CULTURE & BIG PICTURE THINKING
To truly empower line reports to perform fully, a leader needs to understand the culture of their business & the macro environment. A great leader will understand the true purpose of their business and its culture. A great leader will translate and cascade these to their team members in a user-friendly format, and plan activities around them, thus influencing actions, performance and engagement.
If a leader cannot provide clarity on the culture, does not understand the greater business context and fails to explain the executives' vision, employees will start questioning them. In turn, motivation and engagement levels will drop and an unhealthy 'us and them' culture might start to arise.
The more connected and aligned to the company's vision and culture a leader is, the more work synergy they will be able to instill within their organization.
If a leader cannot provide clarity on the culture, does not understand the greater business context and fails to explain the executives' vision, employees will start questioning them. In turn, motivation and engagement levels will drop and an unhealthy 'us and them' culture might start to arise.
The more connected and aligned to the company's vision and culture a leader is, the more work synergy they will be able to instill within their organization.
How do I do this? Where do I start? What do I need to look at?
1 - Understand the culture picture: the how we go about delivering the what
Think about the type of industry you are in and identify what the common attributes and qualities are. Do you fall into a market culture focused on results and profitability, a hierarchy culture where monitoring and organizing tasks is a priority or of a culture of mixed of shared values, preferences and practices?
Now take a closer look at your own organization and ask yourself what the main internal culture is, and how you contribute to that culture. Think about some of the following dimensions from the G Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory:
- Power distance between leaders and subordinates – a traditional hierarchy structure where decisions and initiatives need to be agreed top down is viewed as high power. A low power structure is where you can see an open-door policy and more collaboration.
- Uncertainty avoidance – a high level of this dimension reveals an organization with strong guidelines, defined processes and tradition. On the other hand, an organization with a high level of tolerance to ambiguity fosters creativity, innovation, trial and error.
- Individualism Vs. Collectivism refers to how people tend to work in the organization. It’s the ‘I’ Vs. the ‘We’. It’s working as individual departments towards reaching goals or working across departments/functions to reach goals.
- Long term Vs. Short term focus – Organizations with short term orientation value tradition and have no reason to plan for too much change. Organizations who see the world in flux and view adaptation as a necessity, think that planning for change is vital.
Reflect on the above using the decision-making process for example. How do you make decisions and act? How are decisions cascaded down?
What happens when things do not go according to plan? Is there a tendency to take ownership and support or to shift responsibility and blame?
Now take a closer look at your own organization and ask yourself what the main internal culture is, and how you contribute to that culture. Think about some of the following dimensions from the G Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory:
- Power distance between leaders and subordinates – a traditional hierarchy structure where decisions and initiatives need to be agreed top down is viewed as high power. A low power structure is where you can see an open-door policy and more collaboration.
- Uncertainty avoidance – a high level of this dimension reveals an organization with strong guidelines, defined processes and tradition. On the other hand, an organization with a high level of tolerance to ambiguity fosters creativity, innovation, trial and error.
- Individualism Vs. Collectivism refers to how people tend to work in the organization. It’s the ‘I’ Vs. the ‘We’. It’s working as individual departments towards reaching goals or working across departments/functions to reach goals.
- Long term Vs. Short term focus – Organizations with short term orientation value tradition and have no reason to plan for too much change. Organizations who see the world in flux and view adaptation as a necessity, think that planning for change is vital.
Reflect on the above using the decision-making process for example. How do you make decisions and act? How are decisions cascaded down?
What happens when things do not go according to plan? Is there a tendency to take ownership and support or to shift responsibility and blame?
Another way to look and understand the culture is to look at your own on-boarding process, form the attraction phase to the alumni one.
Do you remember when you looked at the company’s website to prepare your application? What inspired you to apply? Now remember your on-boarding process, orientation day and organizational socialization period. What aspects of the culture were presented to you? What values, norms and behaviors helped you integrate?
As part of your performance evaluation, are you currently being measured on these values, norms and behaviors or just on concrete quantitative data? What mechanisms are in place to live these on a daily basis? What mechanisms do you practice with your team?
Think about the people who left your team, what was their feedback from their exit interview? Did they join an ‘alumni’ network after leaving?
These are some of the explicit parts of organizational culture, to get a more global picture you also need to investigate some implicit elements.
Take a look at what is in place in terms of total reward, employees’ benefits, reward and recognition programs, working and leave arrangements as these can tell you a great deal about the amount of care invested in people. What does your working environment look like, is it vibrant and promote desk sharing? What do staff display on their desk? Do you have a clear desk policy? Do people chat and gather at the coffee station? Do you have a formal dress code?
