Costly culture failures
That’s not meant to be an over-the-top headline. But I hope it sobers your thinking on your “intentional culture.”
I shared this article with clients in 2018. It reviews several of the scandals that took down business leaders and organizations at the time. (Those scandals have since been replaced with yet more scandals and takedowns.)
A money quote from the article:
Top leaders will be viewed as financially and morally negligent if they don’t understand their culture and deal with what they find.
Tim Kuppler
I’ve often heard colleagues wiser than me complain that a company that focuses on a “culture initiative” usually isn’t successful at changing culture. It’s makeup when what’s needed is surgery.
Likewise, I’ve seen organizations fail at culture change when they tap one department to implement it. HR become the culture police, for instance.
“Pie-DAY-uh”
But there is another way, and it has been with us as long as Western Civilization itself. Paideia is the Greek word for culture. It also happens to be translated “education.” You might know it from the famous Bible verse:
And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
Ephesians 6:4
“Nurture” is actually paideia. It could also be translated “training,” “discipline,” “instruction.”
But I like “nurture.” It captures the idea of helping something grow.
That’s what you are doing with culture. If you are intentional about it, you are cultivating (same root word as culture) certain values and behaviors for your team.
And if you’re not intentional? Well, culture is what you allow.
Culture lessons from the garden
When our youngest was born slightly premature, medical professionals advised us to wake up every 2 hours, on the clock, to feed her. We realized after a month that was a bad idea: She was strong enough to let us know when sh was hungry, and we were going completely insane.
During that period, we gave up on this garden. They were raised beds filled with topsoil and compost. The weeds enjoyed our absence.
Why am I telling you this? Because, at the end of the season, my wife weeded the beds. What you see in the picture were the weeds she couldn’t pull.
Standing next to them, I had to crane my head to see the tops. They were woody stems, thick enough that we had to saw them out. You see, the weed had made deep roots, clinging to the bottom of the blocks.
They were strong, healthy plants, but they were useless. Worse than useless, in fact, since they would take from sun and soil what we intended for vegetables.
And we let that happen.
It’s time to intentionally cultivate
The organizations facing scandals let those scandals happen as well.
Like our garden, culture is what you allow.
How could you be more intentional about the culture you want for your team? Where do you need more soil? Where do you need weeding? What are yo doing to cultivate your people?
The training and culture-building of the ancients became what we now call “classical education.” There are many lessons here I am turning into a book, “The Lost Tools of Business.” More to come.