Engaging a High-Performance Culture

This article is based on “Driving Long-Term Engagement through a High-Performance Culture,” which is featured in a 3-volume reference on employee engagement called Building High-Performance People and Organizations (Martha Finney, editor; Greenwood Publishing Group; May 2008).Culture may take top honors as the most mysterious and difficult-to-get-your-arms-around lever of employee engagement. It’s amorphous and intangible. Not long ago, biologists were the only ones creating it — in Petri dishes. Organizational development experts studied it, and there were a few maverick businesspeople, like Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines, who credited culture as the secret to their firm’s success. Most businesspeople dismissed it as soft HR stuff — until leaders like Kelleher started getting attention for the successes they enjoyed, especially in adverse economic times.Corporate culture at its most basic level is the sum of an organization’s behaviors and practices. It is there whether you have deliberately shaped it or not. It reveals itself in big and small decisions as well as daily practices (”how we do things around here”) that tend to perpetuate themselves. Culture often goes unnoticed by employees (like the air you breathe), yet a healthy culture (like clean air) is essential to a healthy organization. It’s potentially the most powerful engagement tool at your disposal. If you get culture right, it provides a foundation for high engagement that can sustain your workforce through good times and bad.Key Ingredients of a High-Performance Culture High-performance cultures are shaped around the following three components:

• A clear, compelling corporate mission. A mission, or purpose as some firms call it, is a statement that answers the question of why the company exists: “What’s your reason for being?” It needs to inspire, inform business decisions, generate customer loyalty, ignite employee passion, and motivate discretionary effort. “Making money” doesn’t qualify as a mission, although profitability is essential to a firm’s survival. And although a mission does not have to reflect a “save the world” tone, it does need to be aspirational and clear enough to engage employees. Its mere existence serves as the organization’s North Star, providing a fixed point to which the workforce can connect.
• Shared organizational values. Core values guide employee behavior and influence business practices as your organization delivers on its promises to customers, employees, and other stakeholders. Core values answer the question: “What are your guiding principles, your authentic, enduring ‘rules of the road’?” Your business strategies shift to meet market demands. Your core values don’t.
• Shared accountability. High-performance cultures require an environment that encourages employee ownership of both the organization’s bottom-line results and its cultural foundation. Culture affects everyone and is everyone’s business. It’s essential, then, that the entire workforce understands the core drivers of your culture and share responsibility for sustaining them.

Pitfalls to Avoid in Shaping Your Culture Copycat CulturesThe mission and organizational values at the core of your culture need to be yours. Benchmarking just doesn’t work. Your culture needs to be unique if it is to be a competitive differentiator — to engage your employees in your marketplace with your business objectives. There’s nothing more de-motivating than trying to be something you’re not. Cultures that engage employees leverage their uniqueness while at the same time raising the bar with aspirational goals.The Celebrity CEO on a TimelineBeware of new leaders bent on promises of rapid culture change. The news is full of CEOs parachuting in to save a firm only to be spat out a year or two later by the very culture he or she is trying to change.Communication BreakdownsNo news here. You can’t conduct a few town hall meetings and call it a day. Just when you thought you’ve said it enough, say it again. Take a tip from the marketing department: Stay “on message.” You may feel like a broken record, but remember that it’s constant radio play that creates hit records — with everyone knowing the words and singing along. Leaders at every level have the opportunity to state and re-state what the organization stands for as well as the organization’s strategy and values.AbstractionsIntegrity. Respect. Customer First. Innovation. Risk Taking. Who could argue with those words? But what do they look like in your organization? How can they be applied each day in every person’s job? That’s where two-way dialogue between employees and managers, not one-way corporate communications, matter. Engagement results when all employees understand why their jobs matter and how they can live the organization’s values.Mis-Steps at the TopDon’t think that the failures of senior leaders to model the values will go undetected. Actions speak louder than words. And though our research indicates that most employees don’t feel safe challenging their leaders’ decisions and behavior, our findings also suggest that they’ll take stock — and move on if there’s hypocrisy at the top.Missing Links in the MiddleCulture is too amorphous and large for senior leaders to effectively maintain it without help from the front lines. Yet most managers are squeezed between the urgency to deliver business results and the need to establish a high-performance culture. If they are held accountable for business results only, or if they see culture as a senior leadership responsibility, the culture will suffer. Give them the tools and support — and accountability — they need to succeed.Misaligned Business PracticesAll the elegant messages and well-intentioned leader behaviors will be for naught if the systems and policies that keep your organization running conflict with your culture’s core drivers.Taking Culture Too FarIt’s rare, but possible, to focus so much on culture that you take your eye off your market. Consider Levi-Strauss — touted for its workplace breakthroughs but so internally focused that the firm forgot how to make a good and profitable pair of jeans. A solid business strategy translated into daily work priorities is a requirement for high engagement so that employees are not only enthusiastic about their work but they also focus their talents to make a difference to the bottom line.An End DateCulture is like a living organism that needs constant feeding and grooming. As your organization grows, recruits need to be assessed for cultural fit, new hires introduced into the culture, and employees reminded with vivid examples of the mission and core values in action. Leaders need to communicate, model, and model even more. If you look away, your culture will continue to grow, but not necessarily in the direction you need to ensure the high performance and high engagement you need to sustain success in your market.

