68% of business leaders believe that culture is a source of competitive advantage but fewer than 10% report success in creating a high-performance culture, according to a survey of 365 executives in Europe, Asia, and North America.
Why are so few successful? Perhaps, as we have found over and over, they lack an effective way to analyze and measure culture. If it isn’t visible, it isn’t actionable.
Here’s what you need to know: the two things a culture must have to be competitive are resilience and adaptability. Resilience ensures you have the means to deliver value in today’s dynamic marketplace, despite technological, environmental, or political disruptions that threaten stability. Adaptability is critical for increasing the likelihood you’ll continue delivering value in the future. The good news is that they are measurable, through Business Ingenuity’s Cultural Alignment survey.
Aligning Your Culture for Resilience & Adaptability
Basically, aligning culture comes down to informing people about “how things are done around here” – not what they do, but how they do it. This is achieved through two important parameters. The first is the organization’s Strategic Framework; it acts as the ‘north star,’ keeping everyone aligned around what is important. Style & Mood, the second parameter, aligns people re how to act appropriately in everyday activity. Let’s take a closer look at each in turn.
The Strategic Framework consists of answers to four important sets of questions:
Who are we? What future unites and inspires us? This defines the company’s VISION.
What is our value proposition? For whom? This defines the company’s PRODUCTS.
What indicators matter for our success? This defines the company’s KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS (KPIs)
What structure, resources, objectives, & methods optimize performance? This defines the company’s OPERATIONS.
Style and Mood.
Style aligns employees in terms of what ‘counts’ as value in their work - and what is secondary in importance. For example, ‘get stuff done’ values ‘being in action all the time’ over being precise, whereas ‘be pragmatic’ values making the best decision possible within constraints, whereas ‘seek perfection’ values overcoming obstacles to achieve ultimate perfection. We have found around a dozen styles, ranging from ‘be nimble’ to ‘be collegial.’ Style is very tied to the CEO; they are generally deliberate in letting people know what they want to see in how decisions are arrived at.
Mood, on the other hand, is a bit more mercurial, often changing very suddenly. For example, securing a lucrative contract, losing a key account, winning a prestigious award, or restructuring the organization can have immediate impact on how people see their future possibilities. But moods can also be shaped by narrative. This ties back to the Strategic Framework. If the narrative that comes with the Strategic Framework is compelling and does in fact, serve as the organization’s ‘north star,’ it will inspire and propel people in the best of times as well as serve to act as a keel in challenging times.
Conclusion
How would you assess your own organization’s culture? Are you part of the 10% that is creating a high -performance culture, or part of the 58% that knows the importance of culture but doesn’t know what to do about it? If you are like the majority of executives surveyed, we invite you to read further to see how resilience and adaptability were brought to light for “Data Analytics Co.”
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