![Keys to [informal] success
1. Leadership by example
2. The right people, the right buy-in
3. Clear values and boundaries
4. Individual as flexible (empowering) as
organisation allows
5. Foster common values -> to build
teams, collaborate and socialise effectively
6. Recognition of fluid nature of company culture –
dependent upon individuals – experimentation
and change a necessary part of cc](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/hardtomeasurepresentationkt-jrbfinal-130606060637-phpapp02/85/Hard-to-measure-Company-Culture-Report-Summary-Findings-10-320.jpg)
![Keys to [formal] success
1. People – what you do to them, what you do with
them
2. Leadership (by example)
3. Make it count: have a process
4. Ambassadors – recognise contributions in this
area
5. Contracts & controls
6. Enterprise & Staff Performance Management –
aligned
7. Investment
8. Stories- in bigger organisations can bring
communications to life
Lots of commonality between formal
and informal success factors...](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/hardtomeasurepresentationkt-jrbfinal-130606060637-phpapp02/85/Hard-to-measure-Company-Culture-Report-Summary-Findings-11-320.jpg)
Uploaded byJames Bridgman
Hard to measure: Company Culture Report Summary Findings
The document explores the impacts of company culture on innovation, collaboration, and communication, highlighting its role as a facilitator of teamwork and brand values. It discusses both formal and informal factors that influence culture, emphasizing the importance of leadership, effective onboarding, and recognition of contributions. Key challenges include managing growth and aligning advertised versus lived brand values, while successful strategies involve fostering shared values and flexible individuals within the organization.
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Hard to measure: Company Culture Report Summary Findings
- 2. Introduction Three keyimpacts we particularly wanted to examine: Innovation Collaboration Communication Many important consequences of company culture: as enabler of effective teamwork as communicator of brand values as language of customer service as barrier to change, or driver of it
- 4.
- 5. Overview of conclusions The virtuous cycle of management and leadership Success depends mostly on the way that people are selected, hired, on-boarded, and empowered. “Success happens when people understand the values and vision of the business to the point of feeling strongly about them, defending them and fighting for them, even when the top leader goes.”
- 6. Informal factors Cultureis a social construct, so informal elements just as critical as formal ones Personal relationships /social interaction Communication style, language used Environment and dress Cultural boundaries Leadership style (lead by example)
- 7. Formal factors CommunicationPlanning Formal Feedback on Culture Performance Action Generation Mechanism (most challenging) On-boarding and Mentoring Processes Values, Vision, Purpose, Mission Statement
- 9. Challenges Cost M& As Brand: advertised vs. lived Growth / Size Changing a culture Empowerment
- 10. Keys to [informal]success 1. Leadership by example 2. The right people, the right buy-in 3. Clear values and boundaries 4. Individual as flexible (empowering) as organisation allows 5. Foster common values -> to build teams, collaborate and socialise effectively 6. Recognition of fluid nature of company culture – dependent upon individuals – experimentation and change a necessary part of cc
- 11. Keys to [formal]success 1. People – what you do to them, what you do with them 2. Leadership (by example) 3. Make it count: have a process 4. Ambassadors – recognise contributions in this area 5. Contracts & controls 6. Enterprise & Staff Performance Management – aligned 7. Investment 8. Stories- in bigger organisations can bring communications to life Lots of commonality between formal and informal success factors...
- 12. Thanks for coming Surinder’s talk 19th June Ideas for the autumn events Staff and Customer Engagement Collaboration Innovation – what sort? Networking...
