I would go as far as to say ‘culture’ is probably the most common area of focus and attention in many organisations, including businesses, educational institutions, and sporting organisations.

Focus, attention, and talk are one thing; want, need, and desire are another. From my experience, many want to see change and improvement in their culture. Each has their own reasons for wanting this change.

Do they have the discipline and drive needed to create and implement the new culture and ensure its nurturing and development over time?

Here are a few tips:

Before you start, make sure you know what you want. The culture you have in mind might suit many things, but does it suit the team that will be responsible for delivering it through what they do and how they do it?

Are you ready for the consequences. If the current team aren’t on board with what you envision, are you ready, willing and able to deal with the consequences? Not only do you have to know what you want you have to know what it will bring.

If you aren’t serious, then don’t start. Changing culture takes a lot: time, discipline, and drive. As you know, everyone usually has this during the honeymoon period, but a strong cultural change is an ongoing process. So make sure you have what it takes for today, tomorrow, and beyond.

You may be the smartest person in the organisation, but this isn’t a reason not to get others involved. You have your perspective of how things are and what might need to change. Once again, this should not be a reason not to get the perspective of others, both within the group and from outside.

Politicking and positioning. Before you even strike a blow, make sure you have conversations that allow you to gauge what people think and feel about what you are going to do. Through these conversations, start to create buy-in from those involved. Have a strategy that allows you to position people so they are ready to move once you start the process of cultural change.

People will protect the past. No matter how vividly you can paint a picture of what the future may look like, some individuals, for various reasons, will want to hold onto what they have or how things have been done in the past. Understand this and know which battles to take on and which ones to leave for another day.

Inside and out. The idea behind changing the culture is to see some form of improvement. Ensure this improvement extends beyond the four walls in which you operate. The cultural change you seek should provide benefits both internally and externally.

Recognise highlight and reward. Sometimes, it won’t matter how much you talk about what you are attempting to do, what you need others to do to make it work, or the benefits that will come from cultural change. Some, for all sorts of reasons, will just not get it.

So, to help others better understand and to create greater clarity, make sure that when you see real-life action that signifies what you are seeking, you take time to highlight that particular attitude, action, or behaviour. If appropriate and without creating a problem for those involved, maybe you should reward these attitudes, actions, and behaviours.

Understand the psychology involved. The cultural change you seek might include strategic change, process change, productivity change, attitudinal change, positional change and many many other aspects of change. The one you need to really consider (and most don’t) is the emotional and psychological aspects of the cultural change. Basically, how will this change have people thinking about themselves, what they do, how they do it and why they do what they do?

Prepare well, measure twice and cut once. I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I have been brought in to clean up a culture mess because someone didn’t prepare well enough and jumped the gun. The cultural change became a cultural nightmare. Prepare before you proceed, and once you’ve started, ensure that any further change you will implement has been thoroughly thought through and looked at from all angles.

Remember that if you make mistakes or start to renege on a particular approach at any point after starting the cultural change process, you will start to lose the engagement and belief of those who will help make the cultural change a success.

See the reality. Have a process to measure the effectiveness of your cultural change in place well before you start. Know what you are looking for and why. What is success, and what is failure? Don’t fudge the numbers for any reason.

And most of all, do it right and make sure…

The Journey Continues!