The Taboo of the Banana

Have you ever heard about the gorilla experiment? Not the one about the "invisible gorilla" and its insights on human perception but the one with its crucial insights on organizational culture change.

As the experiment goes there are five gorillas in a cage with a ramp at the top of which is a bunch of bananas.?Just like every gorilla they love bananas. As soon as one of the gorillas starts to go after the bananas, high-pressure, icy water hoses are turned on, knocking the gorilla off the ramp and soaking all of them. This happens until none of the five gorillas will go close to the banana. At that point, the hoses are removed, and one after one of the original gorilla is replaced by a new gorilla.

Each time when a new gorilla tries to get to the bananas, the other gorillas all jump on him and drag him back. Eventually none of the original gorillas are in the cage, none of whom has ever been hosed.

Without having experienced the icy water in the first place, none of them will go after their own best interest, the bananas. By the end of the experiment they have all learned the unwritten rule (do not go for the bananas) without any of them knowing the resason why (we will all get sprayed by icy water).

If we could have asked the five gorillas for their rationale, they would have told us "I don't know, that's just how its always been around here."

Does it sound familiar? Any organizations is prone to cultural inertia ... doing what they have always done while expecting different, better results. Organizational cultures are powerful. In fact, organizations tend to be reluctant to adapt and thrive in response to shifts in the external environment.?In times of high-frequency change in the external environment organizations need to anticipate, adapt and reinvent themselves quickly and effectively in order to stay ahead of the curve.

What are the unwritten rule in your organization? And more importantly do they serve your organizational mission and your strategy or do they prevent you from achieving your strategic objectives?

Nurturing organizational culture does not only help you to promote employee wellbeing and engagement. Organizational culture is nothing more or less than successfully or not successfully executing on your business strategy. In that regard it can be your biggest booster or your worst nightmare. If it meant to be your biggest booster, your competitive advantage, you need to consciously define and shape it.