The world of business is changing so much that companies are looking beyond just their mission and vision to build a conducive work environment that is challenging, enriching and satisfying for the employees. This environment is called “Workplace Culture”.

Studies have found that when a company invests in building its company culture. It can lead to an increase of 30% in employee engagement, 19% rise in operating income and even a 28% increase in earnings. These are hard facts concluded after conducting intensive research on company culture.

Organizations that create a great workplace environment is proven to consistently outperform their competitors. Company culture helps in recruiting the right fit resulting in reduced employee turnover and most importantly ensures high performance across all levels in the organization.

Having a great company culture is a competitive advantage in the world of business. Yet most organizations are not sure where to start when it comes to improving their culture.

How to build the right culture for your company?

In organisations there is usually an

These cultures will cause chaos and confusion to the employees and to the business. This sort of environment soon becomes unhealthy or toxic for the organisation.

✔ Many companies come to a joint decision based on observation and analysis that their company needs to undergo a culture transformation or maybe the culture needs to be reinforced with the workforce.

✔ Maybe you are a start up and are looking at developing a workplace culture that will stand the test of time as your company grows.

✔ Your company morale seems to be low and the workforce seems to be performing at a pace that is not in line with the company’s expectations. There seems to be an air of “accepted culture” rather than the “actual culture”. You feel that you need help in restructuring your company culture.

Whatever maybe your reasons, Company culture is the top priority in your company’s agenda. But how can you proceed with this? Do you create internal teams for handling this project or do you need to bring in an external facilitator?

Your internal team might seem like the ideal option to choose since they know the company and its culture. But that might not be exactly optimal to achieving the desired results. Your internal team is already exposed to the culture which might make them think things is the same line rather than bringing in fresh perspective. You might find that you have been going in circles.

An external facilitator will conduct a thorough analysis of your company’s culture and present you a report on what needs to be done. They might offer fresh perspective on how to deal with this. But ultimately the action plan that has been created must be practiced within the organization without any hesitation.

So, what can you do when you arrive at such a crucial point?
The solution is choosing both the options – An internal team and an external facilitator.

Your internal team will be responsible in managing the entire project as a representation of the company while the external facilitator will act as a guide in assessing your company culture. Both of them would then work together to create a plan that will address your culture.

But before that you need to define two factors,

1. Define Your Culture Vision – Internal

It does not matter that you do not know what exactly you are looking to achieve but a basic culture vision would be a good start.

✔ Deciding your culture vision needs to be done together internally. This vision must embody what your company means to achieve in terms of workplace environment and also in business.

✔ Deep introspection, brainstorming and discussions must be conducted to arrive at a consensus. You must ensure that the culture vision is mutually agreed on by everyone.

✔ Every organization has two sides- the “for” side and the “against” side. You might observe how some people welcome the concept of culture change and are ready to work for it. There are also those who view cultivating culture as a waste of company time and resources.

✔ Good culture consultants are equipped to handle such blocks when they cross them but rather than them having to completely address it you must address these views and create a joint consensus that will ensure smooth flow of the project. Also, this saves time for the consultant that can be concentrated elsewhere.

Once you have your culture vision set, you can start designing your company culture outcomes and also you can choose a consultant who can better relate with your vision and can deliver on it.

Example:

Our organization should be a pioneer in company culture in our industry by having a diverse workforce, collaborative atmosphere, delivering business with integrity, promoting innovation and valuing people.

2. Define The Culture Team – Internal

✔ Identify and define a dedicated culture team that is made up of members who will serve as ambassadors for the initiative.

✔ This team must take up the lead in the project by analysing the current culture, defining outcomes, addressing any limitations, acting as a guide to the culture consultant and being the point of communication between management and consultant.

✔ This team would also be the advocate for company culture by addressing teams on what is to be achieved and how can they contribute in cultivating culture.

Example:

“We are investing in culture because we care about our people and our culture. We encourage you to provide perspective related to this and we will make sure to address them”

It has to start with a leader explaining to the company why does the company need an effective culture, the team must work on its message about company culture by analysing and defining what must be communicated and by whom. Leadership roles must be encouraged to echo the defined message across all levels of the organisation.

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Now comes in Culture Consulting…,

Culture consulting is a practice designed to help companies achieve their financial, strategic, organizational and social goals by creating a desired organizational culture. This will help companies to assess and analyze their needs in terms of business. Culture consulting helps in determining how and what approach to use in defining your company culture that leads to overall satisfaction and increased profits.

There are consultants who specialize in culture consulting by assisting leaders in pinpointing a clear cultural direction and make a suitable plan for their company. Leaders will be trained on how to manage company culture as the company evolves and how to build teams that will help in upholding the company culture.

Leaders of today’s companies know the importance of company culture, but many still struggle to understand how to use culture to drive results within their company.

Culture consulting also serves as a collective voice of employees’ views. Employees often feel that opening up and being candid about the company might get them in trouble with the management. Consultants will ensure anonymity while providing employees opinions to management so this will encourage employees to be open and honest. This also means that you can get an even more realistic analysis of the culture.

Remember, when you are shaping your company culture, you must look at every aspect right from values of the organization to the way decision making happens and also look at the policies, processes and systems involved.

You need to choose a consultant that will work along with you in creating your aspired company culture.

Finding the right consultant for you:

Bringing in outside expertise in guiding your organization to cultivate its culture is an effective step in creating a high performing company culture.

Finding a company culture consultant that fits your organization takes more consideration than simply knowing where to look for a consultant.

