At some point during your career, you may be asked to lead an organization or a department which needs culture change to improve performance. Generating greater performance is the only reason we lead change. Culture explains how people think, talk, and act in an organization. It influences what is viewed as acceptable and unacceptable in terms of thinking, language, attitudes, and behavior. It is the most powerful influence in any organization.
The first step is the organizational assessment. Culture can be measured. Study both formal and informal metrics of culture. Interview employees, customers, and organizational partners. Be sure you truly understand the current culture or cultures, what factors and forces are creating and sustaining the culture, and how best to realign it with the new culture. Diagnose to treat.
Culture can be measured. In terms of metrics, there is a large and diverse set of indicators which enable leaders to diagnose organizational health. For example, leaders look at recruitment and retention rates, promotions (who gets promoted and why), data from onboarding and exit interviews, customer satisfaction surveys and types and frequency of client complaints, absenteeism, workers compensation claims, use of sick leave, regulatory issues and litigation, employee surveys, and evaluations of supervisors.
With the organizational assessment, leaders can utilize the tools of culture change to realign the company or agency to the new culture. This may involve the entire organization or specific subunits within it. The key is to protect and leverage positive elements of the culture and change those aspects of the organization which do not represent the new culture. The right culture must permeate the entire organization. Culture must be clear, consistent, comprehensive, and omnipresent.
As a general rule, 85-90% of employees will embrace the new culture once they see it produces the right results and as leaders work with them to succeed with it. There will be a small percentage of employees who refuse to change even when the new culture is clearly superior to the old one. They are deeply invested in the old culture. These employees will need to join an organization which matches and fits their attitudes and behavior.
The most potent tools of culture change are recruitment, hiring, training, supervision, evaluations, and promotions. Culture is about people. When you hire and promote the right people, you will get the correct culture.
Successful leaders employ all the tools affecting organizational behavior to ensure a positive and productive culture. These also include training, policies, procedures, technology, facilities, compensation and benefits, and budgeting. Formal and informal and social and economic incentives and disincentives are key.
It is important to build capacity and enable employees to succeed with a new culture. This means training, coaching, and supervision.
Culture must be continuously and effectively communicated throughout the organization. Whether it is a meeting, an email, the website and social media, a news release, an employee newsletter, the company intranet, and murals and posters, every single tool of employee and customer communication must be effectively leveraged. Culture should be recognized and celebrated at events. For example, a promotional ceremony is an excellent time to showcase culture leaving no doubt as to what creates career success. Every opportunity to convey the culture must be employed.
Cultures can be changed. It does require decisions, discipline, patience, and most importantly, leadership. When done successfully, it is a marvelous engine of organizational transformation capable of producing exceptional outcomes.
Sources: Abrashoff, 2002; Blanchard, 2011; Collins, 2001; Drucker, 2001; Grant, 2017; Kotter, 2012; Lencioni, 2012; Maxwell, 1998; Welch, 2005.
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