How to Change and then Sustain Your Workplace Culture

When was the last time you questioned your culture?

Spending quality time analysing the culture in your organisation will help you identify what needs to change, so you can move forward and grow. It won’t all need to change though, so it’s useful to pinpoint what’s working for you that needs to continue or be built on further.

We offer tips and advice on how to both change and sustain a culture that keeps your business viable - fuelling sustainable success.

What is a Workplace Culture?

Put simply, workplace culture is your organisation’s character and personality. It’s most often described as ‘the way things work around here’ and tied up in it are your:  

●      stories and narratives

●      rituals, ceremonies and symbolism

●      core beliefs, mission and history

●      values

●      communication network

●      organisational structure

●      systems, processes, procedures and ways of working

●      role models, opinion formers and behaviours

Cultures aren’t always organisation-wide, they can differ across locations, or even between teams.

Workplace culture impacts how effectively employees work, from the way they solve problems and collaborate to how they engage with their managers and what sense of belonging they feel to the organisation and their team.

More engaged and happier employees have a positive effect on productivity, customer satisfaction, employee retention and overall success with highly engaged teams showing 21% greater profitability.

Let’s look at how you can achieve a strong workplace culture and reap these benefits.

Check in with colleagues if you really want to change the culture

First, you need to know what’s stopping you from growing and moving forward. The easiest way to do this is by performing a culture audit.

Involve your entire organisation. Getting insight from your employees across the board will reveal factors about your culture that you wouldn’t be able to see from the top down.

You could run focus-group-style ‘Culture Workshops’ and ask employees what it means to work for your organisation. You should then ask them what isn't working to understand what needs changing – and, equally important, what aspects of your culture need reinforcing.

It’s essential to involve employees because it helps you to get their buy-in: they become invested in the culture change process.

This is powerful. Your people won’t just be following your instructions like a tick-box exercise. They’ll be shaping your desired culture through their everyday behaviours because they want to succeed as much as you do.

For more advice on executing cultural change, read our blog: Culture Change and the Importance of Internal Communications.

How to sustain what’s working for you

1. Nip negative behaviours in the bud before they gain strength 

A big part of sustaining positive cultural elements is anticipating the bad habits that might creep in and derail what you want to achieve.

For example, if a new leader joins your organisation in the future, they might bring values and attitudes into the business that clash with your culture. Leave this unchecked and it can create conflict among your people that threatens your progress.

To counter this, you could include one-to-one culture sessions in your onboarding or interview process, ensuring new employees at all levels understand what it means to work for your organisation.

If the person you’re analysing has conflicting attitudes, ask yourself: do they have the willingness and flexibility to change? If the answer is no, bringing them into your business may do more harm than good.

2. Align your management team

Think of your managers as the guiding beacons for your desired culture. If their values and behaviours are misaligned with those you want to sustain, they could also lead team members in the wrong direction. 

To align your management team, spend time assessing each member. The information you want to gain from this exercise is:

●      Do they embody the positive aspects of your culture?

●      What negative habits do they have?

●      Are they trusted by their teams and therefore able to influence culture change?

●      Are they being resistant to change?

●      What do they need from you to make the transition to a new culture easier?

Go through this exercise regularly to stop bad habits from spreading throughout your organisation. And be explicit about the behaviours you want managers to encourage in their own behaviour and in their team members’.

3. Encourage open and honest communication

A big part of sustaining your culture is making it easy for people to be open and honest when something isn’t working.

You can achieve this by keeping the lines of communication open between managers and employees. For example, make sure managers are always approachable, even if they are working remotely, and have the time for one-on-one meetings with their team members, who need regular attention from their manager.

Try scheduling quarterly culture group sessions that include feedback activities, encouraging employees at all levels to contribute their feedback and ideas.

It’s imperative that you follow-through on all employee suggestions. Following up shows that you’ve listened, and you value their input, helping build trust. In turn, this makes it easier for them to communicate openly, ensuring you get the real picture across the organisation.

4. Reward helpful and proactive behaviour

Reward and celebrate those people who are living your values and making the organisation what it is. It’s because of them that your culture is strengthening your business, and they deserve your recognition.

The best rewards are unique to an individual’s needs. The right reward will leave a lasting impression, giving the employee all the more reason to stick by you and help you realise your vision.

Understand what motivates individual employees in our blog. It’s important you reward people effectively to boost trust and encourage positive behaviours. Unsuitable rewards could sour the relationship you have with your people over the long-term.

In most cases, it’s as simple and straightforward as a genuine thank you that explains specifically what it is you value about them. For others, they may prefer the public recognition of thanking them in a team environment or copying a senior leader into an email recognising the employee’s achievements. Knowing that a senior leader knows who you are, what you do and that you’re good at it would be a boost to most people.

It’s all or nothing

You can put your heart and soul into evolving and sustaining your culture but if your employees aren’t one hundred percent invested in that journey with you, your efforts will fall flat. As the great French writer, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, once said:

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”

Use our advice to help them feel committed to living and breathing your culture, while in the process enhancing employee engagement, resulting in a virtuous payback cycle of even greater innovation, customer service, productivity and profit.