mrprocedure

In this final installment, we discuss how to change a culture without dynamiting the whole operation. If an analysis of your organization’s culture suggests dynamite is warranted, read no further. Fortunately, the vast majority of organizations can successfully change. Conceptually, the path is easy to understand. Practically, it is not as easy to follow.

Eat Less, Exercise More: what does a weight loss mantra have to do with culture change? More than it may seem on the surface. When confronted with the need to lose weight, we are counseled on one side to increase our physical activity and reduce our caloric intake: eat less, exercise more. But we are also bombarded from the other side with “miracle” weight-loss pills, diets, surgeries, etc. Do we go for the quick fix or for the tried-and-true change of lifestyle?

The lifestyle change achieves results slowly. It’s not fancy, not glamorous, and requires dedication and unfailing effort, but it does achieve the sort of results that can be sustained. And besides, we all know intuitively that before too long studies will show the miracle diet was either ineffective or dangerous (of course, when the miracle diet’s cover is blown, the supermarket magazines will have moved onto a new set of miracle diets).

Culture change can be seen in the same way. There are simple principles (that we will discuss shortly) that if rigorously and consistently applied will move the culture in a positive direction. The changes take time to be established, but once established, they are more easily sustained. Now for some, that is not fast enough, not “miraculous” enough, and—perhaps more to the point—does not allow one individual to take the credit for it. So they seek a book, a slogan, or any other cure that will spare them the real effort necessary for lasting positive change.

Eat less, exercise more. The process will work. How can I be so confident? Because it was the same process that created the culture you presently have!

Where Do I Start?

The raw material for culture change is all around your organization. Remembering in Part 2, we discussed the A-B-C-D progression. A, the first element, represents the actions taking place. Actions are being carried out in your organization continuously, right here and now. What needs to change is the response to those actions.

We must look at each action (or, in many cases, inactions) and classify them as positive (good for the organization’s well-being) or negative (not so good). The response to those actions must be such that the people in the organization recognize they are good (and are rewarded for continuing to do) or bad (and are sanctioned for continuing to do). The actions must be responded to consistently and firmly; there can be no doubt in the actor’s mind about leadership’s position on the action.

As much as possible, the actions related to the process must be given special, focused attention. An action within the process is either good (leads to the creation of salable product or service), bad (inhibits or prevents the creation of salable product or service) or indifferent (has no effect on the actual properties of the product or service). Good actions must be reinforced; bad actions must be analyzed to identify their causes, and those causes must be corrected. Indifferent actions must be systematically eliminated, because they are consuming resources and producing nothing in return.

Through careful, conscientious observation and analysis of actions, choosing and taking appropriate actions in response to those actions, you will establish new patterns of behavior. These will in turn raise expectations and change the culture. Not glamorous, not miraculous, not easy—but effective. What worked to create the present culture will succeed in making a new culture.

Which begs a question: who is responsible for changing an organization’s culture?

1. Leadership
2. The Line Workers
3. A responsibility shared by both A and B

I asked this question many times in courses I presented, and probably 90% of class participants got it wrong.

The answer: A, it is Leadership’s responsibility, simply because they get to determine what is an appropriate response to each action.

Making Culture Change Happen (The Right Way)

When embarking on your culture change adventure, it is important to remember a handful of key points:

• Do not spend time bashing the former culture, because in so doing you are bashing the people who lived and worked under that culture. They will dig their heels in
• Do not confer guru status on individuals, whether in-house leaders or consultants, regardless of how much credit they want. The culture change must be accomplished by everyone working together, not by one person directing and dictating a “new reality.”
• Make the focus of the change effort the processes as much as humanly possible. If you make it about people, you will create factions. Even if individuals or groups are performing poorly, deal with the process aspects, and give the individuals the opportunity to demonstrate their capability with the improved process before making personnel decisions (and, yes, personnel decisions may be necessary for a variety of reasons)
• Involve as many people as possible in the effort, particularly in dissecting processes to understand why they are producing the results they are producing
• Do not spend time begging and cajoling oppositional employees to “get with the program.” Remember you will encounter resistance because someone was profiting from the former culture and now their profit is shrinking. If they are performing adequately within the bounds of the process and not impeding the change effort, endure them. If they are doing neither of the above, expedite their removal from the organization
• Listen, listen and listen more to people at all levels; a problem is best understood when it is viewed from multiple angles
• Do not announce to anyone that “we are going to change the culture.” Do not introduce yourself as a “change agent,” even if you are one. At the end of the day, you want all members of the organization owning the new culture—they had a part in its coming into existence—as opposed to the new culture being forced upon them
• Be patient. It takes time; if time is of the essence (i.e., your destiny is close at hand), expedite carrying out each point above. If it is truly a crisis, be honest about it with the employees and make the focus on how together we will work through the crisis—just don’t call it a culture change!

