Culture + Climate + Context = Growth

Much has and will continue to be written, discussed, and debated about the role, influence, importance, and impact of culture in and on an organization.  Climate and context have equally been studied especially with respect to employee well being.  However, it is the integration of culture, climate and context that now more than ever are key to organizational growth and ultimately organizational success.

Here's why -

For the purpose of my discussion, I operationally define culture, climate, and context as:

·       Culture is both subjective and objective elements that can be summarized as the organizations values, norms and ways of behaving;

·       Climate consists of perceived as well as real organizational practices; and

·       Context is the organizational structure or configuration including work groups, workflow, reporting and span of control practices, and formal communication practices.

Lately, a lot of attention has been given to the transition of "start ups" from launch to profitable to scale.  What is of great interest is the "how" to maintain the excitement, enthusiasm, energy, focus, motivation, creativity, risk, and innovation to name just a few characteristics or traits of a start up through the transition. 

What intrigues me about the transition is one the most common misunderstandings of change and change management.  This is, if change is viewed as episodic, event driven, or need driven, the energy, effort to "ramp up" and deliver change creates more challenges that it solves.

What we have learned or should have learned is that change is constant.  As such, shifts in thinking about change and the change process are critical to the success or failure of an organization - their brand and brand deliverables as well as managing the brand experience.

The landscape is literally dotted with companies, institutions, organizations and their leadership that failed to accept that change is constant - continual.  Teetering on over simplification, the myriad examples studied reveal three common factors missing.  They are the presence and practice of anticipating, adjusting and adapting.

Organizations or businesses capable of anticipating, adjusting and adapting (A cubed) thrived while those that didn’t struggled eventually losing market share or worse – their existence.  Once a “nice” to have – A cubed is an essential component for organizational vitality. 

One example of the capability that A cubed produces are companies and organizations that have or are shifting to being proactive rather than reactive. They are intentional.  They are thoughtful. They are constantly and consistently learning as well as growing individually and collectively. They invest time in building an individual and collective mindset of “why not”.  They challenge themselves through stretching their imaginations, their creativity, and the design as well as innovations by, of and for solutions.  They embrace change as a core function and thus are positioned to thrive let alone survive.

A cubed shouldn't in anyway be reckless or irresponsible.  Rather, when an organization has shifted their individual and collective thinking to "change" and "changing" as natural and organic to the organizational culture, climate, and context they minimize errors or mistakes that are irreversible.

·       What are the assumptions that individuals have about the organizations mission, vision, and core values? Are the words and behaviors congruent?

·       What is the level of personal responsibility let alone organizational responsibility to hold one another accountable for making and keeping commitments?

·       What is the risk tolerance?  Are individuals or work teams affirmed and validated for creativity and innovation?

·       What role does learning play?  Do we take time to learn individual and corporately from what doesn’t work?  Do we study the “whys”?

·       How does fear impact individually and organizational performance?

·       What role does sarcasm play in our organization?

·       Are there patterns of negative, destructive behavior that have become normalized?

The aforementioned questions are not exhaustive but do reveal what individuals “think” as well as “interpret” that shape, influence, and impact individual and organizational behavior.  Without question we all have points of view on the culture and climate of an organization. 

Yet, it may be the context or “viewing point” we have that provides the opportunity for individual and organizational learning and growth creating the conditions necessary to integrate culture, climate and context for success.  

Next week – Context Matters!