Organizational Culture for Innovation: A Case Study Involving an University Faculty

This research was made in the faculty of Social Communication and Journalism of a Colombian private university, renowned for its high-quality standards, with the goal to identify the actual characteristics of its organizational culture and its relationship in favor of innovation. This study was made with a mixed approach and involved compiled information gathered by using two instruments: the Inventory of Organizational Culture in Education Institutions (ICOE), designed by Marcone and Martin in Psycothema, 15 (2), 292–299 ( 2003 ), and the TB Test, designed by Bridges in The character of organizations: Using personality type in organization development . Davies-Black Publishers ( 2000 ), as well as semi-structured interviews done to professors and administrative staff. The gathered information was compared with both theoretical models of cultural analysis built for superior education organizations and representative researchers in the area of organizational culture for innovation, a field of study broad and consolidated nowadays but one that is not usually geared toward understanding and explaining the relationship between organizational culture and innovation in high education organizations. Our findings let us make a characterization of the organizational culture of the faculty and identify its cultural strengths and weaknesses regarding adopting and favoring innovation. Also, this empirical research adds up to an effort to make studies regarding organizational culture for innovation specifically geared toward high-education organizations.