Division 4200 State and Economic Reform, Civil Society

Gender and Change in the Organisational Culture

Tools to construct a gender-sensitive organisation

Deutsche Gesellschaft f�rTechnische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH

Part 1

Within the framework of information management and in order to reach the broadest possible readership, the Pilot Programme Gender of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH has undertaken the task of translating selected publications dedicated to gender. The content of this manual does not necessarily represent the view of GTZ or the Pilot Programme Gender. Published by: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH Dag-Hammarskjöld-Weg 1-5 65760 Eschborn Federal Republic of Germany Internet: http://www.gtz.de Division 42 – State and Economic Reform, Civil Society Pilot Programme Gender Telephone: (+49) 6196-79-1615/1612; Fax: (+49) 6196-79-7332 e-mail: marion.thompson@gtz.de Internet: http://www.gtz.de/gender_project Responsible: Stefani Klos, Pilot Programme Gender Author: Olga Sofía Díaz González Editorial Committee: Jorge Enrique Guzmán, Kerstin Hagmann Translation: M. A. Torres Cover: soho! Werbeagentur GmbH, Wiesbaden, Germany Layout: Chrystel Yazdani / GTZ The Spanish edition “Género y cambio en la cultura organizacional. Herramientas para crear una organización sensible al género“ was published by PROEQUIDAD, DINEM, GTZ, Bogotá, Colombia 2000. Printed by: Universum Verlagsanstalt, Wiesbaden, Germany May 2001

Division 4200 State and Economic Reform, Civil Society

Gender and Change in the Organisational Culture

Tools to construct a gender-sensitive organisation Eschborn 2001

The Cooperation Activities of the Pilot Programme Gender The Pilot Programme Gender was a supraregional project of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH located in Eschborn. It was financed by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Division 406 – Equality; Women’s and Children’s Rights; Participation. It was managed by GTZ Division 4200 – State and Economic Reform, Civil Society. Between 1993 and 2001, the Pilot Programme supported sectoral and regional divisions as well as projects with a view to operationalising the gender approach and developing implementation-oriented concepts and tools. The Pilot Programme Gender was terminated in spring 2001 after its second and final phase. The work of the first project phase focused on:

mainstreaming the gender perspective in sector concepts and instruments and in project designs, in close cooperation with GTZ sector divisions in the Planning and Development Department;

support to regional divisions in the design of country strategies from a gender perspective, expanding and upgrading know-how and competencies among GTZ staff and advisers as well as among personnel in partner countries; this included the development of training modules.

During the second phase, measures having a model character were supported in a range of partner countries. The following two goals were pursued in this context:

to implement gender issues as a cross-sectoral task in the German Technical Cooperation with governmental and non-governmental partner organisations;

to make a visible contribution to the gender policy of the respective partner country, as well as to the reduction of poverty and the improvement of the dialogue between government and society.

The Pilot Programme Gender presents a series of publications reflecting the results and findings of its work. This text deals with organisational change processes and includes guidelines for gender-sensitive analysis and organisational change. It provides conceptual and technical tools that can help to transform the organisational culture. This manual is geared to GTZ staff, consulting firms, people and institutions from partner countries, and it may also be of interest to other organisations involved in the field of development cooperation.

CONTENTS FOREWORD.................................................................................................... VII

INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................1

1. CONCEPTUAL TOOLS.............................................................................3

1.1 REGARDING ORGANISATIONS .................................................................. 4

1.1.1 Organisations as systems within systems ...................................................... 4

1.1.2 Organisations as “machines” and as “living systems” .................................... 5

1.1.3 Effects of viewing organisations as “machines” or as “living organisms” ...... 6

1.2 GENDER IN ORGANISATIONS .................................................................... 8

1.2.1 The notion of gender ...................................................................................... 8

1.2.2 How gender is expressed in organisations................................................... 10

1.2.3 Some common responses of organisations to the insertion of a gender perspective ................................................................................................... 13

1.2.4 Areas of gender analysis in organisations.................................................... 15

1.3 CHANGE AND ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE PROCESSES ................... 16

1.3.1 Development or organisational change........................................................ 16

1.3.2 What are paradigms ..................................................................................... 17

1.3.3 Paradigms and types of change................................................................... 18

1.3.4 Change and learning .................................................................................... 20

1.3.5 Types of learning.......................................................................................... 21

1.3.6 Links between change, learning and paradigms .......................................... 23

1.3.7 Change and resistance................................................................................. 23

1.3.8 Organisations receptive to learning .............................................................. 24

1.3.9 Organisational change is not problem resolution ......................................... 25

1.3.10 Phases of change......................................................................................... 26

1.3.11 The need for change: organisations in a rapidly changing environment ...... 27

1.3.12 Summary: assumptions regarding organisational change............................ 29

III

1.4 ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE: THE KEY TO A GENDER-SENSITIVE

ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE....................................................................... 30

1.4.1 Definition of organisational culture ............................................................... 30

1.4.2 Assumptions inherent to the notion of culture proposed .............................. 31

1.4.3 Paradigms, mental models and change in the organisational culture .......... 36

1.4.4 The visible and the invisible in organisations ............................................... 38

BIBLIOGRAPHY.....................................................................................................40

IV

FOREWORD

The Proequidad Project – Planning and Management of Development with a Gender Perspective – was launched as the result of a special agreement between the governments of Colombia and Germany1 in 1992. Since then, it has had an advisory role for government entities, training centres and women’s groups, geared to facilitating the planning and management of development favouring the construction of a more just and equitable society.

One of the project’s purposes has been to draft proposals and carry out actions leading to the crosscutting insertion of a gender perspective into the management of development. This has involved questioning two significant aspects of the work ordinarily undertaken by development organisations: the first deals with what such organisations have to offer, that is, the products and services they provide for their clients, potential users or target groups. The second aspect concerns how these organisations actually function, as reflected in their profiles, procedures, operational systems and organisational culture.

This text deals with internal or organisational change processes. It is a follow-up of Proequidad’s 1997 “Gender and Organisational Development for Public Entities.”2 This first publication offered the results of research carried out by the Project and included guidelines for gender-sensitive analysis and organisational change. The aim of the present text is to move that process forward, providing additional conceptual and technical tools that can help to transform the organisational culture, an area where the greatest barriers to the creation of gender-sensitive organisations are to be found.

We hope that this book, on a relatively unexplored theme, will be the final link in an integrated proposal for change leading to more equitable social development.

GERD JUNTERMANS ELSA GLADYS CIFUENTES GTZ Representative Presidential Advisor Women’s Equity

1 The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH, the Presidential Advisory Office for Women’s Equity and the National Planning Department of Colombia were the entities involved in the Proequidad Project. 2 Proequidad/GTZ Project (1997). Gender and Organisational Development for Public Entities. Bogotá, work advanced by Ellen Beattie.

VII

INTRODUCTION

Changes in the organisational culture need to affect systems of meanings and mental models, practice and behaviour, structures, guidelines and procedures in order to be stable and deep-rooted. They must also be reflected in the physical environment of an organisation. Changes limited to structures, guidelines and physical surroundings tend to prove superficial and are quite fragile, however. This is because the strongest types of inertia, those supported by systems of values and beliefs, assumptions and mental models – that is, by an organisation’s system of meanings – are what ultimately determine how an organisation gets things done. This Gender and Change in the Organisational Culture manual contains a set of concepts and tools designed to promote organisational gender analysis and to help chart the course of gender-sensitive organisational changes in the specific area of organisational culture, in both its individual and collective aspects. The text is divided into two sections. The first contains the concepts constituting the framework of this proposal and the second offers specific technical tools. The latter is divided into three groups: tools to carry out gender analysis in a given organisation; tools to guide and support a change process in its collective aspect; tools to facilitate a personal process of change. Also included in the last section are some guidelines for change processes, recognising that processes of organisational change can take multiple and diverse paths, and that all organisations undertake such processes in the light of their own dynamics and unique characters. This text is geared to members of organisations – devoted both to products and services – involved in processes of organisational change in the private and the public sectors, to NGOs and to organisational change consultants seeking to have gender influence the way change is managed.

