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106
ANALYSIS OF THE RELATIONSHIP THAT
EXISTS BETWEEN ORGANISATIONAL
CULTURE, MOTIVATION AND
PERFORMANCE
Evans Sokro
Central Business School, Central University College, Ghana
E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract

This research aimed at investigating the relationship that exists between organizational culture, employee
motivation and performance. The domains of organizational culture (organizational values, individual
beliefs, working environment, and employee relationships) and employee motivation and performance
were investigated. In order to find the culture and motivation link, mixed method approach for data
collection and analysis has been used. By using Pearson’s and Spearman’s Correlation methods, a
positive correlation has been found between the two variables. The study revealed that organizational
culture has a direct impact on employee motivation and indirectly on organizational performance as well.
The better the organizational culture, the higher the motivational level of employees. It was observed that
if organizations develop a strong culture of rewarding and acknowledging employees’ effort, it leads to
increase motivation and their performance would be significantly enhanced.
Key words: employee, motivation, organisational culture, performance.

Introduction

In the past decades, the concept of organizational culture has gained wide acceptance as
a way to understand human systems. According to Ricky (2007), culture is an important part
of internal environment of an organization. Organizational culture is the set of values, beliefs,
behaviors, customs, and attitudes that helps the members of the organization understand what it
stands for, how it does things, and what it considers important. Hofstede (1997) posited that the
culture of organizations is the collective programming of mind that distinguishes the members
of one organization from another. According to Hofstede, organizational cultures are different
from that of national culture. Unlike national cultures, people are conscious of organizational
cultures and they learn this culture later in their life at workplace (cited from Hofstede, 2005).
Schneider (2004) proposed that an organization’s culture establishes the rules within which
people act in addition to the ways and methods in which people communicate. Through an
understanding of group culture, employees know exactly what is required of them in any
given situation (Deal and Kennedy, 2000). Besides, rigid procedures and control mechanisms
become unnecessary when group culture is understood because it functions as internal control
mechanism that coordinates employees’ effort (Lee-Ross and Lashley, 2003).
As culture is ‘the way things are done within a group’ it sets priorities and expectations,
enabling people to learn and understand what is important, subsequently identifying those
actions that lead to punishment and those that lead to reward. Besides, Brown (1998), states that
there is a link between culture and motivational factors which are essential for the organization’s
performance. As per Schein (2009), it is tempting to emphasize the significance of corporate
cultures for performance, growth, and success.

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Problem of Research 107

Martin (1992) contends that the objective of studying organizational culture is to help
understand organizational life more. Understanding organizational life is important as it is widely
acknowledged that organizational cultures have an impact upon company performance (Denison,
1990; Kotter and Heskett, 1992; Truskie, 1999; Schein, 2004). However some critics, such as
Alvesson (2002) argue that the extent to which organizational cultures have a direct link upon
performance is somewhat ambiguous. Organizational Culture creates energy and momentum.
The energy will permeate the organization and create a new momentum for success. According
to Boddy (2002), organizational culture has an important and direct influence on behavior of
the people of an organization. He believes that organizational culture can either encourage
an employee to give out his best for the sake of organizational goals or it can discourage or
demoralize people which can be dangerous for the performance of the organization. In furtherance
to this argument, it appears management of most organizations seem to associate performance
of their team or employees to some unique cultural practices in their organization while others
think individual targets are the main driving force in improved performance. This paper aims at
investigating this controversy and to establish whether organizational cultures have any impact
on employee motivation and performance. Understanding organizational life is important as
it is widely acknowledged that organizational cultures have an impact upon companies. The
relevance of organizational culture supports the proposition that, in today’s competitive and
globalized corporate environment, there is huge need for organizational development strategy
at various workforce departments, as this can improve the company’s culture.