I hope this series was useful to you the reader. Regardless of your position or job duties, you can contribute to a change of culture. If you are able to look at, dissect and analyze a process and discover ways to improve it, you are “change agent material!” Just don’t call yourself that.

Please share your thoughts in the comments section or write me directly at mrprocedure@gmail.com.

In Part 2, we made the unsettling observation that the culture of the organization will–for better or for worse–dictate its destiny. Many years ago I worked in an organization that was “sole source” provider of its particular products. As a result, they projected an attitude that was far from “customer-focused.” Internally, workers (and middle managers in particular) were treated about as badly as the customers were.

Well, in time, competititon developed and their customers had choices. Ultimately, when the organization’s bread-and-butter customer found another supplier, everyone in the organization recognized we were now in an irreversible death spiral. Today, the location of my office is now occupied by a Jack in the Box restaurant.

So, to avoid a similar fate within your organization, something has got to change, and it’s got to change now!

We will look at culture change from two angles in Parts 3 and 4. Today, we will talk about re-orienting your organization.

An organization can operate in one of two organizations: a personality-centered focus or a process-centered focus.

You can determine your organization’s orientation (focus) by looking at how conflicts are resolved:

1. In a personality-centered environment, the conflict will be resolved based on who has the highest position, the loudest voice, the most persuasive argument, or who is the last person standing. In such an environment, it’s about winning and losing, command and control, and never about the process. It’s ironic that when a company finds itself in a crisis, they seek out a “rock star” CEO to infuse a new direction. In effect, the company is doing little more than superimposing another personality on the personality focus that put the company in crisis in the first place.

2. In a process-centered environment, a conflict is resolved based on what is best for the processes that achieve product realization (to borrow the phrase from ISO-9001). Egos are set aside, because egos don’t improve processes. In such an environment, leadership is always asking questions of those closest to the process. A new leader coming into an organization intent on instituting a process-focused environment will similarly ask questions, as opposed to coming in professing all the answers.

If the culture is personality-focused, switching to a process focus is imperative. People in the organization must understand first of all their relationship to the processes, and leadership must listen to the voice of the process, which also means the voice of the process performers.

In our final installment, we talk about the front-line actions necessary to bring the change about.

Imagine yourself as a CEO (no, don’t visualize the corporate office, corporate jet or large paycheck). You come into an organization on your white horse (or white Mercedes) and declare that “we need to change the culture. We will become such-and-such, and banish complacency (a famous Motorola tenet), and remake ourselves!”

Now imagine you have been a worker at that same organization for 20 years. What sounds like inspiring oratory in the CEO’s mind was really a slap in your face. Because you are part of that culture, the CEO is essentially declaring you to be part of the problem. (And don’t for a moment believe line workers receive the message any other way.)

To deconstruct the culture, those in charge of “culture change” must understand how the culture came into being in the first place. And the leaders must recognize these two truths:

1. The culture did not come into being overnight, and any attempt to change it overnight is doomed to fail. The same method that created the culture must–believe it or not–be used to change the culture.

2. Regardless of the current state of the culture, someone in the organizatin is profiting from the culture as it is. If no one were profiting from the culture, the culture would change on its own inertia. So when the culture begins to change, someone’s profit is going to be impacted, and it is from those people you will encounter resistance. That is why culture change inevitably leads to friction if it gets in motion at all.

So where did the culture come from? It all started with:

A —  Actions

In an organization, hundreds if not thousands of actions are taking place daily. Some (we hope most) of these actions are beneficial. Some may have no effect, while others may be detrimental to the organization’s success. The more bad actions, of course, the poorer the organization’s performance.

