Organizations That Focus on Company Culture Are More Successful: 4 Books That Can Help
“Having a great company culture is no longer just an option. Today's workers consider it as much as they consider salary and benefits,” said Entrepreneur reporter Sujan Patel in 2015.
The idea of culture will become even more prevalent by 2022. Forbes, in fact, calls 2022 “The Year of the Workplace Culture.” Company culture seems to be here to say, but what is it?
The Purpose of Company Culture
Company culture is not just making sure employees get a decent salary and benefits. It involves making the workplace an environment people would want to be in. Culture also includes collaboration and engaging with customers and employees in a purpose-driven way.
Developing this culture calls for instilling a set of values and beliefs that begins when you hire employees, so you can attract the right talent, and so that they know what to expect.
Although company culture might look different for each organization, the feeling of belonging (or inclusion) seems to be a common theme for companies that focus on company culture. Inclusion and belonging may even increase employee engagement, productivity, and retention.
Company Culture Examples
Besides the feeling of belonging, company culture often involves encouraging employees to become the best that they can be. Some of these examples of company culture are found in personal development books that encourage people to shine in the workplace.
1. General Motors in The Power of Company Culture
The Power of Company Culture describes how Chief Talent Officer Michael Arena motivated employees for success at General Motors. It reveals strategies for increasing workplace engagement and productivity too.
2. Procter & Gamble in The High Speed Company
The High Speed Company describes a number of company culture scenarios, one of which is Procter & Gamble (P&G). This corporation sent its executives to people’s homes. It gave the execs a more personal perspective of how and what P&G products “real” people (consumers) use.
The P&G example shows how company culture can work on the consumer front end as well as among employees. It also produces an environment that employees may respond positively to, knowing that the company they work for cares for the people that buy from them.
3. Netflix in Powerful: Building a Culture of Freedom and Responsibility
Patty McCord shows her approach toward building company culture in Powerful: Building a Culture of Freedom and Responsibility. Some of her methods, such as having to “say goodbye to employees” who don’t fit Netflix’s “emerging needs,” may seem brutal.
Radical honesty, not brutal, is apparently what Neftlix’s former chief talent officer was after. This also included motivating employees by challenging them (probably with work that didn’t put them to sleep on the job). McCord didn’t go the way of traditional Human Resource support, such as performance reviews or retention plans.
What good could possibly come from this? McCord implemented a “no rules” approach. It was meant to give control back to the people, which probably is the riskiest kind of corporate culture to develop. However, it’s known to help employees empower themselves to fulfill their potential instead of feeling inhibited and stifled.
4. WP Engine in Entrepreneur Voices on Company Culture
In 2022, it seems fitting to mention at least one digital company’s point of view on company culture. Apparently, this organization says that culture can happen “by accident.”
Anyone involved in a digital marketing role or in offering freelance web hosting services would understand the WP Engine philosophy. Online work involves a form of collaboration not always achieved in person, and it is a form of company culture.
By the way, “thrilling customers” is reportedly WP Engine’s number one priority. Of course, this would occur alongside online security and website uptimes.
Hopefully, these examples will inspire your team. The principles these organizations applied in their business could work for any company size.