Research Focus

Within the last twenty years there has been a great deal of writing concerning culture
within organizations. Anthony (1994) believes that culture is an abstract and general concept,
a term that is used to encompass many aspects of organizations. Although there is considerable
diversity within the literature relating to organizational cultures, many authors recognize that
essentially, cultures consist of both visible and invisible aspects (Kotter and Heskett, 1992).
Furthermore, numerous authors adhere to Schien’s fundamental definition of organizational
culture. Schein (1985, 2004) defines culture as consisting of levels ranging from overt outward
manifestations of culture to the deep underlying assumptions that drive the organizations
action.
Within Schein’s model of culture, ‘artifacts’ refers to the visible structures and processes,
‘espoused beliefs and values’ to the strategies, goals and philosophies, and ‘underlying
assumptions’ to the unconscious beliefs, perceptions, thoughts and feelings of individuals
within organizations (2004: 27). Thus, Schein’s model helps demonstrate that culture is
something of great importance to organizations as it is something that can either unite or alienate
individuals.
Organisational culture is the pattern of values, norms, beliefs, attitudes and assumptions
that may not have been articulated but shape the ways in which people behave and things get
done (Armstrong, 2006). Cȃpeanu-Sonea et al. (2010) contend that organisational culture is
composed by a set, more or less coherent or articulated, of values, meanings, behaviours and
organisational practices representing the main filter in interpreting the orgnisation’s reality: it
also fulfils the function of behaviour orientation in the company. Organisational behaviour is
determined more by its culture than directives from senior management and the implementation
of strategies in many organisations is affected if they are at odds with the organisation’s culture
(Jarnagin and Slocum, 2007).
Culture is by no means a superficial concept, but a term used to describe a dynamic part

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108 of all organizations. As cultures exist within all organizations, it stands to reason that some
organizational cultures are better than others. Cultures where employees’ goals are aligned
to the organizations goals are often thought of as ‘successful’ cultures (Kotter and Heskett,
1994). Martin (1992) refers to cultures where employees are unified and there is no collective
dissent as ‘integrated’. Within this framework, Martin (1992) recognizes that basic values and
assumptions are shared and enacted by all members of the culture, and the members know what
they do and why they do it. In contrast to the integrated culture, Martin proposes two other
perspectives of organizational culture; ‘fragmented’ when there is little consensus between
employees organizational culture and ‘differentiated’ when the organizational values are only
embraced within parts of the organization. Martin’s integrationist perspective shares some
similarities with the cultural model which Goffee and Jones proposed in 1996. Goffee and
Jones (1996) simplified culture into two dimensions; sociability and solidarity, and created
a matrix using these dimensions. The matrix suggests that four cultures exist; cultures which
are ‘fragmented’ (low sociability and low solidarity), ‘mercenary’ (high sociability and low
solidarity), ‘networked’ (high solidarity and low sociability) and finally; cultures in which
employees have a high level of sociability and solidarity are referred to as ‘communal’ cultures.
Within communal cultures, employees get the job done efficiently and effectively and help each
other succeed.
Whilst Martin (1992) refers to the most espoused for cultures as ‘integrated’, and Goffee
and Jones (1996) as ‘communal’, Denison (1990) refers to effective organizations as having
corporate cultures which consist of four factors; involvement, consistency, adaptability and
mission. In Denison’s model involvement refers to employees having responsibility, being
involved in decision making and thus being committed to their work. Consistency implies
that values and expectation are aligned within the organizations. Adaptability infers that the
organization is able to adapt its behavior, structures and systems when there is need to. Finally,
through the final dimension of mission, Denison refers to the existence of a shared definition of
organizational purpose. He concludes that the most desirable organizational cultures integrate
these four values of involvement, consistency, adaptability and mission.
Denison’s (1990) work on the effectiveness of organizational culture is reflected through
the later work of Truskie (1999) in what he refers to as ‘high-performance organizational
cultures’. Truskie’s work has striking similarities to that of Denison’s, as Truskie identifies
that an ‘integrated and balanced culture’ exists when four key elements are at play, all of which
complement each other; cooperation, consistency, achievement and inspiration. Organizational
culture has an important role in the understanding of organizational behavior (Alvesson, 2002;
p3). However, Robbins (2006) described culture as a descriptive term, in that it is concerned
with how employees perceive the characteristics of an organization’s culture, not with whether
or not they like them. He further backed the definition of Alvesson (2002) and explained that
organizational culture refers to a system of shared meaning held by members of an organization,
distinguishing the organization from other organizations. This system of shared meanings is,
upon closer examination, a set of key characteristics that the organization values. According to
Kumar (2001) and Robbins (2006), research suggested seven characteristics that, in aggregate,
capture the essence of organizational culture. These are as follows:
• Innovation and risk taking: the degree to which employees in an organization are
encouraged to be innovative and risk taking.
• Attention to detail: the degree to which employees are expected to exhibit precision,
analysis, and attention to detail or task.
• Outcome orientation: the degree to which management focuses on results or outcomes
rather than on the techniques and processes used to achieve these outcomes.
• People orientation: the degree to which management decisions take into consideration
the effect of outcomes on people within the organization.

