Organizational Culture
MARKETING AFRICA
Organizational Culture
Tamara Betty Asonga
The Unwritten Organization: The Culture Employees Actually Experience
Not long ago, I left a conversation at work carrying more questions than answers. I found myself wondering whether I had been overestimating the value I brought to my work. A few days later, a colleague reached out unexpectedly.
" You are a problem solver," she said. She spoke about things I had helped her with over time; things I had almost forgotten myself. It didn ' t erase the earlier conversation, but it reminded me of something important: people grow best when they are challenged without forgetting who they are. That, too, is culture.
Organizations today are navigating rapid change, evolving workforces and increasing demands for accountability. Yet amid conversations about strategy, technology and growth, one factor continues to determine whether organizations thrive or struggle: culture. Not the culture written in policy manuals, but the culture people experience every day. Culture rarely collapses overnight. It erodes in slow degrees through miniscule repeated inconsistencies.
Over the years, I have come to appreciate that every organization operates with two distinctly different cultures. The first is the culture we proudly display. It appears on office walls, company websites, annual reports and onboarding presentations. It speaks of integrity, teamwork, innovation, excellence and respect. It reflects the organization we aspire to be.
The second and most lethal culture is never documented, yet every employee eventually learns it. It is the unwritten organization. Often‘ invisible’ to leadership, yet it is unmistakably clear to all employees.
Unlike the first, this culture is not communicated through policies or presentations. It is learned through observation and experiences. People watch how leaders make decisions, how colleagues are treated, how success is recognized and how failure is handled. Long before they understand the organizational structure, they begin to
120 MAL73 / 26 ISSUE understand the unwritten rules. Every experience either confirms or contradicts the values printed on the wall. Over time, employees stop believing the words and start believing the patterns. Employees do not learn culture during orientation. They learn it every day thereafter.
Through this informal curriculum they discover whether new ideas are genuinely welcomed or merely tolerated. They learn whether leaders invite honest feedback or simply expect agreement. They observe whether accountability applies equally to everyone, or whether influence determines whose mistakes are overlooked.
Most importantly, they begin to understand what success really depends on. Officially, organizations reward performance. Unofficially however, people sometimes find themselves asking a different set of questions. Who do you know? Who brought you here? Who survives when leadership changes? Whose opinion carries the greatest influence?
These questions have very little to do with contribution, yet they often shape how people interpret the workplace around them. The moment they become more important than the question, " How can I add value?" an organization should pause and reflect, because it is then that culture is already beginning to shift.
One of the greatest tests of corporate culture comes during leadership transitions. New leaders should bring fresh perspectives, renewed energy and different strategies. Change is necessary and healthy.
Yet a person ' s value should not suddenly disappear simply because leadership has changed. Neither should institutional knowledge be discarded simply because it belongs to a previous era. Healthy organizations are built to outlive individual leaders. Their strategies may evolve, but their principles remain consistent.
When people begin to wonder whether they serve the institution or the personalities leading it, trust automatically begins to erode. Eventually, loyalty shifts from the organization ' s purpose to the individual influence. And that is rarely sustainable.
Perhaps the greatest measure of culture is not how organizations reward people, but how consistently they apply accountability. People rarely resent excellence. They rarely object to high expectations. What gradually weakens trust is unequal accountability.
When one employee is expected to follow every process while another appears exempt, people notice. When valuable contributions are overlooked because they came from the " wrong " department or the " wrong " person, people notice. When influence appears to matter more than contribution, people notice. Every decision quietly teaches people what the organization truly values.
One conversation has the power to build confidence, and another has the power to diminish it. Written rules tell employees how the organization wants to be seen. Unwritten rules tell them how to succeed within it.
Leadership carries a responsibility that extends far beyond evaluating performance. It shapes how people see themselves. The best leaders challenge people while preserving their dignity. They help individuals understand what needs to improve without causing them to question whether they matter.
Perhaps this is why so many people say that employees do not leave jobs- they leave bad experiences. More often than not, those experiences are shaped by leadership. Long before someone submits a resignation letter, they have been quietly deciding whether they feel respected, trusted, heard and valued. Organizations may hire talent, but it is the daily experience of leadership that often determines whether that talent stays.
Healthy cultures are not built through perfect leaders or perfect employees. They