Join The Ken Blanchard Companies for a special complimentary webinar and online chat beginning today at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time (12:00 noon Eastern). Senior Consulting Partners Chris Edmonds and Bob Glaser will be speaking on the topic of Creating a High Performing, Values-Aligned Culture. The webinar is free and seats are still available if you would like to join over 1,000 people expected to participate.
Immediately after the webinar, Chris and Bob will be answering questions here at LeaderChat for about 30 minutes. To participate in the online discussion, follow these simple instructions.
Instructions for Participating in the Online Chat
- Click on the COMMENTS link above
- Type in your question for Chris Edmonds and Bob Glaser
- Push SUBMIT COMMENT
It’s as easy as that! Chris and Bob will answer as many questions as possible in the order they are received. Be sure to press F5 to refresh your screen occasionally to see the latest responses.
We hope you can join us later today for this special complimentary event courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies. Click here for more information on participating.
How do you instill these types of values when dealing with an under performing highly tenure group of individuals? An environment where push back is expected ?
Hi Dominick–thanks for this question. It will be the first one answered when Bob and Chris finish their webinar this morning. Check back for an answer at about 10:05 Pacific Time.
This is a very common scenario – the core issue is there is inconsistent (or no) accountability for performance. That has to be addressed first!
Push back isn’t the beneficial response, right? We need them to perform to standard, then you can work on values clarity and accountability.
You can use this email address for further questions: webinars@kenblanchard.com
What obstacles have union shops presented to you in trying to make a change in culture? What is a reasonable time to expect to make culture change in a union shop?
Hi Richard…Unions typically have very strong cultures for a variety of reasons. My advice would be to involve the union members actively in the change process so that they own it. They would need to see the vlaue of changing how they behave and that it is not in their best long term interest.
Hope that helps.
How can you measure the improvements made by culture change (as on the last slide) – how can you tell they are due to the culture change and not to other changes going on in the organisation’s environment?
If beneficial changes occur – increased performance, increased engagement, increased customer loyalty, etc. – you don’t really care what “caused” those beneficial changes!
Culture is a huge driver of performance and passion – but if senior leaders follow our process, benefits will occur.
Several of the follow up questions asked about how to address this subject if not everyone is in agreement (for example, if the staff sees the need for cultural change, but management does not). I am interested in responses on this subject.
If senior management says we must change, and the employees agree, but middle management is either unable, or unwilling, then it’s time to make personnel changes.
We believe that if you are going to have long term success, the senior leaders must be actively supporting the change and aligned with the change. Staff can certainly influence the change but leaders need to step up.
Are there any tools or methods you’ve used that take advantage of current technology to operationalize behaviors?
Getting valued behaviors embraced by all staff – senior leaders to hourly folks – is the desired outcome. Senior leaders must create safe and reliable avenues to learn how the culture is perceived by employees. Technology can really help with that task!
Every six months a values survey needs to be done across the organization, with employees ranking senior leaders, their bosses, their peers, and themselves on the extent to which those folks are demonstrating desired valued behaviors. A software application like Snap can enable a survey to be administered by the web and allows fabulous data analysis afterwards.
how can you manage to unify two strong cultures in organizations that are merging?
This can be really tricky, but it can be successfully done if the leaders of both organizations implement and communicate that it is truly a merger of equals. Typically, I have seen that one organaization is the more dominant and their values will take precedent. The org. being taken over needs to ensure that it enables employees to feel accepted and valued.
We have spent the last several years trying to merge two distinctly different organizational cultures. In addition, our leadership has changed since the process began. What advice do you have for us to move forward?
See my comment above. Leaders need to take the best of the two cultures and define the behavior that is now expected for all organizational members.
What suggestions do you have for changing culture when to organizations with very different cultures merge?
The best approach is for a combined leadership team (representation from both organizations) come together and declare what the new organization’s purpose, values, and valued behaviors shall be. Those thoughts are shared with all employees, gathering input and finalizing the P/V/VB. Performance expectations are clarified, and then accountability for both performance and valued behaviors will follow.
Make sense?
Yes, thanks. In this situation, the majority of the leadership is from one of the organizations and the culture of that organization seems to be quite a bit behind the culture of those of us from the other organization. Any suggestions on getting the leadership to see that there is a need for change. The morale of the organization is declining. Thanks!
Yup, that’s a challenge. In the webinar I explained that Bob and I have learned that 1) most senior leaders have not experienced successful culture change in their lives and 2) even fewer have LED successful culture change.
