Organizational culture: effortless to form but slippery to influence

The instant two or more humans interact, culture is automatically formed. In the time it takes to buy a latte, you have formed a culture between you and the barista behind the counter. I’ll call that automatic culture. Instant, involuntary. Literally human nature.

If norms and expectations are met, that short interaction has a chance to become a good vibe (“hey, that barista was cool — hope I get him again next time.”)

Culture is like a neural network that lights up any time two or more humans interact. The memory of that interaction is registered by how each person feels walking away from that interaction. That cultural memory gets carried forward and builds momentum so that if two or more people interact often (like in families, social circles, communities, churches, book groups, teams), that automatic culture eventually forms a short-hand set of expectations and identity… “people like us do things like this.”

Welcome to the tribe.

Because most leaders want to be able to positively influence this “tribe and vibe” identity, we’ll call this intentional culture. Culture that gets built intentionally over time.

Whatever type, all culture is made of the exact same human to human call and response.
“I like you and you seem to like me.”
“I feel judged, I don’t feel safe.”

But shaping culture intentionally for a group of people gets tricky.

Guiding organizational culture can be like trying to guide a spooked octopus… do the wrong thing and a big cloud of murk.

In my experience, organizational culture is best respected as the elusive muse it is. A muse that is not easily fooled. It heartily mocks “culture workshops” and employee morale boosting programs. It is instantly deflated by carrot-and-stick (or less nice) forms of employee coercion.

What pumps the company culture muse up is deep competence and enthusiasm, shared liberally across all titles.

There are no shortcuts.

Impactful organizational culture comes from a core set of talented humans doing great work with passion and a willingness to share what they know with others.

Real leadership happens when a real, fallible human being does exceptional work consistently enough to garner respect and deep results. And then they share generously what they know. They up-level everyone around them. They are generous and not insecure in sharing their knowledge. They know they’re building something bigger than themselves.

If you’ve ever been around a real leader like this, you remember it. It changes you.

Everyone wants to work with them. People look up to them. People tell (good) stories about them. They are not always pleasant to be around (sunny disposition and deep competence do not always go hand in hand).

Most importantly, no one needs to tell you to learn from these people. You just do.

I’ve heard this echoed as ‘don’t work for a great company, work for a great team.’

Because the world needs more of us to find our true and unique leadership potential and become humble 10x-ers (lord, do we need more humble 10x-ers), I’m glad to say that much of this can be learned. It’s not easy. But it can be learned if you want to.

How?

The best way to learn how to be your best leadership self is from being around a real leader. It changes you.

Or, you can get a coach. Or both.

As Christian Idiodi said, Usain Bolt is the fastest man in the world.
He has a coach. The coach is not a fast runner. (That is not their job.)

Usain Bolt’s job is to run.

The coach’s job is to help Bolt run faster than anyone else.