Your Company Culture Quality Quotient!

It’s time for a culture shock

You have known there are issues with your culture for a little while, and it’s impacting the work product and your ability to attract the kinds of candidates you need. It’s hard to hide toxic or neglected cultures. And company culture—values like integrity, fairness, diversity, and inclusion—tops the list of priorities for today’s prospects. If you aren’t putting forward the things people want from a company, you aren’t running the best company possible. But, the upshot is you can change course if you face a couple of hard truths.

You need to act before a runaway culture derails your business. What does this mean? The specifics of your situation need to be discussed in greater detail before a specific plan of action can be made. However, for others, the solutions included making a vision statement and putting it in every employee’s hands. Some chose to sit down with their company as a whole and discuss the values that they want everyone to share. For other leaders, there were personnel changes that they had put off for long enough.

Here are seven ways you can impact your culture today:

1. Assess your current culture. You cannot know what needs changing without knowing where you are starting.
2. Pinpoint what needs to change. It can’t be “everything.” Specific, measurable goals for change should be a part of the process. Accountability should be part of it, too.
3. Communicate the core values that will be part of your company in the future. Ensure every single member of your organization knows those values and what they mean.
4. Lead by example. Ensure commitment from leadership at all levels.
5. Commit. This means not giving up when there are bumps in the road. It also means knowing what the non-negotiables and “bad apples” are and committing to eliminating those who are not willing to be part of the solution.
6. Know change is a process. You cannot change a corporate culture overnight.
7. Hire and fire intentionally. Both these aspects of corporate human resources should be done with the culture in mind in addition to the needs of the position.

To learn about the culture-building and new recruitment strategies that John W. Mitchell uses to create thriving company cultures, take a look inside his book, Fire Your Hiring Habits!: Building an Environment that Attracts Top Talent in Today’s Workforce.

Invite John to come speak with your company or leadership team to gain more specific information on how your company can continue to offer the best environment for its most valuable asset—its people. Reach out today!

To stay up to date on the latest thoughts surrounding what it takes to build and sustain healthy and inclusive company cultures, get connected with John on Twitter, and LinkedIn!