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• Team orientation: the degree to which work activities are organized around teams 109
rather than individuals.
• Aggressiveness: the degree to which the people are aggressive and competitive
regarding their work rather than easy going.
• Stability: the degree to which organizational activities emphasize maintaining the
status quo in contrast to growth.

According to Schein (1992), organizational culture has got an amazing characteristic

that the employees never know how much they are influenced through it. Regarding the type
of culture to be present in an organization, some best known classification schemes are being
suggested by Harrison (1972). These include; Power culture, Role culture, Task culture, and
People culture. Handy (1982), notes that this classification plays an important role in order to
understand how organizations work. As per his suggestions, all organizations have got at least
one of these cultures within their working operations as it impacts on organizational behavior
as well as employees’ motivation.

Organizational Culture and Motivation

Motivation is the key component of organizational culture. Organizational culture

plays a significant role in an organization regarding how people feel about their work, levels
of motivation, commitment, and in turn job satisfaction. These views are further backed by
Sempane et al. (2002) by explaining that people are the key factors for competitiveness and
organizations can demonstrate highly complex social structure because of their cultural strength.
There is a clear mutual interdependence between organization and its employees, where both
the parties have an impact on each other’s potential in achieving success. Such a relation gives
birth to the relation of employee motivation and job satisfaction (Schneider and Synder, 1975).
There are evidences from researches that motivation and job satisfaction cannot be treated in
isolation. Organizational culture should be prompted to ensure employee motivation in order to
achieve organizational goals (Sempane et al. (2002). Motivated staffs take pride whilst doing
their job and thus feel responsible for the organizational success. But it has been an issue for
some managers regarding how to motivate their employees, (Management News, (1990).
According to Hofstede (2001), recognition of the work done by the employees will make them
work harder in future.
Motivation can be seen to be linked to culture by looking at the five sources of motivation
proposed by Kanter (1989). He details that employees are motivated through mission (inspiring
employees to believe in the importance of their work), agenda control (enabling employees to
control their careers), a share of value creation (rewarding employees for successful efforts),
learning (providing learning opportunities) and reputation (giving employee’s opportunity to
get a name for themselves). These five sources of motivation link in with the work of Denison
(1990) and Truskie (1999) as all three sources focus upon the same general areas. Consequently
it can be seen that there is a link between motivation and culture, as strongly integrated cultures
will often result in motivated workforce.

Organizational Culture and Performance

According to Ogbonna and Harris (2000) there has been a lot of literature defining the
link between culture and performance of an organization. Despite the fact that some authors
have written against the link between the two, most of the theorists have come up with sufficient
evidences describing the link between the organization’s culture and performance of the
company. For instance, Brown (1998) suggested that one of the important consequences of the

