Organizational culture and the perception of autonomy and work overload in Startups

The number of Portuguese startups and incubators has increased significantly in recent years, but there are few studies in the literature dedicated to understanding the environment of startups, and those that exist do not study the most prominent culture in these organizations or how this construct influences work dynamics. The objectives of this study were: (a) to verify which is the most prominent organizational culture in the context of startups; and (b) to evaluate the relationship between the perception of organizational culture and the perception of autonomy and overload in the employees of Startups technical staff. For this, a questionnaire was applied to a sample of 292 workers in technical staff of startups. Multiple regression models and repeated measures ANOVA were used to verify that the entrepreneurial culture is the most prominent in these contexts, differing significantly from the other types of culture. It was also observed that the entrepreneurial and team culture positively predict autonomy at work and negatively overload while the bureaucratic culture negatively predicts autonomy at work and positively overload. The results of this study point to the importance of promoting more autonomous teams in organizations, thus reducing the perception of overwork that can be harmful to the worker's physical and mental health. In practical terms, it will allow managers to make better decisions about the degree of freedom of their teams.