Culture: the Glue for Business Building

Culture is the glue that holds an organization together. It's "what it feels like to work  around here." It's "how we do things in this company." Culture helps employees understand what to do in a variety of situations where specific policies and practices may not exist.

Without a strong culture, inconsistency's the norm. And inconsistency leads to inefficiencies, or worst case scenario -- chaos. Human beings generally like to know what to expect, what the norms are...even if some people like to buck them at every turn! Culture helps define the norms. And it's norms that make one company feel good to us and another, a place we can't wait to exit.

As leaders, we strive to build a positive culture for our businesses. And yet, in spite of our best efforts, a culture is something that evolves. When a manager tells a new employee that "we start work here at 8:00, not 8:05" but the new employee notices in the first couple of weeks on the job that employees show up anywhere from 7:30 to 8:30, what time do you think the new employee thinks is "starting" time? Yea, right. Anytime before about 8:30 is starting time. I say about because if someone had a good enough excuse, chances are even 8:45 or 9:00 would be ok. That's culture.

The story goes that Walt Disney was walking through Disney World before its completion with a small group of his department heads. Suddenly he stopped, pointed to a specific area and said, "I want 10,000 fireflies over there!"

The head of construction asked, "When?"

Not, "But where could I possibly find 10,000 fireflies?" Or, "Wouldn't 5,000 do?"

In the culture that Disney was building, only perfection and top quality was acceptable. Everyone knew that. No second guessing. No debating. It's a value that was at the core of the culture and everyone bought in to it. Otherwise, they didn't stick around. 

How do we build that kind of culture? So that when someone takes a job in our company, they are signing on for what goes with it -- the norms, rules of behavior, preferred way of doing things, and values.

• First of all, identify your own values as a leader. What's important to you?
• Discover what important to those who are key to your company's future.
• Define a mutual vision based on shared values.
• Articulate "what's important around here" in order to live out your values and vision.

Do you want employees to stick with you through the ups and downs of business cycles? Invite them to help you build a culture that they can embrace and count on, one that they describe to others with pride and passion.

Photo on flickr by ashotaway