Organizational Culture Profile (OCP)

Abstract

The Organizational Culture Profile (OCP) is a widely utilized psychometric instrument developed by O’Reilly, Chatman, and Caldwell (1991) to assess both individual preferences and organizational values, thereby calculating person-organization fit. This scale employs a profile comparison approach using 54 value statements (reduced to 40 in later versions by Cable & Judge, 1997) that describe organizational characteristics. Respondents utilize the Q-sort method, sorting these items into nine predefined categories based on their desirability (for individuals) or descriptive accuracy (for organizations). The Q-sort process follows a strict item distribution pattern (2-4-6-9-12-9-6-4-2 across nine categories). Organizational profiles are typically derived from key informants, while individual profiles reflect ideal preferences. The final person-organization fit score for each individual is calculated by correlating the individual preference profile with the corresponding organizational profile.

Keywords

Organizational culture, Person-organization fit, Q-sort method, Organizational values, OCP, Job satisfaction, Employee turnover, Profile comparison, Organizational commitment, Work values.

Authors

O’Reilly, C. A., III, Chatman, J., Caldwell, D. F.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the OCP is to measure the congruence, or person-organization fit, between an individual’s preferred workplace values and the perceived actual values of a specific organization. This measurement is achieved by generating two distinct value profiles—the employee’s ideal culture preferences and the organization’s current culture—and quantitatively comparing them using a correlation coefficient.

Beyond assessing individual fit, the OCP also serves to map the core dimensions of an organization’s organizational culture itself. By asking a group of key informants familiar with the organization to sort the 54 value statements, researchers can establish a shared consensus regarding the cultural attributes of the firm, which is crucial for understanding organizational dynamics and predicting outcomes like commitment and turnover.

Construct

The core constructs measured by the OCP are Organizational Culture and Person-Organization Fit. Organizational culture is defined and operationalized through a set of shared values and norms that characterize an organization and guide behavior. The instrument captures this structure through seven underlying dimensions identified via factor analysis, which include aspects related to task handling, interpersonal relationships, and individual actions.

The scale’s ultimate output, person-organization fit, is a measure of compatibility between the employee and the organization. High fit suggests that the employee’s personal values align closely with the dominant values of the organization. This compatibility is considered a critical psychological mechanism influencing employee attitudes, retention, and performance within the field of industrial and organizational psychology.

Validity

The construct validity of the OCP is supported by the consistent emergence of a seven-factor structure across both employee preference ratings and organizational ratings of the 54 items (O’Reilly et al., 1991). Chatman and Jehn (1994) further confirmed that the factor structure of the OCP remained stable and consistent across a diverse sample of 15 firms.

Criterion-related validity studies confirm the predictive power of the OCP’s person-organization fit scores. Fit scores correlated positively and significantly with favorable outcomes such as normative organizational commitment and job satisfaction. Conversely, fit scores showed negative correlations with undesirable outcomes, including intention to leave and actual turnover (O’Reilly et al., 1991). Furthermore, research by Cable and Judge (1996) demonstrated that OCP-measured fit correlated positively with subjective assessments of person-organization fit, subjective person-job fit measures, and the perception of an organization’s rewards system.

Reliability

The reliability of the OCP, particularly concerning the ratings used to establish the organizational profile, is typically assessed using variations of the Spearman-Brown prophecy formula to estimate the reliability of the average rating across key informants. Across multiple studies (Caldwell & O’Reilly, 1990; Chatman & Jehn, 1994; O’Reilly et al., 1991), the calculated Spearman-Brown reliability coefficients consistently ranged from .84 to .94, demonstrating strong inter-rater reliability regarding the organizational profile.

Temporal stability was examined by Cable and Judge (1997), who reported that the test-retest reliability for organizational profiles assessed six months apart averaged .61. However, when focusing only on items rated as highly characteristic (Q-sort categories 7, 8, or 9) or highly uncharacteristic (categories 1, 2, or 3), the mean test-retest reliability was higher at .87. This suggests that the most defining and extreme characteristics of the organizational culture are measured with greater stability over time.

Factor Analysis

The initial factor analysis conducted on the 54-item OCP, based on individual employee ratings, yielded seven distinct factors that account for the underlying structure of organizational values. These seven dimensions categorize the 27 most salient values and represent the core components of organizational culture as measured by the OCP. These factors were found to be consistent across various firms.

The seven dimensions identified are:

• Innovation: Reflects the organization’s tendency to take risks, be responsive to new opportunities, and emphasize creativity and experimentation.
• Stability: Defined by an emphasis on predictability, security of employment, and adherence to organizational rules and procedures.
• Respect for People: Describes values related to interpersonal relationships, focusing on fairness, tolerance, and valuing the individual.
• Outcome Orientation: Focuses on organizational norms for individual actions, emphasizing high expectations for performance, achievement, and results.
• Attention to Detail: An emphasis on being highly analytical, precise, and oriented toward accuracy in all work tasks.
• Team Orientation: Describes values promoting collaboration, cooperation, and sharing information freely among employees.
• Aggressiveness: Defines an emphasis on competition, decisiveness, and sometimes forceful interpersonal interactions.

Instrument

Test Type: Psychometric Scale / Value Assessment

Format: Q-sort methodology (Original 54 items, later 40 items; 9 forced categories).

Language Available: English (Original)

Population Group: Employees, Key Informants, and Organizational Members

Age Group: Adults (Working Population)

Population Details: Applicable across diverse industries and organizational contexts for assessing cultural fit and diagnosing organizational values. The organizational profile typically requires key informants with broad experience.

