You are attracted to a communal form and likely to do well if:
• You are an idealist.
• You have a strong need to identify with something bigger than yourself.
• You consider yourself passionate.
• You enjoy being in teams.
• You are prepared to make self-sacrifices for the greater good.
You will most likely succeed in a communal culture if you:
• Are prepared to put the organization above all else (family, private life, etc.).
• Practice what you preach—live the values.
• Spend time with your colleagues—talking about work, the product, the values, and the competition.
• Wear the logo—that is, clearly identify yourself with the organization.
• Make work exciting.
So there you have it—the "brass ring" of cultures. On closer examination, perhaps the brass doesn't look quite as bright. The communal culture, when functioning well, is a force to be reckoned with, of this there can be no doubt. But the communal company, as we have shown, is a managerial challenge like no other. Once a communal company's values are in place, they are hard to keep in balance.
Perhaps the ying and yang of the communal culture can best be summed up by something Steve Jeffery once said. "The reason that HP's culture is so effective is that the organization works so hard at it; they work very hard at keeping it alive and healthy." Other cultures, such as the mercenary and fragmented, involve much less maintenance. Yet if you've got the considerable energy and desire to make the commitment to the communal form, this culture's ability to deliver competitive advantage and personal fulfillment makes it well worth the effort. Perhaps the best testimony is this: Jeffery took many of the cultural aspects he had come to love at HP and applied them at SQL Financials, where he is now president and CEO—the office environment, the coffee-break meetings, the beer busts, ranking and monitoring. In just three and a half years he has seen the company grow from a $3 million start-up to $45 million in 1998.
If a communal culture does fall out of balance, however, it is possible to correct it, just as it is possible to fix a too cliquey networked culture or a too heartless mercenary one, or even to repair a hostile and unproductive fragmented environment. In the next chapter we talk about creating cultures and about changing ones that already exist. What levers do managers and employees have at their disposal for such transformations? And what does it take to pull them? We all need to accept that organizations are changing now faster than ever before. Change skills are a core competence for the future.
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