Culture…

Good morning dear reader & welcome to my world this week. Over the holiday season, & further my last article on gratitude, in my first full week back the ongoing problem of productivity & culture has, for want of a better term, been haunting me ~ again… We know from the data available culture plays a significant role in productivity ~ I have written on both subjects previously.

However, as we begin another year, we hear & read about how organisations talk a lot about how to be productive, & to increase efficiency. This invariably involves culture & is something deeply personal. It is created over time & as a response to the things which happen to us & around us. It is a developed & developing thing, & when organisations say they want to ‘work on the culture’, they are really saying the way people are behaving is not working ~ for them... 

This is when things get tricky. Who sets the rules on what works in a culture? Who gets to decide on culture? Often the people we involve in these conversations do not share all they might because this is a process of judgement ~ someone has looked at the culture & found, or speculates something lacking. 

These conversations often put us in a position of us & them ~ the people who display the ‘right’ culture, & those who do not. And what does this say about each of us?

People hold tightly to their own culture, even when it does not have a specific name or description. We like to do things in a way fitting with who we think we are. 

When we talk about changing or adapting a culture, we are asking people to reconsider who they are at their core, which can put the best of us on edge & into a reactive mindset. ‘Why should I change when it is you who does not respond to me on time?’ Instead, perhaps we need to talk about habits ~ a far easier thing to reconsider & something we know we can change.

Studies show about 40 percent of what we do every day is a habit. We do not think about it, we just do it. Ask people if they want to change a couple of their habits around how they work & they are pretty open to the idea. Ask them if they want to change their personal contribution to the culture & you will get a very different response. Poor culture is almost always about what the others’ are & are not doing ~ not about us, so it is not our problem to solve, right?

So, when I think about productivity & effectiveness, instead of culture, I think about the habits I have moving me towards & away from these things. 

For example, when we want to become more productive, thinking about a to-do list today rather than the years’ goals becomes an easier choice ~ productivity can be gained by creating or adjusting my daily habits. I can use these habits to propel me forward. 

If we want a culture to lift our productivity & motivation, then we need to look at habits which shape this culture, many of which are counter to what we say the culture & values of our organisation are. 

How many times have you seen a mission & vision statement & posters on the wall about creating a culture based on innovation or being trusted advisers, & then thought to yourself ‘but this is not what actually happens around here’.

We can build habits which challenge us to be open minded & try new things; we can build habits to sharpen our focus on what actually matters, & we can build habits which help us to take a wider, more connected perspective of getting great work done. 

Or we can complain about having poor culture & wonder why we have reduced productivity.

Our habits create our culture, which impacts our productivity. We can spend a bunch of time creating posters about our culture, or we can get to work on the habits to support it. We can start creating these habits anytime we like.

Thank you for taking the time to be with me once again. I hope my journey may encourage you also. This is Kenn Butler in Paradise, Nelson, with my best wishes for the 2019 year ahead, as many are returning to the workplace. I look forward to being with you all again next week.
 



www.kennbutler.com