The Relief India Trust Organizational Culture:

Introduction:

The Organizational Culture serves as a pivotal determinant in a non-government organization. It is a subset of organizational theory and management and it is widely discussed within this domain for raising awareness about the criticality of this factor. Cultural diversity is essential in an NGO and unfortunately it goes unnoticed and unappreciated by the mainstream policy makers, which include both the donors and the government. According to the ReliefIndia Trust, the simplest definition of organizational culture is ‘the way we do or think about things here’.  The concept of organizational culture is often sometimes referred to as the ‘Characteristics of a NGO’. A strong organizational culture is pivotal to be prevailing in any NGO as it is reflected back not only within their organization, but beyond as well where they deal with the general public, donors and government for various reasons related to social welfare work for the wellbeing of people living in the society. It should have its main focus on social psychology with emphasis on the negotiation and as well as the inculcation of different values and meanings as expressed through the behavior, motivational level and the artifacts. The cultural incompatibilities existing within the organization are usually the root cause of the failure of the NGO.

General Types of Organizational Culture:

 According to the Relief India Trust research about the importance and relevance of organizational culture in NGOs, there are basically 4 distinct types of such cultures which are given below for your consideration:

·         Club Culture – This is the first type of organizational culture which has a typical setting of an NGO, where the leader of the house or the founding member of the NGO sits as the main person in the center of the organization. He has got the services of like minded people who sit next to him in order to work on behalf of their leader. It is a very common culture that is followed in many of the NGOs in the country and in several other regions as well.

·         Role Culture – It is a machine like structure in which the organization is divided into different employees, including top management, lower management and administrators etc with their roles clearly defined. The main emphasis in such a structure is always on rules and orders and it is also a popular type of organizational culture practiced in many NGOs worldwide. The Relief India Trust NGO also has this useful role type organizational culture in their NGO.

·         Task Culture – It is an organizational setting where a team of employees is formed according to their skill levels in order to address a lot of different NGO’s tasks in a much efficient manner. The emphasis in such a culture is always more on planning rather than the procedures. It is the most popular culture for the private sector where restructuring of the NGOs is a top priority.

·         Person culture – A person organizational culture is the type in which the  people working in an NGO are the main resource, but they are served with a minimal structure.