Understanding organisational culture in the community health setting

In this chapter we will introduce you to organisational culture and illustrate what we mean by taking examples from conmmnity nursing practice and cmmnunity health services (CHSs). But first we need to come to an understanding about the meaning of culture. Culture has been described as the values and rules of communities; in other words, their shared common understandings and beliefs. Research and writings on culture have predominantly come from the fields of anthropology and social sciences. More recently, leaders in management and organisations have examined culture from an organisational perspective. For organisations, culture represents a set of shared values and customs that can be seen as a unifying factor for a group of people who have a common language and belief system of the agency where they work. These shared values allow the group to function cohesively and also to protect itself. The shared values and beliefs, both implicit and explicit, may create a type of insider/outsider division.