Thousands of years ago, when humans roamed the African savannah, it was in our best interests to live in tribes. Being part of a tribe allowed us to sleep soundly knowing that others were looking out for man-eating saber-toothed tigers. If we became too sick to hunt, we knew our fellow tribe members would help us out. We could trust that other people would look out for us and they could trust that we would look after them. A solitary human would never have survived that hostile environment.
A few months back, I wrote an article called Are you Limiting your Company Vision?
Jane leads a team of 30 software programmers for a large insurance company. After months of slavishly working on a new sales tool to promote to car dealerships, the head of operations informs Jane that the company’s strategy has changed. The new direction means months of rework. Jane’s team feel deflated. Rather than celebrate a successful launch, they’re stuck with renegotiating contracts, dealing with the frustration from other internal departments and various technical challenges. Scepticism abounds with the new strategy. Jane urgently needs to restore trust and counteract the growing cynicism of her team.
One of the most common complaints from employees revolves around whether they believe their organisation can be trusted.
On a regular basis, I conduct roundtables with CEOs and executives about how many of their employees understand the company vision. A common theme among all the organisations is that their executives all “live and breathe the vision,” but they often stumble with extending the same enthusiasm to other employees throughout the company. In particular, filtering the “why the company exists message” down to the lower levels of the company. Some even question if it even matters and whether “the German backpackers packing boxes for six months, or the Chinese computer programmer or the forklift driver” even needs to know.
You know what it’s like. You walk into a company for a meeting and something feels off. The receptionist is rude, staff seem flustered and the place is a mess. When you meet your client or colleague, you feel an almost palpable detachment and annoyance towards the organisation.
Mediocre companies will often tell you they have a great culture, but when you question them on what makes it wonderful, they provide you with bland platitudes and flimsy proof.
Despite the potential threat of the horrific death of their friend, and possible manslaughter charges, four unlikely accomplices worked tirelessly together to help create what is arguably the 20th century’s most artistic and dangerous endeavour ever. In the process, the main leader demonstrated remarkable skill as a leader and CEO of the group.
Corporate culture might be an over-used terms these days, but what it really boils down to is what behaviours staff undertake when no-one is watching.
A Towers Watson study titled Change and Communication ROI, claims that the most important goal of an effective communication program is to motivate both employees and management to act upon, and achieve, the goals set by the organisation.
Yet, most organisations fail miserably at their latest communication launches, including safety. With only 55% of communication initiatives succeeding initially and only one in four being successful (25%) in changing behaviour long term.