“I came to see in my time at IBM that “culture” isn’t just one aspect of the game – it is the game.” — Lou Gerstner (1942 -) Former IBM CEO, credited with its turnaround
Last week a friend was venting some frustrations about an organizational culture change initiative at her company. She’d been working on it for 6 months and didn’t feel like she was getting much traction. When I asked her how much input she’d been getting from the executive team, she said very little. Then she started to defend them by saying they were too busy – until she caught herself. “I guess that’s the problem,” she smiled. “The executives being ‘too busy’ to focus on people issues is how we ended up in this situation in the first place.” Bingo.
Consider this:
Your company culture drives its success. To be better at innovating – leaders must make sure the culture expects and fosters innovation. To improve customer satisfaction – leaders must make sure the culture expects and fosters great service. Culture is your organization’s DNA – the blueprint for everything you do. Great leaders realize this. They know that organizational “culture” isn’t a single item on a task list. And it can’t be delegated to a committee. It’s all encompassing. It’s the real work – and legacy – of leaders.
Try this:
Consider the team/group/organization you’re leading:
1. Look at your vision/mission statement and jot down the behaviors that everyone supposedly follows.
2. On a second list jot down the behaviors that everyone actually follows.
3. Pick the one discrepancy that annoys you the most.
4. Make it a top priority to change it.
5. Put some structures in place to ensure the change happens (communication, processes, rewards etc).
— Doug Sundheim is a leadership consultant, author, and speaker. His book on Smart Risk-Taking is due out in 2012.
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