Add comment August 5th, 2009

A Mother of A Leader

Once again, I was twittered this insightful and heartwarming article that I would like to share with you. Please feel free to add your comments here or send a note to the author - Erin Schreyer - with your thoughts.

Have you hugged a leader today?

This past Mother’s Day weekend, I thought a lot about the joy I have with my children, as well as the blessings I have received from my own mother.  Mothers have a deep sense of pride in what we do.  We want to do it well because we sense that the impact our efforts will shape the lives of our children forever.

When I think about the responsibilities of being a mother, they are great.  Often, they are synonymous with the characteristics of outstanding leadership.  Think of the parallels:

Mothers and leaders must be inspirational and visionary.

They can’t waste energy on obstacles, difficult situations and “I can’t.”  Instead, they must forge ahead – goal-oriented – breaking barriers with optimism and encouragement, showing their family that creative solutions can bring success.  Moms are problem-solvers, out-of-the-box thinkers who want to push the limits and provide for their children.  In a sense, weren’t Moms the first entrepreneurs?

Remember the inspiration she gave you, so that you had the belief you could do anything?  Even before the words “entrepreneur” or “inspiration” existed, mothers had paved the way by bringing us into this world and providing a vision of how great our lives can be!  Likewise, leaders should inspire to bring out the best in their teams.  They should encourage and support fresh, new ideas, be ready to take some calculated risks and celebrate the rewards of taking their organizations to new and exciting places.

Mothers and leaders add value by serving others.

As stated by John Maxwell in The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership… “the bottom line in leadership isn’t how far we advance ourselves but how far we advance others.”

From the day you were born, you mother nurtured you, supported you and sacrificed for your well being.  Yes, mothers often put the needs of their children ahead of their own….and they do so to build into them and give them the greatest tools, abilities and methods to achieve success.  “What can I do for you?” is a commonly used phrase. That’s leadership at its finest!!  An organizational leader should be sure they are empowering their team, giving credit where credit is due and being generous by sharing his/her time, knowledge and resources.

Mothers and leaders must be able to connect emotionally to others.

Primal Leadership: “Even if they get everything else just right, if a leader fails in this primal task of driving emotions in the right direction, nothing they do will work as well as it could or should.”   

Think of a time in your life when you felt emotionally hurt and you shared that with your mom.  She made you feel better, didn’t she?  Moms are not only good listeners, but they have a way of knowing just the right thing to say to help you move forward in a better direction.  Moms acknowledge their children, express empathy and connection, and then they leave you with a sense that you can do better next time.  Leaders should also realize that their emotions are contagious.  If they resonate positive energy and enthusiasm, it will likely rub off on their teams.  That emotional connection may take everything else to the next level.

Mothers and leaders must know when to lead and when to let go.

John Maxwell writes “Good leaders recognize that when to lead is as important as what to do and where to go. Timing is often the difference between success and failure in an endeavor.”

The greatest responsibility of parenting is raising our children to be the best they can be…out on their own.  It’s years of building into them to let them go and flourish.  Throughout their childhood they need their mom’s guidance, love, and support.  We must lead them….and we must let go – just like that spectacular moment when you let go for your child’s first two-wheeled bicycle ride.  Moms must lead when needed and let go when needed.  The same is true for great leadership.  There are times to step up and lead, and there are times to allow others to do the work.  There are times when decisive actions need be taken, and a good leader knows how to identify these and make them happen.

There are many likenesses, indeed, between mothers and leaders.  And in fact, yes, mothers ARE leaders in many respects.  The biggest differentiating factor, however, is that a mother’s love is deeper, more passionate, protective and joyful than any business can bring.  While we can enjoy our careers and business leadership, the fact remains that no earthly act is more gratifying than being a mother and being loved in return by your children.  That unconditional emotioncan inspire even the greatest of all leaders. 

Have you experienced a leader who possessed the attributes of a great mother? How did it impact your performance? How have you taken the example provided by a great mom and demonstrated that to your team? If you have, how did they react? I would love to hear an example of maternal leadership that has paid off in real results with your team! Please share.

——————————————————————— Erin Schreyer is the Owner and Managing Partner of Sagestone Partners, LLC. She can be reached at eschreyer@sagestone-partners.com.

Image Source: wahmbreakcafe.com

Add comment May 13th, 2009