What is crucial to the organization is how the actions are handled. Another way to put it is: what was the response to the action as perceived by the actor, and did the action turn out profitable for the actor?

Here is an example: a worker shows up late Monday morning. We would consider that a detrimental action. If the issue is dealt with promptly and correctly (tardies will not be tolerated, for example), the worker soon learns that there is no profit in being late and it could lead to significant loss. If the issue was ignored, the worker realized no negative effects, and perhaps profited by being able to sleep in a little later. This worker may find him/herself conditioned to show up late.

An other example: a worker works late hours on Friday to ensure a critical shipment makes it out of the warehouse. This we would consider a good action. Any good leader would recognize immediate, positive feedback will benefit the worker. But what if the effort is met by the leader with a shrug that says, “you get paid for the overtime, don’t come to me looking for warm fuzzies.” How likely is that worker going to put the weekend on hold the next time?

Actions are all around us, but what is critical is how the action is responded to. The responses will inevitably lead to:

B — Behaviors

If coming in late is never dealt with, pretty soon the workers will regularly realize the profit of some extra sleep. In other words, coming in late has become an accepted manner of behavior. If coming in late is dealt with consistently each and every time, showing up on time will become the accepted behavior. Repetition reinforces behavior. Behaviors become habit. On some level, “it’s okay.”

Over time, as these behaviors become entrenched, the organization reaches a tipping point where the accepted mode of behavior is now the expected mode of behavior. And at that point, the behavior is an element of the organization’s

C — Culture

The transition from accepted behavior to expected behavior may be subtle, but it is critical because, if a negative behavior becomes engrained in the culture, there is an ugly underside.

I’ll give you an example from my past. Several years ago, a gentleman named Bobby came to work in a production department. Bobby was a go-getter, fast learner and before long was running circles around the rest of the crew in terms of efficiency. Did the other workers appreciate Bobby’s efforts, even if it meant less effort they had to put out.

I got my answer several months later. Another gentleman, Randy (whom I will point out was an ex-Marine; if he were reading this he’d want you to know that) came into the same department and soon was doing high-quality, efficient work. The response of the other workers? “Oh, he’s another Bobby.” And it was not a compliment.

In this environment, a culture of low effort had taken hold, and woe to the worker who’d dare demonstrate a strong work ethic. Such an attitude–culture–will ultimately have a norming effect, where the quality and efficiency of the good workers’ performance will erode.

What is critical to understand in any organization is that the culture will certainly, inevitably dictate the organization’s

D — Destiny

Good or bad, the culture within the organization will manifest itself in the organization’s performance, which in turn will be reflected in the customers’ perceptions of the organization. If you project 3-5 years into your organization’s future should it run in the same manner as today, and don’t like where it will end up, you have no choice but to get to work immediately and change the culture!

In part 3, we will discuss how that happens.

A recent discussion was started on LinkedIn regarding culture change. The title of the discussion said it all: What does it take to change an ailing culture? Lots of effort and learning.

Well, sure, effort and learning…but what needs to be done and what needs to be learned? The topic of culture change is a hot one. It seems almost cliche that when a new, super-charged CEO comes into a company, “we are going to drive culture change” will fall from the new savior’s lips. Culture change is not a car, and it can’t be driven just because someone with an eight-figure salary says it will be.

But most people, not just CEO’s but people at all levels of many organizations, sense that something is off; in the words of the discussion-starter, the culture is “ailing.” So how can a culture be changed? Lots of effort and learning?

In this and the next three posts, I will share my theory of culture development and culture change. I don’t claim it to be uniquely my thoughts, but this presentation has worked as a “side bar” discussion in many classes I have presented. So I present my ideas here, and always invite conversation, discussion, disagreement or any comment you care to supply (I am tired of cleaning out my spam queue on my blog).

I contend that, like nearly any continuous improvement effort, culture change is not so much about mastering some inside information or “ancient wisdom” as it is about relentlessly performing a few easy-to-understand activities. Could it be as easy as lots of effort and learning?

In a sense, yes, but the learning and effort have to be reversed.

The first learning has to concern itself with: what is our current organizational culture? If I intend to change the culture, I need to have a keen understanding of what the current culture looks like. In describing the culture, there are both quantitative and qualitative aspects to the culture description.

