Institutionalization

It’s alive! It’s alive!

An institutionalized organization pretty much becomes its own entity. Employees come and go. Leaders come and go. It’s no longer bound to mere humans. Everyone knows these organizations. They’ll probably outlive almost everybody, unless something tragic happens.

Some well-known colleges and universities have reached this status. They’ve been around for 150 or more years and are pretty much staples in the national culture. Some companies are so institutionalized that their names have become verbs…like Google and Facebook and Xerox. And Kleenex.