Passion Part III - Culture

In this series of posts, I write about passion as a force multiplier in an organization and the creation of passion through individuals who know their role, are convinced their role matters and see the good of their work.  I argue that leaders must focus on five elements to create this level of passion; vision, culture, principles, style and sacrifice.  A previous post discussed vision, this post is focused on culture.

Culture eats strategy for breakfast.  Makes you laugh at first until you realize it is true.  An organization with strategy, but a culture that will not allow the strategy to happen, is cursed from the outset.  The dictionary defines culture as the predominating attitudes and behavior that characterize the functioning of a group or organization.  A little stilted for me.  Let's try a mental picture; think of a 2x2 table with internal vs. external on the horizontal axis and individual vs. group on the vertical axis.  As an individual, I am judged by my behavior.  That is the external box.  However, my behavior is created by my beliefs.  That is the internal box.  For the group the word that goes in the external box is culture, the words that go in the internal box are shared values.  Culture is the collective shared values of the people in the organization. 

So what shared values create passion?  Some of the values depend upon the strategy of the organization.  The organization might want to be innovative.  If the organization is bureaucratic and punishes risk, innovation is not likely.  The organization might want to deliver the highest quality, but if the culture consists of rapid decision making without data then the strategy of high quality will suffer.  While some of the culture will depend upon the strategy, there are three values that must be shared for passion to exist in an organization:

1. Merit vs. entitlement
2. Straight talk vs. passive aggressiveness
3. Accountable vs. paternalism

Merit vs. entitlement - There are places you walk into where entitlement reigns.  People sashay around with the basic attitude, "because I have this badge - someone owes me something".  It is a be-served vs. a serve mentality.  Merit based cultures share a value of, "I first owe my customer, my colleagues and my company something, once delivered, I can expect something for me".  The best talent wants to be in a merit environment because they know they can win and be proud of their work.

Straight talk vs. passive aggressiveness - Nothing wounds passion more than passive-aggressiveness.  This is the type of behavior where you might say to me, "Alex, you are doing such a wonderful job, your work is great and you are a fantastic contributor to the organization".  Then you walk into the next office and say, "Alex is such a waste of oxygen, I have no idea why he is here".  Straight talk is difficult.  Straight talk means looking someone in the face and telling them the truth about their capability, contribution, skills or style.  And then coaching them.  Humans tend to avoid this conversation, or as my 12-year old Aristotle-like son Will says, "Dad, grown-ups tell you want you want to hear, kids tell you the truth".  One way to get into a rhythm of straight talk is to imbed the words 'judge' vs. 'observe' into your skull.  Avoid judging and focus on observing.  To judge is to form an opinion or estimate; to observe to see, watch, perceive, or notice, especially so as to learn something.  I was taught this rhythm by a good friend of mine Damon Beyer who is a partner at Katzenbach Partners.  Damon is one of the real leaders in cultural change management and drilled into my head;  Observation, Effect, Recommendation.  Observation is  fact with detail, Effect is the real impact on people or situations and Recommendation is a concrete statement to retain or change that which was observed.  When this pattern is followed, judgment rarely occurs. Without judgment straight talk can thrive.

Accountable vs. paternalism - Organizations that share a value of paternalism tend to follow a similar pattern.  If things are going well, everyone thinks they are individually doing a great job.  If the organization is struggling, people stand around the water cooler and talk about how much they need or want 'daddy' to fix it.  The real danger with paternalism is that the origin lies with the leadership.  The leaders assume they are smarter and can make better decisions than anyone else in the organization.  They get involved in details at all levels and if someone is deciding every last detail of how you get your job done, you stop thinking for yourself.  Given the type of world we are all competing in, we need a lot of individual initiative.  People with courage, intelligence, competence and self-confidence bloom in an organization with accountability and decision making at the right levels.

Culture eats strategy for breakfast.  We must have the right shared values in place for passion to exist.  The basic foundation includes merit, straight talk and accountability.  If these don't exist and you have been the leader of your organization for more than six months than the first place to look is in the mirror.  Because whatever the leader is interested in, the people become fascinated by...or as Robert E. Lee once wrote, "You must be careful how you walk, and where you go, for there are those following you who will set their feet where yours are set"

In the next three posts, I will write about principles, style and sacrifice - three elements that the leader can use bring a merit-based, straight talk accountable culture into their organization.