Business Modeling and the Study of Culture
Culture encompasses all aspects of a people’s behavior and beliefs that are not innate. It is what distinguishes different countries from one another and is reflected in the foods they eat, their arts, social patterns, religions and even their way of speaking. The discipline that investigates these differences is called anthropology, though many other disciplines contribute to its study.
The emergence of cultures in societies can be influenced by historical events and can occur on either a macro level, such as the fall of Rome in A.D. 476, which left Europe divided into several warring states or a micro level such as the Black Death in the 1300s, which cut European populations by up to half and reshaped religious beliefs and values. The more common type of cultural change, however, takes place on a smaller scale and is a result of the evolution of individuals as they interact with each other and develop their own identities within the larger society.
In a company context, cultural change is the process by which individual employees adopt and embrace the core values and vision of the organization. The integration of culture into a business can be achieved by providing employees with clear and accessible communication about the company’s vision, mission and values. This can be done by distributing a cultural handbook, holding regular cultural workshops and incorporating cultural artifacts into meetings.
As a tool for organizational change, it is important to consider the impact of an employee’s cultural values and behaviors on their work. The most effective ways of doing this is to identify and understand the cultural value systems of employees, then align these with those of the company. This ensures that culturally sensitive behaviors are rewarded and enables the company to remain consistent with its values and vision.
When it comes to business modeling, there are a number of available theories and simulation models for analyzing the influence of culture on individual decisions and collective outcomes. These include integrating cultural dimensions in coordination models (such as Schwartz values) and using the Cultural Theory framework for understanding how these influences impact agent decisions, interactions and aggregated collective performance.
In recent times, a new approach to the study of culture has emerged which focuses on everyday attitudes and values, such as assumptions and prejudices, rather than on the more traditional focus on reenacting past rituals. This is sometimes called ‘cultural history’ and is a strand of the broader social, economic and women’s histories that developed in the 1960s and 1970s. This approach seeks to find the voices that have been excluded by more dominant narratives of the past and provides a critical lens for understanding the present. It has been described as ‘textual cultural history’ in the sense that it combines an emphasis on texts (reified meanings in circulation) with the tradition of anthropological and sociological approaches to culture.
Culture encompasses all aspects of a people’s behavior and beliefs that are not innate. It is what distinguishes different countries from one another and is reflected in the foods they eat, their arts, social patterns, religions and even their way of speaking. The discipline that investigates these differences is called anthropology, though many other disciplines contribute to its study. The emergence of cultures in societies can be influenced by historical events and can occur on either a macro level, such as the fall of Rome in A.D. 476, which left Europe divided into several warring states or a micro level such as the Black Death in the 1300s, which cut European populations by up to half and reshaped religious beliefs and values. The more common type of cultural change, however, takes place on a smaller scale and is a result of the evolution of individuals as they interact with each other and develop their own identities within the larger society. In a company context, cultural change is the process by which individual employees adopt and embrace the core values and vision of the organization. The integration of culture into a business can be achieved by providing employees with clear and accessible communication about the company’s vision, mission and values. This can be done by distributing a cultural handbook, holding regular cultural workshops and incorporating cultural artifacts into meetings. As a tool for organizational change, it is important to consider the impact of an employee’s cultural values and behaviors on their work. The most effective ways of doing this is to identify and understand the cultural value systems of employees, then align these with those of the company. This ensures that culturally sensitive behaviors are rewarded and enables the company to remain consistent with its values and vision. When it comes to business modeling, there are a number of available theories and simulation models for analyzing the influence of culture on individual decisions and collective outcomes. These include integrating cultural dimensions in coordination models (such as Schwartz values) and using the Cultural Theory framework for understanding how these influences impact agent decisions, interactions and aggregated collective performance. In recent times, a new approach to the study of culture has emerged which focuses on everyday attitudes and values, such as assumptions and prejudices, rather than on the more traditional focus on reenacting past rituals. This is sometimes called ‘cultural history’ and is a strand of the broader social, economic and women’s histories that developed in the 1960s and 1970s. This approach seeks to find the voices that have been excluded by more dominant narratives of the past and provides a critical lens for understanding the present. It has been described as ‘textual cultural history’ in the sense that it combines an emphasis on texts (reified meanings in circulation) with the tradition of anthropological and sociological approaches to culture.