Why culture is becoming a competitive advantage in business

Employee engagement has been shown to be beneficial for everything from productivity to employee retention. However, just 29% of American Gen Yers are engaged in their job — due in part to the fact that organizational change can be difficult to plan and implement.

For example, though nearly 80% of executives in the US believe that employee experience is important, just 22% say that their companies are excellent at delivering a differentiated employee experience.

Looking to tackle this, NYC-based culture management platform CultureIQ is helping companies understand, measure and improve employee engagement. Founded in 2013, the platform allows businesses to collect employee feedback, measure engagement and identify the unique qualities of their own culture through benchmarked, customizable surveys. In order to ensure that they make the most of the information gathered, CultureIQ’s in-house culture strategy team offers customized support to analyze the results and turn it into organizational culture change.

“Our goal is to help organizations truly understand their culture, so they can take action to improve it, which means they can recruit and retain the best talent.” — Greg Besner, Founder and CEO of CultureIQ.

They also make it easy to conduct regular surveys — enabling businesses to track the progress and impact of policy changes. “Our goal is to help organizations truly understand their culture, so they can take action to improve it, which means they can recruit and retain the best talent,” says Greg Besner, founder and CEO of CultureIQ.

“Organizations that have the highest performing culture also have the most successful financial results.” — Greg Besner, Founder and CEO of CultureIQ.

CultureIQ emphasizes the importance of managing culture in the workplace, and aims to help companies turn it into a competitive advantage. This is why they believe that culture is more than just an HR issue — it’s a business concern. “The work we’ve done with over a thousand companies has clearly shown that organizations that have the highest performing culture also have the most successful financial results,” says Besner. On average, Gen Yers would happily take a $7,600 pay cut to their salary to work in a culture that affords a better quality of life, and research shows that engaged employees are 87% less likely to leave a company.

“Consumers really are attracted to doing business with organizations that have a strong culture.” — Greg Besner, Founder and CEO of CultureIQ.

The benefits to business go beyond a happier workforce. Creating and maintaining a great workplace culture also impacts consumer perceptions of a company. “There is now a blur between a company’s culture and a company’s brand,” says Besner. “Consumers really are attracted to doing business with organizations that have a strong culture.” In fact, global research shows that organizations that rank in the top 25% of companies on employee experience also sport nearly three times the return on assets, and double the return on sales compared to the bottom 25%. And Besner believes that the emphasis on this will only continue; “In the future, the people and the culture will be the key differentiator.”

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Canvas8 is the leading consumer behavioral insight specialist. Masterfully combining research, trends and strategy, Canvas8 deliver the inside scoop to businesses about what consumers really want.

Sources
[1] How Millennials Want to Work and Live, Gallup, May 2016
[2] [3] The employee experience: culture, engagement, and beyond, Deloitte, February 2017
[4] Why millennials would take a $7,600 pay cut for a new job, Fortune, April 2016
[5] What you risk by forgetting employee engagement, Inc, April 2018
[6] Positive employee experiences boost bottom line, HR Executive, August 2018