Most business owners and managers probably feel more comfortable with this section than the others. Entrepreneurs are problem solvers by their very nature. When something’s not working well, they want to step in, come up with an innovative solution, and spearhead its implementation.
Having concrete, tangible, step-by-step ways to tackle the “culture thing” lets company leaders feel like they have a project. “Let’s create our own People Analyzer.” “Let’s get everyone set up on TINYPulse.” “Let’s schedule a once-a-month game night.”
Turning culture into a task list with nice boxes to check off—well, that’d be nice, wouldn’t it? But this book’s four sections are arranged in somewhat chronological order: before you start using these tools and tactics to support your efforts to build a better culture, you should first gain clarity about the culture you want in the first place (section I) and then figure out how to personally lead your people towards that vision (section II). Only then does it make sense to use tools and tactics to support you in that journey.
Otherwise, these are solutions in search of a problem.
Bill Gates once said,
The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency.
The spirit of that quote is essentially what we’re saying right here.
Refer back to Steffen Maier’s article on Google and the employee survey. When employees don’t believe in the company in the first place, the tools used to help improve culture are ineffective. You need a certain amount of trust and healthy culture established before applying particular tools.
But having clarity and leadership plus tools and tactics is a recipe for success.