Hopefully both explicit and implicit elements are aligned and as a leader you want to make sure you take your cue from them with your behaviors and actions. If you don’t you might create sub-culture, which more often than not, will be a harmful one.
Do you remember when you looked at the company’s website to prepare your application? What inspired you to apply? Now remember your on-boarding process, orientation day and organizational socialization period. What aspects of the culture were presented to you? What values, norms and behaviors helped you integrate?
As part of your performance evaluation, are you currently being measured on these values, norms and behaviors or just on concrete quantitative data? What mechanisms are in place to live these on a daily basis? What mechanisms do you practice with your team?
Think about the people who left your team, what was their feedback from their exit interview? Did they join an ‘alumni’ network after leaving?
These are some of the explicit parts of organizational culture, to get a more global picture you also need to investigate some implicit elements.
Take a look at what is in place in terms of total reward, employees’ benefits, reward and recognition programs, working and leave arrangements as these can tell you a great deal about the amount of care invested in people. What does your working environment look like, is it vibrant and promote desk sharing? What do staff display on their desk? Do you have a clear desk policy? Do people chat and gather at the coffee station? Do you have a formal dress code?
Hopefully both explicit and implicit elements are aligned and as a leader you want to make sure you take your cue from them with your behaviors and actions. If you don’t you might create sub-culture, which more often than not, will be a harmful one.
Do you know your company's vision and mission statement? Do you know how it was designed and by who? Do you know your business' 5-year plan?
Do you know about competition? And a final one, although I am sure you can think of more, do you know what impact of the political context has on your organization? In other words, are you business savvy about your organization as a whole and not just your job, department and function?
A good way to start is to look your organization's internet site. You will find a lot of useful information in the 'About Us' section. That's usually where you will find the strategy and future plans, the press releases and annual reviews etc.
If you want to translate the big picture to your employees, talk culture and get them onboard you need to understand what your company is trying to achieve and how it goes about it.
The next step is to really understand how your team's objectives relate and link to the company's objectives. In a work context everyone should be working in the same direction, every employee's contribution should be aligned to the company's objectives and vision.
Once this is clear in your head, then talk to your key stakeholders and ask them what things could improve so that together you can work better in order to achieve these common goals.
Do you know about competition? And a final one, although I am sure you can think of more, do you know what impact of the political context has on your organization? In other words, are you business savvy about your organization as a whole and not just your job, department and function?
A good way to start is to look your organization's internet site. You will find a lot of useful information in the 'About Us' section. That's usually where you will find the strategy and future plans, the press releases and annual reviews etc.
If you want to translate the big picture to your employees, talk culture and get them onboard you need to understand what your company is trying to achieve and how it goes about it.
The next step is to really understand how your team's objectives relate and link to the company's objectives. In a work context everyone should be working in the same direction, every employee's contribution should be aligned to the company's objectives and vision.
Once this is clear in your head, then talk to your key stakeholders and ask them what things could improve so that together you can work better in order to achieve these common goals.
3 - Communicate and plan actions
Finally, communicate with your team members in a language that is 'your language' and not in a robotic company corporate language full of acronyms. It is important to know your audience when you are communicating, you need to make sure you relate to your people.
Whenever you get the chance, make links between the tasks or projects they are working on and the big picture, tell them how they are contributing, tell them about the 'WHY' and the ‘HOW’.
You can organize an interactive team session to look at current objectives and ways of working and using brainstorming activities to get everyone’s input on what is currently working well, what is not working and needs to stop, and what could the team do that currently is not happening.
Whenever you get the chance, make links between the tasks or projects they are working on and the big picture, tell them how they are contributing, tell them about the 'WHY' and the ‘HOW’.
You can organize an interactive team session to look at current objectives and ways of working and using brainstorming activities to get everyone’s input on what is currently working well, what is not working and needs to stop, and what could the team do that currently is not happening.
In conclusion
This is the same for your team members, to be motivated and happy at work, they need to understand the whole they need to understand their purpose, the reason why they are there. They also need to feel involved in deciding how they align themselves and contribute to the big picture, how they translate and live the values, the culture.
Understanding the bigger picture does not stop with your team members and cascading strategies, making plans and finding purpose. For a leader, it goes well beyond that. It means you are truly able to understand all the micro & macros implications of your decisions, plans and actions.
Understanding the bigger picture does not stop with your team members and cascading strategies, making plans and finding purpose. For a leader, it goes well beyond that. It means you are truly able to understand all the micro & macros implications of your decisions, plans and actions.