UGM's approach to Organisational Culture
We can help you:
- test engagement using robust, customised tools that can determine and then measure what makes a difference to performance.
- assess the type of culture that prevails in your organisation, what culture is desired, and devise plans for bridging the gap.
- assess and refine organisational values (or principles), including clarifying what they mean. This includes clearly stating which behaviours are supportive of the values and which behaviours will not be acceptable.
Simply put, organisational culture is ‘How we do things around here’. It includes values (and principles), attitudes and behaviours, played out through work practice. Organisational culture is important for two key reasons. Firstly, as a metric, it's a barometer for the people dimension of your business – do your people enjoy fair weather or foul? Secondly, as well as being an output of all business activities, it is also an essential business input!
Like it or not, we have found that clients and employees continually assess whether what you have promised (either expressly, or through inference) is what is being lived. A large enough mismatch is likely to lead to under-performance and, ultimately, to the loss of the client or staff member. Furthermore, they will probably leave the business unhappy and, research suggests, are likely to share that bad news many more times than clients and staff who might be happy with the business! In this sense, organisational culture is closely tied to reputation.
UGM uses a multi-lens approach to tackle and solve organisation culture concerns. We usually start an assignment by taking the cultural temperature, using tailored online tools, in-situ observations and interviews. This serves as a benchmark as well as a diagnostic. Spring-boarding from our analysis, we then apply carefully selected frameworks and customised tools to help you find and implement the most effective approach for the current needs of your business. When promises and practices line up, clients discover that untapped sources of energy are released, supporting business success.
A number of the UGM newsletters deal with topics closely linked with organisational culture.
If you would like to receive further information about UGM's approach, please send us an e-mail via info@ugmconsulting.com.
