Culture

Culture is a funny thing. When it's good it's great, and when it's not - we forget how important it is. Culture defines how we contribute to the group or team or organization that we're part of in many ways. Strong positive cultures tend to see 'more' from their people, while less positive or even weak culture have their staff view where they spend time as just their job.

Culture is created through example by the leadership, or those the leaders nominate, and it's precariously balanced. One bad egg can wreck a culture - as it often is manifest as an unstated set of rules that we follow because we want to. When one person acts counter-culturally, it spreads a toxic feeling - the rest of those involved recognize the anti-culture contagion, but are often powerless to stop it as culture rules aren't written down more often than not and hence can't be enforced.

Culture is very similar in a properties sense to an organization's or team's momentum. You know when you have it and others do too, but it's hard to recreate on demand.

Those responsible for culture, (and it's by-products of passion, energy and goal-focused behaviors) have a responsibility to maintain it positively and strongly. That they abdicate this responsibility in some cases is unacceptable. It's akin to throwing away an ROI focus, or accepting huge cost overruns. Sadly however as it's an intangible quality that not all recognize, the requirement to keep it strong, keep it burning well and preclude others from spoiling it is often overlooked. That's just a sign of simple lack of vision unfortunately.

So I ask you - what have you done today - yes, today - to promote a vibrant, healthy culture that helps empower your group, team or staff to go above and beyond. If the answer is nothing - then you have some work to do.