Fearful Business Examples to End the Year

1. I recently read an article in Fast Company about the 4 Ways CEO's Accidentally Mess Up Company Culture. The article highlights four common actions that can begin creating a toxic culture including

• Micromanaging
• Being inconsistent 
• Outsource too much
• Don't embrace new employees

These aspects are all ways that coincidentally can create a culture of fear. When the author wrote the headline for 'mess up' the culture a typical by-product can be fear and it keeps employees from contributing their best work. To read more about how this can happen and its affects read my book entitled Corporate Bravery - available on Amazon.com

2. Another recent news story that has generated headlines is the upcoming paternity leave for Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook. More specifically, he announced that the upcoming birth of his first child would prompt him to take a leave and that he would be taking two months as a result.

The move was hailed as an example for other executives and employees to take the time for your family and overall it sounds like a brave example but when you look a little deeper at this example it has the potential of impacting culture in a negative way.

This potential negative impact isn't because Facebook is giving their employees additional benefits or because they are giving men an additional benefit but rather because of the context of this new benefit. If you read the story you will notice that the change to the policy occurred after or simultaneous to Zuckerberg's announcement of his intent to take two months. This indicates that the policy change only happened because it was real to Zuckerberg despite the fact that it had been a real issue to other working parents since the beginning of Facebook. A subtle nuance I know, but one that is likely understood by Facebook employees and just reiterates the divide between management.


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Interesting Aspects of Bravery - Slack and Diversity Edition

The Corporate Bravery post for this week focuses on two interesting areas of thought around management concepts.

1. The first is a Harvard Business Review spotlight of a study on the results of companies led by CEO's with daughters. According to the researchers, of the 367 public companies where personal information could be identified for the current chief executives there was a strong correlation between  the social responsibility of those companies and the fact that the chief executive had a daughter.

You can see some of the aspects reviewed and the results were impressive for most of the areas reviewed. The strongest being a more diverse workforce and the lowest being human rights with even still a 1% improvement.

In Corporate Bravery we talk about the trust of leaders and having leadership that cares about the individuality of the team goes a long way toward building trust, eradicating a culture of fear and improves performance.

2. The second piece was a Time Magazine piece on the company Slack. For those of you not using slack, it is a team messaging app that is helping teams and entire organizations communicate more effectively and in real time. I find myself using it more with my startups and it has been helpful. 

The article mostly paints a picture of typical fast growing start-up culture. But some of the quotes from a recent company gathering brought to mind the question about how it is possible to keep a company moving toward a culture of bravery when so many new people are being added and ultimately shaping the culture of the startup every day.

The article concludes focusing on a plan that the founder, Butterfield, has to spread the wealth from an increasing valuation and ultimately an IPO or acquisition, to the rank and file. While ultimately not a cure all for culture it speaks to some core values that they are creating as a company.

Do you have any thoughts or experiences you would like to share around keeping your fast growing company's culture strong?   



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