Canadian HR Reporter

STRATEGIC CAPABILITY NETWORK'S PANEL of thought leaders brings decades of experience from the senior ranks of Canada's business community. eir commentary puts HR management issues into context and looks at the practical implications of proposals and policies. CANADIAN HR REPORTER EXECUTIVE SERIES 13 www.scnetwork.ca APRIL 2019 e inconvenient work that is culture ree SCNetwork members discuss Brett Richards' presentation Paul Pittman: About 10 minutes into this presentation, I started to think I had lost some brain cells, and judging by the responses to Brett Richards' questions, my guess is that others were having the same problem. We have access to videos of the presentations and I rewound sev- eral times to understand several points. ere were a lot of concepts to digest in Brett's presentation — though he did warn us at the start, so much to say and so little time. I no sooner had taken a concept on board and was framing the "yeah, but" when along came the next one, often completely dif- ferent from the last. None were grounded with examples (for us simple folks) that would have helped embed what were some really powerful ideas. Others just swam by, lost in the assimilation of the preceding idea. e 13 "inconvenient truths" all needed more discussion and context to be fully understood. This was powerful stuff that may have unfortunately missed the target as we skated through a busy agenda. The audience seemed a little lost when asked which applied to their organiza- tion — few had a response. en Azam Bhaloo, CEO of the Foray Group in Markham, Ont., came along and got us back on track with some real-world ap- plication we could sink our teeth into. His organization provides child-care services and embraced the cultural concepts in Brett's presentation to create a culture the owners thought would better prepare it for growth. He explained how he and the management team reacted when the cultural dashboard data (the OGI) was showing indicators of readiness that they could not sense walking the halls. The OGI measured the key cultural values they were eager to instil in the organization through every communication with the workforce, and reported how these were taking root as well as their impact on behav- iours and performance. Clearly, it's a powerful instru- ment that has captured the im- agination and engagement of Azam's leadership team, dem- onstrating to me that engage- ment with an employer's vision has to be measured and cannot be "sensed." Without data, the wrong conclusions can be drawn and the wrong steps taken. e OGI is a very important enabler to embedding leader- ship's vision into an organization. Jan van der Hoop: Paul, I agree that "less is more" certainly ap- plies here. e assertion that only 31 per cent of HR leaders think their organizations have the culture necessary to drive perform- ance — regrettably — does not surprise me. For many business leaders, culture is ethereal and hard to measure, and the notion of diverting energy and resources to disrupting, managing, develop- ing or somehow turning culture into a competitive advantage seems dubious at best — with the result being that the unmanaged culture is often more of a drag on innovation than an enabler. In hindsight, Brett's focus on mindsets as a combination of how we think, feel and act is rel- evant to any culture or change management initiative. Too often, we communicate the facts (think) without anticipating and addressing how people will feel about an issue and how they are likely to act as a result. e other crucial point that was covered by Azam is that this work is never done. Nimble, adaptive, innovative and profi t- able cultures are those that are always being challenged and stimulated. Thinking of this work as a program, owned by HR (or any other single stakeholder), with a clearly defi ned beginning and end date, dooms it to failure. Culture is an outcome of leadership, and everyone in the organization is responsible for safeguarding and contributing. It is a living, breathing thing that never stops evolving and shifting, whether you are managing it or not — so it's best to be intentional about guiding and directing it. ere's no question this is in- convenient work that by its very nature interrupts and siphons re- sources away from the "doing the work we're paid to do" but, if done right, yields tangible ROI. Sandi Channing: Going into the presentation with few expecta- tions on yet another talk on the importance of culture on organi- zational growth, I was pleasantly surprised. Brett had many points throughout his presentation that left me wanting more. He spoke about the "organ- izational environment" which in- cludes culture, climate and mind- set. It is these elements that defi ne how leaders and contributors act, think and feel in contributing to an organization's success. Brett stated that feelings are often underestimated in times of change. ose who have worked for organizations in the midst of growth, acquisitions and mer- gers and new C-suite members are familiar with the emotional roller-coaster changes bring. For organizations to ignore the emotional side is a slippery slope. e direction of the business is changing, putting culture into a fl ux and no one's managing it. "Seeing the invisible people and culture dynamics and link- ing them to performance is key." Despite the amount of data on the importance of culture in an organization's success, at many organizations, culture continues to just happen. ere is no strat- egy — or if there is, often it's more of an HR initiative and not aligned with business goals. is is concerning given that "failure to achieve workforce culture alignment can cause employee performance to decline as much as 12 per cent." e saying: "If you can't change the people, change the people," has often been the response when an organizational environment has changed. Contributors with solid skills may have been let go because of a shifting culture that wasn't man- aged eff ectively. While replacing employees may be an easy fi x, astute HR leaders recognize the short- sightedness of this approach, particularly with the current war on talent. e OGI — a statistically valid- ated tool that assesses the readi- ness for and responsiveness to internally or externally generated change — has merit. I, too, was glad for the case study as it took Brett's presenta- tion from the theoretical to the practical. Azam's enthusiasm for the model and its success was contagious and warranted. Using the OGI provided the business with a tool to measure the invisible and intangible fac- tors that could have inhibited their growth. Instead, the statistics provided proof that managing organiza- tional environment is worth the time, money and eff ort. is Empowered by: is Empowered by: A Great Leader A Great Leader www.scnetwork.ca Networking, Mentoring, Peer-Peer Feedback Formal Online & Of ine Learning On the job experiences & challenges 20% 10% 70% Join SCNetwork, for a monthly dose of thought leadership and grow your community of peers in a collaborative space. We welcome all HR professionals who support business success through people. Cultivating the Power of Human Capital for 35+ Years! Looking for a way to achieve the 30% you need to become a great leader? "A mindset represents more than how we think, it captures how we feel, and how we choose to act within the world." Four principles guiding mind- sets are: imagine, or a focus on new ideas; resolve, a focus on so- lutions; analyze, a focus on proof; and align, a focus on values and integration, he said. "Each of these four mindsets are equally relevant, equally nec- essary. However, organizations leverage these four mindsets in diff erent ways. And, therefore, it has implications in terms of where their current state is and where they need to shift in order to be adaptive," said Richards. "Culture change and sustained success requires… attuning mindsets of leaders and contrib- utors to the organization's busi- ness strategy." "We have to think about where do we need to shift to and how do we attune the organization ac- cordingly. And by attunement, I mean aligning the thoughts, the feelings and the intentional choic- es of organizational members to achieve intelligent action." Mindsets can't simply be for- mulated and then hung on the wall, he said. "It has to be built into the op- erational plan, in terms of the way people are actually living, moving and having their being in the organization. It has to be fi rmly embedded in the strategy and the operational plans, in the competencies in the performance management," said Richards. "In order for it to really see a sustained shift, you do need to embed it into the DNA. It's not enough just to say this is our new strategy. You have to be very in- tentional with integrating it into the operations of the business, the processes, the systems, the cadence, the way in which people operate in their meetings." ree SCNetwork members discuss Brett Richards' presentation ree SCNetwork members discuss Brett Richards' presentation ree SCNetwork members discuss Brett Richards' presentation PANELLISTS: • Jan G. van der Hoop, president of Fit First Technologies in Toronto • Paul Pittman, founder and president of the Human Well in Toronto • Sandi Channing, senior director of total rewards at Compass Group Canada Jan van der Hoop Paul Pittman Sandi Channing METRICS < pg. 12 Culture is a living, breathing thing that never stops evolving and shifting. Intentionality is important

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