Oct 27 2021
Culture Change | MIT Sloan Management Review | Rose Hollister et al.
How the authors see it: “We define culture as a shared set of values (what we care about), beliefs (what we believe to be true), and norms of behavior (how we do things). […] We developed a set of culture transformation principles that maximize the likelihood of success:
- Recognize that responsibility for culture can’t be delegated.
- Start with the “why.”
- Define the target cultural values and behaviors.
- Engage and get input.
- Build a bridge to the future desired culture.
- Build a culture road map.
- Reinforce the desired culture in all organizational systems.
- Rapidly reward the emerging culture. “
Source: Hollister, R., Tecosky, K., Watkins, M, & Wolpert, C. (2021) Why Every Executive Should Be Focusing on Culture Change Now, MIT Sloan Management Review, Reprint 63137
Michel Baudin‘s comments: I define culture more simply as “the way we do things around here.” You don’t change it by making it the goal of a change program. To do it, first, you change the work, and then employees’ perceptions follow.
Redesign shop floor layouts to facilitate flow, develop multiskilled operators, hire employees for whole careers and retain them through thick and thin, engage them in solving problems,…
Over time, employees realize it’s not idle talk about lofty goals but concrete changes to their daily experience, including teamwork. Then it becomes “the way we do things around here,” in other words, a new culture.
October 28, 2021 @ 12:56 am
Very insightful and exhaustive. I am also working on the same topic for my Ph.D. dissertation here back in India. Would love if we can work on some common ground
October 28, 2021 @ 11:33 am
Yes – I had the good fortune to have spent a week with Ed Schein on this topic – early in my career. One comment that he made that has persisted with me for the last 30 years is: “You don’t change culture by trying to change culture.” Rather, one needs to look at all of the elements of organizational architecture and employ those to enable people to be successful in using new behaviors – behaviors that eventually become a part of their daily regimen.
October 28, 2021 @ 11:39 am
It’s true that you have to redesign the work. The problem is that a lot of mgrs think they have already done that. Still, they are wading in process errors and product nonconformances. In fact, the mgrs didn’t fully engage the workers in the redesign process. Therefore the existing process is below par. The engagement of the workers in designing the process is the culture change that’s necessary.
October 28, 2021 @ 9:34 pm
1) I really like the way culture is defined by David Mann in Creating a Lean Culture.
“…we can think of culture asa the knowledge an adult needs if how things re done to stay out of trouble as a member of a group.” “One fo the interesting things about culture is the for group members, culture is invisible.”
2) The culture of any organization is shaped by the worst behavior the leader is willing to tolerate.
Educators Gruenert and Whitaker
October 31, 2021 @ 12:49 pm
Culture of an organisation takes its birth when the mission and vision of the organisation are established .The set of values, beliefs should not change. They are permanent. Only the way we do what we do to realise the mission and vision can undergo changes to keep pace with the competition and continue to survive.
November 1, 2021 @ 10:31 am
Viswanathan
In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, they are not.
Cultures in organizations change due to many causes, not just in response to competition.
I have seen organizational cultures in several organizations change rapidly, sometimes in response to competitor/market positions, but more often due to changes in leadership.
November 2, 2021 @ 9:08 am
Leadership changes the culture only to achieve better results compared to competition that is there already or perceived to be in the time to come. Any change is painful and no leader will do just for the sake of it.