The quantitative measure of culture will include any performance measurements, whether on the profit-and-loss statement, the quality or productivity report, or inventory management reports. Qualitative measurements will also include absenteeism statistics, turnover statistics and safety statistics. Any less-than-desirable measures indicate adjustments to some aspects of the culture is warranted, because the measures are necessarily a function of the culture.

Qualitative measures are a critical component of culture understanding, even if they are not so quantifiable. The qualitative measures are more personal: people feel the effects of the culture in a way that either stimulates or suppresses excellent performance. The culture will often be described in terms of morale (good or bad).

So the first aspect of culture change is to define and describe the current culture and determine to what degree “culture change” is something to pursue. Leadership has to take the time and make the effort necessary–and be honest to themselves–to accurately define the current culture. Leadership must then correlate the qualitative with the quantitative (the poor results) in order to plan “change.”

The next step (which will we cover in Part 2) is to understand how the culture came into being, and what will have to be done differently to remake the culture.

(This is the sixth installment in my “Answers from LinkedIn” series. This is also the second part of a two-part response to an issue raised in a LinkedIn group I belong to. Please read the first part before reading this part, just to avoid confusion.)

So how did policies and procedures get so hopelessly intertwined, or clouded, as the original discussion starter put it? If policies and procedures serve different purposes, where did we go wrong?

There are a few answers to that. One seems to be a “one-stop shop” mentality around many organizations’ documents. Let’s combine the policy with detailed descriptions of processes that only the responsible group needs to be aware of. So no matter who you are, regardless of the situation, everyone grabs the same document. It sounds efficient, but in most cases the individual grabbing the document needs about 10% of the information in that document. Remember your policy audience!

Another contributor to the confusion has been, for better or worse, ISO. Not so much the standard but the documentation structure that developed as part of the certification effort. Central to this discussion is the familiar documentation hierarchy:

1. Policies

2. Operating Procedures

3. Work Instructions

4. Records

(In my Writing Operating Procedures book, I reverse the order of the elements of the hierarchy, but this order is fine for this discussion.)

First of all, ISO does not mandate or even mention such a hierarchy; you will not find it in ISO-9001, AS-9100 or any other Quality Management System variant. The hierarchy is all good and well, except that organizations began populating each level with the wrong information.

The policy level is rarely an issue (other than cramming the policy document with 15 pages of procedural actions taken at high levels in the organization). But somewhere along the line a major breakdown occurred around “what is an Operating Procedure?” Some of the software I saw designed to make procedure writing easy contributed to the problem. The problem is that Operating Procedures took the following form:

1. The Receiving Department removes the raw material from the truck and stores it in the holding area.

2. The QC Department pulls samples of the material and delivers it to the Lab for testing.

3. When the material passes testing, the QC department locates the material and places green (acceptance) tags on the material containers.

4. When the containers are green-tagged, Production Control moves the material into the Production storehouse.

…and so on.

To the uninitiated, this appears to be a procedure. After all, each element is numbered! The problem is, this “procedure” only tells the reader who is responsible to do what (it also provides an order in which actions are taken). This is, by definition, a statement of policy, because I am not telling anyone how to do anything. Now, this is a useful document; I am not knocking the fact the information is documented, but calling it an Operating Procedure is incorrect. It is a Policy.

Now by having policies spill over into my Operating Procedure level (or tier), I end up compressing multiple types of procedures into a tier called Work Instructions. There is a clear, substantial difference between an Operating Procedure and a Work Instruction, but these get grouped together (and in fact, too often, I end up with a hybrid Operating Procedure / Work Instruction document that an employee only needs half of at any one time) and it is not only clouded, but it leaves the poor worker in a heavy fog through which they are expected to carry out their assignments.

Simply: Operating Procedures exist to describe how an activity (task) is performed; its audience is the task performer and its sole purpose is to facilitate learning the task. Work Instructions are detailed instructions to execute a task under particular circumstances (e.g., make a specific product). Its audience is the worker while doing the task. My rule of thumb is, if the document is one the worker needs at their side to reference while performing the task, it is a Work Instruction. Both of these are different purposes than the purpose for a policy.

There is much more I can state regarding this issue. That is why I wrote Writing Operating Procedures, which for a limited time I will still offer for free to anyone who writes me at mrprocedure@gmail.com. Thank you for reading and I welcome any comments.