Can you regain your soul after your company has grown?

That's the question every organization with a unique culture faces as they scale. Whole Foods and Starbucks are recent examples of companies that lost (or are losing) their distinctive cultures. Zappos, by many accounts, has lost the quirky culture that made it a darling with customers and team members after its purchase by Amazon.

Southwest Airlines has done a better job than most companies at keeping its culture alive, but even they have seen cracks in their performance and collaborative spirit.

It even happens to communities. The slogan "Keep Austin Weird" described the desire for the city to maintain its distinctive vibe and support of local businesses. Many locals now see the slogan as a “cry for help ” as the city struggles with growth, accessibility, and the dilution of unique businesses and venues. Austin is still weird, but it’s freak flag is now surrounded by monuments to corporate sameness.

Why is Culture so difficult as we grow?

“Remember what it was like when we first started? Remember how everyone looked forward to doing great things every day? I want to go back to that.”

Robert (not his real name), the CEO, voiced his desire to a group of managers at the end of an off-site session. Perhaps you have experienced the same feelings.

Robert’s organization had experienced exponential growth in size and reach over the previous decade. The ability to move quickly and everyone jumping in to help had been replaced with layers of approval for decisions, job descriptions that confined—rather then encouraged—collaboration, and an objective-driven performance management process that created silos.

Robert recognized that the organization had lost its soul one well-intentioned decision at a time. He also acknowledged that he played a starring role in the saga of what his organization had become.

Robert found these challenges as he looked back on what happened.

• Coordination: More people created the need for more structure. Meeting space was limited, so signups were created. Maintaining schedules, approving PTO requests, and even finding meeting space became more challenging. The answer was to formalize, and each decision new policy devoured another piece of the culture.
• Connections: Adding more people meant adding more layers of management. Each succeeding level removed him from direct connection with the team. Knowing everyone was difficult, and he became someone who occasionally dropped in rather than a consistent voice that models the culture. Technology made communication possible at scale, but it also facilitated the loss of
• Consistency: Customers expect a consistent experience. Employees do, too. Robert’s organization created processes and held people accountable for following them. Results occur, as the old saying goes, when you inspect what you expect. Robert’s organization inspected consistency.
• Communication:?In the early days, Robert had pulled people together for both regular and impromptu meetings. That was no longer feasible, so he did the next best thing—he sent digital communication so that everyone heard the same things. More important, Robert had to rely on layers of management to convey the content and context of messages. Scale creates more opportunities for individual interpretation.
• Cost control: Owners began paying attention to costs and profit margin became a stronger driving force in decisions. Every company wants to achieve profitability as quickly as possible. But ownership changes raised expectations.

The realization that his problems are universal did little to alleviate Robert’s frustration. He needed his team to keep the efficiency and effectiveness of his current reality while regaining the collaboration and commitment from the old days.

The Plan

Robert and his team embarked on the journey to regain the soul of the company. Here is how they did it.

1.??? Acknowledge and own the elephant in the room.

Nothing ever fully changes until we tell ourselves and others the truth. Robert’s admission that he wanted things to be different and ownership of the current reality were crucial. Others felt the same way. They were reluctant to speak up without knowing how it would be received.

2.??? Link back to the Mission, Vision, and Values.

The vision of Robert’s company had changed in the past decade, but its stated mission and values had not. He engaged the organization in redefining how the culture would and would not be different when it reclaimed its culture. The opportunities for input and involvement were level-appropriate to ensure the right people were having the right conversations. Most important, these conversations dug deep into the impact of decisions on communication, decision making, quality, customer expectations, etc.

3.??? Establish measurable goals and metrics.

This was one of the most difficult aspects of the change. Concepts such as collaboration and caring can mean different things to different people. All metrics fall into one of these categories:

• Activities
• Results
• Perceptions

Results and perceptions are lagging indicators. Activities are leading indicators. the team worked to identify the specific behaviors and performance that create the perceptions and lead to the results they wanted.

4.??? Align process, structure, and systems.

The leadership categorized processes into these groups:

• Primary driver of value-supporting performance and behavior.
• Secondary driver of value-supporting performance and behavior.
• Minimal driver of value-supporting performance and behavior.

From there, the company systematically reviewed, updated, modified, and in some cases, abandoned processes to ensure that they supported the culture. Over time, the organization also looked at its structure, decision-making processes, and technology systems to ensure their alignment. Some aspects of the current reality (like the ERP system) could not be changed. In those cases, the company looked for modifications that would minimize a negative impact.

5.??? Build support.

The process of communication and involvement began early and continued throughout the change process. Robert used the communication and support-building process to show that things were changing.

6.??? Build capacity.

Every organization is perfectly organized, structured, and optimized to deliver exactly the results it is delivering today. Over time, the company’s capacity to support and sustain the culture it desired had faded. Some of the believers and adopters from the early days had moved on through retirement or frustration. Expectations needed to be reset at every level, and the company had to learn how to operate in the environment it wanted for the future.

7.??? Empower action and ensure accountability.

Empowerment and collaboration were hallmarks of the “old days.” Returning to that time required letting go and allowing that honest mistakes would occur. The team used metrics as a leadership tool to help people move toward the desired performance and behavior rather than a report card.

Did it work?

Everything was great … for a while. Robert’s business was sold to a strategic player in its industry. The new owners did not share his vision for the culture. He and other senior leaders were given packages to leave.

The culture held on for a while. Resource allocations changed and new metrics were put in place. New leaders valued other things. The culture changed again.

A mid-level leader who survived the layoffs recently called me to catch up. She recounted a recent conversation with Robert, her former CEO. She had said these words to him:

““Remember what it was like when we turned the culture around? Remember how everyone looked forward to doing great things every day? There are still people here who want it to be like that again.”

According to her, Robert could be heard smiling over the telephone.

Randy Pennington is an award-winning author, speaker, and leading authority on helping organizations create and sustain cultures that deliver positive results in a world of accelerating change and uncertainty. To bring Randy to your organization or event, visit www.penningtongroup.com , email [email protected] , or call 972.980.9857.

Disclaimer: This story is true. Robert's name and company identify have been sanitized to maintain client confidentiality.