Chemistry, not Culture

Instead of culture, let’s talk about chemistry in the workplace.

Credit: Unsplash

Disclaimer: I’m just as guilty of referencing ‘culture’ when describing teams, workplaces, and companies. Recently I’ve grown unsettled with the term. I offer a replacement: chemistry.

Culture = similar things

Culture suggests amalgamation and assimilation of similar things that begin similar or evolve to become similar. Historically when describing societies, it generally refers to shared customs and behaviors. No doubt there are positive things to be said about shared behavior. On the surface this is a good thing.

However, things go awry when poor behavior is amplified by the absence of dissimilarities that would otherwise offset bad actors. This is why in many cases we feel compelled to attach favorable adjectives to culture such as “a positive team culture” or “a healthy company culture” to ensure conduct is favorable—and to clarify that we’re not speaking of bad culture.

The term ‘culture’ carries a lot of baggage too. Try this exercise: see if you can picture in your mind phrases like “startup culture” or “Silicon Valley culture” without immediately reverting to stereotypes, whether positive or negative.

In short, culture denotes sameness and ambiguous outcomes.

Chemistry = similar + dissimilar things

Chemistry, on the other hand, suggests blending similar and dissimilar things. It inherently demands that some degree of variance be present between similar and dissimilar elements; elements that in the workplace include people, diversities, perspectives, backgrounds, customs, behaviors, products, tools, and so forth. Workplace chemistry can lead to powerful, beautiful outcomes.

With chemistry, we aren’t obligated to attach favorable adjectives. Rather, the focus is on the capabilities and properties of our chemical ‘compound’ (system) when all elements are in play. This enables us to use the term neutrally such as “the chemistry of our team is very inclusive” and “our company chemistry encourages everyone to express their opinions freely but defensibly”. Further, if we choose to attach favorable adjectives such as “a healthy…