Organizational Culture: The Ultimate X Factor?

You know what? I used to think that orga­ni­za­tion­al cul­ture, pur­pose and val­ues were feel-good things — just fluff and a waste of time. Those were my ear­ly, naïve days. I now know Cul­ture is valu­able and a pow­er­ful, strate­gic tool.

Val­i­dat­ed by the research of Jim Collins and oth­er thought lead­ers, and my own expe­ri­ence, com­pa­nies with a strong, defined Cul­ture flow bet­ter and are more fun to work in. To build a great com­pa­ny, you need a great Cul­ture and aligned peo­ple with a strong focus on results.

When we work with com­pa­nies on their Cul­ture, we put three prin­ci­ples and then four dri­vers in place:

Three Prin­ci­ples

Define your Vision, Cul­ture and What Your Com­pa­ny is About

1. A clear Pur­pose — why you exist beyond profit.
2. A clear BHAG (Big Hairy Auda­cious Goal, a Jim Collins’ con­cept) — a mas­sive goal the orga­ni­za­tion ral­lies toward for the next 10 to 25 years.
3. Clear core Val­ues – actu­al behav­iours required in the com­pa­ny, not just a list what makes a nice per­son but those required to exist in the com­pa­ny. It’s a list from which you hire and fire. If peo­ple are con­sis­tent with the Val­ues, we want them on the team; if vio­lat­ed, they can’t stay in the com­pa­ny (even when they are share­hold­ers active­ly work­ing in the business).

Four Dri­vers

What You Need to Keep Your Com­pa­ny Strong

1. Hire peo­ple based on the orga­ni­za­tion­al cul­ture. Make sure they are good at the job, and a nat­ur­al fit work­ing well with­in the oper­at­ing sys­tem of the company.
2. Decide who to pro­mote, rep­ri­mand and/​or release from the com­pa­ny with cul­ture in mind. Those who don’t fit are giv­en the chance to fit in or are freed up and helped to find a more appro­pri­ate place to work.
3. Rein­force the Cul­ture three to five times a year to keep it alive. Oth­er­wise, your core Val­ues and Vision fade are for­got­ten and fade into the back­ground like wall­pa­per. These could be an annu­al award event, shared sto­ries that link back to your core Val­ues and Pur­pose and/​or incor­po­rat­ed into speech­es or pre­sen­ta­tions by the CEO or executives.
4. Build your Cul­ture lan­guage. In com­pa­nies with a strong Cul­ture, we fre­quent­ly hear the words that relate to core Pur­pose and Val­ue. For example:

[A] One com­pa­ny we work with has an account­abil­i­ty and action core val­ue called ​“I’m on it now.” Instead of say­ing, ​“I’ll do that” they say, ​“I’m on it now” and it’s become part of the Culture

[B] Anoth­er com­pa­ny says ​“ele­vate peo­ple” to describe how we help them to learn and grow

[C] Anoth­er says ​“down to earth” as a key phrase. How often the words are used and ref­er­enced in a con­ver­sa­tion is an acid test of the strength of the Culture.

The Chal­lenge

• Have you tru­ly clar­i­fied your Cul­ture in a tan­gi­ble and mean­ing­ful ways (Val­ues, Pur­pose and BHAG)?
• Are you using them to define and fil­ter the peo­ple who join, pro­mote and exit the company?

Do you need help to define your Vision and Cul­ture? Call us, we’d be hap­py to help.