As the owner or leader of a business, chances are, you’re always looking for ways to stay ahead of the game. In order to do this, you may need to make big changes at your company.
Sometimes, this will involve changing the company’s fundamental beliefs and core values. This is called cultural transformation, and it’s a big deal because it changes everything about a company — not only who they are, but what they stand for.
Cultural transformation is really important for a company. Oftentimes, company culture can directly make or break a company’s long-term success. It affects how well the company does as a whole, as well as how happy, motivated, and productive the employees are.
The question is: how do you cultivate culture transformation in the workplace? We’ll be answering this question and more in this article, so stick around!
What is Company Culture?
Being able to grasp what makes up a company’s culture is really important when it comes to understanding how it can change over time. Company culture, also called organizational culture, mainly has to do with the typical behaviors shown by employees and leaders within a company.
These behaviors (like how well employees work together or how effective their decision-making skills are) reflect what the company values and are mostly influenced by its leaders. It’s worth noting that company culture isn’t fixed; it can change as time goes on. That’s why it’s important for leaders to guide their company’s culture in the right direction.
At its core, company culture is basically the shared values, expectations, and behaviors that influence how employees do their jobs. Having a strong leadership team and a positive organizational culture is super important because it helps keep employees engaged, makes them more motivated and productive, and creates a healthy business environment.
On the other hand, if a company has a weak or negative corporate culture, it can lead to unhappy employees, lots of people leaving their jobs, and the company not doing as well as it could. This shows just how important it is for companies to actively work on building and maintaining a healthy organizational culture.
What is Culture Transformation?
Cultural transformation often becomes a necessary business strategy when an organization realizes that its current culture isn’t in line with its vision, mission, core values, and goals. As a business leader, this should tell you a lot (i.e. that your company’s current culture is actually holding the organization back from reaching its goals).
Culture transformation happens when the entire organization goes through the process of realigning the culture with its vision, mission, and values. Basically, when you cultivate culture transformation, you’re giving the organization a cultural “makeover” from the inside out.
Many business leaders view cultural transformation as a big change that happens across the whole organization or in specific departments and teams. In a nutshell, it means getting everyone in the organization to believe in the change (as well as understand why the change needs to take place).
Others view cultural transformation as a shift in focus (i.e. instead of focusing solely on making profits, a company might decide to focus on improving how well its employees work together).
Sometimes, cultural transformation happens unintentionally. For example, when things get volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA), some organizations might react without a clear plan, and the cultural transformation process might take place without anyone realizing it.
As the leader of your organization (or, the “captain” of your ship, if you will), you’re responsible for taking charge of this cultural shift within your company and making sure that chaos doesn’t reign supreme.
The Benefits of Cultural Transformation
Cultural transformation isn’t just some trendy new idea (in fact, the concept of cultural transformation has been around for a while — we didn’t always have a name for it, though).
Cultural transformation is important and (oftentimes) necessary for companies that want to achieve their vision and goals over the long term. Let’s take a closer look at some of the reasons why cultural transformation might benefit your company below:
Goal alignment
By cultivating cultural transformation within your company, you can make sure that everyone is on the same page (i.e. that everyone’s goals are aligned). By creating and shaping a culture that supports desirable behaviors — like coming up with new ideas and collaborating effectively — your company will be that much closer to achieving its goals.
Improved employee retention
Employee satisfaction and happiness are incredibly important. Changing your company’s culture might just make your employees feel more connected to their work and the company’s mission as a whole. When people feel like they’re part of something important, and that their work truly matters, they’ll be more likely to put in a lot of effort and collaborate with one another.
For example, if a company introduces programs to recognize employees’ hard work and you, as the leader of said company, encourage open communication and employee engagement, it can make employees feel more appreciated — and, therefore, motivated. The more motivated your employees feel, the more likely they’ll be to stick around for the long haul.
Increased flexibility
Transforming your company’s culture is also a great way to increase flexibility (i.e. your employees will be able to cope with changes quickly and effectively). By creating an environment with a strong culture where employees are encouraged to learn, take risks, and come up with new ideas, your company can easily stay competitive.
Let’s say, for example, you give your team members in your business unit the power to make decisions without having to wait for approval from higher-ups. This could potentially make the company more responsive and better able to adapt to changes in the market.
Attract top talent
A positive workplace culture can make the company more attractive to talented people who are looking for a job. When a company is known for treating its employees well and offering opportunities for growth, it becomes a place where people want to work.
For example, if a company is known for supporting its employees’ development and emphasizes the importance of work-life balance, it can attract high-potential employees. The more talented your employees are, the more business success will be likely.
Better customer experience
Changing your company’s culture could also lead to better experiences for your customers — which is always a plus. When employees have a strategic plan to provide great customer service and meet customers’ needs, it leads to happier customers who are more likely to come back and recommend your company to others.
How to Implement Cultural Change
In order to kick off your organizational transformation journey, you’ll need to plan carefully and follow some key steps. The first thing you’ll need to do is figure out what your current culture is like by doing a culture evaluation or assessment. This evaluation will provide you with a starting point and help you decide what you want and need to do in terms of cultural changes.
Next, you’ll need to come up with a clear vision of what you want the culture to be like after the changes take place. This vision should make sense to everyone in the organizational structure and guide them in the right direction. Set goals that match this vision so that you can track how well things are progressing over time.
Remember to focus on changing behaviors that support your business goals. For example, if you’re trying to change your company’s hierarchy culture into a clan culture, you’ll want to focus on culture shift items like improving core behaviors among your team members and giving your employees more responsibility. Make sure that these changes are reflected in how you evaluate employees and help them grow professionally.
Throughout this ongoing process, make sure that you’re being open and communicative about what’s changing and why. You should encourage your team members to share their thoughts, too. Good communication builds trust and gets everyone on board with the changes. Think carefully about how you communicate with different groups of people within your organization, too. This will make your efforts to change the company culture even more effective since you’ll be creating an inclusive environment.
Changing your company’s culture is going to take time — so be patient. Don’t get frustrated if big changes don’t happen right away, or if your employees don’t immediately seem on board with the changes you’re trying to implement. After all, a successful transformation will not happen overnight.
What you need is a solid plan that lays out how you’re going to make those changes happen over time. Getting everyone on board, from the CEO to the newest employee, is super important for making sure your culture transformation works out.
Let’s Build Your Culture
Here at Culture Partners, we understand that cultivating a cultural transformation isn’t always easy. At any rate, it’s not something most business owners can do alone. That’s why we’re here to help!
Feel free to schedule a complimentary consultation with one of our senior partners. Let’s discuss the state of your company’s current culture and the steps you’ll need to take in order to implement true cultural transformation.