Strategic Management: A Competitive Advantage Approach, Concepts and Cases, 16/e

Integrating Strategy and Culture

Every business entity has a unique organizational culture that impacts strategic-planning activities. Organizational culture is “a pattern of behavior that has been developed by an organization as it learns to cope with its problem of external adaptation and internal integration, and that has worked well enough to be considered valid and to be taught to new members as the correct way to perceive, think, and feel.”4 This definition emphasizes the importance of matching external with internal factors in making strategic decisions. Organizational culture captures the subtle, elusive, and largely unconscious forces that shape a workplace. Remarkably resistant to change, culture can represent a major strength or weakness ...