One-team culture

One of the things that many of my clients are seeking to achieve is a ‘one-team’ culture. By this they mean, one way of behaving, working together and achieving, that everyone adheres to.

Culture, unfortunately, is more complicated than this as it is - more often than not - a feeling that people have, based on how they perceive their circumstances at that moment in time, within the team that they are working in, rather than the things they see on the website or wall.

The closest any organisation can get to a one-team culture is to firstly recognise that the company is made up of multiple sub-cultures, each with different goals and targets and therefore the behaviours required to be successful in each will likely be different.

And secondly, ensure that managers have all been trained - in a consistent manner - on how to build culture. That way, the same principles of culture-building will be applied across every team and thus, the chance of the values being consistent across the organisation are greatly enhanced.

This also creates a benefit for the organisation in that it can measure all managers equally on the kinds of cultures they are building for their teams to flourish. They will then be able to more easily recognise those doing a great job and those who require more support or in extreme cases (where safety and performance has been undermined), performance management.

Culture is everyone’s responsibility, however, the greatest lever for consistency will always be found through managers and if they don’t have the skills required to build it, then a one-team approach will always be out of reach.