What leaders DO: build cultures
by Miki SaxonAccording to serial entrepreneur and VC Neil Senturia, “Building a team is the key to creating a successful start up—picking the people who will fit into the culture. The CEO’s most important job is hiring well and being the visionary and model for the culture that you want in your company. There are great players but what wins Super Bowls are great teams.’ In the post he tells of turning down a badly needed skill set because the person didn’t fit the culture. And it wasn’t a unilateral decision, he discussed it with his team and they all agreed.
Companies talk constantly about building teams, the importance of teams, blah, blah, blah, while their managers continue to hire skill sets without nearly enough thought as to whether the owners fit the culture or not passing on candidates when they obviously don’t fit.
Managers, especially entrepreneurs, need to understand that although it’s tough to lose a needed skill set, it’s far worse to lose your culture. It takes guts to make the correct decision for the long-term in a world that runs on short-term. It’s never an easy choice, but it is one that pays off for years.
Ten years ago I wrote Don’t Hire Turkeys! Use Your Culture as an Attraction, Screening, and Retention Tool and Turkey-Proof Your Company and it’s just as true today as it was then.
Your culture is the sieve through which all people should pass—without contortions or rationalizations—preferably aligned, but at the least synergistic.
The keynotes of a culture are:
- Consciously developed – Cultures happen with or without thought. Those that just happen are the easiest to twist and manipulate.
- Flexible – Just as trees bend in strong winds and buildings are designed to sway in an earthquake, so you want to build your culture to withstand economic storms and the winds of change.
- Scalable – To grow as the company grows requires a deep understanding of what’s cultural bedrock and what are accessories.
- Sustainable – Although originally stemming from the CEO, at some point the culture must become the property of the employees if they’re going to support it.
None of this predicts what the culture will actually be, that’s a function of the CEO’s MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy)™, not of all the articles on what makes a great culture.
More on that tomorrow.
