Culture is Process

I think workplace “culture” is the idea that our values are embodied in how we behave. Leaders support the culture through modeling…

I think workplace “culture” is the idea that our values are embodied in how we behave. Leaders support the culture through modeling, coaching, recruiting, and by recognizing and celebrating choices made by the team.

Leaders want to see values and culture made real consistently. We want to see their ongoing effect throughout the company. How do we do that?

I’m not sure! It’s not easy. But here’s one observation.

Culture is process, and process is culture. If I want to emphasize the impact that values and culture have on our work, I should go and make sure they’re incorporated into my process. Here’s what I mean.

Inclusion is a core value. We help managers improve diversity in their teams by supporting them with tools and process that guide them, for example in recruiting and retention.

The Salesforce announcement that they’ll tie executive pay to diversity aspirations is a good example. That’s a process that’s making the values real for the leadership. Another company has a process that prevents an offer letter from being created before reviewing evidence that a diverse slate of candidates was considered. That’s awesome. Let’s innovate!

Trust is another important value. Leaders create a sense of safety when they trust their teams, and we hope they’ll trust us in return.

How do we support a culture of trust in our process? Here are some ideas:
- Take senior leaders out of your hiring loop, delegate hiring authority to teams
- Do upward or 360 reviews that foster a sense of accountability for leaders
- Make your goal setting process as concise as possible. Communicate about it thoughtfully and carefully, and in writing. Clarity fosters trust.

Finally my favorite value, customer focus! Easy to say, hard to do. It’s probably already in your values statement, so let’s put it in your process! Some ideas:
- Which teams need better customer focus? How might we integrate our customers into their process? Example: At the Directors meeting, let’s ask Support to talk us through a ticket that has been open for 30 days or more.
- Lots of companies are onboarding new employees through the Customer Support team, which is super. Let’s have everybody do one day of support every quarter.
- Operationalize weekly customer interviews that are open for everybody to attend. There are nuts and bolts to this, but do not let it stop you. Perfect is the enemy of good.

Values + culture = process. Unless you put them in your process, your values and culture could be reduced to a slogan.