Why Your Culture Can’t Be Fixed (and What to Do Instead)

by | Nov 12, 2024 | Leadership, Management, Teaming

“Culture eats strategy for breakfast”

I’m willing to wager a decent amount of money that the people you work with (and maybe yourself?) do not understand the concept of company culture.

People think culture is the set of shared beliefs and values that are usually written on a poster and often celebrated during onboarding. Ultimately, culture acts like a magical tapestry that covers everything and everyone in the organization. That culture is the very foundation of success.

But here’s my first objection to all of those claims. Culture is not a what. It’s a how.

It’s not what we believe in. It’s how we work. And that “how” is really about the dynamic that is created when interactions collide.

These interactions are driven by MUCH more than beliefs and values.

Consider this: We can say that we believe in just about anything. I’ll use “excellence” as an example. Company culture does not produce excellence. How we interact does.

The people in the organization must demonstrate a wide variety of behaviors (plus skills, insights, external relationships, and SO much more) to produce excellence. This is why some companies can deliver excellence – and many others cannot (even though “excellence” is proudly displayed on the company poster).

Let’s swap excellence with another popular value… fun. We can say we value fun, but again – have you ever been to a work party that was boring and stale beyond explanation? Fun cannot be produced without a wide variety of behaviors to produce an atmosphere that is genuinely fun.

And let’s ponder fun for a moment. Does the company poster mean that “fun” is produced by employee parties? Or does it really mean that “fun” is produced by winning? Again, fun is meaningless as a “what.” It’s only when we switch to emphasizing “how” that it begins to (kind of) make sense.

Your culture is NOT what is posted in a poster

But it doesn’t end there.

Your actual culture is usually not what is publicly known.

Let’s look at one of the most successful companies in the past couple of decades.

Apple came out of “has-been” status in the 2000’s to dominate not just the tech landscape, but the music and entertainment world, telecommunications, retail, and even finance.

By all means it was a success, and it was touted as an amazing culture. But the reality was not so nice.

Here’s what a former Apple employee had to say about’s Apple’s cultural value of “secrecy.” (1)

“This environment of secrecy produces an unwritten hierarchy of “haves” and “have-nots” within the company. For the “haves,” the hierarchy of disclosure is a way to exert influence and demonstrate power beyond one’s role or title. For “have-nots,” it’s a subtle but constant reminder of your rank.

To be sure, this culture of secrecy generates billions of dollars in real value for Apple’s shareholders. There’s no denying its merit and its reflection of the man who created the culture.

But values drive priorities, and no value can be reflected in a company’s culture without making trade-offs. Apple is no exception. Its legendary secrecy led to information silos, discouraged cross-functional knowledge sharing and created a rigid definition of roles that discouraged individuals from expanding their professional horizons.”

The real culture of Apple had more to do with silos, turf wars, and rigidity than secrecy. Secrecy was just the public name for the justification of the other behaviors.

But I can guarantee you that what was done in private was not what was talked about in public.

Your culture is NOT what is public

But of all the arguments that I can offer about why culture is a myth that people genuinely don’t understand, this is the most damning thing that I can say: Your company culture crumbles and disintegrates under pressure.

In other words, if I want to peer into the true soul of an organization, I want to see how its people respond to stress.

  • How do people act when an outcome MUST be produced?
  • How do people act when someone FAILS?
  • How do leaders respond to hearing BAD news?

Most of the time, I see individuals who do well – but rarely do I see entire businesses do well across every function and every level.

“But Tim – what about the example of highly successful company XYZ? Everyone wants to be like them.”

Let me ask you this: Does everyone want to be like that company culture or do they want to simply have the same results?

Look at the “Top 5 most successful companies of the last 20 years” (per ChatGPT).

  1. Apple
  2. Amazon
  3. Microsoft
  4. Alphabet (Google)
  5. Tesla

I know many former (and even current) employees of those companies and they all have their own horror stories. At best, none of the cultures were anything spectacular.

In other words, those companies were able to produce amazing results – in spite of themselves. Their innovation made them desirable places to be.

Until their innovation started to fall behind.

Until competitors started to catch up.

Until the stress started to grow.

When everyone was winning, the “culture” was great. But once stress took over, the intended standard of company culture disappeared.

Your culture is NOT your results

But there is a silver lining here.

Culture CAN be a powerful lever. Culture can be used to generate energy in a way that causes growth and value. But ONLY if you have these four things in place:

  • Clarity
  • Empowerment
  • Engagement
  • Accountability

If I take away ANY one of these elements, your organizational ability to handle stressful situations will fall aport.

And your company culture… Will. Become. Toxic.

So, instead of trying to “fix” your culture, build it by investing FIRST in clarity, THEN in empowerment, FOLLOWED by engagement, and FINALLY genuine, trust-based accountability.

And it MUST be in that order…

  • There will never be a healthy culture without trust-based accountability.
  • And there will never be accountability without authentic employee engagement.
  • And there will never be engagement without effective empowerment.
  • And there will never be empowerment without consistent clarity.

Here is the best part of that advice. Once you inject clarity, you immediately see EVERYTHING shift into a healthier place. It may be small at first, but clarity really is THAT powerful. It is the prime domino for high-performing teams. All other dominos fall into place once clarity is forged and maintained.

So, what is the bottom line? It is this. Culture is not the magical ingredient we often think it is. It is the OUTCOME. Your culture EMERGES from HOW you use clarity, empowerment, engagement, and accountability. Period.

Culture is not an outcome that can be fixed – because you can’t “fix” an outcome.

Mirror moment:

If you removed what is posted, what is public, and the results of your organization, how would you describe your company culture? In other words, if an outsider came in and watched how people interact, what would they describe?
If you ramped up pressure and stress to deliver a truly important outcome that has fallen behind, how would people and teams interact? What would happen to your cross-functional clarity, empowerment, engagement, and accountability?
Imagine yourself in a high-pressure situation. How does your own behavior shift to deliver the desired result? How’s that working for you?

Holomua. Onward and upward.

All the best ~ Tim

(1) https://www.vox.com/2017/9/11/16288896/apple-secrecy-inkling-culture-leadership-transparency-values

PS When you are ready, here are a few ways for us to continue your journey together.