Does the organization do regular employee morale surveys? Is the declining morale visible and/or noticed by senior leaders? It might be time to stuff the suggestion boxes (if they exist) with this issue.
If senior leaders do not see the problem, they will not address the problem.
Is there a best practice for roll-out communication of the determined core values? Specifically branding.
Key issue, you touch on. Communication is almost universally known as an important step to change management. But have you ever asked yourself why? From what I’ve learned, good quality communication should be purposeful. It should help to increase level of knowledge and understanding. When employees say communication is broken in their organization, their really saying, we don’t know what’s going on. Help us understand what is happening around us.
Sr. leaders have the responsibility for defining the organizations values and involving all organizaional members in understanding the core values and then defining the behaviors appropriate for their role. High involvement is the key here.
What impact do employees who do not share or practice the organization’s values have on those that do?
The impact of the “low values match” player(s) have on an organization are significant. If low values match players exist, that means there is inconsistent (or no) values accountability. Not good.
Inconsistent values demonstration impacts an employee’s discretionary energy, which you’d LOVE to have in the workplace. Not good, again.
One more thought – if low values match players exist in an organization, it means that the values are a LIE. Really not good.
Helpful?
I’ve started to try & induce staff to begin thinking in terms of org values, goals by seeking group input on enhancing our mission statement. This is what I hope will be a starting point for defining our org values. However, there has been little response to this. How can I generate more interest in this? – Or is there a better method to getting staff to defined values, goals & improved behaviors and productivity?
If you already have company values to work from, then it’s as easy as facilitating discussions about what does this one value look like to us? When are we doing it well, when have we slipped up? Talk it up in your organization and focus on that value for a month or so, then rotate to another. When you complete the rotation, start again because you may have new employees, or employees in new roles who will surely benefit from the discussions of what the values look like in practice.
That should work well with our small org.
thanks
Hi Karen…you are on the right track with your approach here. There may be a lack of trust in the organization and a belief that you are not really interested in hearing the input. Leaders must actively listen to the feedback and model good communication skills. Give it time and acknowledge the feedback when you get it.
Reward people who participate.
Reward has shown to be important and staff does look for model behavior –
Thanks
Do you have specifics on how to increase the level of trust in an organization?
Trust is built by leaders/players doing what they say they will do and treating people fairly.
Our entire process is driven by the best practices of creating a workplace environment of mutual trust and respect. We hit the highlights in our webinar – here’s a little more detail on them:
* Clear Expectations – for both performance and values. Values must be defined in behavioral terms.
* Creating Buy-In – sharing expectations (particularly values/valued behaviors) with the employee population, inviting input, then senior leaders declare a “from this time forward” all will embrace their defined expectations (for perf. and values)
* Accountability – all staff are held accountable for demonstrating valued behaviors AND for meeting/exceeding performance expectations. Staff (at any level) who do not embrace desired values and performance expectations are coached, redirected, praised if they hit the mark, and managed out of the organization if they don’t.
ANY INCONSISTENCY in holding staff accountable will erode trust and respect.
Helpful?
Your response reinforces my understanding and recommendations I’ve previously made to client organizations.
Nice webinar …
Thanks JQ–we enjoyed putting it on and really appreciated the strong turnout. Hope you’ll join us again. Next event is on March 17.
Most of managers in a company think that training is sole responsibility of Training manager, who must assess needs, prepare programs, materials, plan and deliver training. What would be the first steps in changing culture toward participation, collaboration and knowledge sharing among top management team?
Hi Uldis…
You need to change the organizational belief that training is the sole responsibility of the Training Dept./HR. Leaders need to clearly communicate to all leaders that it is the role of all leaders to train and develop their employees. Then hold them accountable for acting on it. Leaders can walk the talk by modeling this behavior for all managers to see. Get your C level managers into the classroom to model this.
Great questions from you – we’re very enthused at your interest in this important concept. Thanks for your participation –
Send any further questions to webinars@kenblanchard.com!
Thanks to my partners Bob & Dave!
Great questions!
We appreciate the energy and passion that the group has related to this subject. It is clearly near and dear to our hearts. Chris and I are very passionate about this subject and feel that we have done good work in this area with many organizations. Our goal is to create more awareness about the impact of culture on organizational performance and success.
Contact me at bob.glaser@kenblanchard.com if you would like more information.