Vanguard Corporate Culture: The Tech Age Solution

Vanguard Corporate Culture has a huge claim. When you read this “brag”, your skepticism will soar and you will be tempted to stop reading because it is an impossible assertion. There is little doubt that after reading the next paragraph, you will say to yourself: “No way!” / That is understandable. However, what if Vanguard Corporate Culture really can make this claim legitimately? What if there really is such a thing? As impossible as it sounds, what if Vanguard Corporate Culture is correct? It costs you nothing to keep reading and check it out!

Vanguard Corporate Culture has a business solution for all businesses that – if done according to the comprehensive blueprint – will solve all problems and issues that your business has faced, is facing, and will face in the future. Another pandemic will not deeply affect your business. Your company will absolutely lead its industry. Your corporation will have guaranteed longevity, impervious strength, and more prosperity than ever before. There will literally be no issue that cannot be conquered. How’s that for a claim!

Now, please read and allow Vanguard Corporate Culture to explain; allow us to serve you in the best and most sensible manner.

Throughout my 40-plus years in business, from serving first as a line employee, and eventually an owner/operator, I have been “recording” key observations. The results I have accumulated are a view of the “evolution” of contemporary, mainstream business as shaped by economic events, new technology, and more recently the emergence of computers, the internet, and a new world of variable effects. Business has always been reactive; each business has had no choice but to react to new challenges. And if solutions were realized, very often those remedies came from outside of the company.

I hope you can agree that we are not primarily in the ‘Information Age’, nor are we in the ‘Digital Age’. We are in the parent of those, which is the Tech Age – the technology age. And we are still in the infancy, ultimately, of the tech age in the grand scheme of business evolution.

Further, technology in-and-of itself moves forward exponentially, faster and faster. Our business models do not keep up with the evolution of technology. Our business models are out-run by the pace of technology, leaving behind our antiquated business models.

Additionally, we – as human beings on a spinning planet, in an orbit around the sun – base our calendars and time itself not in geological time, or universal time, but in “people time”. We observe time from the perspective of our lifespans. If a person lives to the age of 82, that is just under 30,000 days. We all now see 30,000 as a small number. We spend $30,000 on vehicles – in huge volume – every day, for example. We will soon have individuals who are trillionaires! Then, when one subtracts sleep time and other biological time demands, family and friends time, and other common demands on our time, there is not a lot left to personally realize our dreams and goals.

Along with this human, ego-centric view of time, we all know that in early childhood, one day seems quite long. As we grow older, our perception of time changes and speeds up dramatically. The point is that time is: 1) a matter of perception (as is all else in life), and 2) the most precious of all things that we value, mostly because none of us can know how much time we have to spend.

It could be argued that our human view of time – which is our “daily reality” – is naturally subjective in that we do not (perhaps cannot) view time objectively. We can only see how it affects us according to our lifespans. In fact, in our daily life it is something less than a habit to step back – each and every day – and attempt to look at our reality in a new and more objective way; it is not typically in our collective experience to challenge ourselves to entertain an entirely unique perspective every day, or our set of values and ideals. Our temptation might be to disagree with this assertion. But it seems that our human condition is to believe we are thinking “outside the box” - objectively in all things – when in fact we might not be pushing our sense of objectivity far enough. We must keep questioning our objectivity.

So far, Vanguard Corporate Culture is saying that time is everything, and we do not always perceive time in the most objective terms. Also, to this we add: our perceptions determine our values, our direction, our judgments…everything.

This results in a less than ideal vision of what are the best and most effective options and choices to make. We are not perfect and cannot make perfect moves, especially by ourselves. However, when we make use of a group of minds – a collective focus – we can gain more objectivity; entertain more variables; look at more ideas. Okay, we will come back to these thoughts soon.

