Company Culture and Default Behaviors Under High Uncertainty

Randy Hale • Jun 26, 2020

Company Culture and Default Behaviors Under High Uncertainty - Webinar Summary

“If you always do what you’ve always done then you will always get what you always got.” - Henry Ford

What is Culture?

Company Culture has a way of perpetuating the status quo. The behaviors that are accepted and rewarded typically run deep and are cemented in place by enduring beliefs and values.

Culture is often described as the behaviors within an organization. While this is true, those behaviors are actually a reflection of the VALUES AND BELIEFS within an organization.

Cultural Bias

Most organizations have a cultural bias. Some rather strongly so. Most organizations would benefit from an intentional reflection on their culture and a collaborative series of conversations about what shifts in culture would be beneficial in the journey to becoming a more effective organization that delivers improved business results.

How can we see our culture?

Culture can be a rather conceptual and elusive thing to fully grasp. Whether it be through running workshops throughout the organization to capture current and desired behaviors or using tools like the Culture Map, as described in last week’s webinar by Mike Leber, it is very beneficial to drive these conversations and engage people in the process.

At Agile Leadership Journey, our tool of choice utilizes the Competing Values Framework which has been used by over 12,000 organizations to provide insights on Organizational Values as a way of making culture visible.

By running this simple diagnostic, an organization can visualize the collective views across the organization on both the current and desired future balance of values across the four dimensions of the framework:

Collaborate: “Do things together”
Create: “Do things first”
Compete: “Do things fast”
Control: “Do things right”

How does visualizing our culture help?

Having a visual representation of culture helps drive a more effective series of conversations. By seeing where you are and where you want to go, it becomes possible to discuss approaches for how to get to the new desired state.

It is very powerful in reviewing the survey results to see varying perspectives and where there might be differences in how the current and desired states are viewed by executive leader, middle manager and team member segments - or by different locations / geographies - or by different departments / functions.

Seeing the various perspectives is very powerful. The survey results do not provide answers, but rather they provide much more powerful questions that the people within the organization must consider and answer themselves to shape the path towards a more balanced culture that delivers improved business results and improved employee experience!