From the course: Creating a Culture of Continuous Improvement

What is culture and why does it matter?

From the course: Creating a Culture of Continuous Improvement

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What is culture and why does it matter?

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- We all know that culture is what drives our organizations, much like the engine of a car. At the very least, it requires routine maintenance to keep working effectively, because what works today will not be acceptable forever. You need to continue to refine, improve, and set yourself up for greater success as your organization grows and evolves. It's my position that culture is two things. One, how your employees behave, and two, what they say about you and the organization when they aren't at work. Organizational culture is the shared set of values and beliefs that make up your unique social and psychological environment. And that environment likely consists of many subcultures, each with their own unique sets of values and beliefs. Say, for example, you're a large and completely hypothetical multinational coffee company. You may have different cultures in your retail store versus the corporate offices. Within those offices, there may be cultural differences from your IT, to HR, to your finance or operational teams. Culture is not some monolithic brush we can paint everything inside your walls with. There is nuance. So where strategy is meant to dictate what things get done in your organizations, culture dictates how things get done, or rather, how things are done. And just like the engine of a car can differ between makes and models, so too can cultures differ from organization to organization. With that as a backdrop, it's clear to see why culture is so important. Culture in your workplace is not stagnant. For an organization to stay relevant, its culture has to evolve and adapt. Overcoming that inertia through the development and growth of a continuous improvement mindset, remains critical for your continued success.

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