Last month I wrote about change, and concluded with a couple of quotes from Andrew Carnegie:
“If I lost every dollar I ever made, but still had the people I work with, in five years I would be wealthier than I am today.”
And this one: “I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do.”
I am following up by continuing the discussion of culture.
The word culture is one of those words that has a terrific variety of meanings in different contexts. When I was younger my parents took my brother and sister and I to plays and classical orchestral concerts to expose us to culture. By the time I finished high school I was exposed to the drug culture, had participated in biology class experiments involving a culture which was a medium for the cultivation of bacteria, and we were host family to several international students who each hailed from a quite different culture than ours.
When you hear the term “Corporate Culture” what comes to your mind? Is it a positive thought? Or, is there a sense that your corporate culture needs some adjustment?
I believe that your culture is who you are. It is exactly who you are, not who you say you are, and not who you want to become. It is how you and your organization behave, right now. It cannot be anything else. It is impossible to say that you are one thing and consistently behave differently from that.
I recently attended a SHRM Chicago Roundtable discussion on culture. We discussed the idea that among the most important aspects of culture, as identified by employees are these three:
Respect
Credibility
Fairness
In our work at Perspective Power we have found that Respect is something that people want, perhaps as much as anything else, in their relationships. Their personal relationships and their work. And that as important as it is to be respected, we have just as great a need as individuals to be able to respect others with whom we relate.
I will pick up again next month with a discussion of respect.
This Article was written by co-Founder of Perspective-Power, Brian Reinbold: Originally written for Chicago SHRM (Society of Human Resource Management) January 2017 Column: “Organizational Development Perspectives. Fresh ideas on Leadership, Culture and Communication”
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