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Let’s look for a moment at America. Most people living in the USA, love their country and its overall ideals. Although we all choose which American ideals we love and enjoy, collectively Americans share enough core ideals in common. This is our American culture. Our military soldiers throughout America’s history have given their lives to protect our American culture. Differing geographical regions of the USA tend to have their own sub-culture. Each of our family units have a unique, shared culture. The point is that the cultures we belong to is who we are, and that culture reflects the ideals we share commonly within that group. In short, our culture “rounds out” our lives and livelihood. Let me say that another way: our culture is what gives our collective reality meaning, direction, hope, and is ultimately who we are.

Relating culture to business: it is the opinion of Vanguard Corporate Culture that in the history of the Capitalist economy, we have entirely “missed the boat” as to the concept of Corporate Culture. So often corporate culture exists mainly on paper, stating our company values and beliefs and perhaps motives, yet few businesses carry such corporate culture to the extreme meaning and value of what is should be and could be.

In recent times, a slow movement has emerged where corporations are finally taking a closer look at their company culture and how it is expressed. There is even more attention paid to a focus on the individual within the corporate culture. Vanguard Corporate Culture applauds these forward-thinking advances. However, a Culture Department – as a major driving component of daily business – has not been fully conceived. Vanguard Corporate Culture asks: Does the corporate culture grow revenue, or create new revenue streams? Does it not only pay for itself, but add large significance to the bottom line? Does it maximize the value and importance of the people inside and outside of the business? Can it solve all of the issues that the corporation has and will have?

Although business vision is slowly gaining better objectivity, the focus is still off-point. We are not aiming at the center of the target.

Vanguard Corporate Culture asserts that corporate culture has not typically been its own company department or division. Our cultures in modern business are not providing a collective set of ideals that produce meaning, direction, hope, and are not ultimately ‘rounding out the experience’ of the individual within each business.

Further, in this Tech Age, it is becoming more and more prevalent to “pass by” the people – the human element – because our focus is mainly on financial gain, new technology (often replacing people), higher productivity…dollars. Our business culture is not effectively for and about people. Our perceptions have become skewed. Corporate Culture is still not what is should be and must become.

The importance and value of the individual is reflected in our practices. For example: it is typical in today’s business models to outsource what we call “Customer Service”. Typically, we must wade through extensive menus when calling a customer service phone line before actually talking to a live person. And then after spending frustrating time with recorded menus, the live person we end up talking to talks like a robot, meaning that they only respond with “canned, trained responses”. Or we make a call and we do actually get a live person on the phone immediately, but they are overseas somewhere and are difficult to understand, and once again they are robotic in their responses.

Another example is that our current business terminology so often reflects ephemeral vision. When we call our staff members “employees” (although they are legally employed by us), the stigma is that the person feels like a number, or expendable, easily replaced, and not highly valued. The term “Customer Service” also suggests a short-term vision. It is so much healthier to think in terms of the “lifetime value” of each customer and instead of ‘customer service’ departments, we could create “Customer Experience” departments.

We need to completely shift our focus to the individual, and collectively the people. People are the staff members of our companies, and people are the patrons of our business. People create our products. People provide our services. People build the devices of technology. People run our business. People determine our success, our growth, stability, key performance metrics…our dollars!

We must now have a “Neo Renaissance” in all businesses. We must have a re-birth of the importance of the individual person in all aspects of business. A new and evolved perception of the person in our business models must now emerge. We must adopt a Tech Age perception of how we spend our time and money in business; an objective view of how we must treat the individual and the collective, both inside and outside of our business.

And finally, the core of the Vanguard Corporate Culture business philosophy is to build a company Culture Department in each business model.

Something relatively newfangled in business on the C-Suite level is the CXO, aka the Chief Experience Officer. However, a much more meaningful, useful, accurate, and intelligent title and job responsibility should be: Chief Culture Officer, which would include not only the experience of our customers/patrons, but also the experience of our staff. What is now being termed a “CXO” might instead become a Chief Culture Executive, at the top of the Culture Department.

A new Corporate Culture Department would include Culture Facilitators (who handle a caseload of up to 20 employees each, and are tasked with “rounding out” those staff member experiences). Such Culture Facilitators become something like a Life Coach for each person in their charge. The Culture Facilitators learn all they can about each person in their caseload and relentlessly feed them items of value that help to “round out” their work life and personal life. The Culture Facilitator also coaches their people to be thinking of ideas for the company, including solutions to issues, new revenue streams, cost cutting, and enhancing the experience of all people inside and outside the company.