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1. CONCEPTUAL TOOLS

We present a basic set of notions and definitions that can help guide a gender-sensitive organisational change in this section. Emphasis is laid on organisations, organisational change, gender and organisational culture. We chose these tools because we believe they are useful and help to generate deep and lasting changes in organisations. These conceptual tools are set forth bysubject areas as follows:

1.2 Gender in organisations

The notion of gender and how it is expressed in organisations

1.3 Organisational change

Elements for the better understanding of change in general and organisational change in particular; links between change and learning

1.4 Organisational culture

Elements for the demarcation of the adopted concept of culture, a key area of gender-sensitive organisational change.

1.1. Regarding organisations

We attempt to define organisations in general and the notion of organisation advocated in this text

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1.1 REGARDING ORGANISATIONS

In general, organisations are basic forms of modern life and systems instituted to achieve goals. Through organisations, the trends in the broader social systems that they are associated with gain in effectiveness. The following proposal lays emphasis on the systemic quality of organisations. Organisations are complex systems embedded in other complex systems. Systems are complex units whose components interact and are interdependent. Organisations are ecological and self-regulated systems. They have the capacity of self-repair (self-organisation), they are linked to their environment (ecological relation) and their components are interdependent. Organisations can also become disorganised (increase of entropy) or reorganised (self-repair principle) internally.3 1.1.1 Organisations as systems within systems A system is a whole in itself and it forms part of a larger system at the same time. Because they are systems, organisations are also parts of larger systems. This means that they can influence their immediate environment and generate effects beyond it. The “external” environment, in turn, affects how organisations evolve. Likewise, organisations have subsystems within themselves that interact and mutually affect one another. In organisations, tension prevails between the individual and the collective, the internal and the external (context), the formal and the informal, as well as between their internal subsystems. There are visible, observable, quantitative and objective “external aspects” in organisations (individual behaviour, group dynamics, expressed values, guidelines, procedures, formats, documents, manuals, etc.). Organisations also have “internal aspects” (meanings, beliefs, attitudes, identities, internalised values etc.) that are “invisible”, impossible to observe or quantify. To the first (external) category, we gain access through observation, and to the second (internal) through interpretation. Both external and internal aspects have individual and collective facets. Individual and group behaviours, for example, are part of the external category. Individual (subjective) and collective (inter-subjective) meanings form part of the internal category.

3 Morin, E. (1995). Sociología, p. 89.

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1.1.2 Organisations as “machines” and as “living systems”4 “The logic of the artificial machine, when applied to humans, develops programmes at the cost of strategies, hyper-specialisation at the cost of general competence, mechanical properties at the cost of organisational complexity: the rigorous workings, logic and synchronised tuning of the machine forces human beings to comply to a mechanical way of functioning. This logic disregards living individuals and their essence as subjects, thus disregarding subjective human realities.”5 Knowledge regarding organisations can be compiled in different ways, but it is usually guided by two principal metaphors: the metaphor of the organisation as an artificial machine and the metaphor of the organisation as a living organism. The implications of regarding organisations according to one or the other metaphor are enormous. Each metaphor pursues a dramatically different logic.

The Machine The Living Organism

A machine is composed of very reliable parts, but is much less reliable as a whole than when each part is viewed separately. Any local alteration may block the entire system. It can only be repaired from the outside.

Living organisms are made up of extremely unreliable components that easily become degradable, but as a whole they are much more reliable than their parts. They can make new parts to replace the ones that die or wear out; they can self-regenerate and repair themselves if damaged.

An artificial machine is only capable of one programme. It cannot tolerate or incorpo-rate disorder; it strictly obeys its own pro-gramme; it is made up of very specialised parts and destined for very specialised tasks.

Living organisms are capable of a strategy; that is, they can invent their own behaviour when uncertainty or confusion occurs. There is a complex and intrinsic link between organisa-tion and disorganisation, creativity and disor-der in living organisms.

A machine is controllable; it follows a certain logic. It is predictable, effective, specialised, rigid, quantifiable, keenly tuned, fast.

Living organisms are always uncertain. They are never stable; they are always prone to changes in their relations with the outside world. The “parts” of living organisms are multi-functional, polyvalent, flexible.

4 Adapted from: Capra, F. (1982). The Turning Point: Science, Society and the Rising Culture and (1998) La trama de la vida: una nueva perspectiva de los sistemas vivos. Wilber, K. (1996). Sexo, ecología y espiritualidad: el alma de la evolución. Morín, E. (1993). Tierra – Patria and (1995a). Introducción al pensamiento complejo: el paradigma de la complejidad and (1995b) Sociología. De Geus, A. (1997). The Living Company. 5 Morín, E. (1993).Tierra Patria, p. 107.

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According to recent research, certain common features are recognisable in organisations with a long life span. Their logic is more akin to that of living beings than to that of machines. Thus organisations may be seen as living organisms and not as mechanisms. If we add to the traits just mentioned the fact that living beings are goal-oriented, sensitive to their environment and have a limited life span, we observe that organisations also share these characteristics. Furthermore, if living organisms are the only systems capable of learning, organisations can also learn because they are living organisms. Inanimate objects cannot learn. Organisations that have trouble learning are those that are not able to adapt themselves or evolve when the world around them changes. 1.1.3 Effects of viewing organisations as “machines” or as “living

organisms”6 Contemplating organisations as mechanisms or as living organisms is much more than a metaphor. How we view them has immediate and direct implications for the everyday life of organisations. It has significant implications for the ways in which people in organisations tackle their work and take decisions. Metaphors may be regarded as mental models having a very profound influence on organisational dynamics. For example:

6 Adapted from: Senge, P. Foreword in De Geus, A. (1997). The Living Company.

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Organisations according to the metaphor of the machine

Organisations according to the metaphor of the living organism

A machine belongs to someone. What does it mean to say that someone – a person, an organisation – owns a living organism?

A machine exists for the purpose it was created for by those who built it, for example, making money for its owners.

A living organism has its own purposes that will never be replaced by the goals of others. What happens to the life energy of a living organism when it cannot pursue its own purpose?

A machine must be controllable by those who operate it. For example, the function of management is to control an organisation.

Living organisms are not controllable; they can be “influenced” through a series of interactive processes in which both parties are influenced, the one exerting the influence and the one receiving it.

An external agent creates a machine. For example, corporate systems and procedures may be viewed as something created by management or imposed on an organisation.

Living organisms create their own processes, just as human organisms manufacture their own systems. This is how the informal part of organisations is constituted.

A machine is fixed, static. It can only change if someone changes it.

A living organism evolves naturally.

The identity of a machine is the one given to it by those who build it.

Living organisms have their own sense of identity, which is their own “personality”.

A machine’s actions are reactive; for example, an organisation reacts to goals and decisions taken by the management.

Living organisms have their own goals and their own capacity for autonomous action.

A machine runs down unless it is reconstructed by someone, for example, the management.

Living organisms can self-regenerate. They continue to be an entity and keep their own identity through changes; for example, an organisation maintains its identity even when its members change.

A machine works as the sum of the functioning of its parts. In an organisation, for example, the members are “human resources”, a reserve force waiting to be used to contribute its individual “resourses”.

In living organisms, the whole is more than the sum of all its “parts”. The whole contributes qualities that need not be present in all the individual members. In an organisation, its members form working human communities that can learn as a whole, like theatre groups or sports teams. Only living beings have the capacity to learn.