Test Methodology: Profile comparison approach. Organizational culture is derived by averaging key informant Q-sort ratings. Individual preference is derived from employee Q-sort ratings of desirability. Person-organization fit is calculated by correlating the two resulting profiles.

Keywords

Q-sort, Organizational values, Person-job fit, P-O fit, Culture assessment, Employee retention, OCP dimensions, Spearman-Brown, Psychometrics.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Information not provided in source.

Affiliation Email addresses: Information not provided in source.

Correspondence Address: Information not provided in source.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

Test Year: 1991 (Original OCP published by O’Reilly, Chatman, & Caldwell).

Permissions and Fee: The original publication was in the Academy of Management Journal. Use requires permission from the Academy of Management, as noted in the source material: “Reproduced with permission of Academy of Management in the format textbook via Copyright Clearance Center.” Fees depend on the intended use (academic research versus commercial application).

Reference’s

Cable, D. M., & Judge, T. A. (1996). Person-organization fit, job choice decisions, and organizational entry. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 67(3), 294-311.

Cable, D. M., & Judge, T. A. (1997). Interviewers’ perceptions of person-organization fit and organizational selection decisions. Journal of Applied Psychology, 82(4), 546-561.

Caldwell, D. F., & O’Reilly, C. A., III. (1990). The impact of person-job fit on job performance, satisfaction, and tenure. Journal of Management, 16(3), 517-531.

Chatman, J. A. (1989). Improving the prediction of performance: The role of organizational culture and person-organization fit. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74(3), 333-346.

Chatman, J. A., & Jehn, K. A. (1994). Assessing the relationship between organizational culture and performance: The case of financial service firms. Academy of Management Journal, 37(3), 522-545.

O’Reilly, C. A., III, Chatman, J., & Caldwell, D. F. (1991). People and organizational culture: A profile comparison approach to assessing person-organization fit. Academy of Management Journal, 34(3), 487-516.

Sheridan, J. E. (1992). Organizational culture and employee retention. Academy of Management Journal, 35(5), 1036-1056.

Vandenberghe, C. (1999). Organizational culture and person-organization fit: An examination of their relationship with job satisfaction and organizational commitment. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 8(3), 395-408.

Items of the Organizational Culture Profile (OCP)

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

Instructions for assessing organizational profiles:

To obtain profiles of the cultures of firms, informants with broad experience are asked to sort the 54 items in terms of how characteristic each is of their organization’s culture. Respondents receive the following definition and instructions: “Important values may be expressed in the form of norms or shared expectations about what’s important, how to behave, or what attitudes are appropriate. Please sort the 54 values into a row of nine categories, placing at one end of the row those cards that you consider to be the most characteristic aspects of the culture of your organization, and at the other end those cards that you believe to be the least characteristic.” The Q-sort ratings from multiple key informants for an organization are then averaged to develop a single profile for the organization.

Assessing individual preferences:

To assess individual preferences for organizational cultures, respondents are asked to sort the 54-item deck into the nine categories by responding to the question How important is it for this characteristic to be a part of the organization you work for? The categories range from “most desirable” to “most undesirable.”

Calculating the person-organization fit score:

The person-organization fit score for each individual is calculated by correlating the individual preference profile with the profile of the organization for which the person works. Additional descriptions of the approach to assessing fit appear in Chatman (1989) and in Caldwell and O’Reilly (1990).

Organizational Culture Profile items:

The original 54 OCP items are provided. The items retained in the 40-item version of the OCP used by Cable and Judge (1997) are indicated with (CJ).

1. Flexibility
2. Adaptability (CJ)
3. Stability (CJ)
4. Predictability
5. Being innovative (CJ)
6. Being quick to take advantage of opportunities (CJ)
7. A willingness to experiment
8. Risk taking (CJ)
9. Being careful
10. Autonomy (CJ)
11. Being rule oriented (CJ)
12. Being analytical (CJ)
13. Paying attention to detail (CJ)
14. Being precise
15. Being team oriented (CJ)
16. Sharing information freely (CJ)
17. Emphasizing a single culture throughout the organization
18. Being people oriented (CJ)
19. Fairness (CJ)
20. Respect for the individual’s right
21. Tolerance (CJ)
22. Informality (CJ)
23. Being easygoing
24. Being calm (CJ)
25. Being supportive (CJ)
26. Being aggressive (CJ)
27. Decisiveness (CJ)
28. Action orientation
29. Taking initiative
30. Being reflective (CJ)
31. Achievement orientation (CJ)
32. Being demanding
33. Taking individual responsibility (CJ)
34. Having high expectations for performance (CJ)
35. Opportunities for professional growth (CJ)
36. High pay for good performance (CJ)
37. Security of employment (CJ)
38. Offers praise for good performance (CJ)
39. Low level of conflict
40. Confronting conflict directly (CJ)
41. Developing friends at work (CJ)
42. Fitting in
43. Working in collaboration with others
44. Enthusiasm for the job (CJ)
45. Working long hours (CJ)
46. Not being constrained by many rules (CJ)
47. An emphasis on quality (CJ)
48. Being distinctive or different from others (CJ)
49. Having a good reputation (CJ)
50. Being socially responsible (CJ)
51. Being results oriented (CJ)
52. Having a clear guiding philosophy (CJ)
53. Being competitive (CJ)
54. Being highly organized (CJ)