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Culture Trumps Reorganization Every Time

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by Ron Wince — published Jul 14, 2010 12:43 PM
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In his recent editorial column in Government Executive...

“Reorganization is Easy Compared to Culture Change,” Editor Tom Shoop comments on a common reaction to crisis – moving things around.  Shoop articulates the dynamic perfectly – management tends to assume that simply moving the chairs on the Titanic will somehow prevent the sinking of a ship that’s hit an iceberg.

In the course of our work with both commercial and government organizations, we see this happen over and over.  Crisis hits and the immediate “solution” is to remove the leader.  While this may give the illusion of corrective action, far too often the true outcome is disappointing and fails to address root cause of bad performance.  In many cases, the mission and culture are not aligned with the outcomes needed from the agency.  Another implicit statement from Shoop is the mention of President Obama’s pledge that the new leader will solve the problem.  Obama falls into the same trap we see time and again among leaders – simply mandating an action does not mean the problem will be solved, the strategy will be executed or the results will be acceptable.  Well over 70% of the time, this approach does not work.

Whether an organization is headed down the road of launching a process improvement or integrating an acquisition, the failure of leadership to recognize that proclaiming an action be done will rarely – if ever – meet expectations. The antidote in hard or static times is building a deep and broad culture of continuous awareness, vigilance and actionable process improvement.

Like the tip of an iceberg, moving the deck chairs or barking orders are actions that only scratch the surface in creating and maintaining an effective enterprise in crisis or not.

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Culture change might mean leadership change

Posted by Anonymous User at Jul 20, 2010 01:37 PM
Neither a change in leadership (or leadership behavior) nor a mandate are enough on their own
but both are necessary to change the culture of an organization. Culture change has to start with leadership example. In the absence of leadership, culture just happens and will most often echo the management style prevalent in the organization. GE is a company often lauded for its high performing culture and the person most noted for creating that culture is its former leader Jack Welch. Without Welch's vision of how he wanted the organization to act and of its beliefs and practices, as well as his relentless drive to build the culture of the company, GE would likely not have achieved the same level of success.

If an organization does not have the culture it needs to succeed, you need to look to leadership first. If in the leader you don't see the beliefs and practices that will lead to success, one of two things needs to happen: the leader has to change or you have to change the leader (if you want to kill the body, chop off its head).

Reorganization should not trump culture change... but it sure can jump start it.