Corporate Culture is a funny thing. It is difficult to describe, yet it’s
importance is undeniable. Many believe
that a culture is defined from the top and for the most part I do not
disagree. When the culture is set from
the top it has the most chance of surviving.
However, unlike a lot of things in business, a culture cannot be defined
by decree. A CEO cannot just say what
the culture of her organization will be, instead she and everyone under her
must reinforce the culture through their actions. For this reason, cultures usually develop
over time. This also means, that a
culture can change but that the process often requires a concerted effort and
will take significant time. This is why
it is extremely important for all levels of management to enforce and reinforce
the culture that you want within the organization.
One question I hear a lot is “can a culture be defined from
the bottom up?”. I believe it can, but
only to the point that the leadership allows it to and supports it. Culture often needs to be enforced when
different things influence our behaviors.
Let’s take a look at an example.
Many companies want to implement a “Fail Fast” culture. In a fail fast culture, the goal is rapid
learning, experimentation, and avoiding analysis paralysis. Companies that want to adopt an fail fast
culture want these benefits in order to innovate and hopefully grow a solution
that meets a need in a creative new way.
Failing in this case is seen as simply part of the journey, so better to
get through it and learn the lessons as quickly as possible so that they can
move on the successes. But there is more
to failure than just the learning and exploration. Failure has a lot of negatives associated
with it too. For one, failure can be
extremely expensive. I often see these
negatives creep into the equation of culture because they can influence people’s
behavior away from the culture. This is
why leadership is required to build a successful culture. Leaders need to combat the negative influences
to the culture they are trying to build.
This is one of the most important responsibilities of leadership in
modern corporations.
When only some leaders are supporting the culture and upper
management doesn’t correct the situation, micro-cultures can form. Micro-cultures within an organization form
when there is an insulated group that can define and enforce their own culture
with minimal outside influences. This is
why, it is very difficult to create a successful culture without the very top
of the organization being on-board. Each layer of management needs to be
supported by the layer above. These
micro-cultures can have devastating effects on the overall morale of the work force. Micro-cultures can be a breeding ground of
resentment.
Culture in all of its forms, macro and micro, is defined through the actions of the people that belong to it. Culture cannot be declared and only survives by keeping the outside or negative influences at bay. Leaders at all levels must help reinforce a culture or it will not take root. The protection and cultivation of the "right" behaviors and the correction and redirection of "bad" behaviors falls squarely on the shoulders of management. So while culture can be started from the bottom, without the support of management it has almost no chance to survive.
