Perceptions of organizational culture and personal effectiveness: A Meta analytical study. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- * Reena George and **Dr.C.Jayan. Abstract This paper reviews the existing literature on the relationship between organizational culture and the quality of work life (QWL) and how it encourages the employees to find meaning and purpose in their life. This paper further argues that certain organizational cultural attributes add to the shaping of the behavior, productivity, and personal effectiveness. Basically, organizational culture is the personality of the organization, and it decides the employees’ attitudes, performance and well -being. Keywords: Organizational Culture, organizational behavior, QWL, personal effectiveness, and productivity. INTRODUCTION Most people are born and die in organizations. They are educated and work in organizations. They spend a great deal of their leisure time playing and praying in organizations. Furthermore, one of the largest and most powerful of organizations -the government or state- prescribes and proscribes how the citizens should behave throughout their lives. All people are shaped, nurtured, controlled, rewarded and punished by organizations all their lives .Men are social animals who live in groups most of which may be called organizations ( Furnham,2005). No wonder, therefore, Organizational Culture has become an exciting field of research in the new millennium. It plays a very significant role in making organizations to get the best out of themselves. Culture provides the energy needed to function well by ensuring as it were a proper circulation of blood through all the organs (Farooq et al 2008). It is the flesh as well as the spirit (Kumar, 2005). In biological terms, culture is like the DNA of an organization, invisible to the naked eye, but critical to shaping its behavior. One culture is distinguished from another in terms of how some commonly shared human problems are addressed and the specific solutions that are sought (Trompenaars, 1993). Hofstede (1980) has clearly brought out the strong influence of culture on an organization by describing it as its “software.” --------------------------------------------------------------------------  * Research scholar, Dept of Psychology, University of Calicut.  **Professor, Dept.of Psychology, University of Calicut.