When people use the Double S Cube framework to identify the culture of their organization, group, or team, they are occasionally surprised to discover the results. They may have sensed, for instance, that their culture was communal, only to discover it was networked. Or they may have guessed mercenary, only to learn what they were dealing with were the effects of a negatively networked situation. But virtually no one is surprised to learn their culture is fragmented if they have sunk there from someplace else. The contrasts are so stark. Paradoxically, however, people who have long existed in the fragmented culture are often the least aware of their social architecture. Culture is not a salient matter to them. If you ask them to describe their organization's culture, they respond, "What are you talking about—we don't have a culture." 1
The fragmented culture, of course, is characterized by low sociability and low solidarity. This condition is not as rare as it sounds. Lots of organizations are fragmented in the most macro form: The four major divisions of British Aerospace are fragmented from each other, for instance, although the hundreds of groups and teams within these divisions often take other forms, including the communal. Likewise, the 140 international operat-
ing divisions of the consulting firm Coopers & Lybrand demonstrate low levels of interaction and coordination, but individual parts of the firm run the gamut of networked, communal, and mercenary. And indeed, some of them are fragmented as well. Think too of Baker and McKenzie, the world's largest—and first global—law firm, headquartered in Chicago. It too can be characterized as a federation of local offices only loosely linked to the center.
What does this culture look like in action at the local level? In basic terms, people are not particularly friendly with one another, nor do they particularly support the institution or its goals. They work at an organization but for themselves. Admittedly, this dynamic sounds as if it must be dysfunctional in all situations, but like the other quadrants of the Double S Cube, the fragmented has its positive form. Moreover, the positive form can be both personally fulfilling and a source of competitive advantage. The negative form, however, can be perhaps the most hazardous of all eight cultures. It damages individuals and destroys institutions. Yet sadly, we have seen it in operation countless times, and indeed, perhaps all working people experience it themselves at some point in the course of their careers.
Like the other cultural forms, the fragmented has its rules of survival. Interestingly, these are often difficult to draw out from members of fragmented cultures, largely because they are not used to speaking openly in groups. (As we've noted, we typically conduct the culture "quick test" in group settings.) But their reluctance to share the rules of survival is not just a matter of shyness. It is a matter of personal strategy. This is, after all, the culture of the individual.
THE FRAGMENTED CULTURE RULES OF SURVIVAL
In the positive, they are as follows:
1. Make yourself valuable.
2. Keep your eyes on the prize—outside.
3. Honor ideas and outcomes, not individuals.
4. Hire brilliantly.
5. Show up, occasionally.
And in the negative:
1. Wear a bulletproof vest to work.
2. Learn to manage prima donnas.
3. Honor thyself.
4. Give what you must and no more.
“WHY WOULD I TELL YOU?”
There is no fifth rule for the negative form of the fragmented culture because four were hard enough to squeeze out from its members. In fact, in one instance, a high-level executive in a negatively fragmented organization answered our request for the rules of survival with this line: "If I knew them, why would I tell you?" We would suggest that his rather chilling question just about sums up the negative form in all its dark glory.
But it is important not to dismiss the fragmented culture, to invoke Thomas Hobbes on human life as "nasty, brutish, and short." For in some instances and environments, it is the culture that gives its members the most freedom, flexibility, and fairness. It demands nothing but high performance, hence the first
rule of survival —Make yourself valuable. In fragmented cultures, employees are judged on their productivity and the quality of their work, no more and no less. They don't have to schmooze the boss, put in "face time" at the office, waste energy promoting any aspect of the institution, or physically present themselves in a socially acceptable way All that matters is their output. 2
If this utilitarian contract between organization and employee sounds like something out of science fiction, we would counter that it exists all around us in the here and now. In recent years we have worked with several newspapers, none of them keen to be named. Not all are fragmented, of course, but many are. The reasons are organic to the nature of the work itself. Reporters are judged not by how often they show up in the office—in fact, too much time in the office is a sign that the reporter is not out in the field, tracking down sources and leads. As for sociability, reporters often appear to be quite chummy, but in reality most are fiercely competitive with each other. There is only so much space on the front page, and all of them are vying for it on a given day. In addition, it doesn't really pay for a reporter to spend his time befriending colleagues. Better to be befriending the people who can feed you information for stories—and they are not likely to be in the office.
