The Organisational Culture Inventory is a tool that allows organisations to build a valid and reliable picture of their current culture, whilst identifying the constructs of their ideal. It helps a senior management team to understand what they are really asking of their employees and how this affects performance, motivation and job satisfaction. It can be used to provide a framework for performance improvement, gauge the organisation’s readiness for change, define specific changes that need to take place and provide a means of monitoring and measuring improved performance.

The process begins with senior managers, individually, completing the ideal culture inventory; a series of questions asks them to depict what they consider to be the ideal culture that will deliver the organisational goals and purpose. The questionnaires are computer processed, with the team’s responses collated into a team view of the ideal culture. The resulting data is published in report format supported by a graphic profile illustrating the collective ideal culture. This information provides the basis for a facilitated workshop where the senior team explore the reality of their collective ideal culture, achieving consensus as to a target culture.

This is followed by a cross-section of the workforce completing a questionnaire which, when processed, depicts their perception of the current culture. The findings from this research are published in the same format as that of the ideal culture findings, enabling senior managers to identify the gap between their target culture and that currently operating across the organisation.

In a second workshop senior managers consider the current culture results, comparing them to the ideal culture identified in workshop one. The outcome of this workshop is agreement to a broad strategy for bringing about the desired change to move the organisation towards its target culture.

The OCI is most often used by organisations as the start point for a bespoke culture change programme.

Aim:

To define the specific changes that need to take place for an organisation to achieve its ideal culture.

Outcomes:

As a result of this programme organisations will have:

• A “point in time” picture of their current culture, as perceived by the workforce.
• A profile of their ideal culture, as perceived by the senior team.
• Gauged their readiness for change
• A strategy to move the organisation towards its target culture.