Culture is a lived experience, not a slogan, and it is a compounded effect of everyone at the organization, not an aspirational concept.
It begins with the truth — not the truth we wish to believe, but the actual truth of the day-to-day lived experience of your employees. Taking a hard look at the reality, rather than the vision, will begin the best practice of culture change.
Be specific and include all voices. A manifesto is short-lived. Because we want the culture to saturate every part of the environment, the more specific and digestible, the easier implementing cultural shifts will be. When employees’ voices are included, they have more buy-in to developing the organization’s culture, and change will diffuse more effectively.
Culture needs to be consistently observable: Any external party who interacts with anyone at the organization should have a comparable experience. And any internal party who interacts with any of their peers should have the same experience. You might say that a culture is a living being.
Ensure that progress is rewarded and that systems are carefully constructed and scaffolded to reinforce the culture, especially if it includes new norms. A culture has its strength in these systems.
Recall, too, that culture adaptations are fluid. They shift with economic, environmental, and societal change. Equip your leaders to nurture the culture.
Preparing for a Culture Shift
First, you want to prepare your leaders to be change agents. All too often, decisions are made that incite change — the change is implemented — but none of the proper steps in change management occur due to the time intensity. However, if constructed carefully with a built-in communication strategy, change can be adopted more quickly and with less stress for those affected.
Be intentional that this new culture will be for your future workplace. Show readiness rather than being reactionary. This means you need a team comprised of both design thinkers and forward-focused visionaries.
Design trajectories for continuous development. Because culture adaptations are fluid, so is your team, and they must remain fluid also — in terms of constantly advancing.
Some Reflection Prompts
- Have you considered hiring an Organizational Development Specialist? These professionals are culture architects, keeping company goals and objectives at the forefront of all endeavors and initiatives, who instrumentally align all employees to the desired culture state.
- Have you ever been involved or known a colleague who worked in a “sick” culture? What did you do to improve the culture?
- How do you exert solutions-mindedness?
- What would the impact be if you changed your organizational culture — truly, radically?
Success Story
We have a client who, in the past three years, has expanded their facility twice and is getting ready to expand once again. This same client has just recently had mandated overtime to meet customer demand – another element that continues to expand. With great success comes great responsibility, yet it affects team members and their lives.
However, anytime I go to this client location, I am consistently met with friendliness, positivity, and genuine interpersonal communication. While this may seem puzzling — the steadfast posit of the employees who are under extreme demands — for this organization, it’s no surprise. Starting about one year ago, the organizational leadership constructed an employee engagement and appreciation initiative that is chock full of meaningful, weekly endeavors. Through this purpose-driven effort, supporting its inclusive, people-first culture, I am eager to continue to witness their additional successes in the coming years.
The Takeaway
Appreciation is never a waste of time, but organizations with unappreciative cultures waste away.