Think out loud.
Perspectives, ponderings, and points of view on the topic of Corporate Culture
If I wrote another book, it would be called “The Culture Is.” Why? Because there is always a culture. Some leaders and some companies are deliberate and intentional about creating and curating their culture, so they have the culture they want. Others are less so, so they have a culture that gets in the way of what they’re trying to accomplish. Either way, there is a culture.
The question is: is the culture serving you?
Often, leaders think that culture is about the ping pong tables, the free beer, or the swag people get at orientation. Or, they think it’s about the engagement survey results, or the holiday party. That’s not what culture is. If you have ping pong tables in your lobby, the culture isn’t ping pong tables, it’s a culture that values connection, community, and some version of a ‘work hard, play hard’ mentality. Unless, of course, the people playing ping pong are somehow punished for doing so…and then your culture is closer to a ‘get your work done at all costs’ type of workplace, or maybe a ‘if you want to get ahead, don’t let the boss see you playing ping pong’ type of culture, or some version of a culture based on fear. The ping pong tables are just the artifact; they don’t have meaning in isolation. It’s how we engage with the ping pong tables that makes our culture.
WHAT IS CULTURE?
Culture is how we make decisions, who makes the decisions, when we make decisions. Culture is how senior leaders behave, how they talk to each other, how they talk to their teams. Culture is who gets promoted, who gets hired, who gets fired. Culture is how work gets done: in teams, in isolation, or some other way. Culture is who does the work. Culture is what we laugh about, what gets rewarded, what gets punished. And, the company’s culture is almost always the reason for its success or its failure. I know that’s hard to believe when we spend so much more time on strategy and tactics and operations plans, but therein lies the problem. If we spend all of our time on strategy, and no time on culture, it will sneak up and bite us in the ass. Culture and strategy shouldn’t be two separate initiatives - one should feed the other. You could have the best strategy in the world; if you have a terrible culture, your strategy won’t come to fruition.
And just as a strategy changes over time, so too does the culture! We can’t expect to keep the same culture at 100 employees that we had at 10 employees, and we can’t expect the culture at 500 employees to remain the same when we get to 5000 employees. Same as the strategy, the leadership skillset, and more. We evolve. Companies evolve. Industries evolve.