#278: The 5 P’s we need for our business culture
Your company’s purpose strengthens resilience and creates value, if it is genuine
No matter how well-designed your strategic plan is, it will fall flat unless your team shares the appropriate culture. At the end of the day, the people who implement the plan matter. That is why Peter Drucker said, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”
Culture = Purpose
It’s relatively easy to develop a mission statement or kick off a purpose initiative. Most organizations have sought to define their purpose at some point or other, and many think it important to ensure that the company’s purpose is embedded in everything it does. But leaders also know that’s not easy. Perhaps that’s why companies announce purpose changes so often. About 70 percent of them fail to reach their stated goals, in large measure because they fail to change—and sometimes fail to even think of changing—the mindsets and behaviors of employees.
Purpose should be systemic and rational, but also emotional; it should resonate with members of your organization and inform their decision making.
Five major elements are critical:
Portfolio strategy and products: the products and services your organization provides, and the “where to play” and “how to play” choices you make to best serve your customers
People and culture: the talent—and the talent management—your firm deploys
Processes and systems: the operational processes you adapt to meet purpose-related targets; the ways you ensure that behavior up and down your value chain is in line with your purpose
Performance metrics: the target metrics and incentives you use to measure what you wish to achieve, how your firm is progressing, and the way you create and distribute incentives to make your organization’s purpose tangible
Positions and engagement: how you align your external positions and affiliations to be consistent with, and consistently deliver on, the purpose your company has defined
When you craft any strategic initiative, these 5 P’s must be taken into consideration. Your team will only take your purpose seriously if you consistently connect the dots. Whether you are introducing a new product, or a new distribution strategy, aligning it with your purpose and internal culture is a must.
6 signs your culture is in danger
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Shan Foster, co-founder and CEO of Fostering Healthy Solutions, works with leaders across the U.S. on how to create a culture that everyone can trust, one that has shared values of diversity, equality, and strong ethics.
Here are six signs that leaders need to reset their corporate culture.
1. Leaders are treated better than staff
It’s important to celebrate the success of a company’s best leaders. But a problem arises when leaders are treated better than staff.
“When leadership has a leash that’s too long and don’t get reprimanded for anything, it creates an allure that they’re untouchable,” Foster says.
This creates a power imbalance that can often lead to workplace abuses. If employees have issues, they will slip through the cracks.
If that leader acts against company values, for example, employees aren’t likely to report it to the company. Instead, they sit in silence and feel like nothing can be done.
To fix this, Foster says that organizations must embrace accountability for everyone. This can be as simple as ensuring that every employee — no matter their tenure or rank — gets a performance review.
“Not only should leadership evaluate their subordinates, but they should get feedback from employees on how they are being managed,” Foster says. “Anything that’s egregious can be reported.”
2. Managers lack training
Experience does not equate to ability, Foster says. When organizations assume that the best managers are those with the most experience, he said that there’s far too much room for error.
“You want to make sure that everybody is trained on organizational policies,” Foster says. “A lot of leaders, unfortunately, feel that this seems like a waste of time, so they don’t do it.”
But when leaders go untrained, Foster said, they make a lot of unnecessary mistakes. They rely too much on HR for staff issues, they don’t take performance reviews seriously, and they aren’t intentional about the growth of their workforce.
The solution, Foster says, is to train everyone consistently. This means ensuring that managers and staff have the budget for training and professional development. Foster also suggests evaluating managers on their own training.
3. A lack of reporting
Without reporting, Foster says that leaders have a false sense of confidence that they have a good corporate culture. But employees often don’t report without leadership reaching out.
“You want to ensure that you’re staying connected to people,” Foster says. “Have check-ins, do surveys, and have a multitude of ways to ensure that you aren’t just guessing at how people are experiencing the workplace.”
When there’s no reporting, Foster said that employees likely don’t feel safe. In weak cultures, people fear that reporting may lead to retaliation. Ultimately, they fear losing their job.
But when reporting is encouraged by leadership, people feel safer and they work harder, Foster said. “It has a direct correlation to productivity,” Foster says. “It also breeds engagement.”
4. Leaders say ‘Diverse candidates aren’t applying’
When leaders tell Foster that diverse candidates aren’t applying, he knows that their thinking is limited.
“Diversity is not just race and gender,” Foster says. “It’s also those with disabilities, those who speak different languages, those who have different perspectives, and those who were born in other countries. If you have a hard time getting diverse candidates to apply for your position, you have to ask, ‘Why?’”
Finding new talent means building new relationships and widening the scope of the talent search. Often, companies are searching too narrowly, only using engines like LinkedIn and Indeed. Foster said that there needs to be more than just one or two places to search for new talent.
5. There’s no strategic plan or budget
If there’s no money being put into the company’s cultural and diversity initiatives, there’s no mission, according to Foster.
“When members of your workforce come up with great ideas for employee engagement or professional development, and leadership tells them that there’s no budget, that means that people aren’t important,” Foster says.
When companies plan and budget for culture and diversity activities, Foster says that companies see better profitability and more engaged workforces. Work can become a place where employees feel challenged and engaged, rather than a place they dread.
6. Managers don’t live diverse personal lives
If leaders encourage a culture of diversity but don’t have a diverse personal life, their corporate culture won’t be sustainable, according to Foster.
“You can learn some of these cultural competencies through your natural friendships and relationships, by getting outside of your norm and being exposed to different people,” Foster says.
Foster hears feedback from leaders across the country that they don’t have exposure to diverse people. But he believes that leaders, like anyone else, must fight to prevent their lives from becoming echo chambers.
“What it boils down to is a heart issue,” Foster says. “We don’t spend enough time together, so we’re constantly making the same mistakes. If we live more diverse lives outside of work, a lot of these cultural workplace issues would be easier.”
We talk a lot about building your company culture in these articles. Can you define yours? If you had to put it into a five to seven word sentence, what would it be? Would it make you and your team get out of bed in the morning?
You are not going to create and implement a purpose or culture overnight. It’s hard work today, but I assure you that it will lead to a better tomorrow! Connect with us at the Kole Performance Group, and we can guide you along this path!