UNDERSTANDING PROFESSIONAL CULTURE IN ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT

This paper formulates a new conceptual framework for understanding professional culture in organizational context. Our analysis begins with an attempt to identify the complex interplay between individual sense-making, group beliefs and culture. The process of professionalization and the development of professional cultures is described and the influence of professional belief systems on organizational culture is examined. The inter-relationship between four different types of professional subculture and organization culture is illustrated in a case-study analysis of an Australian home-care service. The stability of an organization's operating environment is identified as a major factor which facilitates and constrains the propensity for professional subcultures to radically transform or incrementally refine dominant organizational cultures. The paper concludes with a critical reappraisal of the significance of professional subculture as a determinant of an organization's cultural system.