I recently attended a presentation delivered by a local business leader. The topic centered on how to change the culture of an organization.
When he accepted his leadership position eight years ago, the culture of the organization needed to be improved. In order to motivate everyone, he had to be passionate about the new direction. To be passionate about it, it had to come from within him, so he did not consult his new leadership team for input.
He began by asking himself “why does the organization exist?” It had to be much more than providing a product and making a profit. Those were merely the results of what they did and how they did it. Why did his organization exist?
After many sleepless nights the answer became clear. The organization’s sole purpose was to help people. If everyone in the organization focused on helping people, everything else would fall into place.
The leadership team met and defined a new mission statement. A good mission statement is important because the mission drives the direction. Everyone in the organization needs to understand the direction or they will not get where they want to go.
The management team communicated the mission statement to the rest of the team. Everyone began to hunt for ways to help people. They shared ideas of how they could help people, even if it was outside of their normal area of operations. They strove to help people, even if it meant not generating income on every contact.
Management encouraged everyone to make as many contacts as they could. Then they shared success stories about how they helped people. Almost immediately, their clients noticed the difference, and the difference was good. The culture had begun to change.
Now this organization is respected as one of the very best in its industry. It all started with changing the culture of the organization.
