Let’s challenge the notion that companies should hire and train employees to fit their culture. Instead, companies should aim their people management strategies at cultural expansion.
What does it mean to expand your company culture? Do you have to change your values? How about your mission statement or noble purpose? What about those forward-looking practices you are working so hard to create, like innovation, resilience, agility, and candor?
Cultural expansion is less radical than that. Principled values do not become obsolete. The cultural expression of values, however, needs careful re-thinking over time.
For example, look at a value like “safety” at work. In the Industrial Age that meant physical safety. In recent years studies have shown the additional importance of psychological safety to employee well-being, and so an updated expression of “safety” as a value can and should be applied according to the new understanding. Safety no longer means just providing protective gear; it means guaranteeing that everyone feels free to speak up and to express their whole human selves at work.
Cultural expansion applies values to a new context, whether that’s brought about by technology, social evolution, or a new awareness of human rights at work – and today, the context of work and business is always new, always evolving, always pushing into unknown territory.
A familiar case of cultural expansion is expressed in the business case for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Business leaders know that a workforce with many points of view and many life experiences will create products and solutions for more customers. They also know that equal pay for equal work must be a reality, not a slogan, and they look for data to confirm that’s happening at the company.
If the culture doesn’t expand to embrace inclusion, the diversity and equity efforts suffer. HR brings in more diverse talent, sets and monitors equitable pay practices, and yet too many employees still don’t feel they are equally empowered to make decisions and set direction. That’s still reserved for the longstanding in-group (typically white and male). It’s a common case of culture expanding a bit but ultimately failing to live up to its ambition of elevating the entire workforce.
How culture spreads
Culture is learned through human connections. (Consider how you learned the workplace culture in your first job – was it from a company manual or your managers, mentors and peers?) A culture of genuine human connection makes spreading all the other cultural values or signals or actions possible.
You can see the salience of human connection to innovation in the collaboration exercise of brainstorming. Speaking at the spring 2021 Workhuman Live Online event, organizational psychologist Adam Grant noted brainstorming’s flaws (people get excluded, everyone agrees with the boss) and recommended a technique he called “brainwriting,” which is grounded in human connection:
“The team is given a prompt in advance of a meeting and individuals generate ideas independently. Then you bring the group together to bring in the wisdom of crowds. That’s where you figure out which ideas have potential, and that's where human connection is really needed.
Grant went on to say, “A lot of the critical work people do, especially if it's not in their job description, is invisible to senior leaders. And it's one of the reasons why peer recognition programs are so important.” This is a cultural lever. When people show appreciation to one another; when they celebrate the things that make us most human and recognize both our unique contributions and our common purpose, they confer value on what is most human. That’s a cultural expansion worth having.
Cultural expansion is cultural abundance
Enduring organizations adapt to the changing business and cultural landscapes. In 2021 and beyond, innovative companies will not hire people who “fit” their culture. Instead, they will add employees who will augment their cultures with new perspectives born of experience. They will welcome people who challenge the status quo, offering new ways in which a company can fulfill its mission and live up to its values. When more people practice the principles of an organization’s culture, they strengthen it regardless of their employment status. However long or periodically they are employed (e.g. gig workers), they know they belong.
It helps to approach cultural expansion with an abundance mindset. If your company survived the disruptions of technology, globalization and crises like the pandemic, your people have already shown a talent for adaptation in matters such as how, when and where they do work. Remind them of this as you call on them to work toward a more connected and human culture. They have already proved they can learn and change. Address the deficits in your culture with the same belief in your collective power to overcome them.
The first step in expanding your culture: Identify inconsistencies between what your culture says and what it does. Are you really living a culture of inclusion, or does opportunity and promotion ultimately come to the same types of people? Does a commitment to workforce well-being extend to people with “invisible disabilities” like depression or anxiety? Do you have ways of resolving conflict that turn disputes into moments of elevating dialogue among employees?
This is not always comfortable work. Are you willing to be uncomfortable? As a leader, you hardly have a choice. Kim Sullivan, chief people Officer at Concentrix, recently put the matter of changing for the better succinctly when she told a Workhuman audience, “We’re leaders: We have uncomfortable conversations about topics all the time. We make decisions about things that are uncomfortable…but it is the right thing to do.”
"company" - Google News
July 27, 2021 at 09:00PM
https://ift.tt/2WfKPth
Your Company’s Next Cultural Challenge - Forbes
"company" - Google News
https://ift.tt/33ZInFA
https://ift.tt/3fk35XJ
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Your Company’s Next Cultural Challenge - Forbes"
Post a Comment