The Stories and Styles that Shape Organisational Culture

Created by Nguyen Tan Phat, SGS, Client Management

Meeting at his favourite location as always, I have known him for the long time.

I am working in a combined environment but full of potential, I think

With the long – term experience in journalism, he deserves the job as Senior Editor of Esquire. Being in the Sunflower’s family, he understands the organisational culture that brings up the topic of this interview. 

Since the establishment in Vietnam on March 2013, Esquire is the leading magazine in men’s lifestyle. More importantly, Sunflower has been successfully merged Esquire into their organisation. It is interesting to investigate into this matter with the support of my friend, Mr. Thien Phuc. Working under Mr. Nhan Nguyen, Editor in Chief of Esquire, and Ms. Huong, founder of Sunflower, he is trained in order to identify the trend to create the content that is going to attract readers. Even his team works independently from Ms. Huong, however, she still involves in the decision making of the content. 

With more than 20 years experiences in journalism and specialised in literature, Ms. Huong is not only the leader but also a divine mentor in my daily job. She can spot the problem of the article and rationale why it doesn’t fit with the topic or viewers.

This factor is one of elements that shape the organisational culture, the story behind the founder of the organisation. Mr. Phuc believes that it is essential because Ms. Huong has set the value of the company and his job, as the new comer, has to try his best in order to maintain the standard. Additionally, Sunflower has become a prestigious company for any journalist looking for the next level in their career, Mr. Phuc is not exceptional. Unlike other magazine brand, Esquire has only one headquarter in USA. Mr. Phuc always tries to perform well in his daily task so he can have an opportunity to be trained in the USA like his boss.

It is a chance for advancement my current knowledge

Advancement and Growth is the highest level of Organisational Pyramid to motivate the staff adapting to the corporate culture. Mr. Phuc has set this target since he came to Sunflower. Beside from internal motivation, the management style of supervisor also contributes to the drive of employees to work with their full capabilities. Instead of dividing into 4 corporate cultures like Charles Handy, Sunflower’s management style is the combination of those four, while Esquire’s team works independently and most of their staff is self – encouraged to meet the deadline. However, sometimes Ms. Huong can interrupt the topic or article before publishing it. We can see the corporate culture can be a little bit of everything from the Power Culture to Role Culture. 

At the end of the day, it is all about the sales of Esquire.

It is all depend on the content of the article

During the interview, I was wondering how Sunflower could adjust the content to fit with the local but still maintain the Original Personality of the brand. Mr. Phuc explained that they have to receive an approval from International Editor of Esquire in the USA before publishing. At the end of the day, Esquire Vietnam is still in control of Esquire USA in term of the issue’s articles and topics. 

At the end of my interview, I have realised sometimes theory doesn’t work the way it is, and I have interpret my understanding on this following picture. Additionally, the stories of symbolic frame is the most important factor to form the corporate culture. Mr. Phuc has demonstrated how he fit himself in Sunflower and provide me an insight of theory in practice.

Word Count: 605

Additional Trivia: Don’t You Know?

• Esquire US controls the content of any other international version excepts Esquire UK.
• Esquire doesn’t have their headquarter in Asia, however, if they want to look for a standard, Esquire Korea will be the one.

Reference List

Casul, M 2014, ‘Organisational Culture’, Lecture in COMM2384 Client Management, 27^th March, RMIT University, Vietnam.

 

Sandford J. 2013, ‘How management style affects motivation when employees work from home’, Inside Business, 23^rd December, viewed 3^rd March, http://www.insidebusiness360.com/index.php/how-management-style-affects-motivation-when-employees-work-from-home-7048/.