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Nurturing organisational culture (View Comments)
Rajiv Nambiar
Posted On Wednesday, January 27, 2010 at 02:28:43 PM
‘What is the culture of the organisation?’ A familiar question with a seemingly harmless disposition. But is it? Is there an underlying tension in the mind of this executive exploring a career option with another employer? Is there an implication on the employer?
Culture in an organisation should be productivity and happiness enabling. Culture can have brisk adaptive capability only if it is design-led. Keeping an organisation together and going great when the chips are down is probably the ultimate test for culture capability. But how many corporate leaders have a conscious design for culture building? How much of it is left to chance in today’s corporate world?
That culture has to be driven top down is easier said than done. There is greater sanctity than what meets the eye in this ‘top down’ recommendation for culture building. Many in leadership positions restrict themselves to playing only a very ‘managerial’ functional head’s role. Some of them need to be reminded about the leadership element in their role. The culprit could well be the high pressure job compounded by an overwhelming transaction paradigm regularly seen at the workplace these days. Or, the subject of organisation culture performance and audit never makes it to the balanced scorecard of the CEO. Excuse or lapse, either way there is a compelling need to transcend it.
Perhaps a good way to begin would be by articulating what we want organisational culture to achieve for us.
The following are common desirables in most workplaces. But do they exist? Are these easy to come by?
• A positively charged work environment – there is joy at work, employees deliver as committed and are willing to go the extra-mile as a matter of habit and have mindsets that are not unmindfully entrenched but agile enough to adapt and respond to changes
• Where the ‘professional’ does not privately ‘check out’ fearing threat to his sense of security and dignity
• Where senior executives are not posturing and are feel free to speak their mind and challenge thought processes and are not made to’ feel small’ or ‘put in place’ for doing so
• Where ‘intent’ has a fair chance against ‘perception’ – the ‘other side’ is always heard
• Where diversity is seen as a strength to be leveraged
• Where the work styles and habits of leaders have also move to a higher order along with higher titles; from ‘controls’ to trust and empower and from personal comfort to finding purpose in a certain ‘growth inspiring vulnerability’ in the company of resources and situations which more often challenge than say a quick ‘yes’
Everything begins with a design. The list of initiatives can be endless but, perhaps a good beginning for any kind of culture building initiative could be the active sponsorship of a few major elements in organisational development which can prove to be major differentiators by the CEO and his lead team.
Shared Agenda – ‘What do we stand for as an organisation and which emotional dimension binds employees as a collective force in favour of the organisation?
Accessibility of Leadership – This not just about having an ‘open-door policy.’ Strangely, the straight and simple exercise of engaging a far more forthcoming junior and middle management community as a barometer for gauging cultural issues does not happen in more than a few organisations. Consequently, we see the rise of in-house power brokers and gamesters who play conduits for self gain.
Job Designs – It is time to read ‘JDs’ as job designs and not job descriptions. Purpose, stretch, challenge and empowerment are factored in a job design. No one ever joins an organisation to be branded as a ‘poor performer’ or ‘dead wood’. It is important to get to the source of this issue because left unattended, the credibility of certain organisational processes are coming under a scanner in the eyes of the employees. Over time it impacts the attitude and esteem levels of affected employees. The days of recruiting ‘servants’ are over. These days we recruit partners and team members. Many managers are yet to make this attitudinal shift.
Policies, Rules & Regulations – These are necessary and possibly well meaning. But they are also blind, deaf and un-empathetic in their black and white form. Like all measures and controls, they have the power to deliver a death blow to cultural aspirations and shape an alternate, unsolicited organisational behaviour. But how many instances have we come across where the efficacy of people related policies have been audited against behavioural dimensions?
Leaders nurture ‘culture’. They leverage culture as a ‘sling’ that will give greater impetus to their initiatives. ‘Culture’ in turn nurtures leaders for the future. The bottom-line is that organisational culture has to be designed, managed, periodically calibrated and overhauled. It is too serious to be outsourced to the HR Department or anyone else. And, it is more than some statistics thrown up by a regular ‘best employer survey’. And of course, construction of culture begins at the top, in the CEO’s office!
The author is Practicing HR professional with over 20 years of Corporate experience. Can be reached at rajiv2911@gmail.com
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