Culture is not Numbers

The corporate culture is the soul of an organization. All strategies and their success depends on how great your corporate culture is. It’s not easy building a great culture. No set definition of an “excellent” culture is apparent. It varies greatly. Some would say Google has the ideal one, Apple is better, no Intel, no Amazon. It varies extremely to what fits your organizaiton. Often times the thinking behind creating corporate culture is how can we get more out of our employees. This is either done via perks, competitive salaries, so they will work more and later hours. Perks work only so much, definitely better salaries but, it will go only so far.

Another approach to building culture is to set aside the quantitive view and focus on building cohesiveness within the organization to tackle crisis and the future with ease. A hallmark of a great corporate culture is how inspired people are through the best, worst, and mundane aspects of daily corporate hustle. A great family can handle the toughest of times, yell as loud, fight as passionately as possible with each other yet still get together for dinner and laugh. Organizational Behavior research I have read compares a good corporate culture as flexible and resilient, a well put together family with great leadership and tight bond. Perhaps the next time a CEO or someone in management considers corporate culture, they may think beyond the numbers and the metaphilosophical, perhaps something close to home.

Build a family, and numbers shall follow.

What does corporate culture mean to you?

How would you define it?