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110 strong organizational culture is its impact on the performance of the company. Also, Denison
(1984) conducted the research on performance-culture link using the data from 34 companies
of America in a period of 5 years. Based on the quantitative studies, the author, constantly,
examined the cultural characteristics and performance of these companies throughout the
period of 5 years. He used the data of ‘return on investment and sales to measure performance.
Although there were variances among some of the measurement indicators’ strength to find
the relation between the two, he was successful in finding out a link between the culture and
organizational performance. He found that long term financial performance is linked with the
decision making and work design of an organization. Despite the encouraging results of the
study, it had its limitations too. Lim (1995) came up with a strong criticism of Denison’s studies
and stated that the study was based on the measurement of organizational climate rather than
measuring organizational culture.
In 1990, Rousseau researched into the link between organization culture and performance
of an organization. In order to overcome the limitations present in the study of Denison (1984),
he chose data from 32 voluntary fund-raising service organizations. The amount of money
raised at that time by the organizations was taken into account to measure performance and
for the measurement of organizational culture; organizational culture inventory promoted by
Cook and Lafferty (1983) was taken into consideration. Unfortunately, Rousseau was not
successful to find a significant correlation between organizational culture and performance.
After the Rousseau’s study failed to find any significant link between the two, Kotter and
Heskett conducted an extensive study in 1992 in order to find culture-performance link. Data
was collected from 207 companies over the period of 5 years. Various measures of culture and
economic performance data were taken into consideration to make their study successful. At
the end of the study, only a minor relation was found between strong culture and long term
performance which was their initial objective.
Studies were conducted by Ogbonna and Harris (2000) in order to investigate the relation
between the organizational culture and company performance. They included leadership style
as one more variable in their model. Data was used from 1000 registered British companies.
Customer satisfaction, sales growth, market share, competitive advantage and sales volume
were the variables used to measure performance. In order to measure organizational culture,
innovative, competitive, bureaucratic, and community cultures were taken into account. Their
study revealed that all the variables used to measure organizational culture are having their
direct or indirect impact on the organization’s performance.
Besides, Suppiah and Sandhu (2011) found that organisational culture types influence
tacit knowledge sharing behaviour and that such influences may be positive or negative
depending on the culture type.

Methodology of Research

General Background of Research

Research design, articulates the tools through which the empirical data are gathered and
analyzed (Punch 2000). However, Singh (2008) defines research design as a mapping strategy
and maintained that it is essentially a statement of the object of the enquiry and the strategies for
collecting the evidences, analyzing them, and finally reporting the findings. More importantly,
Punch (2000) states that it helps in relating the data collected with the research objectives,
hence facilitating the means to achieve the end results. In this study, a survey approach is used
because it provided the researcher with the opportunity to have easy access to information and
also minimize cost.

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111
Sample of Research

The population for this study is the management and staff of a multinational automobile
company operating in Ghana. According to Powell (2000), sampling is often one of the most
crucial steps in research. In fact, rigorous sampling methods have been developed and used
primarily within the context of survey research. However, according to Lancaster (2005), the
basic logic and many of the specific techniques of sampling are equally applicable to other
research methods such as content analysis, experimentation, and even field research. This study
used a simple random sampling method to collect data from 50 respondents comprising 38
males and 12 females. Also, 31 respondents were junior/secretarial staff, while 12 respondents
were managers, 6 of them were senior staff, while 1 respondent was a senior manager of the
company.

Research Instrument and Procedures

Questionnaires have been adopted as the instrument for data collection. A semi-structured
questionnaire i.e. (open and close-ended questions) was employed to elicit information from
the respondents. The questionnaire was divided into two sections and an overall number of 21
items. Section A contained demography related questions, and B asked participants to respond
to questions related organisational culture, motivation and performance. A total of 65 survey
questionnaires were distributed and 50 were returned giving a response rate of 76.9 percent.
The rationale of the study was explained to the respondents before data was collected. The HR
Officers assisted in distributing the questionnaires and was ready for collection within five
days. Questionnaires were sent out to the people with different working backgrounds in order to
gain responses from almost every department of the Company. Besides, few management staff
in the human resource department were interviewed so as to gain understanding of the culture
existing in the company studied.

Data Analysis

Data was analyzed and interpreted using both quantitative and qualitative analysis
techniques. Frequency distribution tables were also used for easy interpretations. As stated by
Punch (2000) quantitative research focuses more on numbers. It tends to decentralize human
behavior, leading to the criticism by the people preferring qualitative research (Creswell, 2003).
Qualitative approach according to Katsirikou and Skiadas (2007) differs markedly from the
quantitative approach and is underpinned by very different epistemological and ontological
foundations. Consideration of human behavior and perception is the significant factor for
the reason that researchers adopt this approach (Cresswell, 2003). Cresswell (2003) further
explained that qualitative research helps in understanding a phenomenon more deeply by
analyzing the reasons behind it, while as quantitative tools analyze the phenomenon itself,
without bothering about the human perception of reason ‘why’. According to Clarke (2007)
and Tashakkori and Teddlie (2003), the combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches
has been advocated by researchers to study various social phenomena in the fields of social
and behavioral sciences. The combination of both approaches is most commonly known as
mixed method approach (Onwuegbuzie and Jiao, 2007). The researchers mixes or combines
both quantitative and qualitative research techniques into a single study and is regarded as the
class of research (Tashakkori and Teddlie, 2003; Creswell and Clarke, 2007). Punch (2000)
also advocates in favor of exploiting both the approaches so as to maximize the validation of
the research. In order to provide more validation to the research, the researcher employed the