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All organisations display certain behaviours and characteristics present in living beings: they are capable of learning, they have coherence since they have their own identity, they construct links with other entities, they grow and continue to evolve until they die. When managing organisations, we must accept this, in both its positive and negative contexts. The metaphor of the machine is so powerful, however, that it can shape an organisation’s character. Many organisations become more like machines than like living organisms, because their members see themselves as cogs in a wheel. Perhaps the first task at hand, therefore, is to transform this line of thinking. As Albert Einstein once said, “the significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.” 7 1.2 GENDER IN ORGANISATIONS

1.2.1 The notion of gender The notion of gender is used interchangeably to refer to sex as a synonym for “women”, to define relations between men and women, to refer to the complex connection between nature and culture, or as a crosscutting category of social analysis applicable to every sphere of human endeavour. The view of gender as a crosscutting category of social analysis broadens the range of its applications, facilitating, for example, studying the interaction between the biological aspects of human sexual dimorphism and the cultural aspects relative to the human species. It allows us to investigate the construction and reproduction processes of gender-differentiated roles, upon the basis of the biological or sexual dimorphic differences in the human species. It permits us to understand the individual and collective implications that sexually divided cultural orders exert on specific women and men. It allows us to examine the cultural implications of masculine and feminine archetypes in human cultures, throwing light on how we perceive the processes of construction of male and female subjectivities. The notion of gender helps us to construct different, or at least “revised”, versions of history, psychology, economics, arts and sciences.

7 Quoted by De Geurs, A. (1997) in: The Living Company, p. X.

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Gender as a crosscutting category of social analysis deeply enriches our grasp of what being human entails. The concept of gender greatly contributed to the paradigms about “human nature” developed during the Twentieth Century. We now enter a new century with a much more pliable, richer, more flexible image, a more wide-ranging notion of human potential that includes, but also in many ways transcends, the narrowly defined roles associated with sex/gender and all the other categories still in use. Here we advocate a notion of gender that recognises both the similarities and likenesses between men and women – as human beings belonging to the same species and having equal legal rights or opportunities – and the differences – not only between men and women, but among women themselves or men themselves. To focus on the similarities or the differences alone leads to a dualism that continues to favour exclusion; to deterministic or essentialist approaches and ultimately to biological and cultural reductionism. Human beings invariably construct meanings for the Masculine and the Feminine. These meanings vary among different cultures and social groups. Such meanings have quite profound implications since they define the roles, spaces and values, chances and potentials of specific individuals, women and men alike. People are not influenced by biology alone or by culture alone. Individually and collectively, we are shaped by the interaction between biology and culture. Many of the notions we have acquired are learned, along with their allocations and implications. Thus, they are also susceptible to being transformed. Transforming acquired notions is desirable because the systems of meanings – allocations – implications of the Feminine and the Masculine have paved the way for inequity and discrimination in virtually every culture on the planet. Today we begin to realise that women have been affected by discrimination and inequality in a particularly adverse fashion and in all spheres of human interaction (productive, reproductive, political, communal, cultural and personal). From a general human and gender perspective, in which the masculine role model is not the only reference point for human potential, we can understand that human inequities, discriminations and mutilations affect women and men alike, although in very different ways in the different aspects of their lives. The search for equity and equality, therefore, cannot focus on women alone or on the most highly-valued social spheres alone – the productive and the political – the spheres in which men interacted exclusively until not so very long ago.

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We must strive for equity and equality in every sphere of interaction, in making a balanced assessment of the sexes, in recognising the essential contributions both sexes make to the creation and preservation of human life and in the need for women and men alike to “occupy” these spheres of human interaction under conditions of equality. 1.2.2 How gender is expressed in organisations We are not simply seeking to “add” a gender dimension to organisations. As a matter of fact, organisations are always being influenced by gender factors that contribute to shaping them. Gender affects an organisation at every one of its working levels: in its culture, structure, processes and procedures; in its systems, infrastructure and beliefs; in its individual and collective practices and behaviours. Gender is expressed in multiple forms. Some are more obvious, some subtler. These forms are often accepted as “givens”, as the “natural” way of doing things. Thus, they are not even questioned or viewed as problems. Research on the influence of gender in organisations has revealed the following:

Women, who constitute 51% of the world’s population, do not occupy even 10% of the world’s top managerial positions.

Men are mainly in charge of decision-making posts, while women mainly fill subordinate and service jobs.

The wage pyramid shows strong sex biases: different wages are paid for the same jobs, according to whether men or women perform them. On average, women earn much lower salaries than men do when performing the same jobs.

Throughout the world, women earn 75%, on average, of what men occupying the same jobs and having the same expertise earn.

Women climb the hierarchical ladder much more slowly than men do: they start at lower levels and advance much more slowly than men; they tend to remain longer at each post and to conclude their careers at lower levels. Men usually begin working at higher levels, stay less time at each post and conclude their careers at higher levels.

Women more often specialise in one field and are less mobile than men, both in terms of work and working location.

Differentiated demands are placed on women and men with respect to working requirements, dedication and performance. Female work is stigmatised. Often

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women must be overqualified to meet working requirements. Women must have more attributes and score more winning points in order to gain access to the same jobs that men hold.

Sexual stereotypes influence how posts are filled; men enter service or “supporting” roles at an even slower rate than women enter top management.

Women carry out over 95% of the “general service” jobs in organisations, jobs with less prestige and lower salaries attached to them.

Informal-style ties both at work and in personal relations, foster and reproduce sexual stereotypes; women are underestimated or discriminated against most of the time as a result.

Women tend to have part-time jobs much more often than men do.

Women are more prone to interrupt their jobs or to become unemployed.

Men tend to suffer serious or fatal accidents at work more often than women.

In two-income households, women earn less than their partners, on average; a husband’s career tends to take precedence over a wife’s career.

Women in organisations tend to interrupt their work more often than men do, due to their domestic obligations. This has negative repercussions when it comes to female promotion or performance evaluation.

To succeed in the labour market, women postpone or avoid marriage or having children much more often than men; the conflict between working and having a family is not as critical for men.

Professional and executive women tend to marry men with equal or higher educational levels.

Men tend to marry women with lower educational and professional levels.

Women employees devote many more hours to domestic chores and childcare than men employees do.

Men who would like to spend more time with their children are prevented from doing so by their working conditions and the expectations placed on them.

Women employees enjoy significantly less leisure hours per week than men employees do.

In every country in the world, women work between two and five hours more, on average, than men.

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A great number of organisations lack a female success pattern. With respect to success and leadership, a good worker is invariably defined within parameters that are easier for men to meet, on account of their personal and domestic situations. Women always need to strike a balance between work and the home. Management processes tend to be inflexible and are universally conceived for an abstract and homogenous (male) employee. They have few flexible mechanisms or mechanisms receptive to change. This actively contributes to perpetuating gender stereotypes and inequities in organisations. (Male) homogenisation and gender stereotyping are manifest in specific management processes such as selection, pay, working shifts, promotion, qualification, welfare programmes, training, performance recognition and evaluation systems. Research carried out by the Proequidad Project in public entities has revealed that: Selection: The tools used to recruit and train personnel are applied to men and women uniformly, without taking into account how their lives might differ. Given the organisational bias in favour of male attributes, male recruitment is promoted over female recruitment. At the same time, there are formal and informal systems of segregation when it comes to job descriptions, which mean that personnel of a given sex is often sought according to the type of job in question. Working shifts: Identical demands are placed on men and women with respect to the number of hours and types of shifts worked, as if the sexes had the same domestic obligations. Frequently, top management posts demand 12-hour shifts or longer and complying with this taxing schedule forms part of the evaluation criteria. Promotion: Top managerial posts tend to be filled by free appointment and dismissal. Individuals gain access to them via professional prestige (their unconditional devotion to the institution) or political considerations (their connections to those who wield the power of decision in government.) Both these parameters help men to reach these posts, since men can devote themselves more wholeheartedly to their organisations and cultivate the political ties that are relatively closed to women. The fulfilling of technical criteria is more likely to be found among men. Such criteria also influence promotion, although they become less important at top decision levels. Qualification: How people are graded or deemed qualified depends on what is known as the “administrative career” in Colombia. Yet this system does not take into account the interests of men and women. It favours competition and the exams applied for it promote technical know-how. Women tend to remain longer at their posts, which makes their careers more “horizontal” and with fewer promotions.

