It
is an axiomatic fact that strategy execution and corporate culture play a
remarkable role in the attainment of organizational success. From the
chronological point of view, it can be argued that the significance of corporate
culture emerges in between strategy formulation and strategy execution. Organizational
strategy can be in fact properly developed on paper, but whether this is not also
appropriately executed with great or sufficient precision it is hardly
imaginable that an employer might ever be able to successfully point in the right
direction and achieve its scope, that is to say successfully pursue its
intended strategy. The most effective and appropriate KPI to asses corporate
culture can be hence identified with its capability to support organizational
strategy and more in particular its consistent and successful execution.
The values,
beliefs, behaviour and “the way we do things around here” fostered within a
business by an employer in that considered crucial to the attainment of its
objectives clearly vary from organization to organization. The fact each company
has a different corporate culture peculiar to this and only this should indeed represent
the distinctive characteristic of each organization, somewhat of its DNA. In
the unlikely event of two or more organizations fostering exactly the same type
of culture, nonetheless, even remarkable differences between these are likely
to emerge by reason of its different execution.
It
can be very pragmatically concluded that the efficacy of corporate culture
sorely depends on how helpful and supportive this proves to be of strategy
execution. To be deemed appropriate and coherent with the employer’s wants and
expectations an organization’s culture essentially needs to ease and favour the
effectual strategy implementation process.
Every
business founder concentrates and focuses his/her efforts on fostering and
promoting a type of culture peculiar to his/her organization so as to enabling
this to achieve competitive advantage. Notwithstanding, it can be identified
some features and components, which whether properly underpin corporate culture,
should contribute to considerably increase employers chances to successfully implement
their strategy.
Table 2
Readiness
to change
The
speed change occurs in the exogenous environment habitually requires employers
to introduce changes into their organizations at the same pace. The fact that employees
may oppose and resist change, albeit this is necessary for their organization
to stay afloat and remain competitive in the relevant market, and the delay in
its implementation this habitually entails are likely to have a remarkably
negative impact on strategy implementation.
Individual
readiness to change should be hence considered as one of the main underpinning
pillars of corporate culture and should be invariably inspired by concepts like
dynamism, energy, adaptability and innovation. The metaphor of the organization
as a chameleon might prove to be effective to properly convey the message. This
species of lizards has adapted to live in trees and developed the ability to
change the colour of their skin to match their surroundings and escape
predators’ attention (though this theory has been relatively recently opposed
by some scientists who sustain that the change of the colour of their skin is
rather used by these reptiles to communicate and control their body temperature).
Since for modern organizations gaining and maintaining competitive edge is
crucially important, as chameleons these should aim at constantly growing
throughout their lives. Being informed of what occurs in the external
environment and about their competitors’ moves is clearly of pivotal importance,
too; as chameleons, hence, organizations should be able to simultaneously look
at two different directions with a 360-degree view and promptly focus on what
they see.
Organizational
culture cannot and should be not, nonetheless, only based on a defensive and
adaptive approach; employers should attach great importance to their employee capability
to come up with new ideas, develop new approaches and anticipate future trends,
and should thus encourage everyone within the business to contribute in this
sense. Innovation must be hence invariably regarded by employers as an
additional important pillar of their organization culture; the most appropriate
metaphor organizations can use to convey the message might hence be that of the
innovative chameleon.
Clarify
and spell out the intended objectives
Individuals
are habitually willing and in many respects keen to accept and genuinely
embrace change whether these understand and recognize the need for its
introduction and the benefits it is intended to bring. Making clear what the
reasons for change are and why this is actually necessary for the organization
to maintain or expand its presence in the market would clearly help an employer
to gain its employees’ support and active participation during the processes of
change and strategy execution.
The direction identified by a company should enable this and
its people to achieve success and in turn secure employees job stability. The
circumstance strategy is implemented and change is eventually introduced to
support the process, essentially with the aim of deriving a benefit to the
organization, regardless of which this might be, has to be clearly outlined and
explained to employees from the outset. It is indeed absolutely necessary that
these become fully aware of the positive implications associated with the
introduction of change and of how significant their support is in order for their
employer to successfully pursue its intended strategy.
Employers must invariably avert talking the talk and do not
walking the walk; employees would sooner or later find out whether these have
supported their decisions with deceitful arguments and should such circumstance
occur the consequences would definitely be disastrous and more often than not
irreversible. First and foremost, employers need to gain their employees trust
and confidence, which can definitely be regarded as a key prerequisite to
establish an effective communication channel with individuals. Openness,
transparency and trust should be thus invariably considered as features
strongly characterizing corporate culture, but clearly not exclusively “on
paper.”