Culture consultants know what data and information to concentrate on for each specific aspect in company culture. They have the experience to guide and inform about the actions to be taken based on the data.

The below factors should be considered while choosing a culture consultant,

FACTORS	PROCESS
Do your groundwork	First develop an understanding about company culture through literature and articles. This will provide you with direction. Example: The Culture Code by Daniel Coyle is a good read about company culture Look at your competitors and allies’ culture. You can take inspiration from them but you cannot decide that the same will work for your company. Research on the various consultants specializing in company culture. Find the one that fits your vision and would be able to better relate with your culture. The more you do your groundwork, the more prepared you are.
Market your message	Once you have defined your message, Broadcast it through your company’s channels of communication. Your message must communicate that there is nothing wrong with your culture rather you are investing in it to create a high performing culture. When you broadcast your message, interested consultants who relate with your message will find their way to you and soon you will be having options to choose from.
Ask for recommendations	Another best way to finding the right consultant is to ask for recommendations from peers, contacts and HR Consultancies. Culture consultants might come by different names or even specialized in one or more areas of HR. Remember to keep an open mind. Use your professional social networks to search for consultants, LinkedIn, SHRM are great places to hunt for culture consultants.
Screening your options	Once you have your list of consultants, start combing through their profiles to create a measurement criterion with which you can assess them. Make sure that the criteria adhere to your expectations from the consultants as well. Measure each consultant against the criterion and do a preliminary assessment that will provide you with a initial ranking. Schedule interviews with the consultants and ask them questions that will help you in finding the right fit, some examples of questions would be, How do they plan to approach your culture? The kind of examples and snippets they provide about their work How long have they been practicing as a culture consultant? What method of culture assessment will they use? The duration they typically take
Verifying the information	After interviewing the consultants, verify the information provided by them. Ask for client references Ask them to provide you with a report on the results they have delivered on Use your networks to do a background check on them
Assessing the consultants	Use your criterion and the discussion with the consultant as data for assessing the consultant Discuss with your culture team on their feedback While assessing, you must consider certain factors, Did the approach presented by the consultant fit your culture? Was the suggested approach a mix of quantitative and qualitative data? Did the consultant only address employee engagement, morale and core values? What kind of technology would the consultant use to generate reports? (If they use generic technology, they would be spending time for reports and presentations rather than time actually doing the work) How relevant is their experience in relation to your needs? How good are their delivered results? How do they make culture stick through reinforcements? (If the culture does not change after the consultant’s work is done, the employees will feel dejected by the management and this will further affect the work culture) Overall, how do you think would they fit into your culture?
Moving to next step	Once you have your final options of consultants, have a discussion with them again in terms of commercials, what would they exactly do, detailed outline of your vision, culture roadmap etc. Once the final discussion is done, brainstorm within your team to select the right consultant keeping in mind budget, alignment, plan of action and overall fit.
Deciding the consultant	Once you have made your decision, communicate it to the consultant and negotiate the terms in a proper way. Make sure that you cover every aspect of the project. Provide the consultant with time to reflect and get back as well. This will help them to regroup and come back with any terms that need to be addressed. Once the project is finalised, Make it legal for both the parties. This way you both are accountable. Negotiate the scope of work involved – employee engagement, surveys, duration, focus groups, leadership coaching and values designing etc.
Shifting into action	Once everything is signed and sealed, prepare your team and the company for the arrival of the consultant in terms of cooperation and openness. Make sure the culture team and the consultant are put in contact to collaborate further. There must be seamless communication between both. Address your organisation on the upcoming change and ease everyone into it by communicating clearly what will be happening over the next few months.

A consultant starts work in a specific way-

1. Gathering data through quantitative and qualitative measures (Focus groups, interviews and assessments)

2. How is the actual way of working (actual culture) and the desired way of working (desired culture) aligned with the optimal culture (strategic choice on which way of working best supports the execution of a given strategy within the available resources and time).

3. The consultant will then provide a compiled report of findings and insights to the management. The consultant will also provide recommendations on how to proceed further.

4. Once an approach is decided, the consultant will start working into the company to go deep into the culture. The best consultants will encourage employees to generate ideas for changes in company culture.

5. The consultant will work with leadership roles to train them to create effective teams and to carry on the culture despite any changes that may come up.

6. There are many culture consultants that place an emphasis on helping organizations develop best practices for remote work and flexible work arrangements.

7. The consultant must work on creating a long-term plan that will help in maintaining and cultivating the desired culture.

Conclusion:

Be very careful and aware in creating a company culture that is authentic to your organisation by considering your values, beliefs, vision, people and business. Encourage employees to act as advocates for your organization by enriching their employee experience by engaging them effectively to boost morale and inspire them to deliver high performance results.

No one can transform culture overnight. In fact, the consultant cannot change the culture by themselves. Culture improves when team members in the organization put effort into changing behaviours. Culture consulting takes time to analyse work culture and apply initiatives with leadership. Getting employees to adapt can be a slow process at times, depending on the nature of the activity.

Management needs to ensure that they are operating in a way that is consistent with the cultural expectations to which they hold others. It is important that management be held accountable to the culture and hold others to the culture.

When the return on investment (ROI) for the culture consultant shows a clear return, you must revisit your initial plan and think in term of term-term vision. You must work along with the consultant in creating a roadmap of long engagement that will track and monitor the culture.

Remember your culture must satisfy your organization’s immediate needs and also stand the test of time in terms of long-term business goals.