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Pay: Very often women are paid less than men when occupying the same type of post and having the same kind of responsibility, though in many countries this is not legally permitted. Wherever women and men who occupy the same posts do receive the same salary, the majority of the women still occupies lower posts and earns lower wages. This implies that women not only have less influence on decision-making and resource allocation, but also that their average pay is lower. Welfare: The definition of welfare is standard and often ultimately tends to promote male interests, or welfare programmes are geared to reinforcing traditional gender roles and spheres. Training programmes often have a gender bias and do not promote the access of many women, also on account of how working shifts, frequency, etc. are designed. Another example of this is holding recreational programmes on days off, coinciding with the time women perform domestic chores. 1.2.3 Some common responses of organisations to the insertion of a

gender perspective Organisations react and respond in different ways to the insertion of a gender perspective. Some responses are to “dodge” the issue, while others show different levels of “acceptance” and understanding of the subject. Common ways of resisting change, which are expressed in various ways, are to trivialise or ridicule the situations that cause inequity in the organisation; to deny the existence of inequity in general; to blame a specific group; to blame women only, or men only; to admit that the problem exists but do nothing about it; to carry out unnecessary or inadequate research; to assign the responsibility for gender issues to someone lacking the means or the expertise to generate true change; to point to the exceptions in order to argue that change already took place; to regard the issue of gender awareness as an imposition from outside. The Proequidad Project has made it possible to observe the following attitudes towards gender, both within organisations and regarding what they have to offer:8

8 Adapted from: Guzmán, J. E. (1999). Ideario del Proyecto Proequidad.

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Invisibility: Gender has not been given any thought at all. The organisational style and the forms in which services or programmes are offered are seen as something independent from the influence of the specific people carrying them out or receiving them. People are viewed as an abstract, uniform mass and thus inequity is not perceived; it remains invisible. Denial: Inequity is admitted at the level of society, institutions and programmes but it is not perceived to form part of the specific institution. The reasons for this are purportedly strong, for example, the fact that there are no wage differences between men and women; that every post has specific tasks; that there are mainly women in the organisation or that it carries out technical programmes. Organisational marginalisation: The problem is acknowledged and some importance is even allocated to it, but the assumption is that it is already solved because some actions were already undertaken, for example, a special gender division was created, or one or more people were assigned to the gender issue. Programmatic marginalisation: The problem is recognised, but it is assumed that it can be solved through isolated actions, separate from the project as a whole or the organisation’s overall functioning. Such endeavours are meant to cater to the specific needs of a specific disadvantaged sector of the population, usually women. As a result, gender projects or project components have been created. Focal demand: Gender is viewed as something of secondary importance, a problem easy to overcome by making the staff more aware with a bit of extra information. Thus, gender issues are thought to be resolved by holding lectures or workshops, or by bringing in an expert from outside to define what should be done. Lack of information or expertise: The problem is recognised or its effects are guessed at, but no data about its specific characteristics exists and no effort is made to clarify what might lead to a solution strategy. Nothing is known about the problem in this sense, or about its dimensions; no specific tools are available to facilitate finding a solution. Complexity of the problem: Gender inequity must necessarily exist, but not even its effects are clearly discernible. There is knowledge about gender in general, but no studies have been carried out and no concepts have been developed regarding the organisation’s particular setting. Structural problems: Gender inequity is acknowledged, there is a general grasp of the situation or there are tools at hand. In fact, the staff has received some gender

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training, but this training has not been put into practice for various reasons. People do not accept the proposed changes, the technical staff offers resistance, the top management level believes that the financial and managerial implications of the whole thing are too expensive. 1.2.4 Areas of gender analysis in organisations Using the organisational approach as a reference point, four areas or groups of variables may be identified in which interventions can take place: 1 The profile 2 The management processes 3 The organisational culture 4 The “personal” factor. We will emphasise the last two points because of the weight that they exert on processes of organisational change with a gender perspective. The underlying assumption is that if human beings change, and the ways in which they relate also change, structural changes are more likely to occur. To analyse how gender influences the organisational culture, further distinctions must be made: the implications of gender on mental models and beliefs, on practices and behaviours and at the physical/material level. These subdivisions are made assuming that the organisational culture’s system of meanings visibly affects behaviour as well as the physical corporate environment.

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1.3 CHANGE AND ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE

PROCESSES

“Order is all that is repetition, permanence, invariability, all that fits under the aegis of a highly likely relation, framed within dependence on a law. Disorder is all that is irregular, deviation from a given structure, a random, unpredictable happening. There would be no room for innovation, creation and evolution in a perfectly ordained universe. No human or living existence would be possible. Nothing could exist under complete disorder either, because there would be nothing stable upon which to build an organisation… Degradation and decadence are normal phenomena. It is normal for things not to last forever... there are no recipes for perfect balance. The only way to fight degeneration is through constant regeneration; in other words, through an organisation’s ability to regenerate and reorganise as a whole, counteracting all disintegration processes…” 9 1.3.1 Development or organisational change It is essential for an organisation to understand the logic of change when it embarks on a substantial transformation that implies breaking with past paradigms of reality. How change is perceived, its rhythm and the forces it brings into play, are in themselves instruments of change and awareness. People committed to change, who know the uncertainty it may cause, must develop a flexible, alert attitude. This is difficult for those who reject any modification of their status quo. Recognition and acceptance of change as the only sure, constant variable, allowing room for its uncertainty, both at the personal and collective levels, implies looking at life from a different angle from that taken by those who see change as something undesirable and inconvenient, those who only seek security and certainties for the orientation of their lives. Change involves processes of imbalance and rebalance, order and disorder, being generated inside or outside a given system. Although every change involves movements in systems themselves, not every change implies breaking with an existing order. When changes in the existing order take place, we are developing something akin to, or better than, of the same. 9 Morin, E. (1995a). Introduction to Complex Thought, pp. 125-126.

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Given the unequal relations between men and women that subsist in organisations, however, a gender-sensitive organisational change is not designed to improve what already exists. It is also intended to break with the existing order and transform certain norms, guidelines, routines and perspectives. For changes in the status quo to last, producing a different kind of order and not more of the same, we need to promote and extend the new trends intended to become the mainstream, should they thrive. Eventually such tendencies are bound to create a new perspective and a new “normality”: equitable relations between women and men in organisations. Thus, we are not referring here to organisational development – more or better of the same – but to organisational change: a qualitative break with what previously existed. Although change processes involve a myriad of human aspects – thinking patterns, emotions, behaviour, appearances and lifestyles – we will concentrate on two aspects for the moment: thinking patterns and systems of meanings. We therefore refer to:

The notion of paradigms as a filter through which to read reality

The relation between paradigms and types of change

The relation between types of change and types of learning

Resistances as forces inherent to change

The phases following change

The difference between change and problem resolution

The application of this approach to organisations receptive to change in a quickly evolving environment such as the present one.

