Give a Discussion About Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Culture

Culture is a hot topic these days, and equally someone who's been deeply involved in helping shift our own culture at Microsoft, I'm excited by the level of interest from our customers and partners who want to acquire more. And even though culture change can experience like growing pains, it's an astonishing fourth dimension to be at Microsoft, which is in no small function due to the influence and leadership of our CEO, Satya Nadella. His new book, Hit Refresh , chronicles his personal and professional journey to become the third CEO in Microsoft's forty-year history. Information technology too tells the story of a leader helping a company and its employees rediscover its soul and transform its culture.

I was recently asked to share what I'd learned near our civilisation transformation over the final three years, and while in some means nosotros are merely getting started, nosotros've already learned quite a lot about what it takes to make civilisation modify real. So, in the spirit of sharing and learning, hither are:

#1 Honor your past; define your future

When nosotros started this journeying, a lot of people wanted to write a narrative that said, "what's happening today is good and what happened in the by was bad." Just nosotros didn't see it that way because there was a lot to honey about our get-go forty years! We spent time talking with employees near what we wanted to build upon—things similar our spirit of employee giving, creating technology for proficient, and setting big bold ambitions —our people were very proud of this heritage. Merely, we besides knew we needed to leave some things behind. Nosotros were competing on the inside, withal our existent competition was on the outside.

And at that place were other things to get out behind.

Satya put it all-time when he said we want to change from a "know-it-all" company to a "learn-it-all" company.

Once we knew how we wanted to evolve, we needed to recollect about our time to come. Through focus groups, surveys and a lot of dialogue up, down, and beyond the arrangement, we divers the fashion we wanted to work. At the same fourth dimension, Satya was reading almost the concept of a growth mindset, and we began to see how that approach could fit nicely with the civilization nosotros wanted to create.

#ii Net it out: Uncomplicated withal strategic

By this time, we had 50 dissimilar ways to describe our civilisation—learning, curious, brave—and the list went on. Information technology was too much, and nosotros needed to net it out.

That doesn't mean we hurried. Nosotros took our time on this step—9 months, in fact.

Nosotros brought in experts like Dr. Michael Gervais, the mindset coach to the Seattle Seahawks football team. We met with Jeff Raikes, a former Microsoft leader and CEO of the Gates Foundation, and at present on the lath of trustees at Stanford. And, nosotros consulted with Dr. Carol Dweck, the author of Mindset and leading authority on growth mindset.

We conducted more than focus groups across a wide diversity of diversity dimensions, hosted meetings with our corporate vice presidents, so organized a "Culture Cabinet" to synthesize the ideas and serve equally evangelists for the roll-out.

In the terminate we decided to embed our culture in the growth mindset focused on three attributes: Customer obsessed, Diverse and inclusive, and Ane Microsoft. All of these are in service to Making a difference in the world.

#three You tin can't imitation it

Satya appear our aspire-to civilisation to the unabridged company and and then at our shareholder coming together. Information technology was a bold approach, and it meant that every activity would exist measured against it, and nosotros couldn't faux it. Satya'south ability to regularly exhibit the growth mindset through his words and deportment has been a huge driver for our momentum. For culture change to stick, your CEO, leaders, and managers must embody the culture that you're talking about, and information technology must exist real.

#4 Have a purpose-driven mission

The next large lesson is that information technology's non just about culture. It'due south of import for culture to be paired with a purpose-driven mission. I detect that the bulk of employees today want work that gives them significant and purpose—they desire to know they're making a deviation. While your strategy will evolve, your culture and sense of purpose should be eternal, or at least long-lasting. Culture paired with a purpose-driven mission allows your employees to use your company platform to realize their own aspirations and passions.

#5 Make symbolic changes big and modest

Once y'all declare the culture, the adjacent big lesson is to signal that things are changing.

We quickly took on some big changes, including revising our review system which was previously focused on a forced rating curve that tended to bulldoze competitive beliefs. The new system focuses on individual impact, contributing to others, and leveraging others. Our company meeting changed dramatically as well, from an experience where employees sat in the audition and listened to executives talk—very static—to a week-long result that includes a hackathon, product expo, and learning events—very interactive.

To raise variety and inclusion awareness, nosotros launched unconscious bias training and followed up with a course called Dialogue Across Differences to help employees understand how to support individuality and promote belonging.

We did small things too, including sharing ten inclusive behaviors – things like not interrupting each other in meetings. These smaller actions tin telegraph to employees that a alter is underway and private efforts tin make a difference every day.

#half-dozen Brand information technology who yous are

The side by side learning is about embedding the culture into your people processes. Much similar symbolic changes, making concrete changes to the way yous interview, reward, and promote volition assist yous align your processes to your culture. We changed our approach to reviews, evolved recruiting practices to a more than inclusive arroyo we telephone call Screening In, and even inverse the criteria for corporate vice president promotions to include a "culture index" and interview.

#7 Communicate, communicate, communicate

This ane can't exist overstated. Advice needs to be consequent and constant. We engaged at every level of the visitor through traditional and non-traditional methods—short videos from our CEO, rich magazine-style SWAYs, and even coffee cups with civilization letters. We also put significant emphasis on harnessing our manager community, arming them with a "Manager Meeting-in-a-Box" so they could easily carry messages directly to their teams. The point is to beat the drum oftentimes to keep your culture top of mind.

#8 Let engineering accelerate the alter

As a tech company, using technology is in our Deoxyribonucleic acid, and we just took this for granted. Afterwards and then many customers and colleagues asked how we changed then rapidly, I had that 'aha' moment. Hither are a few examples of how we used (and continue to use) applied science to assist land the culture:

• Keeping score: We mensurate employee sentiment through a daily pulse survey to see if people empathise the civilisation and are embracing it, and nosotros give leaders access to robust HRBI (Man Resources Business Insights) with visibility to a number of culture areas, including building more various teams.
• Myths and insights: We apply data to dispel myths that might concur us dorsum in our recruiting approach, and motorcar learning to proceeds insights like predicting drivers of attrition.
• Collaborating and learning : To reinforce our learning culture, nosotros centralized all learning systems, and now offer employees access to Lynda.com. Through Skype, Yammer, and Microsoft Teams, our employees have set up access to collaboration tools.
• Connecting at scale : Employees are able to join (in person or virtually) Satya'southward monthly Q&A to hear from our CEO likewise every bit ask straight questions. Through Yammer and Skype, they give existent-time sentiment, and that information helps us understand what resonates and what doesn't.

#ix All oars in the water

To go where you're going with your culture, y'all need everyone on your leadership team committed and onboard. If you allow behaviors that are inconsistent with what yous profess, it tin breed cynicism because people are watching. To ensure authentic and lasting change, you demand to be mindful of this and prepared to take action.

#10 Stay humble, stay the course

My last learning is a reminder that we're still on this journey and we're continuing to learn. It's important to stay humble—don't declare victory. Be consequent in your approach day in and twenty-four hour period out, and celebrate the little milestones while staying the grade.

I recently talked about these 10 Learnings with our CMO, Chris Capossela, at Microsoft's Envision event, and then if you desire to learn more details about how we are driving culture alter, check out our session.

I know this list will evolve equally we proceed downwards this path, and I'yard looking frontwards to sharing more learnings along our journeying. As your organisation adapts to this time of digital transformation and changing employee expectations, permit me know what you are doing to evolve and stay relevant.

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Source: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/10-things-weve-learned-culture-kathleen-hogan

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