Organizational Culture of Social Support Institutions - Empirical Study

Abstract

The value of support offered to individuals and families in a difficult situation, being a significant indicator of the quality of their lives, appears to harmonize inseparably with the moral aspect of the functioning of social support institutions. The support activity implemented by social services, as any other kind of professional activity, is subject not only to legal, but also to ethical responsibility which ought to be examined on both the individual and the macro levels. The article presents results of the author’s own study regarding organizational culture of social support institutions operating on the local level. The diagnosis has been made using the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument (OCAI) model where four main types of culture are listed, which enables the presentation of the predominant features of social institutions, i.e. adhocracy (creation), market (rivalry), clan (cooperation), and hierarchy (control) cultures. As it is visible in the results of explorations undertaken, the predominant type of culture in the social support institutions examined is hierarchy culture (33.02%), whereas clan culture is the most desired one (38.13%). This means that the surveyed employees perceive their workplaces as highly formalized, oriented towards internal affairs and following the rules. According to them, the development of their institutions depends largely on the quality of interpersonal relations and professional development of skills.