1.3.2 What are paradigms The word paradigm is of Greek origin. Nowadays, it is commonly used “in the sense of model, theory, perception, assumption or reference framework. In a more general sense, it is the way we “see” the world – not in terms of our visual sense of sight, but in terms of perceiving, understanding, interpretation.” 10

10 Covey, St. (1989). The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, p. 23.

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One way to think of paradigms is to view them as maps. A map is a representation of certain aspects of a given territory, but “the map is not the territory”. A paradigm is just that. It is a theory, an explanation or a model of something else. Maps or representations refer to the interpretation we make of how things are and how we believe they should be. Often we are not even aware that these versions of reality exist and so we seldom question them. We simply assume that how we see things is how they truly are. These ways of interpreting reality are an important source of our self-image and of the way we are. They shape how we relate to the world and to others. “We see the world, not as it is, but as we are – or, as we are conditioned to see it.”11 Different people see things differently because everyone looks through the prism of their own experiences. It is not that facts do not exist in themselves. The interpretation each human being makes of facts, however, is tinged by past learning experiences. Facts lack meaning when they are devoid of interpretation. “The more aware we are of our basic paradigms, maps or assumptions, and the extent to which they have influenced our experience, the more we can take responsibility for those paradigms, examine them, confront them against reality, listen to others and be open to their perceptions, thereby getting a larger picture and a far more objective view.”12 A paradigm shift, whether it takes place instantly or gradually over time, or leads in negative or positive directions, means shifting from one way of regarding the world to another. It is a change that generates powerful transformations. If we intend to carry out relatively minor changes in our lives, it may be sufficient to focus on our attitudes and behaviour. However, if we aspire to a meaningful, well-balanced change, we need to concentrate on our basic paradigms. 1.3.3 Paradigms and types of change Changes take place in varying degrees and have different effects on systems. Basically, there are two types of change: the first type takes place within the principles or assumptions of a given system – Change 1 – and the second transforms a system’s principles or assumptions, that is, it transforms the system itself – Change 2 –.

11 Covey, St. (1989) op. cit., p.28. 12 Covey, St. (1989) op. cit., p.29.

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In Change 1, continuity of the existing patterns subsists. The paradigm is not modified. Change 2 involves dismantling previous assumptions, bringing about a transformation in the existing paradigm. Both types of changes occur in real life. Change 2, no matter how modest it is, introduces ways of understanding that are incompatible with our former ones. It is like looking at “the same thing” with a different lens: the same “facts” are interpreted in a different way, a way that is not the opposite of the previous one either. When change involves going from one end of a spectrum to the other, we are still at the level of Change 1. “It is one thing to notice, take into account or argue about something as patent as a change of something into its opposite, but it is very difficult, especially in human relations, to be aware that this change is actually no change in the overall pattern.“ One of the most common human fallacies is to believe that if something is bad, its opposite is necessarily good: ”Much human conflict and many conflict-engendering solutions are due to this unawareness”.13 Change 2 always involves a process of starts and stops. It is a quantum leap in logic and thus its practical manifestations may seem illogical and paradoxical. Although Change 2 also takes place during the course of our everyday lives, it tends to be seen as something beyond our control, incomprehensible even. “But second-order change appears unpredictable, abrupt, illogical only in terms of first-order change, that is, from within the system. Indeed, this must be so, because, as we have seen, second-order change is introduced into a system from the outside and therefore is not something familiar or something understandable in terms of the vicissitudes of first-order change.”14 People therefore may find it irritating and extravagant. Viewed from outside the system in question, “It merely amounts to a change of the premises governing the system as a whole.”15 An example of Change 1, shifting from one pole to the other, is the notion some people defend that going from a “men-bossing-women-around” situation to a “women-bossing-men-around” situation is desirable, not really understanding what the quest for gender equity entails. Nothing would be gained in terms of achieving equality between women and men by such a scheme. Change 2 means shifting from unequal, hierarchical and discriminatory relations to relations not tarnished by privileges for, or discrimination against, either gender or any 13 Watzlawick, P. (1974). Change: Principles of Problem Formation and Problem Resolution, p. 22. 14 Ibid. 15 Watzlawick, P. op. cit., p. 24.

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human group. This means changing the assumptions underpinning inequitable systems of relations to other forms of assessing human beings, irrespective of sex/gender, ethnic origin or age. Those who base their lifestyles and identities on hierarchical values, whose thinking patterns do not include equality and equity for everyone without exception - for example racist, sexist and xenophobic individuals, are bound to find such changes disagreeable, incomprehensible or unacceptable. Usually a lot of time is invested in changes of the first type, covering the whole gamut offered by the logic of a given system. Solutions that failed in other instances are repeated over and over again, reproducing vicious circles in relations, institutions and societies as a whole. This occurs until some options “outside” the system can be discovered, for which one needs to examine the assumptions upon which options are formulated and not the formulation itself, finally breaking vicious circles and gaining other perspectives from which to interpret problems and tackle them. 1.3.4 Change and learning Learning is inherent in human nature. Through permanent learning processes, we construct ourselves and the world around us. We human beings reach our potential and self-fulfilment through learning. In our culture, however, learning tends to be restricted to formal education cycles, or to the periods during which we train for a new job or occupation. There is also the strong human urge to embrace routine and repetition and stop learning. This type of behaviour, which would obviously be lethal during the first years (childhood and adolescence), becomes almost mandatory when we turn into adults. Adulthood and old age are not regarded as favourable or appropriate learning periods or deemed desirable for undertaking new kinds of work or occupations. The search for security and stability in adults also contributes to the drastic halt in the learning process just mentioned. As adults, we appear to live according to the cultural mandate of closing ourselves to new worlds. People who stop learning and do not draw sustenance from remaining open to new options and worlds, may apparently live safe and stable existences but, in fact, they have shut down their universe so as to only let in what they already know. This means they stop growing as individuals. Fear and mistrust of the changes that take place around them make their lives impoverished.

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Therefore, promoting organisations that are receptive to learning also means promoting an enriched lifestyle, conducive to learning. 1.3.5 Types of learning Three types of learning are directly associated with the two types of changes we just described:

Type I or “proto-learning” applies to the simple solution of a problem, the classic stimulus/response situation.

Type II or “deutero-learning” refers to a “progressive change in proto-learning velocity.” It implies exploring the nature of contexts, enhancing our ability to solve problems, recognising sequences and “learning to learn”. “Proto-learning is thus about the solution to a problem within a certain context, and deutero–learning is about figuring out what the context itself is – learning the rules of the game. Character and “reality” originate in the second type of learning and character and reality are surely inseparable.”16

Deutero–learning takes place from our very early infancies. For many people, their reality becomes “the” reality. They cannot imagine a differently structured reality. People who learn almost only in this way are likely to be self-centred. They consider anything that contradicts or questions “their” reality abnormal. In other words, “the person shapes the total context to make it fit his/her expectations. The self-validating character of deutero-learning is so powerful, that it is usually impossible to eradicate and lasts from the cradle to the grave.”17 At this level of learning, someone can jump from one extreme to another, as attested by the numerous cases of political, religious or other “conversions”. In these cases, Type II or deutero-learning is strictly maintained.

A way to stop focusing on a single reality as the only true one is by means of Type III learning, “where it is no longer one paradigm versus another, but understanding the nature of the paradigm itself. Changes like these involve a deep reorganisation of the personality – a change in the form and in the content (…). These changes rupture Type II learning categories.”18

“In Type III learning, an individual learns to change the habits acquired during Type II learning (...), s/he learns that s/he is a creature automatically used to Type II learning, who imitates or follows Type II learning exclusively. Type III

16 Berman, M. (1987). El reencantamiento del mundo, p. 214. 17 Berman, M. (1987), op. cit., p. 215. 18 Berman, M. (1987), op. cit. p. 215.