Editor's Notes
- #3 Company Culture, in many ways, is the most 'hard to measure' area of business that we have covered so far. With critical psychological, social and relationship dynamics, culture is something that is much talked about when it is distinctive and unique, often ignored when a more prosaic part of business life. Yet culture has profound impact on team and leadership effectiveness, employee retention and motivation, customer service, 'brand alignment', collaboration and ability to innovate. So how can we understand which issues are the most important to address for an effective company culture? How can we utilise ways to measure and monitor its impact on performance (if at all possible)? Finally, are there ways of understanding culture that can be integrated into a business strategy that is genuinely useful?With the rapid pace of change in the business world, increasing internationalisation, and the rise of the 'nerdocracy' businesses based on a model of rapid, 'lean' and disruptive development (usually web based), how can you use your company culture to compete?For this roundtable, we aimed to examine these issues, look at individual examples of how different companies deal with culture, and discuss practical measures to improve business effectiveness through managing culture within an organisation.
- #5 Used in sociology and academic circles to analyse businesses and groupsProblem of identifying what type you should be for maximum successCompeting Values Framework [1983->]A way of understanding culture via different models (and combinations) of business typesClanAdhocracyHierarchyMarketShows competing valuesMost useful as a model for discussionAs organisations look to move towards beingmore in one direction, must contract in opositivequadrant
- #6 In order to develop, maintain or protect an organisation’s culture, one cannot rely on the (soulless) structure of management processes alone; it takes true leaders, those who ‘live’ the values of the organisation, to carry the culture through. But then again, it takes sounds management processes to source and attract these leaders. This brought us to the conclusion that there is a virtuous cycle of leadership and management, which businesses need to break into in order to be successful.By ‘leaders’, here, we do not mean simply ‘senior or executive managers’. When it comes to culture, the leaders are those, throughout the business, whose behaviour and personality fits in tightly with the ethos of the organisation – it is a lot about the way that they do their job every day.So indeed, culture, and the ability of businesses to nurture their culture, has a lot (everything, perhaps) to do with the people in the business. When we talked about ways to protect and develop a culture, a large majority of the ideas around the table had to do with people. To make the culture (and its benefits) happen, you need:to recruit of ‘the right people’an appropriate leadership styleleaders who are close to staff, and understand what drives them and why they like working thereleaders who are close to customersand know what creates the right impression for themleaders who are highly visible (because leadership is mostly done by example and modelling behaviour)transparency in internal communicationsuppliers who also fit in with the cultureIn short: businesses need the right people.
- #7 The interplay of informal and social factors in workplaces have a major impact on many aspects of business and individual performance, yet get little ‘formal’ attention in business strategy. The challenge – even when companies prioritise these elements – is to have a mechanism to judge effectiveness of what is being done and a process to look at alternatives and routes to improvement.For example a budget for ‘social’ events is great, but how is it best spent, and by whom? A general budget for office wide outings, drinks and perks is great, but some (extroverts) would get more benefit than others. Individual budgets might not contribute to the company or team sufficiently, team budgets might factionalise the workforce. Often this will depend on the overriding culture of the specific business, and particularly should be tied into the goals and brand values. Google lets employees devote 10% of their time to personal ‘hobby’ projects to motivate them and generate innovation. Jo mentioned specific attention to individuals – given perks like testing latest tech – where possible.Three approaches to tackling difficulties in creating better informal culture:experimentation: try different approaches in different teams and compare the results democracy: let the group decide (within parameters) what social rewards/events would benefit the company and help foster the right valuesprovide personal support via professional expertise – offer counselling, in-house and external team buildingcareful recruitment & assessment to keep everyone ‘on track’ and avoid problemsThe other key element we found was that to lead by example not by dictat made a big difference to effectiveness of leadership styles – where informal factors come into play, individual behaviour speaks louder than words (particularly these days when there are so many comms to choose from and it’s therefore easy for leadership to distance themselves)In addition, finding out what the company can and can’t do in it’s structure will help set boundaries and simplify options – an emergency fire service can’t debate endlessly over who is going into the building first! A simple list of “for our business to work, we must do X, and must not do Y” will help all the issues outlined, but particularly the more intransigent ones like cultural and personal relationships.
