Ask any number of business executives to define culture and you will get a wide-range of definitions. So, for the purpose of this week’s OnMessage Minute, we will define culture in the following way, courtesy of DecisionWise:

“An organization’s culture consists of the values, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors that employees share and use on a daily basis in their work. Culture is how employees describe where they work, understand the business and see themselves as part of the organization. Culture is important because it drives decisions, actions, and ultimately the overall performance of the organization.”

Now that we have a definition of what culture is and what it consists of, we must ask the question: Is it really a priority for executives? Do executives really understand that the state of their culture is in fact the state of their customer experience?

Based on research, one would conclude that the answer is absolutely yes. However, when you look at the percentage of companies that actually leverage culture as a competitive advantage in the customer experience, you would probably say no. Let’s dig a little deeper into the facts.

According to PwC’s report, “Culture’s Role in Enabling Organizational Change,”

  • 84 percent of executives agree that their culture is critical to business success
  • 60 percent agree that culture is more important than strategy or operating model

However, the research also shows that 95 percent of executives say change is needed in their culture and 51 percent believe their culture is in need of a major overhaul. So, to quickly summarize: culture is critical, yet it is in need of “change” or a “major overhaul.”

PwC is not the only company to discover a significant discrepancy between the executive team’s desire to leverage culture as a differentiator and their ability to actually make it happen. Duke’s Fuqua School of Business surveyed more than 1,400 North American CEOs and CFOs and discovered only 15 percent said their firm’s corporate culture was where it needed to be.

Why is that? Maybe it’s because they view culture as a separate thing or a net-new initiative. Which means that maybe they need to look at culture differently. Maybe they need to acknowledge that culture is not something that is manufactured apart from the company’s story and strategy.

Your story clearly defines your company’s purpose, positioning, value proposition and promise to customers.

Your strategy clearly defines your vision, mission, values and the associated actions, investments and initiatives that are required to make that story a reality.

Executives must come to the realization that a company’s culture is in fact the byproduct of the company’s story and strategy — in action.