Directors Video

Organizational culture is the collective behavior of people that are part of an organization, it is also formed by the organization values, visions, norms, working language, systems, and symbols, it includes beliefs and habits. It is also the pattern of such collective behaviors and assumptions that are taught to new organizational members as a way of perceiving, and even thinking and feeling. Organizational culture affect the way people and groups interact with each other, with clients, and with stakeholders.

Assessing and developing our organizational culture is important because:

Culture is a driver of employee motivation.

Culture is powerful and can be a major barrier to the implementation of an organization's strategic objectives. Often there is a discrepancy between what an organization strives to achieve and the assumptions and beliefs its employees actually hold.

Why does DLA evaluate its culture?

DLA strives to be a high-performing organization. The Culture Survey, administered every 18 months allows the workforce to identify organization's strengths and weakness from an enterprise perspective and cascades down to division level. Past survey and culture action plan results are the baseline for future surveys so DLA can assess progress towards a healthy culture. High performing organizations historically mean high workforce satisfaction, which equates to achievement of agency mission and goals.

Since 2003, DLA has surveyed the workforce culture with the Denison Culture Model The Denison model measures four critical traits of culture and leadership (mission, adaptability, involvement, and consistency). Each of these traits is further broken down into three indices (for a total of 12).

DLA Culture Survey FAQs

What the DLA workforce says about the Culture Survey:
"I feel like I have a voice that is heard by leadership to improve my work life."— Carrie, DLA Distrbution "DLA leadership really cares about the workforce and wants us to excel to support the mission." — Liz, DLA Energy "I like the fact that progress is charted through the action plans. We get to see the change for better."— Sean, DLA Land and Maritime

Have questions about Culture? We want to hear from you!