Cupcake Culture and Core Values

What are the traits of genuinely great places to work?

This question has driven me to explore what our team, families, agency, and community need to reach our potential. Having met with hundreds of talented individuals and organizations — as well as having committed myself to studying the very best places to work and what every individual needs to succeed — I have learned that there aren’t any magic bullets.?

It’s clear to me that being the very best colleague, company, and community member takes more than just some top-down big company or self-improvement program but rather an organic, ongoing, and evolving OPERATION, purposefully and collaboratively focused on personal, professional, financial, spiritual, and philanthropic success.?

In our final days in this world, we will not be counting dollars or polishing awards –— we will be looking at the difference we’ve made and the lives we’ve impacted along the way.?

Operation Awesome is simply a metaphor INDUSTRIAL uses for taking personal and collective responsibility for living extraordinary lives and making a positive impact on people we meet along life’s journey. This requires that we do the hard work to make a company an AWESOME and impactful place to work and live. Together.

If you’re reading this, the odds are that you have been thinking about what Life/Work balance looks like and what are those things in your company that you genuinely value. Taking a good look at your company’s Cupcake comes in.

Cupcakes & Culture

When it comes to culture in business, it’s like a cupcake.

First, there’s the cake part of the cupcake, which represents the true essence of the culture of the business. The cake’s ingredients of mission, vision, and core values are combined, nurtured, and baked just right to fill the mold to become the most substantial and fulfilling part of company culture. It’s a competitive market for talent out there, so the cake’s recipe always has to be improved, adding new flavors from learnings as time goes by. Eggs, flour, milk, sugar, and a little bit of vanilla? Wedding cake? A company must never cease trying to bake the perfect cake.

Second, the frosting represents all the sprinkles, glitter, artificial coloring, and cream with heaps of sugar and toppings, i.e., the fluff. The frosting on the cupcake is not culture; it’s often the perks, ping pong, fantasy football, parties, and manufactured or worse ‘volun-told’ to convene and have fun. Having fun is essential, but the sugar high that comes with a good lick of frosting should never be considered substantial enough to satisfy a company’s cultural appetites. The study of culture requires a basic understanding of what a company is at a fundamental level.

A business is as sweet as a cupcake is fluffy.

-Me

Company = People

As you consider what life and work look like to you, whether on your own or working in a business, it is vital to understand what a company is and is not. At its core, a business is simply a group of people. That’s it.

A company is the people, and the people are the culture. At its best, a company is a place where both leaders and team members work together using core values as their guide to realize shared visions and missions.

In military terms, a company is the smallest body of troops that can function as a complete strategic, administrative, and tactical unit. Winning in life and business requires a culturally healthy and aligned group of people who are willing and able to compete and be competitive. And, for those of you that have decided to eat the cupcake, recruited to go into battle, ask yourself this one question:

Am I in good company?

Please reach out to me directly on LinkedIn or visit our industrial marketing agency to learn more about our culurally cake-filled Operation Awesome- It’s delicious.