It’s been a week! I have had so many meetings that my head is still spinning trying to catch the themes. In order to process, I find it helpful to go back to the problems I am being asked to solve.
Here’s what on the burner:
A scale up leadership trying to get their team to understand what it REALLY means to lead in a high growth.
An ‘institution’ trying to revitalise a complacent and comfortable culture towards a customer centric and fast-paced one.
An agency on the receiving end of a decision their parent company made that thrown a big spanner into their plans.
Relatable?
At the core of all of these problems is change.
My clients all need to move from point A to point B, in varying degrees. In order to achieve this, they specifically need a culture change.
What got them in there, isn’t going to get them out.
Culture + Change. Two words, often thrown around in unison. Everyone needs it. Everyone seems to be doing it. But what does it actually mean?!
WTF is Culture.
I define culture as:
The behaviours that will deliver your strategy.
These behaviour are the ones that are reinforced, role modelled and recognised by leadership.
They are usually NOT what’s written on your walls.
A culture needs to be intentional, and should be seen as a business imperative. It’s not a pillar in the HR team’s work flow, It’s driven by leadership. You can hire all the smartest brains in the world to come up with well researched and thorough strategic plans, but if you don’t change the behaviours in your org, you’re barely get over the starting line.
As I shared in last week’s post, it’s not going to change by hiring one or two new people. No matter how good they are.
If you put a great engine in an old car, the car won’t perform to the engine’s full potential.
Culture is something reinforced at all times, whenever possible.
And in times of change, require significant shifts in leadership behaviours.
Culture signals.
If you’re unsure of your company’s culture here are some questions to help assess:
How are budgets allocated?
Go to your boss for everything? Disempowered teams.
What’s the hiring process?
More than 4 interviews? Lack of trust or unclear on what’s needed.
What’s your meeting etiquette?
Folks on laptops will always lead to misalignment.
Too many initiatives?
You’re unable to prioritise, likely also bad at decision making.
Do Sr leaders receive regular 1:1s?
Lack of accountability.
Delay letting people go who are clearly a bad fit?
People appeasing, putting people’s needs before the business.
How to change it?
Well for starters you need to know what culture you need before you start to change it. It has to be super clear amongst everyone in leadership + people teams on what the ideal future state is. If unclear, each leader will lead their teams based on their interpretation of the words being used to describe culture.
Take the time to work together to define and align on “what it is” and “what it is not”, and then what can we put in place to reinforce it.
Then BEFORE you launch, look in the mirror and ask yourself.
Are you role modelling the behaviours you want to see in your team:
Accountability: Are you transparent with your direct reports on their performance?
Pace: Are you able to stick to plans without adding new ideas that derails focus?
Growth: Are you making uncomfortable trade offs that will upset people?
Alignment: Are you running meetings that promote active listening and focus on an outcome?
Decision Making: Do you make it clear who the decision maker is?
Putting the CULT in culture.
It amazes me how many people are shocked when I point out the cult in culture, but once you see it, you can’t unsee it. So let’s lean into it, cause it can be done right.
Here are some companies that really understood (maybe too well) the assignment when it came to CULTure*-
Amazon. So strong, anyone that has worked with an ‘Amazonian’ will know what I mean.
Lululemon. I’ve been watching this cult from the sidelines. It’s got an eerie dark side.
Netflix. Although I hear from inside that it’s far from perfect, they did rewrite their own rules.
*By no means does this mean they have nailed it, and actually in some cases failed to pass the inclusion test.
Once you are clear on the culture your business needs to deliver your strategy, get prescriptive and ritualistic in how you deliver it.
Be unapologetic in what that means.
Be prepared that folks won’t want to change, care or come with you.
At any given point your org is made up of 3 categories of folks:
Engaged / Ambassadors
Neutrals
Disengaged/Negatrons
Ambassadors should be the first to be engaged and empower them to shape the rituals and process that will shape the culture. Throw in some neutrals that are almost at ambassador stage.
Have a real assessment on the negatrons. Accept that it will be unlikely that they will cross over, so start planning the exits.
Unmanaged neutrals can quickly swing your organization to majority disengaged, so do better at highlighting the wins, reinforce the ideal future state that will make the change worth it, and and work across your leads to build pride and excitement.
Confidence in the future state comes from the leaders, how your get their comes from your people. Step back and empower.
Get started.
It’s hard to change culture, and it’s much easier to stay the same.
To help map out where you are vs where you ought to be I use my own adaptation of the culture map + the leadership wheel.
Use an iterative mindset when looking at behaviour change. Change one thing at a time (suggest start with how you run your meetings). Make it easy to win. Once it sticks, move on to the next.
Your culture change will happen over time.
To close out, here are some very wise words from Mr. 305 himself.
I agree with Pitbull, you can’t microwave your culture change.
You got this.
G