For a successful project execution, the most essential aspect is communication. From the purpose of the project to its smallest details, communication plays a significant role in allowing the effective delivery of a project. How a company communicates is often defined with the term ‘corporate culture’. Typically, strong corporate culture supports effective and meaningful communication among the teams of the company. Other than effective communication, strong corporate culture also creates a sense of identity and helps retain talent within the company, as stated by Forbes. Each of these factors is important in building a company’s image and attracting potential business.

According to the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument developed by Kim Cameron and Robert Quinn, there are four distinct types of corporate culture:

Adhocracy Culture– Provides a dynamic and creative working environment where employees are encouraged to take risk. This culture focuses on innovating and creating new resources in hopes of impacting the future, while promoting individual initiative and freedom. This culture is most prominent in technical start-ups, technology-driven industries and disruptive services such as Airbnb and Uber.
Clan Culture- Establishes a friendly working environment where leaders are seen as mentors and all are held together by loyalty and tradition. In this culture, success is defined by addressing the needs of the clients and caring for others through teamwork, participation and consensus. This culture is most prominent in healthcare and education industry.
Hierarchy Culture- Depends on a structured and formalized workplace where a smooth functioning of the organization is most crucial and is driven by formal rules and policies. The long-term goals in this culture are stability, reliable delivery and low cost defined success by implementing a structured system of power. This culture is most prominent in medicine, nuclear power, military, government, banking, insurance and transportation sectors.
Market Culture- Supports a result-based workplace that emphasizes reaching targets and deadlines. Leaders tend to have high expectations and are often competitive as reputation and success are at stake. Long-term goals of this culture are to assert market dominance, achieve set goals and outperform the competition. This culture is most prominent in consultancy, accountancy, sales and marketing, services and manufacturing sectors.

Many organizations implement a blend of more than one of these types of corporate culture. During the process of Staff Augmentation, it is crucial to understand complex corporate cultures, in order to find the best fitted candidate for the team and project. Utilizing an effective recruitment strategy in alignment with corporate culture, yields long-term qualified and reliable candidates, as stated by The Staffing Stream. Not only it will correctly align employees to be more stable, but will also increase performance up to 9% (Gartner). A leading cause of job dissatisfaction is weak or unaligned corporate culture. By ensuring candidates’ alignment smoothly with certain corporate culture, the company decreases the chances of dissatisfaction from both the employee and employer’s sides.

Finding an appropriate candidate who is able to adhere to a specific type of corporate culture, requires a thorough step by step screening process that examines him/her from their accomplishments to their creative ability and behavior. Forbes has outlined a thorough method on how to find a suitable candidate for the organization:

Identify Ideal employee profile
Invest time in references
Look for persistence and creativity

Look for social media skills
Use job-specific language and questions
Look beyond professional accomplishments

Not only does this process narrow the search for the perfect candidate, but it also acknowledges the individuality of each applicant. This is particularly important in predicting how an applicant will perform in a particular workplace environment and how beneficial their contributions will be for the company.

References:
http://www.thestaffingstream.com/2014/03/06/understanding-your-corporate-culture-is-key-in-staffing/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/larryalton/2017/02/17/why-corporate-culture-is-becoming-even-more-important/#2730a63469da
https://www.ocai-online.com/about-the-Organizational-Culture-Assessment-Instrument-OCAI
https://www.gartner.com/en/executive-guidance/culture
https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesbusinessdevelopmentcouncil/2019/01/04/12-ways-to-identify-the-perfect-candidate-for-your-company/#751e60c05f1a

By:
Sreevani Konda, Data & Analytics Leader