Reading the signs
Cultural web and diagnosing culture.
- Level
- Bitesize
- Learning time
- 1 hour 30 minutes
- Where
- Culture in Organisations
- Price
- £39
When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Read the full terms
Certificate of Completion
Overview and Outcomes.
Overview
The Cultural Web, developed by Johnson and Scholes, is built for diagnosis rather than comparison. This module works through its six elements, stories, symbols, power structures, organisational structures, control systems, and rituals and routines, and shows how together they protect a central paradigm. Nucor Steel and Lehman Brothers show the same web explaining opposite outcomes, with practical guidance on running a workshop and mapping cultures around a merger. Structure and process are never neutral scaffolding: they are culture written down as an organisation chart, an approval form or a seating plan. This module uses Conway's Law and the McKinsey 7S framework to show how structure and culture shape each other, treats process design, matrix structures, space and digital tools as culture decisions, and explores Netflix, board governance and local government's dual political and officer structure.
What you'll develop
In this Bitesize, you will develop the ability to:
- Describe the six elements of the Cultural Web and explain how they reinforce the paradigm at its centre.
- Apply the Cultural Web to map an organisation and identify its paradigm, including reading its stories and control systems for what they reveal.
- Plan a Cultural Web workshop with colleagues, and use the web to compare two organisations before and after a merger.
- Explain how structure and culture shape each other, using Conway's Law and the McKinsey 7S framework.
- Assess what your own processes, approval chains, physical space and digital tools signal about trust, using a structure and culture alignment check.
The Modules.
1 hour 30 minutes of learning.
- 05The Cultural Web: Diagnosing Culture in PracticeThe Cultural Web, developed by Johnson and Scholes, is built for diagnosis rather than comparison. This module works through its six elements, stories, symbols, power structures, organisational structures, control systems, and rituals and routines, and shows how together they protect a central paradigm. Nucor Steel and Lehman Brothers show the same web explaining opposite outcomes, with practical guidance on running a workshop and mapping cultures around a merger.41 min
- 06Culture, Structure and ProcessStructure and process are never neutral scaffolding: they are culture written down as an organisation chart, an approval form or a seating plan. This module uses Conway's Law and the McKinsey 7S framework to show how structure and culture shape each other, treats process design, matrix structures, space and digital tools as culture decisions, and explores Netflix, board governance and local government's dual political and officer structure.42 min
Keep going.
Part of the Culture in Organisations topic, also sold whole as The way we do things here.
Go deeper, and pay only the difference
- You are hereBitesize, 1 hour 30 minutes, £39
- Next stepFocus, From diagnosis to change, 3 hours, £69. Already own the Bitesize? You pay £30.
- Explore, Reading culture, 4 hours 30 minutes, £129. Already own the Bitesize? You pay £90.
- The whole topicImmerse, The way we do things here, 8 hours 30 minutes, £249. Already own the Bitesize? You pay £210.
When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Prices per person. Read the full terms
Also part of: Setting the course, Shaping culture and direction
Other Bitesize in the Culture in Organisations topic
- How things really get done hereOrganisational culture: positive and toxic1 hour 30 minutes£39
- Lenses on cultureCulture models: Hofstede, Schein and Denison1 hour 30 minutes£39
- Trust at the heartCulture change, mergers and psychological safety1 hour 30 minutes£39
- When culture goes wrongCulture in agile, remote and hybrid working1 hour 30 minutes£39
- Culture without bordersCross-cultural working and culture case studies1 hour 30 minutes£39