Communications
Communication is of paramount importance more than usual; it
essentially represents the only means enabling employers to provide employees a
clear-sighted vision. All of the individuals composing the employee population
need to have crystal clear ideas of the strategy identified by their employer,
should gain a good understanding of how it can enable the organization to
achieve a sustainable competitive advantage and thus genuinely back this. The
establishment of an open, two-way communication channel can clearly facilitate
the process.
Corporate culture, consistently with the aim of inspiring,
building up and winning employee confidence and trust, should promote a
transparent, honest communication ensuring employees to have their say. The aim
of communications should not be hence limited to unveil and share with all the
employees the plan of action developed by the employer, but should rather aim
at enabling the employer to involve and bring on board all of its employees. Corporate
culture should encourage employee continuous contribution and active
participation, and encourage employees to continuously come up with and suggest
new ideas.
Every
individual should feel to be active part of the process and commit his/her
contribution to the overall outcome produced by the organization as a whole.
Learning
In
order for employees to actively become part of the process these have to be first
and foremost put in a position to effectively contribute to organizational success.
Involving in the pursuance of organizational strategy individuals who do not
have the skills and capabilities required, would clearly produce
counterproductive effects. Inasmuch as corporate culture needs to foster
individual participation, commitment and contribution to organizational
success, this has to encourage individual learning. Employers should thus
invariably ensure and secure their employees to have access to the programmes
enabling them to gain and expand the capabilities and knowledge necessary to
effectually play their role.
A
skilled employee population may indeed help employers to reverse the trend in
terms of change in that knowledgeable and capable individuals may actually come
up with new, ingenious ideas anticipating external pressures and proposing
change from within. This circumstance would certainly be ideal, change would
not be in fact imposed by others, but proposed by employees, which would thus
perfectly know the benefits associated with its introduction and would instantly
and naturally become change advocates.
The
same result in terms of employee participation should be indeed ideally achieved
also in those circumstances in which change is proposed by employers by reason
of the pressure exerted by the exogenous environment. Involving employees in
the project from the outset and establishing an appropriate two-way
communication channel should definitely help employers to successfully perform
the feat.
Reward
It
can be contended that the old saying “money talks” still definitely holds true.
Irrespective of the awareness managers may or may not have, the decisions they
make in terms of reward clearly communicate and convey a precise message to
employees, a message which individuals more often than not receive clearly and
promptly. Whether corporate culture fosters individual participation and
involvement, and some individuals behave as desired by the employer and yield
the expected results, these need to be openly recognized. The introduction of
this mechanism not only reinforces the importance of concepts like consistency
and integrity within the business, but may also help employers to sustain and
consolidate corporate culture and the tenets underpinning this.
Organizational
culture should obviously foster individual commitment and participation, but it
should also promote at the same time the employer willingness and readiness to
recognize those who support the business in its quest to pursue its intended
strategy and attain the desired objectives.
HRM
Model
Consistency
should be showed at all the organizational levels and layers, corporate culture
should be thus consistent also with the HRM model adopted by the employer. It
is not indeed just a matter of consistency; the HR management model
underpinning the organization human capital practices should also noticeably
support and sustain a company culture in that this is also essentially
concerned with favouring and easing the attainment of the employer desired
objectives.
Management
commitment
Individuals
will never commit to support their employer and let alone try to go the extra
mile whether the organization management does not lead by example. The management
commitment has hence to be gained from the very beginning and has to be sorely
visible.
The
role played by mangers in developing and shaping organizational culture is
clearly much more than simply considerable. They have the responsibility to
provide employees with a vision, support individuals during their working
activities and make decisions about individual growth and hence future.
Mangers can definitely make or break corporate culture so that before appointing a new manager employers should definitely ensure that these have what it takes to properly perform their role and genuinely and truly support the organization strategy and culture. The findings of many studies reveal that bad management is indeed one of the most recurring causes for employees leaving their organization. Notwithstanding, managers are appointed by employers so that the responsibility for individuals leaving their organization ultimately rests with them. The circumstance an organization appoints the wrong person to fill the wrong position has to be essentially regarded as an employer blunder and whether after having made such a huge mistake employers do not take appropriate action it is likely that these will be called to pay for it anytime soon.
***
The great
significance of organizational culture for strategy implementation and thus
organizational success can be taken as axiomatic. The type of culture fostered
by a company founder should be first of all consistent with and peculiar to the
specific type of strategy this intends to pursue, the objectives this aims at
attaining and the behaviour this expects individuals to exhibit. Nonetheless, employers
should invariably shape and develop their businesses culture taking heed of some
core, founding pillars such as readiness to change, flexibility, innovation,
learning, recognition and open communication. On top of these components
business founders, with the help of the organization management, should
identify the other values and beliefs which they consider important to gain and
maintain competitive advantage over their competitors.
Longo, R., (2015), How
corporate culture supports strategy execution; Milan: HR Professionals.
