Rating: 
Summary: Practical Approach to Diagnosing Culture
Review: Organizational Culture and Leadership is a classic work in the field of Organizational Culture Theory and as such it is a good reference to have. The frustration that many companies have, however, is putting theory into practice and unfortunately this book falls short of helping anyone (apart from O.D. PhD's) to do just that. A practical approach to the evaluation and transformation of culture would be more useful for the vast majority of companies. For example an iterative approach to transformation and alignment using objective diagnostic tools (like the OCP Method developed by O'Reilly, Chatman and Caldwell) and the application of practical "bite-size" changes like leadership development/behvioral change; compensation system change, recruiting model change, organizational structure change, etc. is far more impactful and perhaps more importantly far more implementable. And, of course, as in any change effort, it is important to know whether you are making progress which is all the more reason to utilize an objective and validated measurment/diagnostic method or tool. I really like Kaplan and Norton's work in tying Culture to Strategy in this area (check out their recent HBR article) and the work ThinkShed is doing based on O'Reilly, Chatman and Caldwell's OCP methodology...very practical, very measurable, very effective and being a web based tool, very very implementable.
Rating: 
Summary: The best work I have found about Org. Culture, period.
Review: Schein has spent most of his practicing life dedicated to the topic of Organizational Culture. Having read numerous books and articles pertaining to this topic, this book "out-Schein's" them all (pardon the play on words). Schein takes a very broad topic like culture and makes it understandable. If you want to learn about Organizational Culture from the World's foremost authority, then buy this book. Regarding leadership Schein does not fall short, either, however is not as impactful because leadership has been studied more extensively and there are other quality writings about leadership, including Schein's. He does tie the two together nicely providing a new way to look at leadership qualities. Wonderful book.
Rating:
Summary: The best work I have found about Org. Culture, period.
Review: Schein has spent most of his practicing life dedicated to the topic of Organizational Culture. Having read numerous books and articles pertaining to this topic, this book "out-Schein's" them all (pardon the play on words). Schein takes a very broad topic like culture and makes it understandable. If you want to learn about Organizational Culture from the World's foremost authority, then buy this book. Regarding leadership Schein does not fall short, either, however is not as impactful because leadership has been studied more extensively and there are other quality writings about leadership, including Schein's. He does tie the two together nicely providing a new way to look at leadership qualities. Wonderful book.
Rating:
Summary: Organizational Culture and Leadership
Review: This is excellent reading, especially for those people who are managing business units or any other functional groups that operates within an organization. The author has done substantial research on the topic of organizational culture and leadership. This is not his first book on the topic, but in this book he really flushes out the impact of culture on the organization and especially for those who are in leadership roles. Schein believes that culture can be transformed into a tool that can be used by managers to better understand the dynamics change in the organization. He points out that culture is a phenomenon that surrounds us at all the time and it is being enacted and created by our interactions with others. He feels that the process of culture creation and management are the essence of leadership. Shein feels that if leaders want to start evolutionary change processes that must be adaptive. In order for them to achieve this goal, they must first understand the dynamics of culture. He feels neither culture nor leadership can be understood or addressed individually because many things in-groups are shared or held in common. Shein presents categories of values that groups routinely use to operate within an organization. He provides a very clear definition and explanation of organizational culture. He talks about how leaders are chosen or not chosen. He stresses the point that cultural understanding is critical for leadership, and is the determining factor in the choice of leaders within a group or organization. Shein talks extensively about group dynamics and presents some interesting information about some of the assumption that are necessary for groups to operate successfully. He also discusses how leaders embed and transmit culture both formally and informally within an organization. He also talks about the different stages organizations go through as they age, and how this process impacts the culture of the organization and its leadership. Shein predicts that organization and their leaders will have to become perpetual learners in the future in order to manage learning and change, if they expect to create a learning organization.
| 
