ABSTRACT
The tension between different subcultures within an organization may be destructive, but it does not have to be. If we assume that power is the most significant dynamic in organizational life, the authors will see the different ways power is exercised and categorize an organization's culture accordingly. Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner likewise distinguish between cultures by proposing a number of polarities based on the value positions held by people in the organizations. The imaginative mode recognizes that the energies dominant in any organization and manifested in its culture are constantly in interaction with other energies which are supported, suppressed, or neglected, just as the Olympian gods do not exist in isolation but are constantly interacting and arguing with one another. Making changes at the artifact level cannot be counted on to make any immediate impact on the deeper levels of the organization's culture.
