Organizational Culture PR: Testing the Competing Values Model CVM and Employee Communication Strategies ECS Model in K

1. Organizational Culture & PR:Testing the Competing Values Model (CVM) and Employee Communication Strategies (ECS) Model in Korea Yunna Rhee(Assistant Professor), Beach Moon(Doctoral Student) Division of Communication Hankuk University of Foreign Studies

2. Introduction Culture has long been considered a key factor that can influence public relations practice (Sriramesh, Grunig, & Buffington, 1992; Sriramesh, 2007). However, the concept of culture has not yet been integrated into the public relations body of knowledge (Sriramesh, 2007). Existing public relations research related to culture mostly focus on national or societal level cultures rather than organizational level cultures (Hung, 2004; Rhee, 2002; Sriramesh, Moghan, & Wei, 2007; Srhiramesh, Kim, & Takasaki, 1999; Taylor, 2000).

3. Many scholars attempted to examine the impact of organizational culture on various outcome variables such as employee satisfaction, employee turnover, and organizational effectiveness (Sriramesh & White, 1992; Sriramesh, Grunig, & Buffington, 1992; Smircich, 1983). However, little empirical research can be found in public relations that deals with organizational culture (Sriramesh, Grunig, & Dozier, 1996; Cameron & McCollum, 1993; Everett, 1990) and its influence on PR processes or outcomes. Introduction

4. To identify and explore a valid and reliable measure of organizational culture and employee communication that can be used in public relations research. To examine the relationship between organizational culture and employee communication strategies. Introduction

5. Literature Review  Organizational Culture: "shared key values and beliefs" generating a sense of identity, commitment, social system stability, and meanings that guide behavior (Smircich,1983). Some treat culture as something that an organization is and others see culture as something an organization has (Kwan & Walker, 2004). In this study, we take the has perspective (a) to develop a measurement tool that could be used in various public relations research situations. (b) to explore organizational culture’s associations with other public relations variables, namely employee communication strategies.

6. Literature Review  Grunig, Grunig, and Dozier (2002) conceptualized organizational culture as a construct that is comprised of two dimensions—participative and authoritarian. The dichotomous division may fall short of capturing the variations of internal cultures of organizations. In order to capture the diverse nature of organizational culture, it would be useful to consider Quinn and Rohrbaugh’s (1983) Competing Values Model (CVM).

7. Literature Review 

8. Literature Review  Employee communication: “specialized sub-discipline of communication that examines how people communicate in organizations(Grunig, Grunig, & Dozier, 2002) ” Employee communication is a multidimensional construct and “employees can express varying degrees of satisfaction about definite aspects of communication” (Smidts, Pruyn, & van Riel, 2001). The two dimensions: (a) the content or the message that is relayed through communication. (b) the communication climate or the manor with which one transfers information to the receiver.

9. Literature Review  In this study, we focus on examining the extent of positive communication in organizations dealing with both content & climate We define symmetrical employee communication strategies as “communication content and climate used by an organization that opts to develop and maintain positive relationships with its employees.”

10. Research Questions  RQ1. How well does the four-factor measurement model of organizational culture fit the data reported by employees in participating organizations? RQ2. How well does the four-factor measurement model of employee communication strategies fit the data reported by employees in participating organizations? RQ3. What kinds of relationships can be found between organizational culture (group, developmental, hierarchical, rational) and employee communication strategies (information adequacy, information flow, interaction supportiveness)?

11. Method Survey wording and pretest In this study, we placed all of the constructs at one level. Each item in two constructs was worded to encourage respondents to assume the shared perspective(Table 1 & 2). Measurement (a) Organizational Culture: Hon and J. Grunig (1999). (b) Employee Communication Strategies: Yeung et al.(1991), Quinn (1998); Robertson (2005); Smidts, Pruyn, & van Riel (2001). Sampling A variety of organizations in terms of their functional type and industrial categories (a purposive sampling method). Data were collected throughout 19 organizations participated(October 2007; N=481(78% response rate)). Data Analysis Cronbach's alphas, exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), multiple regression analysis (MRA)

12. Results and Discussion The reliability coefficients Of CVM and ECS range from 0.797 to 0. 919, showing acceptable levels of reliability. The validity of CVM and ECS was assessed in several ways. (a) Convergent validity(Standardized loadings are mostly above .6 and are significant at p<.05) was obtained. (b) Discriminant validity(Anderson and Gerbing's standard, 1988) was obtained. In other words, both CVM and ECS were found to be a valid and reliable measurement tool for organizational culture and employee communication.

13. Results and Discussion

14. Discussions and Conclusions 

15. Discussions and Conclusions 

16. Limitations & Future Research