Chapter 9.2 - Corporate Planning and Implementation
Lesson Objective: The difficulties in changing Corporate Culture
Strategic Implementation is all about putting into effect Strategic Plans:
Choosing between the 5 types of Corporate Culture is no easy task - various factors go into consideration, including:
The company's history and legacy;
Executives attitude towards risk-taking;
The market the company operates in;
The personal characteristics of managers in charge.
An even more complex task is changing the Corporate Culture - which sometimes is a necessary evil:
- When family businesses become public limited companies and nepotism is no longer accepted and investors push to more transparency and development of natural talent;
- When the need to quickly respond to market changes arise;
- When very bureaucratic public companies are privatized;
- When staff motivation is at its lowest negatively impacting profits and pushing for a change;
- When a takeover takes place and the bought-out company having to adapt its culture.
The reasons for changing an Organizational Culture are diverse. The challenges of doing so, however, are immense:
Converting staff and processes into a new culture is a long-lasting procedure (years);
Deep changes in an organization require deep changes in the peoples' thinking and behavior;
Changing culture is scary for many: it may involve changes of personnel, job descriptions, communication methods, and working practices.
Read & Discuss: Activity 9.3
Activity: watch the video and try to identify the best-practices in changing Organizational Culture:
There are some tips to making this switching process less of a hassle:
1. Focus on the positive aspects of the business instead of focusing on fixing negative ones: I
'It is a lot harder to change something bad into something good than making something good better'
2. Articulate commitment from key personnel - including informal leaders:
With the purpose of creating role models to others. Consider replacing resistance.
3. Communicate through your Corporate Objectives and Mission Statements:
4. Implement bottom-up participation:
5. Provide education and training to reflect the new proposed changes, value, attributes, and behavior on existing staff:
'Your people will be more acceptive of a change if they are comfortable with it'
6. Use reward systems to the advantage of the change:
Reward favorable behavior to communicate and convince the benefits of the 'new normal'
Read & Discuss: Activity 9.4
There is a strong link between Corporate Culture and Business Decision-Making. For example:
A business with a power culture would simply impose strategic changes to its people - which may create resistance;
On the other hand, task or person culture businesses may incentivize participation and communication making it easier for a successful changing process.
When a Corporate Culture is strong (widespread common beliefs) it becomes easier for businesses to decide and implement new strategies as most people are already 'in the same page.'
Such importance of Corporate Culture is reinforced by its many legs within an organization:
Examples of values/beliefs guiding behavior:
- In some businesses it is culturally acceptable to pay and accept bribes;
- Some cultures encourage bottom-up conversations and others don't;
- Different cultures have different degrees of ethics and environmental concern.
Going back to the topic of Corporate Change:
Transformational Leadership is an important feature guiding changes: these are leaders that:
Work with the team to...
Identify the need for change,
Create a vision that will inspire people to accept the change,
And implement the change alongside the team.
Transformational Leaders Characteristics:
- Lead by example of behavior/qualities;
- Communicates change to create acceptance;
- Demonstrates legitimate concern for employees needs;
- Provide stimulating challenges to employees to create encouragement and high-performance (self-actualization).
Transformational leaders increase the chances of successful long-lasting changes to take place as they gain support from employees. They ease the process of change due to that received support making the business more adaptable and flexible to respond to market forces.
To-Do-List:
Chapter 9.2 - Corporate Planning and Implementation
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