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learning helps us to learn about Type II learning. In it, people learn about their own “character” and their vision of the world. This awakening necessarily involves redefining the self, the self as a product of previous deutero-learning. In fact, the self itself begins to become irrelevant; the “I” stops functioning as a central reference point of experience”. 19

Type III learning, to the degree that it means learning about the nature of a paradigm itself, is also about apprehending the assumptions on which any human activity are based, such as “science, art, religion, commerce, war and even sleeping”.20

19 Berman, M. (1987), op. cit. p. 229. 20 Bateson, G. (1993). Espíritu y naturaleza.

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1.3.6 Links between change, learning and paradigms

Level of learning Type of change

LEVEL I OR PROTO-LEARNING Simple solution to a problem: Stimulus – response.

LEVEL II OR DEUTERO LEARNING “Learning to learn”. Improves ability to solve problems. Learns rules of the game. Learns the nature of contexts. Self-centred individual: his/her reality is THE reality. Limited identity.

CHANGE 1

Takes place within the premises or principles of a given system.

Continuity of existing patterns – existing paradigm is not modified.

The more things change, the more they remain the same: the same reality, the

same identity.

LEVEL III

“Knowing how to know”. Learns the nature of paradigms themselves. Learns assumptions underlying all human activity. Subject is not centred on his/herself: his/her reality is ONE reality. Redefinition, broadening of identity.

CHANGE 2

Breaking with former premises transforms existing paradigm. Changes

with respect to the rules governing the internal structure or order of systems. Introduces understandings no longer

compatible with the previous ones: change of reality, of identity.

Type I and Type II learning generate Type 1 changes. Usually, these are changes in form and they do not affect the habitual ways of interpreting “reality”. Type III learning causes in-depth changes, shifts in awareness. It transforms both contents and form, hence affecting how the self and reality are interpreted. 1.3.7 Change and resistance

Systems tend to be flexible and conservative at the same time. Persistence (the apprehended) and change (the new) are two conflicting forces present in every system. Resistances are inherent in changes. Resistances express persistence, its conservative forces. If a desired change process is to take place, resistances can and must be tackled. Processes of change do not always flow smoothly. It is only to be expected that questioning the very assumptions on which relations between men and women are constructed, as in the case of gender-sensitive organisational change, for example, is

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bound to produce psychological resistance to transforming fundamental attitudes. Applying new learning in this area implies “unlearning” former ways of learning. This does not only mean changing perspectives, or approaches, but also behaving in accordance with the newly founded approach. Mainstream values and habits cannot be expected to change overnight. Changes that are undertaken responsibly and not just superficially are bound to generate fear and uncertainty, especially at the beginning. Approaching organisations and change processes from the perspective of a given system changes the ethical approach of such processes. This means that instead of looking for scapegoats or “problem” individuals, as tends to happen when things go wrong, we seek to identify the relations and attitudes existing between people, looking for underlying common assumptions. In other words, this requires a transition from the process of “blaming” one or a few individuals, to each member in a whole assuming responsibility for a group-fed process. Being part of a problem also means being part of a solution. Lasting, effective learning cannot be imposed. It can only take place when a collective form of learning strives to create consensus about the need for change and the type of change required. Resistances can emerge as the result of ignorance, fear or anxiety about a broad range of subjects. The answers to them are not confrontation but dialogue and negotiation instead. 1.3.8 Organisations receptive to learning To learn means to change. To change means to learn. And it is people who can learn and change. Changing implies learning to interpret things differently from the way in which we traditionally perceive them. Learning means changing the internal frames of reference we use to understand and interpret the events taking place during the course of our daily lives. An organisation open to learning understands that it is composed of individual people interacting, learning and unlearning. In the learning mode, people are the most important factor in an organisation.

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Interest in organisational learning has broadened and this can partly be explained by the need that organisations are experiencing to respond to fast-changing environments generating new demands. These responses require creativity and creativity is directly connected with the capacity that people in a given group have to take risks, learn and change. Learning – risk - openness – flexibility – creativity – change, are all terms referring to the same process. The current fast-changing environment has shown how important an organisation’s capacity to learn is. At a deeper level, it “reminds us” that life is not under our control. It allows us to “regain” the certainty that life is essentially a flow; that flow is change, uncertainty is part of life, and chaos and order are two sides of the same coin. Both of them are necessary in order to preserve natural and social life.21 1.3.9 Organisational change is not problem resolution Learning for change implies a creative-proactive orientation of people’s energy and attention span, not a reactive one. A reactive orientation – geared to problem resolution – can only provide temporary solutions to previously defined problems. This type of reaction only serves to respond to “what there is.” It does not allow advancing towards a broader scenario recognising the existence of problems, not only concentrating on analysing these problems and drafting proposals around them, but also on proposing altogether “new scenarios”. The aim of this kind of learning is not to perpetuate the same scenario minus one particular problem (absence of the problem identified). Creating visions in organisations and during social development processes allows us to create new scenarios that will have different dynamics and components than the previous ones. At the same time, it makes it possible to create not only broader but different options from those sure to emerge when we only limit ourselves to the solving of one particular problem. It is crucial to ask ourselves the question “What do we focus our attention on?” The problem resolution approach is useful in responding to emergencies such as droughts and illnesses, but it does not tell us anything about the deep-rooted causes, or the dynamics, leading to these and other such “emergencies”. There is a great difference between curing an illness and generating health.

21 De Geus, A. (1997), op. cit., p. 20.

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1.3.10 Phases of change Changes are not linear. They are subject to advances and setbacks, stagnation, acceleration and deceleration, blockages, resistances, crises. Their results cannot be guaranteed. Changes can be consciously induced or forced by circumstances. They can be pro-active and anticipated, or hasty and reactive. Every change involves introducing disorder, disrupting a system’s dynamic balance. It involves the emergence of options, possible paths, new perceptions and new quests. It leads to reorganisation, new balances and a new restructuring of the components in a system. It always increases uncertainty and risks.

Disorganisation – introduction of innovations

Emergence of multiple options

Restructuring – new “balances” The following phases may be regarded as the three transitional zones:

BREAKAGE OR RUPTURE ZONE: De-structuring takes place. Contains the seeds of what is to come. Implies slow-motion changes.

JUNCTION ZONE: Emergence of multiple options, rethinking and redesigning. Uncertainty increases. Change at fast pace, acceleration. Qualitative change is not guaranteed. It requires reviewing priorities, goals and values that will support change. Upsurge of more good and bad news is to be expected.

EMERGENT ZONE: New order. Old problems and crises are seen as new opportunities. News only appears to be good or bad. New kinds of learning take place through crises; restructuring, new forms and adaptations can be appreciated. Restructured knowledge, new maps, new success criteria, new measuring indicators.

These three zones can overlap.

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1.3.11 The need for change: organisations in a rapidly changing

environment

Many reasons can be found for conscious, intentional or planned decisions to change, whether at an individual or collective plane. These reasons may involve:

The working aspects of organisations, such as improving the efficiency of their performance; improving the quality of their services or products in order to survive in a highly competitive market; increasing their profits or incomes.

The changes in macro and micro levels that organisations are undergoing, such as globalisation: of industry and technology; finances, communication and information; employment and migration; consumer patterns22; increasing awareness of conservation; increasing demand for “green” products and many other aspects associated with the global cultural change now under way.

More people-centred motivations. Accepting that more creative, empowering and satisfactory human relations than the present ones can be constructed. Improving the quality of human life and human relations, we can reach the first set of objectives, those traditionally sought, until now, by means of control.