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112 combination of both qualitative and quantitative approaches for data collection. In addition,
according to Bryman (2003), quantitative approach is mostly used by researchers to establish
relationships or links between two or more variables. As the main objective of the research is to
investigate the link between organizational culture, employee motivation and performance, the
researcher finds it convenient to go with both qualitative and quantity research approach.

Results of Research

In order to enhance reliability of the measures, a 5-point Likert scale was employed
for the items in the questionnaire. Pearson’s product coefficient of correlation was used as the
test statistic to test the relationships that exist between organisational culture, motivation and
performance.

Table 1. Level of Education.

Level Frequency Percentage (%)

A Level / O Level / SSSCE 2 4

HND 9 18

First Degree 27 54

Higher Degree (Master/PhD) 5 10

Professional 7 14

TOTAL 50 100

Source: Field Data, 2011

The data on respondents’ level of education showed that 27 out of the 50 respondents
representing 54% were Bachelor degree holders, while 9 respondents representing 18% were
HND holders. The data further revealed that 7 respondents representing 14% were Professionals
and 5 respondents representing 10% were higher degree (Masters’/PHD) holders. However, 2
(4%) respondents were ‘O’ level/ A’ level holders. The analyses clearly revealed that majority of
the respondents were bachelor degree holders (see table 1 above). Average age of respondents
was 32 years.

Employees’ Motivation and Organizational Culture

General responses revealed that majority of respondents believe that organizational

efficiency increases with the increase in the motivational level of employees. This concept is
backed by Hutchinson (2007) who contends that better motivation of employees results in an
efficient workforce and it eventually increases the overall efficiency of an organization.

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Table 2. Employee Motivation affects Overall Efficiency. 113

Frequency Percentage (%)

Fully Disagree 1 2
Disagree 2 4
Partially Agree 2 4
Agree 12 24
Fully Agree 33 66
TOTAL 50 100

Source: Field Data, 2011

Table 3. The More Employees are Motivated the Less Attrition Rate.

Frequency Percentage (%)

Fully Disagree 2 4

Disagree 5 10

Partially Agree 9 18

Agree 16 32

Fully Agree 18 36

TOTAL 50 100

Source: Field Data, 2011

This question has been asked with a purpose to know whether or not the increased level of
employee motivation decreases the attrition rate. As shown above, 36% of total participants have
fully agreed with the statement that better motivation decreases the attrition rate of employees,
while 32% also agree with the statement, 18% of participants also partially agreed. It was also
found that a less population of participants have not shown consent with this statement, in that
10% of the employees have disagreed while as 4% have fully disagreed with it. As stated by
Andrews, (2009), ‘attrition rate or the number of employees leaving an organization reflects
the culture of the organization and whether it is a preferred place to work in. An organization
that retains its employees shows that its human resource development practices and policies
are creating a better motivating environment and quality of work life that is superior to others.
Robbins (2009) also backed this thought by suggesting that it is the obvious consequence
of motivation that employees would not leave an organization where they are motivated to
work in. Most of the employees have agreed that if they are motivated, they will not leave
the organization. These however suggest that the company has not cultivated a culture of
motivating her employees.

Employees’ Performance and Organizational Culture

The study shows that 88% of the respondents fully agreed and agreed, whiles 12%
partially agreed to the statement that ‘my organization performs well because members live
by the corporate culture’. From all indications, it can be said that, fairly, all respondents agree

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114 that the company performs well because employees live by the corporate culture. This implies
that the company’s organizational culture has a direct impact on employees’ performance. This
notwithstanding, it was found that 38% and 22% of respondents disagree and partially disagree
respectively that performance systems in the company are established to reward behaviors that
are consistent with the organization’s culture. On the other hand, 40% of the respondents agree
that performance systems are established to reward desired behaviors that are consistent with
the culture of the organization.

