What is your 'Felt' Culture?
What is the culture of your organisation really? I know you have probably put a lot of work into your values and have even trained people into what it means to live up to these values.
Is this your culture though? Ask your people what it "feels" like to work in your organisation.
What is the ‘felt’ culture?
Let me share a story with you
This is the story of a company that had a behavioural standard, which meant that everyone would give each other honest feedback... no matter what. Yet, it was reported that despite training in "how to give it", people rarely felt safe in doing so.
Something was going on at the level of the "Who".
Who is a Person not a Position.
Who is aspirations, challenges and self-limiting beliefs. Who is the unspoken vulnerability. The person driven to be successful, yet doubting their worth.
Who is an idea formed but not encouraged. Who is a risk not taken for fear of consequence. Who is a working parent trying to make it all work.
Who is a leader that believes in your potential and knows there is more to your story but is feeling the pressure from her boss to ‘performance manage’ you.
Who matters. Who is you.
We Are All Who
I have been working with leaders and their teams for over 20 years. In that time, I have been searching, observing and learning (constantly learning) about how to help leaders become their best self through a journey of self-awareness and development. I have discovered that the greatest impacts happen when everyone is part of the process otherwise...
- Leaders say – ‘has my boss done this training?’
- Non-leaders say – ‘has my boss done this training?’
- Leaders say – ‘I have this new language and new awareness but my team do not …
- Teams have ‘team development’ days that are not meaningful enough and don’t address the fundamentals of effective human interaction.
Leadership Development, done in isolation, doesn't go far enough.
Everyone should be developed, otherwise we continue to operate based on old patterns, habits and behaviours. In that space, our communication remains clumsy at best and our intentions while positive are not aligned with our impact.
We need a new approach. We need to put "who" first.
We need to Put Who First at each Level
with Executive Leaders, Functional Leaders, The Team and the Individual.
The Leaders
The way you engage with your peers and your team essentially role models the culture.
If I see you as honest, fair, respectful and with a focus on excellence then that is the bar I too have to live up to. You can normalise the expected culture through your interactions and what you hold as the standard for yourself and others.
I work with executives to create that agreed and conscious ‘normal’ and facilitate the co-creation of a culture that seeks to invite and bring out the best of each and every ‘Who’ within the organisation. I help you figure out how to do this in your organisation and what needs to happen for that to permeate the whole living system.
The Team
You cannot choose who you work for or with
You spend more time with your organisational colleagues than anyone else in your life. When it doesn’t feel good it impacts every other part of you.
I have witnessed teams transform when they go on a journey of development together. Shared experiences that are honest, vulnerable, and developmental change the dynamic of the team. Psychological safety is created where both the individual and the team thrive.
The Individual
We have more potential than we can ever achieve in a lifetime
The comfort zone is a quiet place. The change and growth zone? Not so quiet. We find ourselves courting the call of that comfort zone rather than putting in the sustained work that forms new habits, creates new opportunities and gives us the determination to take the actions that moves us towards living into our aspirations.
Moving from the training room to support your on-going journey of development through a one to one engagement that is both supportive and accountable results in the embodiment of new learnings and deep personal and professional growth. Through this work, you will navigate with far greater awareness and effectiveness those work relationships that form such a large part of your life.
Are you Ready to Live Your Culture?
We all aspire to live into our best selves. Our intention is not to react, say things in the moment that we know isn’t a reflection of who we really are. We wouldn’t disengage, avoid each other, shrug the shoulders and say ‘whatever’.
We would speak our truth. We would stand in each other’s shoes not necessarily to agree but to simply understand. We would bring our best, innovative, honest selves to the day because at an individual level our who’ness is welcomed and at a collective level we appreciate the individual inside the We.
Culturally, it is the norm for us to expect the best from each other, to show up, to acknowledge our limitations, celebrate our successes, take risks and learn continuously.
This is what lies ahead in our work together.