The signals issued by the macro-context – data yielded by macro tendencies – demand that organisations adapt and make adjustments that will necessarily affect how they function internally, from the perspective of a cultural change. Changing their concepts, values and relations with respect to the outside context, however, is their chief priority at present. The following chart illustrates this:

22 Henderson, H. (1995). Paradigms in Progress: Life Beyond Economics, p. 74.

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The changing environment23

Old tendencies New tendencies

Industrial society

National economy

Standard products and services

Uniform clientele

Initial qualification

Single disciplines

Life-long practices

Employment or sub-employment

Perpetual succession

Cartels, barriers and oligopolies

Diversification

Institutional aid

Representative

Facts and theories

Attitudes

Quantity

Procedures

Individuals

Getting ahead

Absolutes

Information society

Global economy

Customised products and services

Informed and demanding clientele

Continuous learning

Multiple disciplines

Mobile careers

Portfolio careers

Temporary arrangements

Competence and selectivity

Focalisation

Self-help

Participatory

Values

Feelings

Quality

Processes

Groups and teams

Balance of achievements

Relative/contextual

A gender-sensitive organisational change thrives best in organisations that adopt open learning models and see people themselves as their most valuable asset. These types of organisations are not necessarily gender-sensitive, but their principles and values are far more compatible with seeking equity than dominant, vertical organisations, in which the goal is profit and people are seen as “resources” or “means” to a proposed service goal. 23 Huffington, C., Cole, C. and Brunning, H. (1997). A Manual of Organisational Development: The Psychology of Change, p. 3.

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1.3.12 Summary: assumptions regarding organisational change

Persistence and change are two forces always present in every system.

Change and learning are part of the same process. Learning involves unlearning and it also involves changing.

Changes can be forced by circumstances or they may be introduced consciously.

Resistance and change are part of the same process.

Organisations are living organisms and therefore they can learn as a whole being (collective learning).

Processes of change do not tend to be fluid or stable. They have various rhythms, periods of advancement and stabilisation.

Change in its most intangible, least material aspects (systems of meanings: levels of consciousness, mental models, abilities, attitudes) is the most profound and durable, because it involves changing the notions of reality and identity, how we understand the world and act in it.

Resistances can be used constructively to support a process of change.

People are capable of learning and thus of changing throughout their whole lives.

No one can force anyone to change. No one can change consciously and intentionally unless they are motivated to do so; unless a vital urge leads them to “seek”.

Organisations change through the changes taking place in the people that constitute them. Therefore, organisational changes are always mediated by individual changes.

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1.4 ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE: THE KEY TO A GENDER-SENSITIVE ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE

Advancing equity between men and women in any sphere of social life chiefly implies that simultaneously profound cultural changes need to take place: changes in concept and belief systems, in social imagery or representations, in systems of association and assessment. Organisational change processes are no exception. As a matter of fact, given the demands of a gender-sensitive organisational change, the organisational culture is the main arena of change. For transformations to be deep and lasting – that is, effective, real and stable – the key features of the existing organisational culture must be directly and explicitly examined. This is valid for any overall attempt at organisational change, but it becomes much more critical when an organisational change with a gender perspective is involved. Processes of change often hinge on operations, systems and procedures: that is, on the most readily identifiable aspects of an organisation, also those most likely to be measurable. Focusing on these aspects alone, however, can mean the failure of organisational change attempts, since such changes tend to take place at a formal and superficial level. Changes in form only and not in content easily allow us to slip back into old organisational “inertias” and habits. Changes in the organisational culture prove to be more effective when they become embedded into an organisation’s daily routine. 1.4.1 Definition of organisational culture “We need to understand culture as a system that – dialectically – connects a life experience and a compiled wisdom.”24 “Organisational culture designates a system of meanings shared among the members of an organisation about the behaviour deemed correct and significant in it. This allows us to distinguish between organisations.”25 An organisational culture includes “the set of forms in which power is expressed, in which interaction and decision-making take place and values develop, turn into habits and become part of an organisation’s core or “way of being”. The notion of

24 Morin, E. (1995). Sociología, p.146. 25 Hola, E. and Todaro, R. Los mecanismos de poder: Hombres y mujeres en la empresa moderna, p. 19.

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organisational culture encompasses patterns of interaction among individuals at both formal and informal levels, which markedly influence the overall organisational climate. The organisational culture reflects the model under which a given organisation operates.”26 1.4.2 Assumptions inherent to the notion of culture proposed27 The organisational culture as a system of meanings shared by a collectivity has the characteristics of any system. We have already mentioned some features related to organisational systems here. These stress the dynamic nature of an organisational system and its transformation potential. Organisational culture may also be defined as a subsystem within the larger system that an organisation is in itself. These are the premises of the notion of culture we are proposing here:

Cultures are open systems

Cultures are not hegemonic and coherent “wholes”

Cultures are not objective realities but systems of meanings built and shared by their members

Cultures are dynamic: they undergo moments receptive to change and moments of blockage or resistance to change

Cultures cannot be changed by manipulating their external appearance alone.

26 Proyecto Proequidad (1997). Género y desarrollo organizacional para entidades públicas. 27 Adapted from: Newman, J. (1995), Morin, E. (1995b), Wilber, K. (1996).

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1. Cultures are open systems

Organisational cultures are systems within systems, contexts within contexts. This implies that cultural systems are capable of self-preservation but also capable of self-adaptation to the modifications and demands manifested in the broader contexts into which they are also embedded. Each organisational system shows a certain capacity to preserve its integrity. A system exists in relation to its environment, but it does not dissolve into it. Instead it retains its own individual shape, pattern or structure. Organisational systems tend to retain their identity, holding on to their tried and tested ways. At the same time, they are influenced by and receive feedback from the broader contexts into which they are embedded. Gender relations in the broader socio-cultural environment, for example, are reproduced at the level of an organisation itself. Likewise, organisations, as part of the greater context that they are immersed in, need to be flexible and have adaptation capacity in order to respond to the “innovations” and new demands emerging from their surroundings. That is, organisations must satisfactorily deal with the tension between two apparently conflicting tendencies: individuality and consensus. Any notable bias in favour of one such force can endanger an organisation’s very survival: too much individuality can make an organisation oblivious of the environment it services and earns its profits from; too much flexibility can lead it to lose its identity, its own particular kind of contribution. An organisation’s adaptation capacity is linked to its learning capacity. Organisations are capable of “learning” or self-transforming, transcending the status quo, introducing “innovations” and going beyond what they already are. They can also transcend themselves. There is both continuity and discontinuity in learning. Just as they can evolve, organisations can also disappear – they can self-dissolve. It is even fitting that they do so, once they have fulfilled their mission, or when they have become so rigid and obsolete that they no longer display the capacity to change. These four forces, self-preservation, self-adaptation, self-transcendence and self-dissolution, are simultaneously present in the organisational culture.

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2. Cultures are not hegemonic and coherent “wholes” Different types of logic coexist within the same culture, different ways of conceiving things and getting them done. Relatively strong tendencies, which are common to the majority, are detectable in an organisational culture. These tendencies can coexist with “marginal” tendencies, which are of secondary importance in comparison with issues that are more critical for the organisation, such as who wields power and decision-making. It is quite unrealistic to expect total consensus to be reached inside an organisation. Organisations do not “inscribe” themselves, in a clearly cut fashion, into any particular model or organisational culture. Models only serve as guidelines, allowing us to perceive the tendencies at the core of the complex interactions that people engage in. Different departments or divisions usually generate their own dynamics, values and practices, messages and effects on gender relations. Change processes themselves generate new boundaries that produce new forms, imperatives and demands. The potential to change and to evolve arises from the tension between the tendencies just mentioned. A particular kind of wealth emerges from diversity. Diversity also gives rise to conflicts and resistance to change. Resistance, however, may be understood as an aspect inherent in processes of change. At the same time, resistances offer an opportunity to go deeper into understanding the dynamics of organisations. 3. Cultures are not objective realities but systems of meanings built and shared by their members Cultures are not something organisations “have” in the same way they have traits or attributes. It is not external to human identities and management. People are not passive recipients but active co-creators of culture. Systems of meanings, expressed in the way organisations interpret reality and in their beliefs and thinking patterns, are created, maintained and transformed by their co-creators during processes of creative exchange. Working around the subject of culture allows us to perceive the common and the conflicting trends in interpretations and beliefs that people from given organisations hold, and to go more deeply into the common premises and assumptions that support diverse, and sometimes conflicting, interpretations.