The Culture Facilitators report ‘up the chain’ to Culture Coordinators. Coordinators assimilate the findings and results of the Culture Facilitators. The Culture Coordinators manage the Culture Facilitators. The Culture Coordinators also summarize proposals and create feasibility studies (from ideas of the individuals) to present to the RR&D team.

Also within the Culture Department is the RR&D team (Resources, Research & Development). The RR&D team is the center of the “think tank”, which is tasked with Researching and Developing the company so as to resolve current issues, and head off potential challenges of the future, as well as developing new revenue streams (in cooperation with other corporate divisions), thus gaining new Resources that strengthen the company and add resiliency. The RR&D (think tank) from the Culture Department would augment these think tank meetings by rotating in individuals throughout the company. Eventually, every mind in the business – each person – can contribute to the greater good and health of the company.

The blueprint of the Culture Department is such that the ‘Think Tank’ structure will maximize the value of all of the individuals in the company, and draw from the collective minds all kinds of solutions on all sorts of levels, including issue resolution, revenue growth and new revenue streams, and innovative channels to advance all corporate objectives.

Vanguard Corporate Culture will tailor-fit the Corporate Culture Department within your business model. This will modernize the company by extending its vision while simultaneously rounding out the experience of the individual person as a team member, and also the lifetime experience of the persons that are your patrons or clients.

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One immediate example of the Corporate Culture Department providing solutions:

Problem: Staffing shortages during the COVID pandemic, or what is being called “the resignation era”.

Current perspective: Historically, the term “work” has held a negative stigma for millions of people. We set our alarms to wake us early (which is dreaded); we have to leave the family culture; we have to commute to a job that adds nothing much more than a paycheck to life. There is little light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. Given the choice, people would rather be fishing, or on the beach, or at home. Our work is not adding or “rounding out” our life, and work experience.

Culture Department Solution : The Culture Officer (on a team of Culture Officers that each manage a caseload of staff members) interviews each staff member and learns all about that person, from whatever they will tell their Culture Officer. The Culture Officer has a general survey and asks about family members, birthdays, hobbies, likes, dislikes, ambitions, dreams, goals, where they want to be in 5, 10, 20 years…virtually everything they can learn about their caseload of individual people. The Culture Officer will add incredible value to the work life and personal life of each person in their caseload of people.

That Culture Officer is researching new things each day for their people and sending them all sorts of useful, or valuable things. Perhaps the Culture Officer would send a link about rock climbing, or handling a disability in the family, or starting an online business, or how to invest for retirement…anything and everything that will help “round out” that person’s life at work and outside of work. That Culture Officer also joins a weekly meeting of Culture Officers and they discuss new ideas and challenges in their caseloads, and so on. As a side note, Culture Officers will additionally join the RR&D think tank meetings, and other Culture Department events.

Result: That individual person at work now has much more reason to come to work. That highly valued person has much more than a paycheck to intrinsically motivate them. That person will be at work each day. That person will be newly motivated. That person feels wanted, needed, and important. That person is now a part of a meaningful corporate culture that actually gives them joy, a higher purpose, a belonging, a chance to contribute to solutions, a pro-fit.

The Culture Facilitator is also the liaison with the long-term vision of the company, its mandates, its directives, etc. These Culture Facilitators help their people understand professionalism, and more about how they fit within the company, and where they might focus.

Another one of the chief concerns of the Culture Facilitator is to tap into the ideas of the people in their caseload about new revenue streams, new ideas for the company. The staff people actually contribute back to the welfare of the company, making them feel useful in new ways, a real resource.

And finally, the entire Culture Department as a think tank is also focused on fixing problems, enhancing current revenues, ideas about cost cutting and new revenue streams in their think tank meetings and culture officer meetings, etc. The Corporate Culture Department not only pays for itself, it adds all kinds of value to the company, including additional revenue…dollars!