Much is said and written about company culture in industry articles and conferences. But it’s almost impossible to come up with a universal definition that fully encompasses the values, aims, ethics, practice, processes, policies, atmosphere, attitude, and things that impact on every day activities and over-arching visions.
Company culture is the collective attitudes and behaviors of directors, executives and employees. It’s how they interact with each other and the professional world outside of the office. It’s how the leaders lead and how the employees contribute. Sometimes it has been consciously constructed, other times it just grows organically.
Strong company culture makes for a happy and productive workforce. It drives motivation, promotes inclusivity and innovation, respects individuals and their work-life balance, enhances communication, drives operations, and ensures staff retention.
Maintaining company culture through hypergrowth
Even strong company cultures are put to the test during periods of seismic changes, such as hypergrowth, when many rules go out the window. During this phase, the company has to adapt to rapidly changing demands on resources, potential conflict amongst priorities, and external pressures to revise long-held processes.
How can you develop the flexibility that rapid growth demands while protecting your culture?
- Reaffirm and recommit to your company’s mission and vision in ways that will leave your employees can recognize. Don’t simply reiterate them, put them into practice so that your internal and external behaviors are clearly driven by those values.
- If the transition that your company is undergoing calls for cultural changes, make sure your team understands this and sees the merit in accepting and implementing changes, such as revising working practices, providing new support, or modifying hours or locations in which employees work.
- Frame changes as reinventions instead of losses. You cannot afford to take staff loyalty for granted, no matter how enduring it has been to date. In order to motivate employees to make changes, they need to feel a personal investment.
- Honesty, transparency, and two-way communications are vital attributes in a time of hypergrowth. If you begin with the strong foundation of a harmonious, shared company culture, then you will be better able to negotiate the many potential obstacles in the road ahead. Don’t under-estimate the power of the company culture, but don’t let it petrify into a resistance to change that could undermine the whole enterprise.
- Coltech has a long history of working with clients in every kind of circumstance and we are well-versed in how to tackle the many challenges of hypergrowth. We understand the importance of a company’s culture and we recognize the need to preserve it and to adapt it in ways that will carry the whole organization on the journey.Scalability becomes vital and Coltech can help you quickly and efficiently identify your urgent recruitment needs, both permanent and contract. We can give you access to a rich pool of new talent and find highly qualified individuals who can be easily integrated with your existing teams both to match your company’s culture and to maximize the benefits of hypergrowth.
Take advantage of our knowledge and experience.
Call us in Austin on (+1) 512 717 7490
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