not on individuals but on the organization and its goals. Leaders in successful companies live their cultures every day and go out of their way to communicate their cultural identities to employees as well as prospective new hires.

For example Myntra is a major Indian fashion e-commerce company headquartered in Bengaluru. The company’s office is the one that is full of creativity. It is full of energy with colours, elements and visual merchandising just perfect to energize and inspire its 1500 young users, the company believes that more the colours, more ideas.

Espoused Values

A mission statement describes the overall purpose of an organization. Vision statements mention aspirations of the organization; they lay out the most important primary goals for a company. The mission and vision statements are displayed at most vital places in the organization such as the entrance, boardroom, all departments, canteen etc. The organizational culture is a system of shared traditions, values, and beliefs, which have a great effect on how people behave in organizations. When organizations formalise espoused values they must be aligned with organization’s core character. They act as statement of an organisation’s guiding principles and beliefs, and provide a meaningful keystone for behaviour at all levels of the organisation. Values are lasting beliefs which have a strong influence on the people in the organization. It tells how the organization appears in public eyes.

Assumed Values

The most observable feature in an organization is the behaviour of employees. It is the manifestations of an organization’s culture that employees can easily see or talk about.  Employers have a vital role in perpetuating a strong culture, starting with recruiting and selecting applicants who will share the organization’s beliefs and thrive in that culture, developing orientation, training and performance management programs that outline and reinforce the organization’s core values and ensuring that appropriate rewards and recognition go to employees who truly embody the values.

Conclusion

Artefacts demonstrate the culture, norms and values of those who are in the organisation as well as all its stakeholders. In a nutshell it is a medium of communication within the members of the organisation and those outside the organisation.

Robert Cook’s model is an extension of Edgar Schein’s model. An ineffective culture can bring down the organization and its leadership. Disengaged employees, high employee turnover, poor customer relations and lower profits are examples of how the wrong culture can negatively impact the bottom line.

Individuals from different backgrounds and varied interests come together on a common platform called organization to achieve targets as well as earning their own salaries. Individuals in organizations work in accord to achieve towards a common goal. The behaviour of the employees is driven by the culture of the workplace. How people interact amongst themselves and with outsiders also depend on the organization culture.

The artefacts, espoused values and assumed values policies, practices, principles of an organization form its culture. It is essential for an employee to understand the culture and adjust to it well to deliver his level best and win management’s appreciation.