On Building a Great Culture
Context
On finding the HBR’s collection of articles of culture in a bookshop sale block, it was almost predetermined I would buy it given my interest spiking in culture’s impact post the takeover of Worldpay.
I’ve left it quite late in the reading process to write about this so a lot of it may be mis-remembered!
Tempered Radicals
Starting with the final article, which fortunately won’t give away the end of the story, is to focus on how people can make significant impacts to culture through small and seemingly mundane changes, rather than explosive and significant changes. The methods described were:
| Method | Use |
|---|---|
| Self Expression | Using small cases of self expression to go against the status quo, and get people talking about that, which can lead to futher change. |
| Verbal Juijitsu | Pivoting damaging conversations in a way which introduces the speakers to re-think how they are acting without causing confrontation |
| Variable-term opportunism | Recongnising opportunities to confront the status quo more head on without causing conflict. |
| Alliance Building | Building a network of peers within groups of ‘opposition’ to help propogate your message - such as finding white males who are understanding of the struggles women and minorities face in workplaces to help disseminate that message to others who may not. |
These methods were generally things which people might think they do anyway, but implementing them with thought behind their impact will help bring more intended changes. They were actions which would not always be directly visible to people higher in the organisation (though there is a sliding scale of their visibility through the list), and are intended to be minimally disruptive to work being done, and tend around the idea that people may want change but still like the work they are doing or where they are working.
Self expression to me is an example of act how you want others to act around you, or feel around you. The example used is a female employee wearing feminine garments in a male culture (in the 80s), to express the fact she is a woman in that environment without being forward, which encouraged other women in the work environment to be comfortable with themselves at work. This probably seems underwhelming in the current era of womens rights, and I think the message here is that whilst some people may not want to ‘rock the boat’ they can begin to sway it with minor changes to the existing culture.
Defining Culture
Back to the first article, this described a selection of cultural styles which generally define organisations.
- Purpose
- Learning
- Results
- Enjoyment
- Caring
- Order
- Safety
- Authority
The types above are quite static within organisations, and will generally have two or three as their core. Changing these quickly is difficult, and requires gradual change which generally needs top level employees to be on board with the message and culture being distributed - if they are not it can be detrimental to the change (though having opposition is not always a bad thing as long as the dialogue is constructive).