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4. Cultures are dynamic – they undergo moments receptive to change and moments of blockage or resistance to change Cultures are not “fallow fields” waiting to be modified by external agents (experts or managers). The forms that the different change processes display, including resistances and barriers, have a fluid and plastic character. The process is shaped and reshaped in various ways as the changes in question take place (see metaphor of the organisation as a living being and as a machine). This is why it is difficult to explore the dynamic characteristics of cultural change and the tensions this type of change creates. The many resistances observed in the way organisations react to the insertion of a gender perspective (see section on gender in organisations) are examples of how truly dynamic a cultural system is. In this case, we see both receptivity to change – since incorporating a gender dimension is accepted – and resistance to it – since gender is incorporated up to a certain point, often by striking compromises that do not even manage to graze the cultural background fostering gender inequity in an organisation. Resistances to change are active processes expressed in multiple open or camouflaged ways. These resistances can create vicious circles (Change 1 type) hindering any real change. Vicious circles need to be tackled by actions undertaken on multiple fronts simultaneously. Isolated interventions cannot break them down. In fact, they may even worsen a situation, because they allow us to say that we have already tried to do something about the existing obstacles and simply failed.

5. Cultures cannot be changed by manipulating their external appearances alone Organisational culture is not generated by or centred on leaders or those who wield the power of decision. The system of meanings expressed in the values proclaimed, for example, cannot issue from an organisation’s formal structures alone or be “injected” by means of a change in its appearance or corporate image. Declaring the adoption of new values, drafting new visions and missions, changing the appearance of buildings, redesigning the corporate image of an organisation, its reception areas, uniforms, etc., cannot achieve much in the way of changing organisational culture. These attempts may even be counterproductive, by giving rise to a deep-rooted cynicism among the staff.

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Organisations emit messages, often without noticing it, which express what they regard as important or insignificant. The environment in which men and women work, how they are physically located inside a building, the types of roles and professions they carry out, all such elements contain messages that markedly reinforce an organisation’s adopted values. Nevertheless, changes cannot take place by manipulating external appearances alone. Profound changes must affect both the “visible” and the “invisible” aspects: external appearance, observable behaviours, and ALSO meanings, values and belief systems. Substantial changes affect how individuals interact, both personally and collectively. Change involves internal aspects at the personal and collective level (individual meanings or subjectivities; shared meanings or inter-subjectivities) and external aspects at the individual and collective level (individual and social behaviour). The internal and the external, the individual and the social, are two sides of the same medal.

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1.4.3 Paradigms, mental models and change in the organisational

culture A good part of what constitutes an organisational culture is entrenched in our paradigms and mental models. Mental models may be understood as the expression of the paradigms through which the world is perceived, which, on a deeper level, establish the premises and principles of logic governing all such expressions. “Mental models are the images, assumptions, and stories which we carry in our minds of ourselves, other people, institutions, and every aspect of the world. Like a pane of glass framing and subtly distorting our vision, mental models determine what we see. Human beings cannot navigate through the complex environments of our world without cognitive “mental maps”; and all of these mental maps, by definition, are flawed in some way.”28 Nevertheless, because mental models are usually tacit, existing below the level of awareness, they are often untested and unexamined. They are generally invisible to us – until we look for them. The core task of this discipline is bringing mental models to the surface, to explore them and talk about them with minimal defensiveness – to help us see the pane of glass, see its impact on our lives, and find ways to re-form the glass by creating new mental models that serve us better in the world.”29

28 Senge, P. et al. (1994). The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning Organisation, p. 235. 29 Senge, P. et al. (1994), op. cit., p. 235.

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A change in the organisational culture represents a deep change in awareness, “paying attention” to our daily routines and “realising” how things work and why we do what we do. It involves questioning our day-to-day routines. It also allows us to realise that we are continually being influenced by our environment and exerting influence on it. Through this awareness, we comprehend that each person forms part of a network of relations, in continuous motion, permanently giving and receiving feedback. An organisational change with the emphasis made on culture can be grounded on forms of thinking that facilitate “noticing” the meanings and contents present in the organisational culture. Some thinking “abilities” that we are seeking to promote through this approach are:

A way of thinking that recognises that cultural meanings are not “objective” or “given” but relative, being collectively constructed and reproduced through the constant repetition and affirmation of what is deemed “normal” or “natural”.

A way of thinking that understands the nature and trappings of paradigms and mental models, developing a thinking process trained to know how we acquire our knowledge.

A way of thinking that allows a change of approach, regarding the totality and not the parts; regarding interrelations as well as a linear chain of cause and effect; regarding change processes instead of “instant takes”; regarding not only details but a dynamic complexity.

A way of thinking that systematically perceives structures, patterns, guidelines, recurrences, cycles, larger frameworks, chains of events, simultaneity and paradoxes, recognising that there are underlying patterns behind every-day details and occurrences.

A way of thinking that recognises that events and actions can reinforce or undermine each other (balance out). Feedback refers to every reciprocal flow of influences. Every influence consists of cause and effect: influences never flow in just one direction.

A way of thinking that understands that dichotomies are possible. Order and disorder are two co-operating forces. Contradiction is unavoidable; a way of thinking through which we accept that we are incapable of certainties; falling into contradictions does not mean making mistakes but reaching a deeper level of reality that cannot be translated into our logic.

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THREE PRINCIPLES TO USE WHEN CONSIDERING COMPLEXITY DIALOGIC PRINCIPLE: Duality can be maintained at the core of a unit. It links

two terms that are complementary and antagonistic at the same time.

PRINCIPLE OF ORGANISATIONAL RESOURCEFULNESS: Products and effects are simultaneously causes and producers of what they produce. For example, individuals produce the society that produces individuals. We are at the same time producers and products.

HOLOGRAMATIC PRINCIPLE: Not only is the part in the whole, but the whole is in the part. This holds true for the biological world and for the sociological world. 30

These thinking capacities illustrate mental models different from linear and stereotypical thought, which is not receptive to equity, learning or open attitudes. When we develop new thinking capacities, the world literally changes. Changing a paradigm amounts to changing our perception of reality. In becoming aware of our mental models and how they function, we become more aware of the ways in which we continuously build our own representation of the world. 1.4.4 The visible and the invisible in organisations In order to tackle organisational complexity, it may be useful to desegregate its different components into “visible” (observable, quantifiable, explicit) and “invisible” (not observable except by their effects; not quantifiable – their nature being basically qualitative – implicit) aspects. Visible and invisible aspects coexist and mutually feed one another. Organisations cannot exist without an organisational culture, just as they cannot exist without management processes, structures or ways of functioning. These are not optional or redundant aspects. They are simply present in every human organisation. Visible aspects often have priority in the organisational world, while invisible aspects tend to be ignored or considered of lesser importance. Many such aspects exist in every organisation, implicit aspects never made explicit and simply viewed as “predetermined”. Many such “lived by” values are not reviewed, analysed or expressed explicitly, even when they constantly contradict an organisation’s “declared” values.

30 Morin, E. (1995a), op. cit., pp. 87.

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Visible aspects contain clues about invisible ones. The visible is not everything; it may even be the smallest part of an organisation, much like the top of an iceberg. The visible is a reflection of what lies under the surface. This reflection can either give a fair account of an organisation’s inner truths or camouflage them (through boasting or concealment). Organisations are more than their managerial structure, procedures and processes put together, more than the services and products representing what they “offer” their customers. These are the external, visible, observable, objective aspects, explaining “what it does”. But organisations are also grounded upon ideas, values, notions of power, concepts about work, relations between people, the notions already held by its members or present in the social environment. The invisible, intangible, inter-subjective aspects represent “what it is”. The latter aspects constitute the organisational culture.

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