A strong, purpose-driven culture is the fuel that drives performance, attracts top talent and enriches the customer experience. Rapidly changing narratives and a proliferation of information mean it’s more important than ever for leaders to be cognisant of culture and its impact – good or bad – on their organisations.

Workplace culture is no longer an afterthought – it’s the foundation of every successful business. It’s the fuel that drives performance, attracts top talent, and shapes customer experiences. Culture isn’t static; it requires constant attention, especially in times of change.

In this webinar, Justin Grice, Partner, Head of Business Consulting at Eton Bridge Partners, joined three industry experts to explore how leaders can build and sustain great workplace cultures whilst uncovering practical insights and strategies for navigating today’s evolving workplace.

Justin was joined by:

• Kate Guthrie – Senior Independent Director and Independent NED at finova, Scottish Ballet, UK Ministry of Defence and Border to Coast Pensions Partnership
• John Maltby – Chairman and NED with roles including Chair at Allica Bank and West Brom Building Society, and NED at Nordea Bank
• Asher Rickayzen – Founder at SeeMore Consulting, Asher is an experienced consultant supporting a range of organisations align strategy, leadership and culture

We have summarised the key discussion points below but please click here to watch the full webinar.

What is workplace culture and what makes a great one?

Culture can be difficult to pin down, but one thing is for sure – it is very real. “Organisations have a culture whether they like it or not,” says John who sees culture as a dynamic phenomenon that organisations must spend time understanding and responding to. Asher echoes this sentiment; “Whatever happens, there is culture. You can’t pretend it’s not – it’s there and it’s either helping or hindering.” Paying conscious attention to culture is a huge opportunity says Kate; “It can be a massive enabler of delivering your strategy; a strong positive culture allows people to self-actualise and be at their very best.”

When it comes to what makes a great culture, our panel made several key observations:

• Great cultures are responsive to context and able to evolve; a business in a turnaround phase for example needs a different culture to one in a start-up phase.
• In a thriving culture, the vast majority of people feel that they belong in the organisation.
• The culture aligns with the company’s goals, vision and the direction of travel.
• The culture honours where people are coming from, rather than tries to change their fundamental beliefs through pressure.

Aligning culture with strategy and embedding change

“You can only create alignment if you are willing to explore difference,” notes Asher. He clarifies that it’s not about ‘ironing out’ differences because the difference will always be there, but knowing the difference is there makes it easier to work with. Trying to make everyone identical through ‘sheep dipping’ in a command-and-control culture can cause resentment and actually be counterproductive cautions John.

So how easy is it to change culture? Culture evolves all the time – so it can be transformed but the real question is whether that change sticks. “The challenge with trying to shift a workplace culture is understanding how to achieve sustained change,” notes Kate. She says organisations need to consider how to incentivise behaviours they want to see. “Do you hire to the values, train to them, reward them? There are big structural things you can do that hopefully have a life over a longer period.”

The impact of remote and hybrid working on culture

Our panel agreed that Covid created an interesting set of contextual conditions that offer valuable insights into organisational culture. On the one hand, an element of centralised control emerged to speed up decision making, but on the other, greater trust was given to individuals to find their own ways of working. Kate mentions that in many organisations, the switch to a remote model happened very rapidly with initiatives such as Microsoft Teams up and running in weeks rather than the planned multi-year rollout.

The upshot is that workplace culture has irrevocably become less face-to-face. John says this can create barriers, particularly in international organisations that span different languages and cultures; “The challenge is amplified in a virtual environment where you haven’t got the experience of spending time physically with people.” Kate’s advice for global organisations is to think about what binds the organisation in terms of values and norms and express these as simply as possible to people.

Why culture is key to M&A performance

Our panel agreed that culture is a crucial, and often an overlooked component of M&A. John says organisations must consider the purpose of the M&A to inform the context; “Is it to take costs out? Or is it a growth opportunity?” He notes that when the aim is to cut costs, there can be difficult decisions but the best way to handle this is to be clear and authentic about the objectives.

Loyalties to previous incarnations of the organisation can be strong. “Sometimes I go into an organisation that might have had a merger five years ago, but the half-life of the cultures that existed before are extremely long,” says Asher who says people may be drinking out of mugs with the old company logo on or referring to themselves as being part of the previous organisation. Kate agrees that to move the culture forward, you have to acknowledge what was there before; “You need to honour the past and create the culture of the future; if it’s not done well, it’s a lag on performance.”

The impact of leaders on culture

“If the leader isn’t living the values, why should others?” questioned one attendee on the chat. Kate says whilst it’s true that culture can be largely a feature of the CEO, it should be about the organisation as a whole; “Where it’s discredited is where the expressed culture and the desired culture does not align with people’s own experiences of the organisation.”

Asher concurs that the leader has a massive influence on culture, but says we need to start paying more attention to the role of AI; “AI will become very influential and will hold the values of the organisation within it.” Social media and fake news are also changing the way we think and work. Kate acknowledges the challenge of keeping your organisation stable in a 24/7 world of fake news and says strong internal communications are ever more critical to help colleagues understand the organisation’s mission and values.

John counsels that leaders need to understand the impact of technological developments and help people navigate them; “Culture is based on things you have learned to respect – if in wider society some of those are dismantled, then that is challenging.”

Culture is not a buzzword, it’s the heartbeat of an organisation; in one sense it’s as simple as people just working together, yet as individuals, we are complicated. Only through creating the respect and understanding of each other are we able to be at our most effective.

Many thanks to our expert panel for sharing their insights and bringing this topic to life. Please get in touch with Justin to continue the conversation.