Corporate Culture - The How Guide (Episode 2)

This is the second piece of the two-part article about corporate culture. In the last episode I talked about what is and is not corporate culture, it’s importance and some of its attributes. Readers who are interested may refer to Macau Managers Magazine Issue 88.

In commercial flights the pilots usually spend a great deal of effort to control the take-off and landing of the plane – the most crucial moments of the flight. Most of the remaining flight was controlled by the auto-pilot system. If the pilots were to control the plane during the entire course of the flight, mental and physical burnout will be inevitable. Same goes for management. Leaders of the organization can’t manage everything. They must make the best use of their time by focusing on the key activities such as strategy formation, stakeholder management, resource allocation, etc., just as the pilots only take care of both ends of the flight plus the ad-hoc situations, if any. The rest of the daily management and operation is best left with the auto-pilot, which includes a number of things such as culture.

Here’s a real story. A business traveler checked in to the hotel close to midnight due to a delay of the flight. The hungry traveler asked the staff who assisted with his check-in if any of the dining facility in the hotel was operating, only to receive a disappointing answer. Ten minutes after the traveler got in to the room, someone knocked on the door. It was the staff at the front desk holding a bag of McDonald’s. He said “Sir, I thought you might want to have a hamburger.” Imagine the level of customer delight – it was not even asked for. No Standard Operating Procedure in the world will tell you what to do when a hungry customer asked for dining service at 11pm, but a culture of service orientation and autonomy can do.

While the previous episode focused on the Why and What of corporate culture, this article will focus on the How – how can business leaders consciously cultivate a culture that fits the needs of the organization.

1. Start with VMV

Organizations, whether for-profit or non-profit, exist to serve a mission. Vision is the ultimate destination of the organization, and values represent people’s beliefs. Logically, corporate culture, being an umbrella of what we think, do and communicate every day, should be derived from the company’s vision, mission, and values. For example, a start-up unicorn may have a vision to be the market leader in a new industry, hence it is not a surprise to have an ambitious and competitive work culture. A stable non-profit organization may, on the other hand, focus on creating a culture of work-life balance. Alignment is needed between your vision and your daily practice.

Case in point: a group of insurance agents called their newly formed team “Love and Care”, which serves as the backbone of what they do: Love their jobs, and take care of their clients with love. It serves as the benchmark of everything they do. Are you selling a product that serves the needs of your client or the need to fill your own sales target? Do you maintain regular contact with your client, or you only call them when you have a new product to sell? When it comes to forming a culture, a well-crafted VMV, mission statement, or even a motto, is a great place to start.

2. Model by leaders

There’s a saying, “Monkey see monkey do”. When it comes to mimicking others’ behaviors, human is not much different than monkeys. In fact, we grow up mimicking others. Kids mimic their parents’ language and behaviors. Adolescents tend to mimic their peers. When we enter workforce, we mimic our leaders. We do what we see. Therefore, culture is best realized when the leaders walk the talk and talk the talk. True story: A blue chip listed company in Hong Kong prided themselves in “treating staffs as customers”. However, when one of the senior executives of the company was about to leave the building, she was seen stopping behind the door and the staff sitting behind the reception counter of the head office quickly rushed to open and hold the door for the executive to pass. Such an act clearly demonstrated the hierarchy of the company and rendered their “treating staffs as customers” motto a joke. Talk is cheap. Culture has to be lived through daily actions.

Organizations may consider inviting leaders to conduct regular teaching and sharing sessions to the staffs. The Leader-As-Teacher approach is very effective in communicating the beliefs and behaviors you want to cultivate. It also raises the bar for the leaders to be the role model of others. However, note that leaders’ sharing should be based on their own experience and results rather than theory-based knowledge, or it will defeat the purpose.

3. Communicate through stories and experiences

The single best way of human communication is stories. Mythical and religious stories across continents, languages, and cultures can last thousands of years. While organizational culture is to be lived, it is best communicated by stories. Companies may organize storytelling campaigns to promote its culture. For instance, a company in the hospitality industry has run a “Wow Factor Story” campaign across the organization, in which different departments submitted their “Wow Story” related to exceptional customer experience. The campaign served as a platform for these otherwise unnoticed stories got surfaced and recognized. The story database, which accumulates steadily, serves as valuable content in subsequent training and performance reinforcement activities. It is worth noting that this campaign covered not only “Wow Story” for external customers but also internal customers. Placing the same emphasis on staff experience is the best example to walk-the-talk of the infamous line “Staffs are our greatest asset.”.

4. Create your sub-team culture

If the organizational VMV and culture campaign are out of reach, try creating a small sub-team culture within your control instead. Cultures are defined by scopes. There could an organizational culture for the entire organization, a departmental culture for a particular department, and team culture for a team of staffs. Ideally, different layers of cultures should be designed carefully to ensure alignment in themes and traits. However, if you are not within the position to influence anything at the top, try to do something within your small team. Generally, it is much easier to cultivate a culture with a small group of people than with a large organization. Leaders and managers of small teams can easily implement initiatives within their control. For example, if you want to encourage disclosure of vulnerability, ask each team member to share a mistake or a lesson learned in the past week during your team meeting. Caveat: The team leader should be the first person to share. Another example, if you want to emphasize the value of speaking up, start with the lowest rank of staff when you seek input on a certain issue. If the manager or leader speaks first, staffs tend to conform and not reveal their true opinions. If we make it a habit to reverse the order of speaking, you create the culture of speaking up. Caveat: The team leader must thank the staffs’ input and avoid quickly dismissing the values of their input, despite how trivial it may seem.

We have covered the How’s of corporate culture. At last, I want to highlight that culture has to be maintained and sustained. It’s not a one-off installation but a constant maintenance. It’s best maintained by daily and regular activities. An annual team building event is not likely to cut it. Think of it as a weight loss plan. The secret to losing weight is in the daily activities: your diet and exercise. If you only hit the gym once a month, you won’t see any favorable changes on the weight scale. However, too many leaders see culture building as a monthly (or yearly) gym event rather than a daily discipline. They thought spending time on an annual offsite or training event could shape their staffs’ mindset, increase motivation, and establish ownership. Unfortunately, we know that’s not going to happen. Each word you say, each behavior you do, and each decision you make, are shaping the culture of the team. Again, culture is lived through daily interaction. Only when we are aware of the kind of culture we need and consciously and regularly take the appropriate actions will we have a chance to realize it.?

Is the high maintenance worth it? It certainly is. In the last episode I mentioned companies with a healthy culture outperform their rivals. Money aside, working in a healthy and strong culture is simply happier because of the positive relationship and trust between team members. In addition, teams with strong culture generally have a clear vision or goal, which helps team members establish meaning and purpose in their work.

Cultivating a culture that assists your team or organization to achieve its goal is by no means easy, but that shouldn’t discourage you from doing it. Patience and discipline are needed. Rome is not built in a day, so is a healthy and solid organizational culture. Therefore, we must be patient. On the other hand, we must have discipline in every word we say, every action we take, and every decision we make. Just as weight loss, creating a culture is an infinite game.

This article was first published in Macau Manager Magazine Issue 89.