“Culture is to recruiting as product is to marketing.” – HubSpot’s Culture code

Let me ask you a question…

… And I want you to answer honestly.

How much do you know about your culture?

Really stop and think about it.

1. Have you ever defined your workplace culture?
2. Have you missed out on recruiting or retaining top staff because of a culture issue?
3. Have you ever suffered from lost productivity due to your culture?

Well…

If you’re anything like other leaders, you probably answered “yes” to at least one of these questions—or you may not know the answers at all.

Let’s face it:

Understanding your workplace culture and its effects can be challenging.

Can you relate?

Do you avoid culture work because you’re not sure what to do?

Is it hard to get a grasp on your culture and what might be some problems?

If so, I want us to work through an exercise that will help you learn about your work culture—even if you have no prior experience in this area.

(You know, so you can stop holding yourself back from making important transformations in your company.)

Discover your culture today in 5 steps

Figuring out your culture is where you need to start for making any positive change.

And the best way to understand your culture is by asking those who are closest to it.

That’s why in this exercise you’ll be learning about your culture from the inside-out.

Follow these 5 easy steps:

1. Ask 5 staff members to describe your culture in ONE sentence

Have them record their answer on a piece of paper or in an email.

2. Go to 2 leaders and have them describe the culture in one sentence

Now you’ve got both a leadership and staff perspective.

3. Collect and compile the responses

Were there similarities?

Were there differences?

What surprised you?

By gaining the insights and opinions of your staff and leaders, you’re absorbing valuable information about your company.

You’re not only learning about your culture from leaders, you’re learning about how your employees feel. This gives you insight, but also shows that you value and appreciate your employees’ opinions.

4. Craft a statement of your company’s culture

Use your 7 statements to help you to create a culture statement for your company.

Here’s some more examples to inspire:

“We have a culture where we are incredibly self critical, we don’t get comfortable with our success.” – Mark Parker, CEO, Nike

“We believe that it’s really important to come up with core values that you can commit to. And by commit, we mean that you’re willing to hire and fire based on them. If you’re willing to do that, then you’re well on your way to building a company culture that is in line with the brand you want to build.” – Tony Hsieh, CEO, Zappos

(Download Beyond Work Hard, Play Hard for more culture magic that helped Zappos win countless awards for the best companies to work for).

“Hire great people and give them freedom to be awesome.” – Andrew Mason, Founder, Groupon

“Our culture is friendly and intense, but if push comes to shove we’ll settle for intense.” – Jeff Bezos, Founder, CEO, Amazon

5. Share what you learned

Finally, commit to completing this exercise by sharing what you’ve learned with the group.

Stop by the BespokeHR Facebook page and share your culture in a sentence, along with anything you were inspired by through the process:

Any questions?

If you have questions on this topic or any others, feel free to reach me by email or set up a free one-on-one consultation session, or drop me a comment below.

Thanks for sharing!