Table 4. Performance Systems are established to Reward Behaviuors that are

Consistent with the Organisation’s Culture.

Frequency Percentage (%)

Fully Agree 6 12
Disagree 19 38
Partially Agree 11 22
Agree 14 28
TOTAL 50 100

Source: Field Data, 2011

Table 5. Motivation Determines Employee Performance.

Frequency Percentage (%)

Disagree 2 4
Partially Agree 9 18
Agree 19 38
Fully Agree 20 40
TOTAL 50 100

Source: Field Data, 2011

It has been revealed from the responses that 40% of the employees fully agree that full
potential of employees can be determined when motivational level is high while as 38% also
agree with the statement. 18% of the participants partially agreed while 4% disagreed with the
statement made by the researchers, however, no participant fully disagreed with the statement.
According to Griffin and Moorhead (2009), managers must determine how to motivate people
and how to optimize their performance. The long term key to success in business is to create jobs
that optimize the organization’s requirements for productivity and efficiency while motivating
and satisfying the employees who perform those jobs. Virtually, all employees belong to a
work unit, and their work performance depends to some degree on level of motivation given
by the managers. As far as responses are concerned, the thoughts of the employees are similar
to the thoughts of the authors mentioned above, suggesting that there is a need for high level of
motivation in order to get the best out of them.

Influence of Organizational Culture on Performance and Motivation

The study shows 88% of respondents agreeing that the company recognizes the existence
of organizational culture within the organization whiles 12% partially agreed. However, 32%

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agreed that management is committed to the agreed cultural values and demonstrates them in 115
their decisions and actions whiles 46% partially agree and 22% disagree that management is
committed to the agreed cultural values. All respondents fully agreed that there exists culture
orientation for new employees. The study further shows 52% of respondents agreeing that
organizational members avoid actions which contradict their cultural values. 36% partially
agreed to this assertion whiles 12% disagree.

Table 6. Influence of Organisational Culture.

Frequency Percentage (%)

Employee Motivation 1 2
Performance 8 16
Both Motivation & Performance 39 78
None of the Above 2 4
TOTAL 50 100
Source: Field Data, 2011

The main objective of this study is to find out whether there is any impact of organizational
culture on employee motivation and performance. As revealed by the chart, 78% participants
believe that organizational culture has an impact on both employee motivation and their
performances. 16% believe that its impact is directly on employee performance while as 4%
responded that its impact is on employee motivation. However, just 1 person representing 2%
of the total population believe that there is no link between organizational culture and employee
motivation or performance. Examining the overall results for this question, it is quite apparent
that employees firmly believe that organizational culture has an impact on employee motivation
and performance. Furthermore, 72% of respondents indicated that corporate culture contribute
very high to the achievement of organizational objectives in the company whiles 28% also
stated it has high influence on meeting the objectives of the company.

Table 7. Description of Organizational Culture.

Perception of Employees Number of Participants Percentage (%)

Strong 28 56
Satisfactory 22 44
Poor 0 0
Total 50 100

Source: Field Data, 2011

The study shows majority (56%) of respondents perceives the organizational culture of
the company is strong whiles 44% described it as satisfactory. This result gives credence to
the feedback of the interviews with the management staff from the HR department who attest
to the fact that espouse the values of quality, continuous improvement, respect for people, and
teamwork. The company believes in the culture of excellence and as such the concept of get it
right the first time. Employees are encouraged to go to the top to find out the problem and make
the correct decisions.

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116 Table 8. Correlation Coefficients.

Organization
Employee motiva- Motivation
performs well
tion affects the determines the po-
because members
overall efficiency of tential employee
live by the corpo-
organization performance
rate culture
Pearson Correla-
Employee motivation 1
tion
affects the overall ef-
Sig. (2-tailed) .
ficiency of organization.
N 50
Pearson Correla-
Motivation determines 0.211(**) 1
tion
the potential employee
Sig. (2-tailed) 0.000 .
performance
N 50 50
Pearson Correla-
0.053 0.103(**) 1
Organization performs tion
well because members Sig. (2-tailed) 0.066 0.070 .
live by the corporate N 50 50 50
culture Sig. (2-tailed) 0.248 0.084 0.009
N 50 50 50

