What is Company Culture?
Company culture is the distinctive personality of the organization. The culture determines what people do and how energetically they contribute to problem solving, innovation, customer service, productivity, and quality. A company with a well-developed culture outperforms competitors. Because a company's culture affects everything in it—including profits—culture is the real bottom line.

Actions, not reports
Company cultures change when leaders realize how they set the company's cultural stage and decide to change it. Cultural change is an evolutionary process. Based on how people respond to the new context, leaders decide what to do next.
"Culture change" leaders measure their effectiveness by noticing changes in relationships. The management team will begin to see more caring, trust, openness and participation, and stronger commitment, communication, motivation and responsibility at all levels. As part of our consultation, Meridian Group shows managers how to see and interpret these changes.

We work closely with you
There are no quick and easy ways to develop a powerful work culture. Meridian Group works closely with your management team shaping the plan to your company's unique situation. We bring to your leadership team our 26 years of experience developing company cultures. The plan that works best is the one that leadership itself brings to the issue and is committed to put its' full energy behind

Meridian Group's first step—meet with the leader
First we discuss and move to agreement with the leader of the business unit on the project goals and the initial action plan.

Interviews
Following that first meeting we interview each member of the management team plus a cross section of managers and employees from other levels. These interviews use a format developed by Meridian Group over many years. They are designed to build relationships, reveal how people experience their work, and to develop a picture of the key cultural issues and opportunities for actions. These issues are brought into dialogue with the management team at the subsequent meetings.
As the plan develops we train the managers to hold similar interviews with each other, with people who work for them, and then with people in other divisions and departments. Through these interviews managers learn to see evolving cultural issues and accurately monitor the effectiveness of their culture change efforts.

Agree with the management team on direction and actions
At the management team meetings we discuss the program's goals and process and ask members to make a record of the qualities or values they want to strengthen in the company.
We ask the team to meet once every three or four weeks for four to six meetings for a dialogue on cultural issues, particularly how they as leaders plan and lead the change process. In these meetings members will discuss their own relationships and the actions they can take to move the culture in the desired direction. In followup meetings they describe to their colleagues the results of their actions.
At some point a manager volunteers to arrange a similar meeting with her own staff. These meetings are so gratifying and productive that soon they become a normal and valued part of the whole organization. In these meetings, as the threshold of freedom to speak up is lowered, people begin to feel safer in discussing important areas such as relationships, communications, how decisions are made and how authority is used. This is how the culture develops.

Phase II
After six management team meetings we will jointly assess what we have achieved and together develop a plan for the next phase.
Based on successful change in the first stage the leadership group is now in a good position to introduce longstanding issues that they may have previously seen as difficult to address.

How long does culture change take?
Work cultures are established over a long time and are quite stable. How fast a culture changes depends almost entirely on the leadership. With committed leadership you will see some change almost immediately in the top management team. Within a few months people outside this team will report changes. In an organization of say 200 to 1,000 people you should expect to see company-wide changes within nine months to a year. In 18 months the new and stable culture should be settled into place.

Results you can expect

• Greater trust, openness, creativity and responsibility
• Improved teamwork and communications between divisions and levels and within teams
• Dramatic, sustainable increases in productivity, performance and customer service
• Increased ability to attract and hold key employees
• Smoother mergers and acquisitions with higher success rates
• Increased cooperation, collaboration, motivation and openness to change
• Fewer lost-time injuries and worker's compensation claims, and less absenteeism