Culture change within an organisation is one of the most difficult and complex tasks that management may be required to complete. Culture change requires the breaking and re-modelling of deeply embedded behaviours, a task management must be prepared to lead by example, requiring them to change their own behaviour more quickly than their staff.

Culture is an intangible facet of an organisation that is created by people using process. Culture is about managing and channeling the behaviour of people. Although brand and organisational values underpin a culture, it is ultimately the behaviour of people that defines and dictates the ‘real’ culture of the organisation.

A culture can be created, grown and maintained if the company understands what the desired behaviours look like. Understanding the required behaviour is the requisite for making, changing or developing a company culture.

Shifting culture requires:

• A clear and accurate understanding of what the current culture actually is (as opposed to what management expect it to be)
• A precise and compelling vision of the culture that the organisation aspires to
• A clear route and a reason why change is required
• A way of measuring results, to validate that the culture change programme is having the desired affect.

Before cultural change can be implemented there are two key questions that need to be answered, namely:

• What are the benefits of investing in cultural change?
• What are the risks of only investing in cultural change?

Culture has a strong influence on how employees feel, act and work, which ultimately impacts directly on the organisation’s performance and results.

Research from the Gallop Organisation, based on the largest study of its kind (more than 80,000 senior manager interviews conducted over a period of 25 years), has proved that the ‘right’ culture:

• improves employee retention by 44%
• increases customer loyalty by 56%
• increases productivity by 50%
• improves profitability by 33%

There are numerous other case studies and quotes that support these claims.  However, the Gallop research does provide the proof that leaders have been waiting for – that investing in your internal culture does drive a return on investment, both in terms of internal effectiveness, but also in terms of revenue.

It is also important to highlight the potential risks of changing culture, particularly when there is insufficient pro-active investment into developing the supporting elements of culture change.  If the business is looking to maximise productivity, then the vision, culture, management systems, infrastructure, staff skills and knowledge must all be working in harmony.

The major risk is that, without a determined effort and a robust change strategy in place, people will change their behaviours briefly, and then fall back into the old way of doing things.  People must be given a reason why they should change, or change will not be achieved.

It is worthless investing in skills development only to have the culture and operating processing working against it, slowly undermining and reversing its impact. It is similarly worthless asking staff to display team work if they are recognised and rewarded purely on their own productivity.

This is why our approach is to look at the whole organisation in terms of the vision, cultural values, associated behaviours, processes and skill gaps before making recommendations on cultural change or proposing changing. No single area can be addressed in isolation of the others and this is how we minimise the risks of a big shift in the organisation.

Before investing in a programme of culture change, it is really important to start off by asking yourself why. Richard at Brightstone is here to help you to understand what your current culture is, how you envision your new culture and then we can make recommendations to help get you there. It’s what we do best!

Got questions? Drop us a line!