Act Today to Transform Tomorrow
Three Fundamentals for Stewarding Cultural Transformation
As the way we work continues to transition from physical to digital formats, the overlooked pain points and tensions that were present in the cultural status quo across organizations pre-crisis are reverberating more loudly in the new digital arena. For example, organizations with a culture previously lacking in empathy are finding an amplified lack of connection and community in the digital environment. While that might seem temporary or trivial on the surface, breakdowns in communication and working behaviors have the power to curtail innovation and creativity, diminish resilience, and decimate morale.
The good news is that in this moment of collective openness and vulnerability, organizations have a unique opportunity to take action to remedy what wasn’t working before and nurture a culture that positions it for success. Failing to tackle these issues now at best means continuing to operate with unaddressed frustrations and pain, and at worst could mean losing talent, productivity, and momentum permanently.
Regardless of whether the future of your workplace culture is one that will operate largely digitally or physically, Sub Rosa has developed three steps for systemic cultural change that can be used to help guide your journey. The steps below were developed, codified, and proven as a part of Sub Rosa’s organizational change offering and experience with clients spanning technology, hospitality, entertainment, and real estate.
1. Codify the Purpose
Often overlooked in the drive to get results, one of the most critical steps in the systemic change process is conveying why the change is necessary. Before introducing new behaviors, values, or tools, employees must understand the intention and rationale behind the shift. Beyond enhancing specific attributes (like empathy or resilience), leaders must tie cultural change to the company’s overarching purpose: How will a shift in internal culture support the reason your organization exists? How can new ways of operating enable the organization to make a more meaningful impact out in the world? How will this benefit customers? How will it benefit personal development and growth? For change to happen, employees must understand the ultimate goal and business case for what they are about to embark on or they will never feel empowered to play a role in it.
2. Co-Create Action
With an understanding of the intention behind the cultural transformation, it is common to develop the values and behaviors that an organization expects employees to operate by to meet specific objectives. While this is not flawed, it’s incomplete. It’s important to provide resources, like values and behaviors, as guardrails for how employees can operate, but when it comes to what they actually do — the tangible behavior changes that they can make — employees must define these themselves. Trust the experts you hired and keep the process collaborative. Provide the information and tools they need to act but allow them to be the ones to determine the action. Managers can play a supporting role in establishing these behaviors collaboratively with individuals on their teams. Systemic change doesn’t happen through stipulation alone, it’s about laying context and groundwork and providing tools that empower employees to play a lead role.
3. Incentivize & Celebrate Change
Finally, organizations need to do more than just talk about change, they need to act with intent to make change happen. Asking employees to think and work in new ways yet continuing to measure and incentivize old priorities sends conflicting messages about what the company and leaders actually value. The entire cultural system must work synergistically. This could include specific prompts and metrics integrated into performance reviews or, more simply, moments of public celebration that highlight and reward exemplary leaders embodying these new skills. Managers must also play a key role in holding individuals and teams accountable to the agreed upon behaviors and reinforcing these new practices through their interactions.
You’re on your way
While each of these steps requires considerable resources and effort to develop and deploy effectively, together they create an empathic roadmap for change. As is true of all creative endeavors, the work is never done. Once implemented, organizations must continue to review and optimize this system based on the data coming in from their teams, performance reviews and customers. The more you can demonstrate how these changes are impacting the business and optimize them based on feedback, the stronger and more effective your culture will become.
Organizational change is a core to our offering at Sub Rosa. We know the impact that this can make and, given the changing nature of the landscape we’re in, our team has been making themselves available for brainstorms and perspective-taking sessions with our clients. We’d love to offer the same to you and your company as you look to not only navigate cultural challenges, but come out the other side made better by the choices you’ll make today.
Please reach out and let us know your thoughts: Appliedempathy@wearesubrosa.com
