Diagnosing the organizational culture of higher education libraries in the United Arab Emirates using the Competing Values Framework

Organizational culture is an important ingredient of organizational success and employee performance. This study used the Competing Values Framework (CVF) to analyze the organizational culture types exhibited and the preferred culture in higher education libraries in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The framework analyzes the dominant culture based on four culture types: Clan, Adhocracy, Market and Hierarchy. The study sought to identify the current culture and the preferred culture of employees of higher education libraries in the UAE, and to compare the culture profiles of public versus privately-funded libraries as well as the average culture profiles of libraries across all the Emirates. A sample of 355 employees were selected from all 40 higher education libraries in the UAE. An online questionnaire containing the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument was used to obtain responses from the employees about their perception of the existing and preferred culture. 263 responses from 39 higher education libraries were returned usable at a return rate of 74%. The findings indicate that Clan and Adhocracy cultures are the dominant culture types prevailing in the higher education libraries in the UAE. However, the employees prefer greater Clan and Adhocracy cultures, and very low market and hierarchy cultures in their libraries. The results for the public and private universities, and the average culture profile in each of the Emirates are also presented.