Toxic Organizational Culture - Essay Example

In the article Who’s to Blame for Creating a Toxic Organizational Culture, I will agree with Guthrie's position based on the fact that it’s the leader's responsibility to create and shape the organization's culture (Guthrie, 2014). A study by Lin and McDonough (2011) clearly identifies that leadership has a direct influence on organizational culture. The study shows that leaders cannot directly influence an organization's productivity; however, they can directly influence the organization's culture, which has a direct influence on the organization's productivity.

Although in the beginning, the leader is solely responsible for creating an organizational culture, the culture starts to evolve with time and partly influences the organization's leadership. However, a leader who clearly understands the basic ideas of leadership and strives to help the organization achieve its goals should never claim ignorance of what is happening under their nose. They should understand that they are in control; therefore, their task is to constantly monitor the change in their organization's culture. That is to say if ‘the organization's culture turns toxic’ they should be responsible for condoning it since that is their responsibility.