Maintaining company culture

Before jumping to improving or maintaining your culture, let’s discuss the specific culture types. Cultures can be defined by two major competing value propositions: 

• Whether the company values stability or change. 
• Whether the company is internally focused or externally focused. 

Based on those values, an organization will fall within one of the four organizational cultures:

So, which culture is right for your organization? To best answer that question, you’ll need to consider your business strategy. A tool like Team Discovery will define which quadrant your executives believe is best for the company at the moment.

Once you’ve identified your current company culture, you can assess how it stacks up to the one you want. Go directly to the source–your people–and poll how you’re doing. Engagement surveys are a great way to take a magnifying glass to your organization. They allow employees to provide confidential feedback that can identify how aligned–or misaligned–they are with your business strategy. 

Consider the question, “I feel I am recognized for the work I do.” If the results come back and many responses are lower than expected, perhaps your values don’t align with your actions. Perhaps your organization is promoting improved teamwork but at the same time is praising employees based on individual performance and encouraging competition against one another.