Creating the right Culture

[Tony Brook]

Hi,
I've been involved in training proffesionals on the softer skills for some time now and it occurs to me that a vital ingredient to successfull outcomes (regardless of anything I do - although I believe that I provide a great service of course lol) is the culture of an organisation.
That could be the present cultural (I tend to describe an effective culture as one which is both productive and nuturing) Or indeed the overall goal of a company/organisation to create a culture which matches their values.
- not a new idea of course, however unless the significance of this. and indeed the details (i.e. how do the values and cultural ideals translate into the everyday interactions of employees, suppliers and customers) are clearly understood and prioritised - these initiative tend to be less successful than they otherwise would be.
So..
How can we ensure that a company undertaking cultural change understands the full commitment and responsibility of what it is undertaking?
How can we affect the culture of our own communities?
How can someone in an environment which is blaming and judging affect their own area or team successfully?
Any other thoughts on culture change?

Look forward to hearing thoughts and developing this discussion - have a great day - Tony

[practicaleq]

Some quick thoughts:

1. Change has to start from, or at least include, the top or people won't take it seriously

2. It has to be stuck at - nothing makes a person cynical like having seen loads of change initiatives which aren't followed through, consultations which are ignored, and promises that are broken

3. The best people to decide how values translate into everyday interactions are the people doing those interactions, and their immediate line managers or supervisors. Anyone higher is too far removed. The implication is that everyone needs to be involved in culture change.

4. Targets, behaviours that are rewarded, and the examples that are set by senior management have to be in line with the desired values and cultural ideals. Where there is a discrepancy between professed values and actual behaviour, people will believe the behaviour.

[Tony Brook]

Hi Andy,
I agree buy in from top down is essential and involving everyone. Follow through also vital.
In an organisation how does a desire to create a new culture stay at the top of agenda for long enough to affect lasting change.
In my experience the only organisations I've had experience of who have successfully managed to implement culture change (which of course involves attitude change too) are ones who have:-
A - Been taken over by an organisation with a developed set of values, attitudes, way of working together.
B - Organisations which have been on the verge of going bust and had tried everything else
note - I've run into more smaller companies with successfull 'cultures' than larger ones - there seems to be an extra difficulty in organisations above 150 people, in that the personal touch is lost (malcombe gladwell offers a good explanation in his book 'the tipping point' as to why this is)

In the others I've experienced its been more of a 'lip service to HR softies' excercise - and as soon as another issue crops up (which they inevitably do) its forgotten about.
Can we genuinely sell the concept and importance to people at the top, do you think or are they already bought into the principle before they engage external services?



Whats needed is a determined high priority effort - planned down to details as any good project is -

[Linkedin-Entrepreneurs.com Victory Darwin]

good points. Thinking of ING bank, was reading about them in business 2.0 magazine.
i think this is it
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2004/10/...
here's a funny vid
http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2007/biz2/0701/gallery.101dumbest_cu...

There is the culture you create thru having a cafe and gym for employees in your building.
and how you train your customer service staff to handle complaints.

you can give all the staff the new list of rules or whitepaper on culture shift, but it's their daily experience with the company and customers that determines their behaviour.

maybe you're talking about something else, but that's the thoughts it inspires in me! V.

[Tony Brook]

Hi there,
You're exactly on the money there - that is what I meant.
Do you have a convincing argument for a CEO that buys them into the concept and ensures that they go 100% after this goal believing it to be the most improtant thing they do?
Have you run into any good processes for culture change?
Obviously, training, education, workshops etc - but how is it intriduced to the workforce, are role models used etc?
One of the things I think is a factor is that there is a paradox in the traditional approach which I fear some people use i.e.
'You people must change your attitudes and behaviours we are going to police this and god help anyone who doesn't start to share responsibility, respect different peoples values etc'
Its perhaps as frought with difficulty as something like forcing people into a democracy against their will.
Any further thoughts?

[Tony Brook]

PS - the vid was funny - couldn't find the sory about ings bank though - unless it was the one about recycling paper and inadvertantly giving out peoples bank details. was that the one you meant?

[Rajan G. Ramchandani]

Hi Tony,

Companies are made up of individuals. Hence to improve corporate culture, in my humble opinion, we must integrate our thought, word and deed at an individual level which will eventually reflect at the collective corporate level. Hope this makes sense Tony, and gets you started on an enjoyable journey. Wish you all the best. Rajan Ramchandani

[Tony Brook]

Hi Rajan,
Thanks for yur reply
I totally agree and in order to influence individuals successfully some sort of process has to be followed. I reconise that individuals have to;
1 Have a personal motivation to create such a culture and to make changes to their own behaviors and attitudes.
2 have some support/quality assurance process which ensures consistency and progress.

Have you come accross a methodology which works?
What are your thoughts on my other question - i.e. can a company be influenced to undertake a project or do they have to buy in to concepts already, if they can be influenced or sold on the idea - what do you think are the key elements of the sales process?
Your further thoughts welcome.

[Tony Brook]

Further to the thoughts on the attitudes and behaviours of individuals - I suspect the creation of teams within an organisation is a key success factor.
i.e. not just teams in name but real teams, which perform as teams and are appraised as teams - with individuals being appraised within the teams.
Any thoughts?
Michael West (Sheffield Business School) has some fascinating research on teams in the NHS.
He categorised people as either
A thought they were in a team but weren't (according to certain criteria to establish genuine team working)
B Worked outside of a team
C Thought they were in a team and were.
The happiest and least strssed were groups C,B,A in that order
Another alarming stat was that if you went into hospital with a hip fracture, your chances of surviving went down significantly if you were treated by people in group A - scary stuff eh?

[Keith A Ayres]

Hi Tony

Before we can talk about changing a culture, surely we need to establish why the current culture is not right. We also need to establish how that culture developed and why it developed in the 'wrong' way.

When we do this we need to go back to basics. What is the busines, why was it formed and what is it looking to achieve. We need to look at The Business Plan and how that is operating in practice.

Most Consultants bring their views to the table and this is a mistaken methodology as it is the client business that is important and not the consultants views. To bring the consultants views into the formula you are at risk of only looking at symptoms instead of establishing the truth and the route causes.

I offer no answers simply questions. But before anyone gives an answer the facts and the current position must be established. From this point we can start to look at objectives. Only then can we consider solutions or route maps.

[Daisy Varun]

A very interesting thread.. I am still looking for the answers to the initial questions. Also, as Tony says -

individuals have to;
1 Have a personal motivation to create such a culture and to make changes to their own behaviors and attitudes.

I want to know if there is a way to touch upon every individual in an org. and get a commitment from each one towards this end. And what's a good way of doing this?

[Tony Brook]

Thanks for your comment Daisy.
I'm wondering about the same thing - As I've mentioned in reply to another comment - I've seen an IBM project managment methodology used to establish and rollout business standard processes - I'm wondering if a similar approach can be used for personal interactions, attitudes and so forth - even it it can it would be very expensive and time consuming - A company would have to be extremely commited.

[Daisy Varun]

If you could share the IBM PM methodology, maybe I'll get a cue to build upon a process map that can be used for personal/attitudinal trainings. Not that I have done it before... but it definitely makes sense to try.
I cannot agree more with you when you say that the actual issues are swept under the carpet. Most of the learning solutions and delivery addresses the 'symptoms' only. And yes, an organization needs to be 'extremely' commited to bring about and manage the change/learning at the level that we are discussing here. Unfortunately, there aren't many who would want to or can afford to work at that level.