Meridian Group - Company Culture Consultants

Creating Evolutionary Change in Your Organization's Culture: From Dinosaurs to Birds—How Small Steps Lead To Big Changes

This is the first newsletter in a three-part series that looks at why developing a company's culture requires small steps and how those small steps can lead to big changes. In this issue, we will look at the principles and one small example that illustrates the practical application of the principles. Following issues will look more closely at the "How-to".

With my lifelong interest in evolution, I was fascinated by the recent discovery in northern China of fossil dinosaurs that possessed true flight feathers. This fossil evidence reinforced the theory that birds are direct descendants of dinosaurs.

It is hard to imagine how elementary feathers gave small dinosaurs an evolutionary advantage. Feathers, like nails, hair and scales are an extension of the skin. In their early form, feathers are just little buds on the skin—how could that help a small dinosaur? Next came pinfeathers, then warm body feathers and finally complex flight feathers. Twenty million years ago, it would have been impossible to imagine that a small lizard-like dinosaur covered with the pimple-like bumps of elementary feathers could become master of the skies. But that is the nature of evolution.

Is Your Company Culture "Evolutionarily Advantageous"?

Developmentally or evolutionarily "advantageous" means, "is better suited to the environment." Evolution of a bird from a dinosaur or a sophisticated corporation from an elementary one, takes one step at a time, testing each step to see if it is advantageous before moving to the next step. There is no grand plan.

It is the same in the evolution of a company culture. You cannot know what will develop from small, elementary changes. But, you can rely on the fact that what does develop will survive if it is to the advantage of the organism—in this case, the company.

Steps to Guiding the Evolution of Your Company's Culture

The steps of developing a company culture are fairly simple and straightforward. We have discussed them in previous newsletters. Here is a summary of the process:

Here is an example that illustrates the "small-steps-in-the-desired-direction" point. I was working with a financial services company. Managers and employees were college graduates—very analytic and detail oriented—led by a bright aggressive, growth-oriented team of owner/partners. In line with their analytic bent, they decided to assess the existing culture—they wanted an Organizational Climate Survey that looked at communications, job satisfaction, relationships, and participation. To me, this was like taking a patient's temperature before assessing his or her overall condition. As a rule, I'm wary of using survey instruments as a culture assessment and cure-all.

How is Often More Important than What

The management team responded positively when I suggested we use the Climate Survey to do more than simply gather data, but as another way to engage employees and develop the culture. As with much of life, it isn't so much what you do that counts, but how you do it. Managers have little discretion with what they do: they largely respond to directives from above, changes in the market, customer demands, workplace events, etc. In contrast, they have almost complete discretion with how they do it. And fortunately, it isn't so much what managers do that makes the culture develop, it is how they do it. In this case, it was how we could use the Climate Survey to enhance the culture by strengthening involvement.

The managers agreed that rather than developing the survey themselves, they would invite a volunteer group to develop it and plan what to do with the results. As a first step, they asked everybody in the organization to briefly describe what qualities they liked about the organization now, and what qualities they would like to see strengthened. The volunteer group could then use the results of these questions to develop the more formal survey.

With less than 50 employees, this firm had the kind of intimacy difficult to achieve in larger companies. Every employee responded in writing. They described the firm with words like: teamwork, trust, open door policy, friendly, caring, positive, energetic, professional, competent, and skilled. The few suggested changes included: more involvement, clearer and better work processes, and improved flow of communications and information.

Understandably, the firm's partners were delighted. This set a positive stage for the second phase with the volunteer group.

In the best evolutionary tradition, each step with this client grew from and built on the previous one to reinforce the overall developmental direction of participation and openness. As the group continued down their path, such small steps would lead to big changes.

In the following newsletter series, I will describe other organizations and the small steps that led to very large changes.



