Author(s): Lama Mansour Al Jehani, Noorjahan Sherfudeen
Administrative organizations, in general, have peculiarities and features that distinguish them from others. Organizational culture has been linked to the activities of organizations, including administrative innovation, as it is one of the fundamental ways to raise and improve efficiency and effectiveness in service and productive organizations. Organizational culture is a set of values that individuals believe in within organizations, which govern their behavior and affect their performance of the work entrusted to them. Organizational innovation combines brilliant knowledge and creative work, touching all areas of life, dealing with reality, and striving for the best and is the product of the interaction of subjective, objective, personal, environmental, or behavioral variables, led by distinguished people. The purpose of the study is to determine the prevailing organizational culture in Saudi government institutions and its impact on administrative innovation. Specifically, organizational culture was presented as four components (beliefs, values, communication, and organizational standards) and innovation was presented using three components (susceptibility to change, problem-solving and decision making, and innovation promotion). The study also aimed to assess the effect of the individual components of organizational culture on each of the components of innovation. The questionnaire was completed by 91 respondents. Males and females were equally represented in the study sample. Components of organizational culture had different effects on the components of innovation. The only component that did not show a statistically significant association with innovative performance was beliefs. Our results provide useful information for organizations and institutions, specifically the governmental institutions in Saudi Arabia. Results suggest that innovation can flow in the organizations when organizational culture supports it. Our research also highlights concepts that should be developed within organizations; values, communication, and organizational standards to develop innovation. We also proposed a simple model to describe the dimensions of organizational culture along and the expected effects that should occur if efforts were made to improve the norms for organizational culture within the governmental institutions in Saudi Arabia. The current study assessed the association between organizational culture and administrative innovation in governmental organizations in Saudi Arabia. The current model also included components that were not sufficiently assessed in previous models such as communication as a component of organizational culture and its role in administrative innovation.