How to Use Structure to Improve Company Culture
Having a reputable and rewarding work culture is often seen as a cornerstone in many successful companies and organizations. That’s why it’s important that as a leader you find different ways to improve the culture of your business or team in order to match the culture you want to see spread throughout the company. One of the many ways to do so is by implementing a meaningful structure that reflects the type of culture that you are trying to grow within your company. In today’s article, I will be listing five impactful ways on how you can implement structure to improve the culture of your company.
Performance Evaluations
The first method in which you can implement structure to improve the culture of your workplace is by creating performance evaluations for all of your employees. This is a very common and effective strategy that most leaders have incorporated into their organization. If you don’t have this method as a part of your company’s structure, you should start! Alternatively, if you already have performance evaluations here are a few things you should consider.
- The first is being consistent – This is a really important principle. It doesn’t matter if you’re doing these every quarter, every 6 months, or even once a year every year. Whatever it is, make sure to keep consistency in the evaluations.
- The second is creating accountability – Make sure that there are deliverables at play for both the leader doing a performance evaluation as well as for the employees first.
- The third is outlining the opportunities – It is very helpful as a leader to make sure that there is a really clear path to what the opportunities at hand are within any given time frame.
- Lastly giving people choice and autonomy – This is a really important factor when it comes to evaluation because it shows trust with your employees.
Create a Clear and Consistent Process for Meetings
Meetings are often a time that employees dread, but they don’t always have to be a horrible experience! I believe there is a lot of opportunities to implement a good structure for meetings that will ultimately lead to a greater culture.
Here are some simple tips on how you can create a good meeting:
- Start the meetings with appreciation. The appreciation can be for something recently learned, an employee in your organization, or even an event that happened recently.
- Set up a time during the meeting to go over and review any new material, recent learnings, or even the previous meeting so everybody can be on the same page.
- Make sure that you agree on the actions and deliverables being outlined in the meeting.
- Lastly, creating clarity for everybody that is involved in the meeting and what exactly are they expected to do or what deliverables are expected from them.
All of these examples are really simple and easy to add to your team meetings so that you can start to generate a culture that you’ve always wanted. For more tips and examples of the processes that you can implement in your meetings, read this article on How to Design an Agenda for an Effective Meeting.
Make Sure Your Hiring Process Supports Your Company’s Culture
It all starts here, with the hiring process. The hiring process is not a one-way street in regards to how you feel that the potential candidate could fit in your organization, but the candidate is also looking to see if the culture and fit match what they are looking for as well. 75% of candidates will research a company’s reputation before applying for a job opening.
Principle 1
Have a really clear metric or decision-making boundary around what is a “go” or “no-go” for the culture in your company. This obviously requires having a clear stance on what the culture of your organization is beforehand
Principle 2
Make sure that you have a really clear job description when entering the hiring process. You can also think of it as “if the job could talk, what would it say about itself”? This can include factors such as:
- What are the values of the job?
- What are the skills necessary?
- What is the best personality fit for the job?
Principle 3
Have real clear transparency about the culture in your company. Make sure that you implement that culture into the hiring process so that they are aware of what to expect.
Ensure All Corporate Processes Match Your Company’s Values
Work-life balance is a great example in showing that your processes do indeed match the values that your company stands for. If your company has a strong reputation and culture for work-life balance but there are processes or even unspoken agreements that suggest that a person should work on a weekend or past working hours, it creates an incongruence within the structure and culture of the company.
In this scenario, the opportunity to change the current structure can have a positive impact on work culture. If a particular software is required to be used after hours, for example, you may need to change the process in order to properly adjust to an acceptable work-life balance that matches the company’s values.
Mind the Norms About Communication
Communication is a topic here at Arc Integrated that we are trained on and well versed in. This is because on a daily basis we see the importance and value that companies put on implementing communication as a skill.
An example of communication can be seen through wanting more human connections. The hope as a leader is that the values you have and try to grow, end up living and breathing throughout the entirety of the company. Ultimately, if all of your company’s communication takes place via email, for example, you lose that human interaction which inherently prohibits human connection. This is of course not to say that we need to completely remove email if you value human connection, but rather find alternative ways of communication that match the values that the company has. That being said, if your company values human connection, my question would be:
In what ways are you communicating beyond email that drives human connection?
If you enjoyed this article I encourage you to take this quiz on our website. It reveals some ways in which you can improve the culture, performance, and productivity of your team. You can also watch the video version on today’s topic – how to use structure to improve company culture
As always you can learn more about emotional intelligence, leadership, and communication by picking up my book CHANGES: The Busy Professional’s Guide to Reducing Stress, Accomplishing Goals and Mastering Adaptability
Be well,
Michael
Resources:
- Blog Post: How Leadership Skills Can Influence The Values of An Organization
- Blog Post: How to Improve Your Leadership Skills in the Workplace (When We’re All Working Remotely)
- Video: 5 Passive-Aggressive Communication Barriers
