Graphic showing a hand with a missing piece to create an amazing business culture

How to Build an Amazing Business Culture

17 October 2023

Table of Contents

Business culture is critically important. Even with a terrific product and a clear strategy, success will be fleeting without the support of a great culture.

A strong culture shapes how you conduct business, how your team interacts with customers, and each other.

A Great Business Culture Starts at the Top.

You can’t fake good business culture. No amount of marketing or PR will paper over the cracks of a poor culture.

Culture, always, starts at the top. Actions of leaders, and policies, shape the business culture.

In Australia we have recently seen examples of businesses that put profit before everything else. In the process destroying their brand and trust.

You can’t say one thing, and do something else, and not expect there will be a cost.

When culture fails, leaders (and boards), must be accountable. Insincere apologies, marketing, and spin will not be enough. Culture and trust are built through consistent action over time.

What is Your Ideal Business Culture?

To build a great business culture, the starting point is to decide what that looks like:

A culture that supports your Vision and strategy.

Allows you, and the team, to live the Business Purpose.

Is aligned to the core values of the business.

Influences the types of people you employ.

Delivers an amazing experience for your customers.

Your Business Culture: Current Reality.

When you have a sense of the culture you want to create, next undertake a reality audit:

What is not working, frustrating, or impeding the type of culture and customer experience you are trying to create?

After asking; observe behaviours of colleagues, team members and customers. (Observing what people do is more telling than, what they say).

Test policies and processes through the prism of whether they support your ideal culture, or work against it?

Share Your Business Vision.

Another key step in building a great business culture is to share your Business Vision for the business.

If your team, and key stakeholders, don’t know where you are heading how can they buy into it?

But, it is not enough to share the Vision, seek feedback as to what is working against it’s realisation. (Is there a creditability gap?).

Share Your Business Purpose.

A clearly defined Business Purpose is key to creating a great business culture.

Why does your business exist from the customer perspective? Is your current culture aligned to your Purpose?

Does your Purpose inspire and motivate?

Is it reflected in the day-to-day experience of your customers and team members?

Amazing Business Culture: The Right People.

To build and nurture your culture, you must have the right people.

This does not mean that everyone has to be the same, but their values and attitudes must align with those of the business.

Too often, businesses recruit people based on their experience and skills, rather than how they will contribute to and enhance the Business Culture.

A star salesperson, or team leader, can quickly destroy a Business Culture when there is a misalignment of values or attitude.

Building an Amazing Business Culture.

There are many ways you can progressively build an amazing business culture including:

Get to know your team members as people. What are their interests, goals and dreams. What are their values?

Recognise everyone in your team has individual strengths. Help them identify those strengths, then show them how to use these in their daily activities. (When people use their strengths it builds confidence and they enjoy what they do).

Show them how they can realise their personal goals through their daily activities.

Help team members find meaning in what they do beyond the task at hand. To see how their role helps change, or improve, the customers world. Meaning is a powerful way to build your business culture.

Provide specific praise. Catch people doing something right and praise the action. The best book I have read which promotes this approach is The One Minute Manager by Kenneth Blanchard and Spencer Johnson. Of all the books I have read on people management, this is the best by far. It offers simple and practical advice.

Don’t manage your team by “flying a desk”. Sitting at the desk you only see results. Manage by walking around to gain insights on what is happening at the “coal face”. Your visible presence is a powerful way to build the business culture.

Praise in public and coach in private. Public criticism creates fear, even amongst good performers. Fear destroys trust and with it the business culture. Rather than criticise, coach. Follow up post the coaching session and reinforce they are valued team members.

Be consistent. Frame everything you do in the context of the business vision, purpose, and goals.

Celebrate success. Be sure to include all those who contributed to the outcome in your public praise. Too often, those who contribute behind the scenes are overlooked.

Encourage innovation. Praise effort rather than the outcome. Include continuous improvement as a part go Job Descriptions. (The Japanese approach of Kaizen which encourages incremental improvement, that can often lead to breakthrough ideas, is a great starting point).

Make the workplace fun. Look for ways to make people smile. A happy team is more productive, innovative, and will enjoy better customer relationships.

When faced with major challenges, before working on the problem, start with “what is true and positive about the business, team, and customers”. A positive mindset is the best foundation for creative thinking. This approach can also be a great starting point to build your business culture.

To the greatest extent possible, give team members the authority to address customer complaints and fix problems.

Help team members find their own solutions. That way they learn and build confidence in their capacity to find answers to problems. Ask, “What do YOU see as the solution?”. “Would that solve the problem?” “What other options exist?”

Encourage diversity within your team. The longer I have been in business, the more I have seen the power of diversity within teams leading to better outcomes. Diversity provides different perspectives which is important when it comes to ideas solutions and business culture.

Drill deeper if someone is under-performing. Check if there are factors, either personal or outside of work, contributing to the situation. (In my experience, most people strive to do well and in a high percentage of cases, factors not directly related to work can be contributing factors to under performance.)

Invite individual team members off-site for a “coffee and a chat”. I found this approach far more effective than Performance Appraisals from a coaching perspective. (You still need Performance Appraisals). In addition to asking how they were going, and what I could do to help them in their roles, another question I found helpful was; “What I am not seeing that needs to be addressed?

The foregoing are just some “thought starters” to help you on your journey towards creation of an amazing business culture.

Decide Your Guiding Principles.

What Guiding Principles (rules) do you need to build a great business culture?

These are the “non-negotiables” that govern all client and team interactions.

Rather than a top-down approach, create the Guiding Principles with your team:

Ask how will that work in practice?

What are the implications for our customers?

Do any policies or practices need to change if we adopt this as a Guiding Principle?

The Key to Business Culture: Leadership.

The role of a business leader in nurturing a business culture cannot be overstated.

Any deviation or misalignment at a leadership level will ripple throughout the organisation.

The leader needs to be the custodian of the culture and it’s protector.

The one who helps employees thrive, engage with and live the Business Purpose.

When transgressions occur, educate, encourage and support, rather than punish.

To quote Steve Jobs from the recent book, “Make Something Wonderful“, he said, he “learnt people worked for the company first and the boss second”.

In other words, they embraced what the business was trying to do. That ultimately, it was the work that motivated the employees. For the work to motivate, the culture needs to be right.

To learn more about how to build an amazing business culture, don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Bruce Hall.

0414 440 861

Bruce Hall is a highly experienced business consultant and coach. His driving passion is to help business owners elevate their customer experience and unleash their potential.

He believes the foundation for sustained success in business is two-fold; a great business culture and intense customer focus.