Culture Matters!

Since Texas has one of the best job markets in the country, I thought today’s post might be relevant to those looking for employment or looking to make a move.  Last week, I was networking on LinkedIn and I came across an article that I thought was quite interesting. 

HBR posted a blog titled, When Choosing a Job, Culture Matters by Bill Barnett.  The author goes on to write about a man that won the job for a newly created position as CAO.  After he was told he got the job, he decided to interview various people about their culture.  Bill goes on to write that this person decided to turn down the job, because the culture was not one that he wanted to be a part of.

Albert Camus once said, “Culture is the cry of men in face of their destiny.”  As noted in a previous blog, I think one of my colleagues said it best, "Your organization's culture is nothing more or less than the collection of habits of the majority of people most of the time."

So, if you are researching a prospective company to work for, invest in or do business with, asking some key questions to existing staff or connecting with someone on LinkedIn that used to work there, can shed light on whether or not you should pursue them.  Let’s explore a few topics related to a successful culture.

Leadership

As my pastor likes to say, “It all falls on Leadership.”  The leaders in the organization are like the captains on the ship.  They are charting the course for the crew into open waters.  They cannot predict if they are going to run into a giant squid (new legislation, competitive threat, advances in technology, etc.) or not.  What they can do is instill a culture that requires people to bring out their best in way that they not only want to do it, but are compelled to do it.  It’s more than just having a good strategy.  It’s about “finding your voice” as a leader and “helping others find theirs” (reference from The 8^th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness by Stephen R. Covey).

Now I’ve worked for FranklinCovey (a company with great culture) for nearly 5.5 years.  From what I’ve seen here as an employee and what I’ve seen working with clients, I believe that the two biggest points of leverage for leaders is Trust and Execution.  If you can build a culture of high trust and instill an operating methodology to execute, you’ll build a winning culture.  Let’s explore these two concepts a bit further.

Trust

When introducing our Speed of Trust Process to organizations, we show leaders that trust is learnable, teachable and measurable.  When trust is high, business gets done faster and for less cost.  Conversely, when trust is low, it takes longer to do business and it costs more to achieve those results.  With all of this said, trust dramatically impacts the bottom line!

In Stephen M.R. Covey’s best-selling book, The Speed of Trust, he explains that High Trust Organizations out produce Low Trust Organizations nearly 3:1.  Did you catch that?  3 to 1!  If that isn’t a business case for a low trust culture to improve, I don’t know what is!

Execution

If we were to look at a computer as an organization, Trust would be the processor and Execution is the operating system.  If you are trying to get new results (running new programs, etc.) and you are doing it on an outdated or ineffective operating system, it is highly likely that you will never achieve your goal (or at least achieve it with excellence).

FranklinCovey’s Global Execution Practice Leader,  just released a book, The 4 Disciplines of Execution, our next best-seller!  It doesn’t surprise us that this book is flying off the shelves!  There is not an outbreak of execution in the marketplace.  The great companies, that remain great, have this down to a science!

Without diving in too deep into these subjects: Leadership, Trust and Execution, there are of course other factors that affect culture, but these 3 are pretty big! 

So, if you are reading this article as a leader, ask yourself how your team or organization is doing related to these areas.  If you are lacking in one or more, I know that is impacting your bottom line.  Who am I kidding… so do you!  Are ready to make a change?  If so, let’s connect!

If you are an individual looking for employment, make sure that before you begin working for a new organization, make sure you create some time to interview random people in that organization to ask them these 3 questions:

1.       What do you think of the leadership in this organization?

2.       On a scale of 1 to 10, what is the level of trust inside the organization?

3.       Over the last 3 years, how well did the organization execute its top strategic goals?

If you get great answers to all 3, I bet this is a company that is leading their industry and is growing rapidly.  It’s probably going to be worth pursing!

If you feel like you need more help in these 3 areas, contact me, to learn more about some of our new online training offerings.  We have several cost-effective options that will allow you to invest in yourself.  Remember this… Learning is vital to earning!

Helping individuals and organizations one at a time,

John Vakidis

PS - Follow me on Twitter for FranklinCovey Updates, Leadership Quotes and more!