Change Culture…..No magic wand can fix it for you.  

It is alarming just how many organisations commission people to “fix their culture” for them. It is also worrying just how many senior leaders within organisations detach themselves from this equation and see “the culture” being anybody around them but rarely consider themselves a critical part. Cultural change is most certainly a journey and has no quick fix or sticking plaster solution. You can not put a set time frame around it and differing methods will have differing rates of success, depending on your unique organisational circumstances, behaviours and values.

There are many ways to start to build and positively change a culture and it must start by being a truly holistic approach from top to bottom- nobody is excluded. An organisation must view change as an opportunity to engage and involve its people from end to end. This may sound like a very simple statement but I can speak from experience where programmes and projects do not receive the timely and appropriate business resource required to deliver change nor do they involve people end to end. On numerous occasions (and after many conversations) you may get some resources towards the business end at maybe the testing or training stage, though maybe not be the correct type of resource and potentially not those that defined the requirement at the outset….sound familiar?

This is certainly not a statement of intent to build and shape YOUR change culture by only giving the minimum level of commitment at sporadic stages through a change process. I appreciate there are conflicting demands and of course teams will have a day job, so there will be a reluctance to commit fully but then you must ask yourself….do you truly want to change?

The culture will not shift itself that is for sure but the organisation can plan more effectively to ensure the right resources can be made available at the appropriate times. Bringing your people along on the journey, allowing the time and creating the “head space” to change will not only empower others and create confidence but will start to build towards an improved culture that is better aligned to your vision, goals and values.

 

It is far easier to steer a boat successfully when you are all clear on the direction of travel, motivated to row hard and are all pulling together.

If you are the captain and your boat has a leak along the way….. do you;

a). Carry on rowing and hope it is a small leak.

b). Split your team. Some row and some grab a bucket. Hoping the rowers are more effective than the water removers.

c). Stop. Find the leak, plug the hole and re focus your team to go again.

d). Abandon ship. Obviously, a dodgy boat.

 

Attend to the cultural aspects as a priority, start out on that journey as the difficulty with delivering change against a backdrop of cultural challenge makes implementation, embedding change and realising benefits particularly difficult. Using my boat analogy…..It would be like taking the leaky ship on your voyage and having to also row against a strong tide.