Source: Field Data, 2011

Discussion

The researchers drew a correlation between the assertion that ‘employee motivation
affects the overall efficiency of organization’ and ‘motivation determines the potential employee
performance’. The test showed a Pearson correlation value of 0.211 and a significance asymptotic
or probability value of .000 (approximately .001) between the two cases. This implies that there
is a positive relation between the two variables. Given the probability value, it is evident that
the correlation is significant. This indicates that the more employees are motivated the more
they perform well and this inextricably improves the overall efficiency or productivity of the
organization.
The test further shows a positive correlation between the assertions that employee
motivation affects the overall efficiency of organization and that organization performs well
because members live by the corporate culture. This showed an asymptotic value of 0.066
which made the claim not significant. This could imply that employees’ motivation influence
performance but this might not necessarily be as a result of organizational culture pertaining
in the company. Thus, there might be other factors other than organizational culture that
motivate and make employees perform. This might also suggest that it is not the nature of the
company frequently motivating its employees but when there is an effort in that regard it has
a corresponding increase in organization’s efficiency. Therefore if the company develops the
culture of rewarding and acknowledging employees’ effort it could make employees motivated
and perform well. This gives indication as suggested by Owens (2004) that a strong culture
brings out the positive energy of people to perform with loyalty and at deeper level while
having emotional bonds of attachment with the organization.

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Limitations and Direction for Future Research 117

The results of this study should not be generalised extensively since the participants of
this study come from a single company operating in the automobile industry in Ghana. Future
research should include a good number of respondents from across industries.

Conclusions

In investigating the relationships that exist between organizational culture, motivation

and performance in a multinational automobile company in Ghana the study sought to address
the following objectives; assess influence of organizational culture on employees’ motivation
and performance, determine the relationship between employees’ motivation and performance
and also to assess the influence of organizational culture on performance and motivation. It was
established that employees of the company recognizes the existence of organizational culture
within the organization and that management of the company is committed to the cultural
values and demonstrates them in their decisions and actions. In that respect, there exists the
culture of the company orienting new employees on the norms and values of the company
and that employees avoid actions which contradict their cultural values. However, some
workers especially, temporary workers, do not believe to be affiliated with the company, hence
adversely affecting motivation and performance of such employees. Employees believe that
organizational efficiency increases with the increase in the motivational level of employees and
that better motivation decreases the attrition rate of employees in the company. This implies that
organizational culture influences the level of motivation of its employees which makes them
not leave the organization. Better motivation of employees results in an efficient workforce and
it eventually increases the overall efficiency of the organization.
It was also found that performance systems in the company are not established to
reward behaviors that are consistent with the organization’s culture. However, it was noted
that better working environment is essential to achieve organizational goals smoothly and that
the organization’s profit target is set based on the organizational culture and performance.
Irrespective of these, employees perform well because they live by the corporate culture
of the company. This shows that the organizational culture have duly influence employee’s
performance. It was further revealed that full potential of employees can be determined when
motivational level is high. Additionally, employees’ work performances depend to some degree
on level of motivation given by the managers and that corporate culture contribute significantly
to the achievement of organizational objectives in the company. Also, the more employees are
motivated the more they perform well and this improves the overall efficiency or productivity of
the company. Therefore, organizational culture has got an impact on both employee motivation
and their performance.
However, the study is certain that
• It is not part of the nature of the company frequently motivating its employees but
when there is an effort in that regard it has a corresponding increase in organization’s
efficiency
• There might be other factors other than organizational culture that motivate and
make employees perform well on the job.

In view of the findings of the research, it is recommended that:

• Performance systems should be established to reward behaviors that are consistent
with the organization’s culture.
• Organizations should frequently motivate its employees since it gives corresponding
increase in organization’s efficiency. Therefore if organisations develop the culture of

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118 rewarding and acknowledging employees’ effort it could make employees motivated
and perform well.

Acknowledgement

To Gifty Mawufemor Mottey and Jocelyn Darko, I appreciate your valuable assistance
in gathering the data for the research.

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Advised by Dana Egerova, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic

Received: February 02, 2012 Accepted: March 13, 2012

Evans Sokro Lecturer, ��������

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