Perspectives

WHAT MAKES A CULTURE?

What makes up your organisation’s culture? You may well have articulated values, a vision, purpose and mission. But culture is more than words on a page or a mural on the reception wall. Your culture isn’t done once you articulate your values. There is so much more to it than that…
What makes up your organisation’s culture? You may well have articulated values, a vision, purpose and mission. But culture is more than words on a page or a mural on the reception wall. Your culture isn’t done once you articulate your values. There is so much more to it than that…
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WHAT MAKES A CULTURE?

At The Innovation Beehive, we are privileged to work with organisations to diagnose, define and develop their culture. Many organisations, when we first meet them, ask us to articulate their culture. This is important, but it is only the beginning of the journey you need to take.

A well known image to visualise culture is the iceberg analogy: the idea that what is visible is only a fraction of what exists. This was developed by Edgar Schein, but he took it one step further in a less well known metaphor, which actually articulates culture far more accurately than the iceberg.

THE CULTURE LILY POND

Schein suggests that culture can be viewed as a Lily Pond.

  • The Lily Pads: We can see the lily pads and flowers on the surface. These are the cultural artefacts: the words we use to articulate our culture, our brand and, the outward manifestation of a behaviours. In short, the lily pads represent what can be seen externally. These are easy to articulate, but harder to sustain if they are not supported and nurtured.
  • The Stem of the Water Lily: Going deeper, under the surface, we find the stems of the Water Lily. These give structure to the whole. These are the mindsets, the organisational relationships, the power dynamics and the behavioural drivers that give structure to the organisation’s culture. Without understanding and taking care of these, we risk the whole structure collapsing.
  • The Roots of the Water Lily: Deeper still, into the soil, we encounter the roots of the Water Lily. These give structure, but also feed the whole. In the metaphor, these represent the emotional ground and motivational roots of the people in your organisation. This runs deep. If the emotional connection to the culture is not the there, the roots will be rotten and the culture will die. If the motivation is not there, the culture will not be nurtured and fed, and will wither.

Schein’s analogy is useful for thinking about culture, because it pushes us to work hard to explore and investigate our organisation as an holistic, living entity. Doing this will ensure our culture articulation truly reflects what is going on beneath the surface.

WHAT TO CONSIDER WHEN GOING DEEPER

So we know that our culture runs deeper than the words we use to describe it. But what levers can we pull to enhance it? Another model of culture illuminates this question. Johnson and Scholes developed a framework called ‘The Culture Web’, which outlines six areas of focus for influencing culture.

  • Symbols: These are the words we say about our culture, the brand we use, the signifiers we adopt. Too often, this is as far as organisations go on their cultural journey
  • Rituals and Routines: You could say this is the ‘way we do things around here’, which has been used as a definition of culture in the past, but as the Lily Pond analogy shows, culture is so much more than this.
  • Control Systems: As the saying goes, what gets measured gets done. Control systems can make or break your desired culture. Cultures fail when the things that are controlled, encouraged or enforced are misaligned to the behaviours and expectations outlined in the culture.
  • Power Structures: Whether your organisation has a command and control structure or is a holocracy, the power dynamics at play are both seen and unseen. This mean that, whatever you may say about your structure, there will be power dynamics that remain unspoken. These need tone understood and managed if your culture is going to thrive.
  • Organisational Structures: Team dynamics, silos, multi-site, office layout and many other factors all make up your organisational structure. Recognising the impact of this on your culture is essential for creating a strong and resilient culture.
  • Stories: Your people are emotional beings. They need to connect with purpose and values on a deeply level. This means it is vital that we communicate with passion about our culture. Stories are told and shared whether we plan for them to be or not! So it is vital to own the narrative of your culture with honesty, transparency and passion.

Focusing on these elements of your culture will enable you address every level of the Lily Pond analogy. As the visual below shows, the symbols are the visible manifestation of your culture and are nurtured by the other five elements.

WHAT TO DO?

The six areas of the Culture Web are the building blocks of your culture. They all need to be addressed in time, but it is useful to have sense of where to start. So we have developed a Roadmap to Culture, which outlines the best flow we have identified to follow in order to build a stable, impactful and meaningful culture.

The six stages address different elements of the Culture Web and, ultimately, create a culture that is grounded, stable and a true manifestation of your organisation’s best self.

TAKE YOUR FIRST STEP ON YOUR CULTURE JOURNEY

If you want to enhance the culture in your team or organisation, take a first step by meeting with our culture expert, Joe Nagle, for a free one hour consultation on your organisation’s culture. In this session we will explore:

  • What your culture looks like right now
  • Where you have made progress on the Roadmap to Culture
  • What structures and activation elements you could put in place
  • What barriers you may encounter to activating your culture
  • What next steps you could take

You’ll receive a free, personalised report from the meeting and this will give you meaningful insight to continue your culture journey.

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