As for solidarity, there may be some professional loyalty to journalists in general but little with their employing organization. Many disdain management as corporate "tools," or at the least consider them foolish stuffed shirts. This is a result, most likely, of several factors: the pay differential between reporters and management and different educational backgrounds. The dynamic is further reinforced by the fact that reporters, by nature and training, are suspicious and disdainful of virtually anyone in authority.
If reporters don't identify with their institutions, why stay? Many don't—reporters change newspapers as frequently as underwriters change investment banks. What matters to a free agent is his own reputation. Thus, the goal is not to be the best
reporter at the newspaper but to be the best in the city, or even in the country. And his organization rewards him for hitting this goal. It too receives accolades (and financial gain) from employing the best reporters to be had. So it should come as no surprise that newsrooms foster fragmented cultures and still function remarkably well. In fact, they may function remarkably well because they are fragmented. The culture creates and rewards just the right behaviors for economic success.
The same can be said of many law firms. Does it matter that a partner attends the company Christmas party, gives her secretary flowers on her birthday, or brings new associates out to lunch? Perhaps such behavior might create a nice atmosphere at the office. But when it comes to landing clients and winning cases—that is, the bread and butter of the organization—all that really matters is that the partner is an authority in her field of practice. It matters that she knows the most current and relevant case law, that she is familiar with important new thinking, or that she has the right experience in the courtroom. For all these reasons, the partner may be in the office very rarely. She may expend very little energy getting to know her co-workers and supporting the firm in general. But by focusing on her work, she is doing what is best for both. By making herself valuable, she makes her organization valuable too.
The prize, after all, for many people who work in knowledge industries is outside the company. Reporters, as we've noted, compare themselves to the universe of reporters. Lawyers the same. Most large law firms only have two or three attorneys per practice area. What good is it to be the best real estate lawyer of three when the real reward, both personal and financial, lies in being the best real estate lawyer of the hundred or thousands available to your clients? Consider also one of the top three law firms in
Switzerland. The partners share little more than the overhead— the office buildings, the support staff and services. But beyond this they are on their own. They work separately with their clients, and there is little, if any, cross-selling. Each partner will increase their human capital by focusing outside rather than inside. A similar dynamic also explains why so many hospitals and academic institutions are fragmented. Patients looking for the best care don't ask doctors how well they get on with their staff. They ask where they have trained and practiced. We know of a family that recently discovered their young daughter was deaf. The experts at their local city hospital determined that she qualified for a cochlea implant, a promising new technology in which a radio transmitter is implanted in the back of the skull. The family then used the Internet to search the world for the doctors most experienced with the cochlea implant surgical procedure. They found two, one in Boston and the other in Australia, and chose the latter because she had performed about a hundred more operations than the doctor in the United States.
Among academics, your standing is also built on the outside world's assessment. Thus, in academia you often find that institutions are fragmented but scholarly fields are networked. A professor of sociology at Yale, for instance, may certainly want to be considered the most accomplished scholar in her department. But that honor is only secondary to her reputation in the field. Real prestige comes from being the top of your peer group—sociologists working at universities literally around the world. And achieving that prize has little to do with the behaviors of sociability or solidarity. It has to do with individual work, in this case, research and writing. It has to do with what goes on in your brain and your measurable output . 3
Honor ideas , not individuals. This is a common characteristic of the fragmented form because organizations that thrive with this culture are the ones where success is a function of great ideas. When a consulting firm sets out to hire consultants, they aren't looking for nice people (although that helps), and they probably
couldn't care less if the people they hire socialize together on the weekends. Nor does it really affect them if their consultants, back at the office, share the same sense of the organization's purpose. First and foremost, they are hiring smart ideas—intelligence. That's why so many consulting firms honor ideas above all else.