HR FORUM

What Is Your Business Culture?

5 essential tips for pinpointing your customs—and positively influencing staff behaviors

as consultants who are asked to help practices improve financial and operational performance, we first ask clients, “What’s your culture like?” The responses from practices often include:

“I don’t know.”



“What exactly IS culture?”



“That seems like ‘soft fluff’ to me.”

Culture is not fluff. Understanding your business culture—and its impact—is a vital skill for business leaders, because it ultimately affects the financial bottom line of your practice.

YOUR TWO CULTURES

There are two levels to consider. The first is outward facing or external: values, expectations for behaviors, and belief systems. Often, these are included in a policy manual: “This is how we treat customers,” “These are our quality standards,” “This is how we function day to day within our reporting structure.”

The second—and the real indicator of your business culture—is what I call the unwritten rules of engagement. These are the ways in which people, including your practice’s leaders, really interact. If these behaviors are not openly discussed and defined they will evolve on their own, and usually into negative patterns that undermine progress. These patterns include:

Individuals just can’t seem to get along or departments seem determined to undermine one another rather than cooperate.



Tasks don’t get completed, and individuals don’t take responsibility; the same mistakes are repeated.



Goals are not met, and your requests to help fix the problem are met with blank stares.

Recognize any of these patterns? These unwritten rules and behaviors will provide clues to how committed your team really is to meeting your practice goals.

ADDRESSING THE UNCOMFORTABLE

It’s that second level of culture, the unwritten rules and accepted behavior, that is often not recognized, is misunderstood, or is just ignored by management. Addressing this behavior is uncomfortable—it takes real work and persistence to address the underground stuff. But the work is needed if your practice is to run professionally.

To help you recognize these unwritten rules and address corresponding behavior, here are some areas to explore:

YOUR LEADERSHIP STYLE. How engaged are you with your team? Do individuals on your team respect you as a leader? Do you understand what motivates members of your team? Do you share or withhold information, including financial data? Are you a collaborator or a rule-maker? Do you have measurable goals that have been shared with the team? Do you celebrate success or “whack” at mistakes?

BEHAVIORAL STYLES. Over 75% of your team, including O.D.s, is stressed to some degree by change and unpredictability. Business is unpredictable. What worked yesterday will likely not work as well tomorrow. Adaptation is a must.

You can help by providing tools to help the team navigate stressors. There are many such tools available, such as DISC behavioral and emotional intelligence assessments, to help team members learn more about themselves and others.

GENERATIONAL DIFFERENCES. Generational undercurrents can hamper a team. Baby boomers (1943-1960) may view Gen Xers (1960-1980) as disrespectful, while Xers may view boomers as rigid. Gen Xers may see millennials (1980-2000) as self-absorbed, while millennials may think Xers are completely cynical. These generalizations undermine collaboration. The good news is that differing points of view, once understood, can add value to problem solving.

STAFF DEVELOPMENT. Feedback systems should provide coaching for performance improvement. Too often these systems are poorly constructed and inconsistently delivered, and marginal performance is handled punitively instead of constructively. Believe it or not, investment in training is a key staff motivator. Money is not the only reward that works.

REWARD SYSTEMS. Compensation systems that award bonuses unequally, like spiffs, can contribute to cultural havoc. They can result in “us-versus-them” thinking and prima donna mentalities. In the extreme, bullying behavior can result when work groups are not all pulling toward the same goals for growth and improvement.

BOTTOM LINE

If you want to know your true bottom line (aka what’s really going on in your business), ask yourself what’s really going on with—and among—your staff members. Figuring that out takes time and patience, and defining your desired culture takes months, if not years.

Assessing—and then dealing with—these common behaviors is your job number one.

—Amanda Van Voris

Amanda Van Voris is director of client solutions at Cleinman Performance Partners, a full-service business consultancy specializing in the development of high-performance practices. ©2015 Cleinman Performance Partners, Inc.