"Freedom is actually a bigger game than power.
Power is about what you can control.
Freedom is about what you can unleash."
Strategic Relevance:
Culture is the make-or-break foundation for any company seeking to implement bold strategies. Successful mergers hinge on developing a compatible culture for the merging companies. Top flight customer service depends on a culture where heroic effort on behalf of customers is expected and a real possibility. Because culture is so crucial to success and so difficult for a competitor to copy, leaders ought to view it as a primary competitive advantage.
This program addresses two dominant issues:
1. What are the cultures and organizational values that have produced sustainable competitive advantages?
2. How does a leadership team go about creating a cohesive culture that organizes itself about company values and principles to guide superior performance?
The masters of shaping culture adopt a different focus, role, and approach in relating to their associates than the prototype tight controls manager. Managers build systems (e.g. procedure manuals, work flow diagrams, organizational structures, reward contingencies) to enable ordinary people to achieve extraordinary results. The outcome is replication of existing best practices. In contrast, leaders shake up the status quo or stimulate innovative thinking. They use "conceptual controls," like symbolic actions, teachable moments, and serving as a walking model, to instill the norms and values that guide associates' choices. Ultimately, associates come to operate with an enlarged freedom to take responsibility for the success of their piece of the business, but always in alignment with the company's vision and values.
Learning Objectives:
By Participation in "Leadership Where It Counts Most" attendees will be able to:
Understand the difference between a range of influence approaches used by managers and leaders, from tight controls to conceptual controls.
Apply a range of culture shaping best practices to instill values or bring them alive.
Utilize a step-by-step plan for conceiving or reinvigorating the important values and guiding principles of their own company culture.
