Bacon and Egg Fry Up or Rice Porridge for Breakfast?

The bulk of my work deals with business culture. It's the core concept for most corporate work and the one that leaders seem to want the most advice about. Changes in the workplace, successfully bringing two or more businesses together, strategic planning, all of these activities are based in managing and enhancing business culture.

Why is that? Think about culture in general. A person who is successfully acclimated to a culture makes hundreds of correct decisions every day without even thinking about it. It starts from what they select for breakfast, what to wear for the day's activities, how they travel to work or school, what language they use to communicate with others to ultimately how they feel about themselves at the end of the day. How well would a business run if each employee was able to make hundreds of correct decisions each day without any other guidance than the prevailing business culture?

Of all of the work I do, this is the most rewarding kind of assignment. They are usually tremendous win-win situations for management, employees and the bottom line. One CEO told me that he now realizes that his job was to manage the culture which he credits with a doubling of his bottom line. Bingo! Here's the Coles Notes on business culture:

1. Executive management has to commit to the culture like Cortez burning his ships on arriving in the New World
2. The CEO or President needs to lead the culture and its development
   
3. Management, at all levels, needs to participate in the finalization of the culture, and be its first converts
   
4. Culture is the result of human interaction accept the time this will take
5. Human interaction is communication, communication cannot be overdone
6. Use culture as the basis of behaviourial management
7. Capture, assign accountability, track and evaluate your implementation steps
8. Be open and transparent

How do you know you need to be concerned about your business culture?

1. You've done all the strategic and operational planning, but you feel you're getting mediocre results
2. You don't feel that you're the first choice for the best employees and you're concerned about staff turnover
3. There is more in-fighting in your organization than taking on the competition
4. You ask a dozen employees, "What does success mean in our business?" and you get three or more different answers or no answer at all
5. You feel that you are doing everything and nothing happens without your personal attention
6. You just acquired a company and it is critical to retain the employees of the target firm
7. You have the sense that there is a lot of activity, even people burning out, but little result to show for it
8. Leaders are blaming followers

One of the most rewarding engagements we were involved in was a client recognized as one of the fifty best managed companies in Canada with a long and successful history. Surprisingly to us and management, when we asked, "What does your corporate vision mean to you?" to their executive and senior management groups we received four different answers. Four different visions of success divided the company into four camps, four sub-cultures, competing with each other for resources, recognition and status. Our task was to coach the CEO in leading an integration of the cultures and ultimately in developing a new expression of strategy. According to him, he has seen results in:

1. Departmental cooperation and capacity
2. Management decision-making
   
3. Management and employee morale
4. Employees stepping up to the plate and making contributions
5. Bottom-line revenue