Can ‘Cultural Transformation’ Take Your IT Business To The Moon?

You know … there is a story … In 1962, President John F. Kennedy visited NASA for the first time. During his tour of the facility, he met an environmental service aid who was carrying a broom down the hallway. The President casually asked the aid what he did for NASA, and without hesitation, he replied, “I’m helping put a man on the moon.”

You might ask how does this story relate to running your IT business? Maybe your business has a few employees, or perhaps your organization has hundreds of associates. No matter the organization’s size, the story above demonstrates how NASA’s culture aligned with its mission and vision, leading to the fulfillment of landing a man on the moon. So, why is it essential to culturally transform and align your organization? How does leadership drive and achieve cultural transformation? Are you struggling to align your culture, and can an executive coach assist you in culturally transforming your organization?

Let’s explore these questions further.

Cultural transformation can be defined as “the process of aligning an organization’s values, norms, behaviors, and processes with its strategic direction and purpose.” It starts with leadership taking time to understand the current culture, modeling a set of core values, setting expectations, walking the talk, and then cultivating a healthy and vibrant culture. In other words, it ensures that everyone in the organization is rowing in the same direction.

There are a few key components to focus on while culturally transforming an organization:  assuring that your mission & vision are up-to-date and aligned with your organization’s purpose, maintaining a set of defined core values, leadership commitment to modeling the expected behaviors, simplifying your processes, and defining the strategy to drive cultural change.

Let’s start with core values. Every organization has a set of values and cultural norms, whether written or not. It is essential to understand the current norms and update or establish a set of values that form the foundation of how the organization conducts itself. What does that mean? For example, if you commit to the value of ‘service,’ but your processes make it difficult for customers to connect with a live person, there is a misalignment between your value and your process. In this case, you should either adjust your approach to meeting your customer’s needs or commit to a different value.

Related: How to Inculcate Business Culture to Create a Successful Business

Behaviors are the next critical component to work on to align with your culture. Are the behaviors of your leaders and staff aligned with the values and goals of the organization? If not, why not? This is where a coach can be a valuable resource. A coach helps leaders and individuals to identify how their behaviors are or are not aligned with the core values. They also assist others in seeing how ineffective behaviors negatively impact the organization’s culture. Coaches partner with leaders and teams to help them to think and behave more effectively on their journey to fulfill their organization’s purpose.

Finally, your processes need to be simple, easy to follow, and support the organization’s goals. If your processes are cumbersome and difficult to navigate, staff will be challenged to take ownership of them and create a high-performing organization. As your staff is closest to the work, seeking their input on how to redesign your processes to be efficient is the most effective way to assure that they will meet the established goals. Continually reevaluating your processes and reengineering them after engaging your staff will lead to greater effectiveness and success.

Achieving cultural transformation is not an easy task, but it is critical for leaders and businesses to strive to create healthy and vibrant cultures. Aligning an organization’s values, behaviors, and processes with its mission, vision, and goals, will help to create a healthy culture, leading to the organizations long-term success.

If you are interested in learning more about cultural transformation or how to achieve it within your organization, consider partnering with an executive coach who can facilitate and guide you and your leadership team through the process.

Carm Moceri, Principal of Healthcare Alignment Solutions, is a certified executive coach with more than 30 years of experience as an executive leader, coach, and transformation expert in multiple industries. You can contact Healthcare Alignment Solutions at healthcarealignmentsolutions.com to set up a free initial success strategy session and to learn how your organization could benefit from transforming your culture into a vibrant and healthy environment and take your team to the moon!