Architecting a Positive Corporate Culture Part 4: Resilience and evolution

This week we continue our discussion of how to create a corporate culture that is conducive to positive mimesis. Last week we spoke about the people—how to hire folks who are both functionally and emotionally/psychologically competent. This week, we are talking about how to ensure the organization evolves in ways that are conducive to the preservation and enhancement of the culture.

Your business will ultimately evolve and face a variety of pressures over time. Your people will naturally evolve as well. It becomes imperative then to do two things. One of them is to understand the impact of these changes. The other is to keep your people engaged and developing professionally. Below are five ways to accomplish this.

1. Develop continuous learning programs. Encourage ongoing education and development in both functional skills and behaviors, especially for managers and new leaders. This could include workshops, seminars, mentorship and peer learning, and access to online learning resources to keep the team updated with the latest industry trends and practices. These should be personalized to cater to individual needs and career aspirations.
2. Conduct regular planning and strategy sessions. Conduct periodic strategy sessions to review goals, assess progress, and adjust plans as needed. These sessions can help anticipate market changes, enabling the organization to pivot in advance. Involve people from across the business in these sessions to ensure a broad range of perspectives are considered.
3. Monitor your metrics. Keep a constant eye on key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics to gauge the organization’s health and performance—both financially and culturally. Regularly reviewing these metrics can help identify trends and potential areas of change early. Be sure these metrics are aligned with long-term strategic goals and not just short-term performance indicators.
4. Schedule top-down and bottom-up feedback sessions: Implement structured feedback sessions involving all team members. These sessions provide insights into the team’s sentiment and can surface ideas for improvements or adjustments before issues become problematic. As mentioned above, it is crucial to act on the feedback to demonstrate its value to the team.
5. “Stress test” the business under different scenarios. Periodically conduct scenario planning exercises to see how your business might react under different situations, however far-fetched they might be. This can include economic downturns, market disruptions, or operational crises. By analyzing how these scenarios impact different aspects of your business, you can identify and strengthen areas of vulnerability. Incorporate what you learn from these stress tests into your processes and training and development programs.

Next week: Challenges and solutions to overcome them when implementing a positive culture