Capability: 59
Path: Capabilities: Team: Management: Culture
Saturday, 09 September 2017
Culture
8 Processes For Organizing Your Team’s Culture
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While culture is embedded in an organization’s values and principles, in its hiring and training, its communications protocols and reporting structure, and in many other aspects of operations — there are certain processes that belong to culture “proper”.
With Invisible Technologies you can forget about these details, because we’ll make sure they’re running for you. Culture has never before been understood as being enabled by a series of background processes, but relationships are paint on a canvas.
1. Book Club
A company or team book club is one of the most effective ways to build a culture of shared understanding. Books invite many interpretations, so nobody is forced to necessarily agree with the author — but the reading grounds conversations about the company around a reference point.
These outside influences help build an intellectual framework for decisions and even a kind of dialect for communicating with each other.
Books don’t need to be business books. They can be fantasy, science fiction, classical literature, biographies, histories, philosophy, economics, even politics and religion are fair game — if your company’s thinking and speaking culture is open-minded to diverse influences. Again, the reading itself is a rohrshach — the value is in the reference point.
2. Conversations
There’s a point to pointless meetings. Our S.I. schedules one every Friday. It’s optional, but we all show up. There’s no agenda, no discussion summary, no decisions to make.
For the first few minutes, there’s free flowing conversation. But our S.I. suggests a random speaking order. One by one, each of us takes the mic and speaks for ten minutes: stream of consciousness, without interruption. These thoughts don’t need to be about work; in fact, usually we talk about our personal lives and thoughts. It’s a fantastic way to get to know each other as people.
Your S.I. will ask you if you want to host a Conversation, and will ask you to select a style from one of our defaults. If you want to invent your own style — your S.I. can promote that format as well.
Conversations can be for all-hands in the company, for everyone on a team, smaller groups, or even one on one sessions. The smaller the format, the deeper you’ll go into the psyche!
3. Talks
Talks are monologues, but you’d be amazed at the wisdom waiting to be unlocked in your team. Everyone has something brilliant to say that has nothing to do with immediate execution, but which they’re just waiting for an excuse to share — because they know it’s important. But they want to be invited, they don’t want to just impose themselves on the team.
That’s where your S.I. comes in — your S.I. will ask you and everyone on your team if they have any ideas for talks to give. Then your S.I. will work with everyone to schedule a talk every couple weeks or so, so it isn’t too burdensome. And your S.I. will work with the presenter to set aside prep time to get materials ready beforehand!
4. Interviews
After every Hangout, your S.I. will ask you if you had any follow up questions you’d like to ask your team members. If you’re a curious person, you’ve probably got a never-ending supply of questions for them. You won’t believe what a gift it is to give and receive curiosity. Everybody likes to be interesting.
Your S.I. will pass along your questions to your team members, and during the next Hangout, they’ll have the option to answer these interview questions.
5. Intersections
When interests intersect, relationships can form around them. Over time, your S.I. knows more about your interests than anyone — as it organizes your digital brain. It also knows the interests of everyone else in your team. It can point out these intersections to you — and let you explore them by text or schedule a Conversation.
6. Celebrations
Every year, everyone on your team has a birthday. Every year, there are things to celebrate — launch events, sales milestones, holiday office parties. This isn’t a priority, so it often gets dropped — or becomes an extra responsibility for an already over-worked member of your team. Let your S.I. do the planning.
Everything from catering to gifts to thank you cards — your S.I. can coordinate everyone to make sure these celebrations are memorable moments.
7. Random
Does your company use its #random channel on Slack? It’s important to keep random conversations happening in your company. But if this channel becomes too noisy, it becomes a distraction or simply gets ignored.
Your S.I. can monitor this channel for anything that relates to your interests, and help you find those moments when you can really connect with your team mates — so you know you’re not missing anything, and can stay focused.
8. Advanced
Want to plan a management offsite to make some difficult decisions? Or a company retreat to build closer relationships, and simultaneously relax and focus together? These are all process dependent — whether it be booking travel or planning events, we can help.
The only limit is ideas for improving your company culture. If you’ve got an idea for a process — we’ll build it with you, run it for you, and upgrade it forever and ever!
Do you love your team so much you could die of happiness? If the answer is no, then there’s work to be done. Work you don’t have to do, don’t want to do — and should really let us do. But the real work, of building relationships — that’s so much fun, we wouldn’t offer to do it for you even if we could.