	Site Map \| FAQ \| Search
	A Better Workplace --- Meridian Group's Newsletter, Number 18, 4-15-03

	Creating Evolutionary Change in Your Organization's Culture: From Dinosaurs to Birds—How Small Steps Lead To Big Changes This is the first newsletter in a three-part series that looks at why developing a company's culture requires small steps and how those small steps can lead to big changes. In this issue, we will look at the principles and one small example that illustrates the practical application of the principles. Following issues will look more closely at the "How-to". With my lifelong interest in evolution, I was fascinated by the recent discovery in northern China of fossil dinosaurs that possessed true flight feathers. This fossil evidence reinforced the theory that birds are direct descendants of dinosaurs. It is hard to imagine how elementary feathers gave small dinosaurs an evolutionary advantage. Feathers, like nails, hair and scales are an extension of the skin. In their early form, feathers are just little buds on the skin—how could that help a small dinosaur? Next came pinfeathers, then warm body feathers and finally complex flight feathers. Twenty million years ago, it would have been impossible to imagine that a small lizard-like dinosaur covered with the pimple-like bumps of elementary feathers could become master of the skies. But that is the nature of evolution. Is Your Company Culture "Evolutionarily Advantageous"? Developmentally or evolutionarily "advantageous" means, "is better suited to the environment." Evolution of a bird from a dinosaur or a sophisticated corporation from an elementary one, takes one step at a time, testing each step to see if it is advantageous before moving to the next step. There is no grand plan. It is the same in the evolution of a company culture. You cannot know what will develop from small, elementary changes. But, you can rely on the fact that what does develop will survive if it is to the advantage of the organism—in this case, the company. Steps to Guiding the Evolution of Your Company's Culture The steps of developing a company culture are fairly simple and straightforward. We have discussed them in previous newsletters. Here is a summary of the process: The leadership team decides to change the organization. The leadership agrees on the direction of that change, i.e. what qualities or values they want to reinforce. Steps 1 and 2 take little time. Managers make small changes in how they do their daily work—changes that will lead the organization in the desired direction. Leaders watch the effect of these changes and plan the next change based on what happened. This third step is 99% of the effort. How Small Steps Lead to Big Change: An Example Here is an example that illustrates the "small-steps-in-the-desired-direction" point. I was working with a financial services company. Managers and employees were college graduates—very analytic and detail oriented—led by a bright aggressive, growth-oriented team of owner/partners. In line with their analytic bent, they decided to assess the existing culture—they wanted an Organizational Climate Survey that looked at communications, job satisfaction, relationships, and participation. To me, this was like taking a patient's temperature before assessing his or her overall condition. As a rule, I'm wary of using survey instruments as a culture assessment and cure-all. How is Often More Important than What The management team responded positively when I suggested we use the Climate Survey to do more than simply gather data, but as another way to engage employees and develop the culture. As with much of life, it isn't so much what you do that counts, but how you do it. Managers have little discretion with what they do: they largely respond to directives from above, changes in the market, customer demands, workplace events, etc. In contrast, they have almost complete discretion with how they do it. And fortunately, it isn't so much what managers do that makes the culture develop, it is how they do it. In this case, it was how we could use the Climate Survey to enhance the culture by strengthening involvement. The managers agreed that rather than developing the survey themselves, they would invite a volunteer group to develop it and plan what to do with the results. As a first step, they asked everybody in the organization to briefly describe what qualities they liked about the organization now, and what qualities they would like to see strengthened. The volunteer group could then use the results of these questions to develop the more formal survey. With less than 50 employees, this firm had the kind of intimacy difficult to achieve in larger companies. Every employee responded in writing. They described the firm with words like: teamwork, trust, open door policy, friendly, caring, positive, energetic, professional, competent, and skilled. The few suggested changes included: more involvement, clearer and better work processes, and improved flow of communications and information. Understandably, the firm's partners were delighted. This set a positive stage for the second phase with the volunteer group. In the best evolutionary tradition, each step with this client grew from and built on the previous one to reinforce the overall developmental direction of participation and openness. As the group continued down their path, such small steps would lead to big changes. In the following newsletter series, I will describe other organizations and the small steps that led to very large changes.