Perhaps you have heard this saying before? Culture eats strategy for lunch.
Culture is most commonly defined as the behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a group of people. So an organization’s culture of behaviors and beliefs are what shape the decisions people make and results an organization achieves.
Lessons learned indicate that an organization’s culture is driven from the top down. For example, what culture related messages do organizational leaders send:With their words? With their actions at work? In public? When they respond to conflicts? When information is shared internally and externally? When changes are encountered? On an ongoing basis?
So how does culture eat strategy for breakfast?
Simple…an organization can have the best strategy in the world, but if their culture will not allow or enable the strategy to happen…the strategy is not going to succeed.There has never been a more critical time for organizational leaders to ensure new strategies are aligned with their organization’s culture. Organizational leaders must also eliminate gaps and connect-the-dots to ensure their organization’s culture is consistent across levels and silos of people.How is culture created, implemented and managed?
Lessons learned show that organizations first need to replace their traditional and reactive methods of communications – manuals, general and annual training, memos and memorandums – with proactive methods that ensure awareness, accountability and measurability.Lessons learned show that organizations are more successful when their acceptable behaviors and organizational beliefs are communicated using methods that require individual level acknowledgements of understanding.
If your organization is just blasting your acceptable behaviors and beliefs and policies out to your people in manuals, e-mails and memos…how do you know if anyone is reading them or understands them?
A recent example of culture eating strategy for breakfast comes from a hospital in Colorado. The hospital recently found out that some of their patients received letters informing them that their medical records were taken from unsecured recycling bins outside the hospital owned clinic. A hospital spokesperson told a Denver news affiliate the following:“We learned that while we have good policies for protecting patients’ information, those policies weren’t really being followed.”I guess their culture ate their strategy (and policies) for breakfast…
SOURCE: https://www.infosecisland.com/blogview/3654-Culture-Eats-Strategy-for-Lunch.html
BIG THANKS TO REV. MARK SWEENEY for suggesting this fantastic topic ! ~ Mom Nanhi ~
