This document compares growth and performance cultures and outlines some of their key differences. A growth culture focuses on helping employees develop their potential through continuous learning, experimentation, and feedback. Mistakes are seen as opportunities to learn. A performance culture emphasizes short-term goals, measuring winners and losers, and weeding out underperformers. The document argues that a blend of individual and organizational components like a safe work environment, learning, experimentation, and feedback can help create an ideal growth culture where teams and employees can thrive.

1. Growthvs Performance Culture
A comparative analysis based on research of HBR & Case Study
Md. Jamilur Rahman
jamilur@shantaholdings.com 1

2. Outline
● Culture
● Definition of Growth &
Performance
● Side by Side Comparison
● 7 Key Differences
● What Makes a Growth Culture
Different?
● Which One Is Ideal?
● Teams Thrive in a Growth Culture
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3. Culture
Organizational culture is defined as the underlying beliefs,
assumptions, values and ways of interacting that
contribute to the unique social and psychological
environment of an organization.
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Source: https://gothamculture.com/what-is-organizational-culture-definition/

4. Growth Culture
1. A growth culture is a set of beliefs and organizational mindset
that is focused on helping employees develop their limitless
potential.
2. Growth Leadership Network describes growth culture as one
where each interaction and every moment is seen as an
opportunity for presence, learning, contribution and excellence.
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/

5. Performance Culture
1. A performance based culture, is an organizational culture that focuses
on making sure people are as effective as possible in their roles. These
roles should support the overall goals of the organization.
2. Performance-obsessed culture focuses on high performance, business
goals, ratings and results. It is all about the outcome and less attention
to the process of how people get to perform.
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/

6. Side by Side Comparison
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/
Growth Culture Performance Culture
Skills and abilities can always be improved, and that the
greatest purpose of the work employees do is to
develop their skills and abilities.
Increase revenue as quickly as possible with minimum
investment. Focus on things like minimizing resource and
personnel costs, maximizing working hours, and doing
away with anything that does not contribute directly to
actual production.
Companies with a growth mindset are not afraid of
challenges and setbacks.
Focus on identifying winners and losers, with the winners
getting more focus and attention, while the losers are
left to fall by the wayside and are eventually weeded
out.
They understand that these are necessary for learning
and growth, and therefore encourage experimentation
and discovery and allow employees to stretch
themselves in order to grow.
The leaders in such organizations are usually more
autocratic than pragmatic, and the most important
values in such organizations are intellect, expertise,
knowledge, and being driven.

7. 7 Differences of Growth & Performance Cultures
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Source: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/7-differences-between-growth-vs-performance-company-tim-mikhelashvili//
Characters Performance Culture Growth Culture
Communication Command Dialogue
Decision Making Power Science
Presentation Goals Impression Content
Leading Change Reaction Perception
Target Audience Customer Person
Competition Type War Sports
Employee Metrics Results Intentions
Tim Mikhelashvili
Medical Science Director
Vifor Pharma, New York

8. Benefits of Growth Culture
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/
Safe Work Environment
Both leaders and employees are prepared to take responsibility for
their own errors and shortcomings

9. Benefits of Growth Culture
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/
Continuous Learning
continuous learning and development based curiosity, critical
thinking, inquiry, creativity, and transparency rather than self-
protection, certainty and judgment.

10. Benefits of Growth Culture
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/
Space for Experimentation
Experiments treated as an opportunity for individuals to grow
rather than be seen to fail if things do not work out

11. Benefits of Growth Culture
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Source: https://www.cleverism.com/create-a-growth-culture-not-a-performance-obsessed-one/
Continuous Feedback
Feedback based on mutual shared commitment to help each other
improve

12. Which One Is Ideal?
HBR identifies four components of growth culture and emphasizes that building a
growth culture requires a blend of individual and organizational components such as:
 An environment that feels safe, where leaders take responsibility for their shortcomings.
 Dedicated focus on continuous learning through inquiry, curiosity and transparency.
 Time-limited manageable experiments with new behaviors.
 Continuous feedback across the organization through shared commitment to helping each
other grow and get better.
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Source: https://www.tatcafrica.com/blog/growth-culture/

13. Teams Thrive in a Growth Culture
How do the world’s greatest managers find, focus and retain exceptional employees?
1. Having the opportunity to do my best work every day
2. Receiving praise or recognition for having done good work in the last 7 days
3. Feeling my supervisor/someone at work cares about me as a person
4. Believing that someone at work cares about my development
5. Talking to someone about my progress in last 6 months
6. Having opportunities to learn and grow in the last year
Cultivating a Growth Culture builds trust, encourages curiosity and enables innovation. It creates an environment in
which people communicate clearly, honestly and with respect. A Growth Culture yields engagement, retention and
high performance.
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Source: https://growthleadersnetwork.com/growth-culture/

14. "Growth Culture exists to breathe life
into leaders and to enable
them to create cultures where
everyone can thrive."
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