Culture Change
The key to your successPropulo has been in the business of “culture change” for operational outcomes for over 15-years. We’ve learned that:
- Culture change truly represents the sum of multiple individual change journeys – to be effective we need to incorporate learnings from brain science and psychology around individual change in attitudes, beliefs and mindsets with broader organizational change research.
- To drive change, the intangibles of culture need to be measured. We created our Safe Production model to drive just that, an ability to explore an operating culture against key facets of safety, quality, productivity and Customer Experience. This goes beyond employee engagement to explore the elements that drive business success.
- Culture change needs to have a defined outcome which can capture the hearts and minds of team members. Culture change initiatives that don’t have this central focus tend to fail. Change for safety and customers tend to gather the most buy-in.
- Culture change can’t be owned by HR. It needs to be owned by the broader organization and operations. It needs to be linked to real results not just soft numbers like employee engagement.
- Culture change can’t follow the same models as other change initiatives. What works to implement a new IT system won’t work for culture.
- Training won’t change culture without a broader focus on change at the individual and organizational level.
To maximize outcomes, our Propulo science team recently completed one of the most comprehensive reviews of research and thinking in culture change. We reviewed all of the leading change models, explored research in individual change and combined it with our own experience to create a modern, evidence-based change model, focused on people.
12 Key Stages of Change
To lead culture change, we have identified 12 key stages that need to be followed to maximize the chances of success. These are:
The Sum of Multiple Individual Change Journeys
When we think of culture change, it really represents the sum of multiple individual change journeys. Each team member is presented with new information or cultural norms and at some stage either agrees or opposes (sometimes unconsciously) the desired change. These shifts in attitudes, beliefs and mindsets reoccur multiple times within a workforce and will continue to shift as more and more team members choose to embrace the new path. Change initiators will be the first ones to embrace the change, followed with early adopters.
Adoption Stages
Until critical mass is achieved, it will be an uphill battle to make the change stick. Once that critical mass is achieved, change efforts will need to be sustained but will become easier.
The Case for Culture
94
Percentage of executives that believe that a distinct workplace culture is important to success
19
Yet, percentage that believe their culture is widely upheld
87
Percentage of Leaders that cite culture and engagement as a top organizational challenge
46
Percentage of EBIT that Culture can account for
Top quartile cultures post a return to shareholders 60% higher than median companies and 200% higher than those in the bottom quartile
Culture Impacts Business Outcomes
- Higher Productivity
- Improved Safety
- Improved Customer Experience
- Increased Organizational Agility
- Increased Innovation
- Increased Revenue & Profits
- More Challenging to Copy
- Increased Engagement
- Reduced Turnover
- Decreased Absenteeism