How does Culture eat Strategy for Breakfast?

In conversations with leaders and clients, I frequently hear about the challenges of building strong organizational culture, especially in today's remote, hybrid, and distributed work environments. Companies are navigating unprecedented talent mobility and discovering new opportunities to create workplaces where people genuinely want to stay and contribute their best work.

The Culture Promise vs. Reality Gap

We've all heard the compelling pitch: "We're a laid-back team that values culture and diversity. We bring fun and happiness to the workplace, and we're like a family."

Sometimes there's a disconnect between what organizations aspire to be and what new team members actually experience. The opportunity here is to bridge that gap and create authentic cultural experiences that match our stated values.

The Great Opportunity for Change

The current moment presents an unprecedented opportunity for organizational transformation. With 11.9 million people in the United States making job changes this year, as Anthony Klotz predicted with "the great resignation," we're seeing people actively seek environments where they can thrive.

Klotz observed that "when there's uncertainty, people tend to stay put, so there are pent-up resignations that didn't happen over the past year." This has created a movement toward organizations that offer genuine opportunities for growth and fulfillment.

When companies invest thoughtfully in culture, they create environments where people flourish, leading to better business outcomes and reduced turnover costs.

What Culture Really Means

Culture encompasses how people think, act, and collaborate. It's the beliefs, commitments, and mindset that create shared understanding. When implemented thoughtfully, culture creates both individual fulfillment and organizational success.

Great culture requires continuous intentional effort, much like building a thriving community. It involves alignment in thinking, shared customs and processes, clear expectations, and actions that foster belonging and purpose.

From Happiness to Performance

While happiness matters, the goal is sustainable high performance combined with genuine satisfaction. The most effective cultures support people in doing their best work while feeling valued and engaged.

Building strong culture starts with intentional leadership. The most successful leaders I've worked with understand how to model the culture they want to see, creating a positive cascade effect throughout their organizations.

The Foundation: Organizational Behavior

Organizational behavior draws from psychology, social psychology, sociology, anthropology, and political science. In practice, this means creating clear value systems and principles that guide daily decisions and interactions.

Starting Your Cultural Foundation

Building culture begins with clarity about what you want to create and why it matters. Success comes through experimentation, learning, and continuous refinement of your approach.

The key insight: cultural fit works both ways. When you join an organization aligned with your values and working style, you can thrive. When there's misalignment, it's an opportunity to either contribute to positive change or find a better fit elsewhere.

Overcoming Implementation Challenges

Culture change requires open dialogue about challenges and opportunities. Success comes through shifting mindsets gradually and sometimes restructuring processes to better support your values.

Strong processes work well when people understand and embrace them. When they don't, it's often because the process needs refinement or people need more context about why it matters.

Culture is fundamentally about people and relationships. Positive culture doesn't mean avoiding difficult conversations; it means having them with respect and care for everyone involved.

Building Accountability and Growth

When people don't know what they don't know, create frameworks to help them learn. Ask thoughtful questions, understand root causes, and establish clear accountability measures.

Leaders who take responsibility for their decisions and learn from mistakes create cultures where everyone can do the same. This builds trust and encourages the kind of risk-taking that drives innovation.

Practical Framework: Mission-Driven Culture

Let's start with identifying your mission - a simple statement that defines your cultural foundation.

Example Mission Statement: "We want to be the #1 search engine in the world for businesses"

Google's Actual Mission Statement: "To organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful."

Notice how Google's mission focuses on the value they create for the world, not just their competitive position.

Defining Your Value System

Value Principle 1: Empowerment "We want our people to feel empowered every day they come to work"

How to get there:

• Provide leaders with hiring budgets and decision-making authority for their teams

• Create platforms for people to share ideas and drive change

• Give team members ownership of quarterly budgets and planning processes

What you need to execute:

• Budget templates and planning tools

• Regular idea-sharing sessions

• Clear decision-making frameworks

• Recognition that the best innovations often come from the people closest to the work

Value Principle 2: Excellence "We want our people to give their best every day"

How to get there:

• Implement transparent systems that help people understand expectations

• Use tools like peer recognition, public celebrations, and clear OKRs

• Create environments where people can see how their work connects to larger goals

Execution strategies:

• Enhance communication practices and knowledge documentation

• Implement incremental technology improvements with user feedback loops

• Create cultures where mistakes are learning opportunities

• Adopt structured communication processes like Scrum

• Invest in tools that provide transparency and data access

• Establish clear success metrics from day one
  

Learning from Mistakes: The PFRC Framework

One effective approach I've seen uses the acronym PFRCP:

• Please

• Find

• Root

• Cause

• Prevent Reoccurrence

This framework helps teams document incidents and develop solutions together, creating a culture where everyone contributes to continuous improvement.

Value Principle 3: Customer Delight "We want to delight our customers and build awesome products"

How to get there:

• Gather regular customer feedback and act on insights

• Make customer perspectives visible throughout the organization

• Define clear quality standards and success metrics

• Share both customer satisfaction metrics and technical excellence indicators

Execution:

• Establish customer feedback loops and regular check-ins

• Create transparency around customer needs and experiences

• Define and communicate what "awesome" means in measurable terms

• Share KPIs that help everyone understand both customer impact and technical quality
  

The Path Forward

There are countless ways to express and build organizational culture, but success requires intentional structure, willingness to adapt, and openness to trying new approaches. The best time to start is now.

Culture building is a discipline that rewards consistency, experimentation, and genuine commitment to creating environments where people can do their best work while contributing to meaningful outcomes.

Great culture doesn't happen by accident - it's the result of thoughtful leadership, clear communication, and systems that support both individual growth and collective success.

One of my favorite videos is from Spotify's engineering culture take a look and hope it gives you some ideas on creating your culture.