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communication, principals promoted collective values that became norms at schools and included punctuality, time management, professionalism, and commitment.
Participants indicated that principals exemplified these values by allowing for collaboration and staff development where teamwork was used as a lever for promoting collaborative goal setting and achievement. This was complemented by recognition of achievement.
It is, therefore, concluded as far as leadership features, that principals played major roles in shaping the school cultures. This was further pointed out in terms of behavioural, verbal, and visual manifestation, where the language use was reflected in visual aspects such as school visions, logos, symbols, and rituals and traditions.
Most importantly, principals’ language usage was that of projecting examples of good practice related to the historical events and schools’ heroes and heroines. This generated inspiration for learners to internalise the need for education as the key to holistic achievements, for themselves as individuals, and their families and communities.
An important conclusion drawn from the leadership of the schools is that of creating supportive organisational cultures while being steadfast in demanding accountability and emphasising work completion. These aspects were executed with an exhibition of concern for people – teachers, learners, and their communities. This conclusion helped me to identify the type(s) of organisational cultures at the school – drawing from Cameron and Quinn’s (2011:39) four major culture types.
It is, therefore, concluded that principals’ pursuits for collaboration, communication, and teamwork are values emanating from their deeply held philosophical beliefs and conviction and are, therefore, drivers for the types of organisational culture at the schools. Clan culture features at the participants’ schools as Masuku, (2011:60) states that, “A functioning clan culture is characterised by mutual acceptance, trust, openness, support, sharing and recognition”; while the market culture as described by Tharp (2011: 5) is a “compete culture” where an organisation is results-driven focused on job completion. The market culture features are expressed where the schools’ aims and objectives are directed to achieving 100% pass rates and maintaining the schools’ reputations of high performance. These aims and objectives drive the schools to focus on competition and winning as a core value. Furthermore,
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in the participating schools, the value for consensus was observed in the decision- making process of the school where all the teachers, learners, parents, and the community are involved in the decisions that affected the schools.
The conclusions drawn above point to participants’ schools exhibiting features of the clan and market cultures, where internal maintenance with flexibility, concern for people and sensitivity for customers are the main focus. A premium is placed on teamwork, participation, and consensus for the former, and an organisation that focuses on external maintenance “with a need for stability and control, is results- driven, which is focused on job completion with leaders who are demanding, hard- driving, and productive; and where emphasis is on unifying the organisation, thus making reputation and success common concerns for the latter” (Quinn & Cameron, 2011:26).
The main point to be made is that culture, and therefore, organisational culture is dynamic and changes over time. For this reason, I concludes that the two types of cultures dominant in the participants’ schools are the clan and market cultures. It could be because as the schools settle into consistency and internalisation of tangible and intangible culture manifestations, one culture will be more dominant that the others or vice versa. As argued by Mellese and Molla (2018:191), school culture is not static, and thus, finding features of two types of cultures at the schools, indicates that the values, beliefs, philosophies, and convictions are driving forces that influence the type of culture that will dominate the school. It is also that a school can have elements of more than one culture.
5.4.2 Lessons from the findings on school organisational cultures
The lesson derived from the organisational cultures of the schools in the study is the existence of three main pillars, namely, a strategy for school operations aimed at performance, a structure within which school operations took place, and behaviours that promoted the attainment of desired outcomes and results.
Dauber, Fink and Yolles (2012:7) describe the strategy as “the overall orientation of an organization long-term plan for reaching present goals and objectives” efficiently and “is a process that is inseparable from the structure, behaviour and culture of the company in which it takes place”. These scholars further maintain that, “strategies
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influence the interaction between structures and behaviour and vice versa”. The schools in this study appeared to have strategies for maintaining their high performance. Firstly, their strategies were informed by the philosophies, beliefs, and values. This is evident, as alluded to earlier, in values upholding professionalism, punctuality, respect, and time management. Furthermore, their mottos, visions, and mission are indicative of organisations that engage in meaning-strategic planning and development.
Structure(s), according to Dauber et al. (2012:7), citing Caves (1980) manifest strategic orientations, regulate information flow, decision making, and patterns of behaviour, that is, the “internal allocation of tasks, decisions, rules, and procedures for appraisal and reward, selected for the best pursuit of [a] strategy”. Furthermore, Dauber et al. (2012:7) citing Caves (1980) point out that structures “turn organisational strategies into action, commonly known as ‘operationalisation’,
‘implementation of strategies’ or ‘strategy doing’ and unfold through organisational structures and activities”. Strategies are put into effect through organisational structures and behaviour. This, in the case of a school, implies the existence of school structure(s) in which process involving teaching and learning take place.
These issues point to a school as a structure with substructures where decisions, rules, procedures, and regulations are taken.
Dauber et al. (2012:8) further emphasise that ”structures in organisations develop due to the need to organise behaviour in a meaningful way and provide orientation for organisational members to set actions that comply with organisational strategy, organisational culture, and, as a result, accepted patterns of behaviour”. The insistence on professionalism, spirituality, emphasis on responsibility, collegiality, and targeted strategies, focus on the ultimate goal of changing learners’ self- concepts into expectations of being successful in life and changing their families and communities are among other factors that are managed through different structures and substructures at the participants’ schools.
Behaviour or performance, according to Dauber et al. (2012:7), unfolds as observable manifestations of predefined strategies as regulated by organisational structures and put into effect patterns of behaviour derived from strategies and structures and make an organisation’s existence as a market player visible.
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Behaviour and performance are, therefore, manifestations of organisational strategy.
These observable manifestations of predefined strategies are also manifested in schools’ visual and verbal manifestations. Numerous examples were indicated for the schools in the study. However, behaviours aimed at maintaining work performance and good results at schools are noteworthy.