- #8 Management techniques, unlike leadership styles and more intangible drivers of culture, have a role in creating a foundation for leadership to ‘happen’ and do its job. In a way, these approaches are enablers. Here are the five most powerful of these management enablers, the ‘proven’ techniques that have helped their businesses shape and nurture a culture of success.5 – Clearly worded values and visionYou might think that going through the exercise of wording the values, mission statement , vision or purpose of a business is a pointless exercise, designed to benefit management consultancies, and soon forgotten by all who should remember them. In a way, you might well be right! However, the most powerful and genuine (i.e. reflecting the true culture of an organisation) values are often easily recognisable in the very way that they are worded. Often they will be memorable, remembered and more easily ‘lived’ because they are not described in the same way as in most companies.Remember as well that the most talented individuals, and those who will fit their culture, probably prepare for their first interview with you by looking for your values, purpose and mission on your web site. They do for two reasons: to check that these values are aligned with theirs, and to impress the person who is interviewing them by demonstrating behaviours and knowledge that ‘fit the bill’. Very little would come out of such an exercise if the values are commonplace, unclear or worse: non-existent. What is your business her to do? Make money? Save lives? That matters.4 – Solid on-boarding and mentoring processes for newcomersThis is where culture and employee engagement become intertwined (and we found this to be a fact at many point in the conversation). A newcomer in any business will usually pick up on the culture and learn its untold rules relatively fast. But what if you make a point, right from the start, of engaging them by saying what the culture is all about, and how exactly it is being ‘practised’ in the business? Take the example of Marks & Spencer’s ‘Plan A’ sustainability values – these lead to a series of simple routines affecting various parts of daily work life within the shops and offices there: explaining why paper towels and bio cups have been chosen over hand dryers and ceramic mugs, or ‘shwopping’ clothes recycling points to engage everyone into ongoing customer campaigns.3 – Action generationThis was cited as the most challenging of the high-impact management processes to implement. It is about ensuring that feedback and data (from employee/staff surveys, business intelligence tools and reporting solutions) is always acted upon. Making sure that the ‘suggestion box’ is regularly checked for new ideas, that ideas are prioritised and reviewed by empowered decision makers, and that results are being publicised within the organisation to demonstrate a real commitment to listening to staff and encouraging positive change and behaviours.This demands processes to collect, sort and follow-up on feedback, as well a people whose role it is to own and lead this process (accountability and responsibility).2 – Formal feedback process on cultureAn effective way to nurture a culture and to engage the people who live it is to collect their feedback on how well the values and mission of the organisation are being demonstrated. You ask your people: here are our values; here what we stand for; how are we doing on that? There are three benefits in doing so:If your process allows for verbatim feedback as well as ratings, it may help you to ‘score’ your culture-related efforts and see how the business performs in that fieldAsking people to feedback on how well cultural values are demonstrated reiterates (reminds them of) these valuesVerbatim feedback is crucially important in capturing ‘the little things’.Recently one of us attended a meeting with a client where staff satisfaction surveys were being reviewed. She could not at first believe how long it took to discuss one piece of comment from one employee about the choice of songs on the main floor’s playlist; yet it came out that music (and what music was being played) was a key elements of what a large number of employees considered part of the relaxed, trendy culture of the place, which was at odds with some of the new and more structured management processes that the business was bringing in to improve the quality of customer service. This one ‘little thing’ brought to life something that senior management had ‘felt’ so far but had not quite been able to comprehend. “Is the playlist really that important? Yes, it is!”.1 – Internal communications planningThis is the single most effective structured process you can use to develop and maintain a culture. Planning involves four essential ingredients:A clear understanding of goals (what culture do we want? what do we stand for?)A set of actions, organised on to a timeline, to reach that goalA management structure: people whose role it is to manage internal comms and deliver the planResources, financial or notGiving internal comms these resources to make them into a structured process that is recognised and endorsed by the leadership team as a rightful investment demonstrates that culture is at the top of the agenda.
- #10 Karen to develop report content on this
- #11 How do you measure effectiveness?- Comparative groups?
- #12 Karen to develop report content on this.
- #13 Brand/values buy-in