Organizational culture and urban planning processes: Case study of the city of Helsinki

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Insinööritieteiden korkeakoulu | Master's thesis
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Date

2023-08-30

Department

Major/Subject

Sustainable Urban Mobility Transitions

Mcode

ENG3085

Degree programme

Master’s Programme in Urban Mobility

Language

en

Pages

100 + 29

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Abstract

To make urban environments more sustainable, cities must implement sustainable modes of transportation in their urban planning. However, due to fluency issues in interdisciplinary planning processes, streetscape development experiences drawbacks. As a case, the City of Helsinki, and its development of cycling infrastructure, as part of streetscape planning, has been studied. This research investigates the relevance of an organizational culture assessment method in examining interdisciplinary planning processes in urban planning. It tests the effect on insiders’ ability to surface their underlying assumptions regarding the derived organizational culture. Semi-structured individual expert interviews were conducted with 16 in-house Urban Environment Division participants. Additionally, a focus group pilot was performed to facilitate group dialogue with the same group of participants. This research enabled the insiders to examine their surfaced underlying assumptions and obtain understanding of the balance of opposite forces among their organizational cultural elements. The empirical study shows worry about the knowledge transfer along the hierarchical ladder and the overall knowledge integration in the different departments. Also, the results indicate a desire for further managerial support and increased appreciation of evaluation practices. The first experiences with this never-before-performed assessment method in the field of urban planning proofs its relevance and enabling effect on the insiders. Nevertheless, the complexity of an organizational culture assessment requires further dedication. So, obtaining even better understanding of the organizational culture is required. Therefore, the researcher highly recommends and encourages continuation of the dialogue via focus group settings.

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Supervisor

Mladenovic, Milos

Thesis advisor

Kaupinmäki, Oskari

Keywords

organizational culture, organizational learning, city of Helsinki, interdisciplinary planning processes, streetscape, knowledge transfer

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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:aalto-202309105762

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[dipl] Insinööritieteiden korkeakoulu / ENG