At The Culture Think Tank, we focus on understanding company culture and the factors that impact culture and drive performance. What I have found fascinating is the key to improving company culture is not about doing big things but rather about doing little things.
In many ways, improving company culture is analogous to tuning an old school analogue radio where small little turns of the dial are all that is needed to clear up static and bring clarity. The same holds true for company culture where small adjustments to the actions leaders take can have a profound effect on culture and performance.
How Profound?
Leaders who focus on making little changes to how they lead each month on average improved their organization’s Culture and Workplace Well-Being scores by 20% in 90 days.
Summarized below are the most commonly reported Top 5 Leadership Behaviors leaders were requested to STOP doing by their workforce. These are the most common behaviors that impair the growth of a company’s culture and are barriers to performance.
As you will discover, correcting the STOP behaviors is a simple matter of communication and focusing on fundamental leadership skills.
The Top 5 Leadership Behaviors to STOP and the steps to overcome them are listed below:
1. Assigning Tasks Without Clear Direction / Deadlines
This is an easy trap to fall into. Most organizations and leaders manage to a project plan or task list; and it is easy to assume everyone on your team knows the priorities and when things are done. However, as our analytics shows, this is not the case. Fortunately, this is an easy behavior to correct. Each time you review tasks with your team, communicate the priority tasks and review deadlines. A few extra minutes each week is the key.
2. Asking for Feedback and Not Taking Any Action
Leaders want to know what is going on and want feedback; and although leaders know what they did with the feedback, the rest of the organization or team does not. The lack of not knowing how their feedback is used is frustrating to a workforce and deemed disrespectful. Proving a simple weekly or monthly update of what you, as leaders, have learned and plan to do is all it takes to move the needle on culture.
3. Taking on Too Much and Not Delegating Assignments
Delegation is a consistent challenge and is more so in a remote work environment. Although a challenge, a workforce will want to help when they see leaders struggling; and the workforce will feel disenfranchised and may become resentful if they are not allowed to help. Recognizing and acknowledging a workforce’s desire to help, even when it is not possible to delegate, provides the context and keeps a workforce feeling valued.
4. Not Respecting or Caring About Our (Your Workforce’s) Needs
A feeling of disrespect or lack of caring is a function of listening. When a workforce feels listened to, they perceive the organization and its leaders care and respect them. This reinforces the importance of sharing feedback and providing periodic updates. Taking a few minutes each week or month to share what the leaders learned from its workforce and where they see the organization going fosters a sense of commitment and caring.
5. Addressing Personal Matters in Pubic
I believe the increased frequency of this STOP behavior is a function of virtualized work teams where a leader’s interaction with their team is through Zoom. In this environment, where there is little opportunity for personal one-on-one conversations, it is easy for leaders to accidentally address personal or performance related issues on a group call. Addressing this issue is a matter of scheduling one-on-one time. Hosting a few 15-minute Zoom calls for one-on-one discussions will go a long way.
Although focusing on the little things can have a dramatic impact on culture and performance, the little things to focus on each month change overtime. That is the nature of business and performance. As leaders adjust behaviors, a new set of behaviors becomes priority. Recognizing the shift in focus and priority is key to growing a company’s culture and sustaining performance.
Fortunately, the advancements in analytic tools and predictive models make identifying the little things to focus on each month easy for leaders to determine and act upon.
