Evolving Culture

It is strange to say that an organization has a culture when you are
in it – but it definitely has one looking from the outside.

Culture is the sum total of the collective agreement of people in an
organization – which is why it is difficult, hard and often near
impossible to change. A strong culture becomes self-reinforcing and has
been described as a virus. It parts thrive on its good elements and
ejects everything that does not fit into its own definition of the
world.

Cultures will never change in total as it drives business models,
distributes power, defines communication styles and re-enforces
itself.

So how does one evolve a culture – which ironically often lives long
after the founders of the culture have departed?

A key aspect is to identify behaviors that are undesirable and then
to not address the behaviors only, but the beliefs in the organization
that drives those behaviors. The behavioral school has for too long
ignored the fact that beliefs, fears and historic lessons learnt get
embedded in policies and have failed to design an adequate model for
culture change through behavioral modification only.

In an organization it may become the culture to allow people to
swear. The belief underlying the behavior may be to let people feel that
they are expressing themselves. The validity of the culture cannot be
questioned, except if it has a negative impact on the brand and/or
bottom line of the company over time. In order to address the behavior,
the belief first has to be changed.

All the literature indicates that corporate culture is hard to change
– but few investigators have looked at the belief systems of
organizations and it would be a meaningful direction of enquiry to
determine if belief systems is easier or harder to modify that
behavior.