Chapter 4

Cultural Change: An Action Plan

Most corporate cultures were established when the vast majority of workers were white and male. Today’s employees are more and more diverse. It’s managerially prudent to ask if the culture that served you well in the past can serve you equally well in the present and the future.

But what if it doesn’t? Suppose that question has been asked, and answered. Suppose that an astute observation of your business environment suggests that change is needed. Suppose, too, that a change agent has come forward and has begun to prepare the ground, using the ideas discussed in the last chapter. What next?

Sometimes executives who are introduced to a new idea decide it is the solution to all their problems and send their people scurrying in all directions with instructions to “do it”—whatever “it” is. Too often, the program takes off with a bang and then fades out with a whimper. This is particularly likely to happen with an initiative as complex and multifaceted as managing diversity. Successfully implementing this approach requires understanding the full process and designing an action plan that takes into account its many dimensions.

Identify Roots

The process of managing diversity begins with identifying the fundamental elements of the corporate culture, in particular those elements that influence or determine the company’s philosophy about diversity. There is no substitute for this. Even though you may be sorely tempted to go straight to trying to change how people act, you cannot skip this investigation into why they act as they do.

Remember the organizational tree? Behavior that you see is a branch; the roots, the part you don’t see, make the branch what it is. Managers who drive behavioral change on the assumption that the roots will follow are doomed to repeat the cycle.

Determining the nature of a company’s roots requires research—what I call a culture audit. It is often conducted by an outside consultant, who is able to bring a degree of objectivity that is valuable in the diagnostic part of the research.

Through in-depth interviews, written surveys, reviews of relevant company documents (reports, manuals, memoranda), focus groups, and direct observations, researchers gather data on the company’s many branches—the behaviors of managers and employees that relate to, or reflect, their attitudes toward diversity (see Appendix 4 for a generic set of interview questions). Depending on the trust level of the corporation, it is possible to use both insiders and outsiders to gather data.

The researchers’ intent is to gather enough data about the branches to allow them to uncover the generating roots. This is a process of inference, and it typically is a joint effort between the consultants and a supporting group of the company’s managers. What branches do we see? Therefore, what roots do we probably have?

Assess Roots

Once the roots have been identified, they must be examined as thoroughly as possible. The goal here is to determine whether they (and also the systems and practices they generate) support or hinder efforts to institute a management approach to diversity. This assessment is critical, since it provides the basis for planning change. The task here is to identify where change is needed—where a root may need to be removed or tweaked, and also where a root might be added.

This process of uncovering and evaluating roots may become clearer if we consider a few examples. One common root, for example, is the “melting pot” mythology. This root is manifested in the organization that prides itself on being “color-blind.” People in this organization say, “It doesn’t matter where you came from as long as you fit in.” The implications? This company expects everyone to assimilate. Diversity is unacceptable.

Still another root assumption is that “cream rises to the top.” This assumption ignores the reality that in most companies, cream is pulled or pushed to the top by an informal system of mentoring and sponsorship. The implications? To get the best from a diverse work force, the mentors and sponsors must work effectively for all groups.

Here’s another: “This company is like a family.” That root is extremely common—and extremely destructive. A major manifestation is a paternalistic climate where managers take on parental roles and employees are seen much like children. Inherent in this scenario is that “father (the boss) knows best” and children (employees) should follow his example. Implicit also is that sons will inherit the business, daughters should stick to doing the company dishes, and Uncle Deadwood deserves to stay around regardless of his performance.

The implications? Success in paternalistic companies is defined by how closely people emulate the manager. Taken to the extreme, this scenario aspires to have every single employee be a clone of the boss. This is the very opposite of diversity.

Flowing from the “family” root in some corporations is a rigid definition of loyalty as childlike obedience and emulation. Employees are expected to obey the manager; in return, they expect that this behavior will eventually be rewarded. For example, in one company managers expected employees to relocate as often and as quickly as necessary—regardless of their personal circumstances. To do otherwise was to risk being labeled disloyal.

Another example of this loyalty expectation is the executive who long ago set up a pattern of coming to work early and leaving late. It’s unspoken, of course, but the expectation is that everyone else will do the same. Now he stands at his window, monitoring employee arrivals and departures. Failure to adhere to his personal pattern is viewed as disloyalty.

As the work force becomes more diverse with employees having needs and preferences unlike their bosses, managers desiring to create a facilitative environment will have to redefine loyalty.

Another culture root that is becoming common is, “We are all a team.” In many ways this root supports diversity—certainly more effectively than “family” cultures—but there can be difficulties with it as well. The problem has to do with the style of developing, nurturing, that works best for various employees.

The “team” assumption often generates a rough-and-tumble, athletic kind of nurturing—much as a sparring partner prepares a boxer for a fight, or the second-string football team pushes the first string. This works well for some, but not all.

In a rap session between a CEO and a group of employees, one person complained that the corporation’s environment was not a nurturing one. He spoke of the challenging, argumentative tone of meetings and boss-subordinate exchanges that he frequently observed. The CEO was surprised; he considered the athletic-type behavior very supportive and facilitative. For this employee and others of similar mind, the corporation’s development process was sorely lacking.

Identify and Plan for Root Changes

To this point, we have unearthed the core cultural assumptions, or roots, that determine a company’s behavior with respect to diversity issues, and we have analyzed the impact of those cultural roots on the success of a managing diversity approach. Quite an accomplishment. Now the task is to identify what roots need to be changed, and in which direction. To do that, we contrast the current roots with the desired roots. Again using the “family” root as an example, the change agent must determine, “If we are not family, what are we? What should we be?”

Once the needed changes have been identified, then we move on to determine how to move from the status quo to the desired root. The manager driving the root modification—the change agent—must develop a full-scale plan for deliberately and definitively bringing about the change. Changing roots requires direct and straightforward action steps, as opposed to indirect approaches.

Work on the root level is laborious. For every root, there are many branches, multiple corporate decisions and actions, and each one has its constituencies. Be prepared for opposition. Deeply entrenched roots have developed some powerful defenders. Whenever these “root guards” hear the words “change” and “roots” in the same sentence, they snap to attention and ask in unison, “What root do you propose to change?” If you tell Uncle Deadwood, for example, that “we think it’s time that you produce or move on,” shock waves will travel through the company. Family-oriented employees will rush to defend the sacred concept of loyalty.

Root guards, in their efforts to discourage arbitrary root change, will sometimes try to inflict pain. If you endure the pain and still see the need for root change, however, the guards will usually grant you a hearing, especially if you convince them of the urgency with a firm business rationale. Maybe your business environment has changed so drastically that success depends on new branches that are incongruent with the existing roots. Root guards are most receptive to root changes once they understand that the risks of inertia outweigh the risks of changing.

Corporate root change is not for the squeamish. Yet managers committed to equal opportunity for all employees must exert the effort. The reward is a strategic advantage over the competition.

Root Change: An Example

Cultural investigations can take on particular poignancy in the case of a merger or an acquisition. The cultural roots and manifestations of the “acquirees” are especially vulnerable, but even the friendliest of mergers can also create cultural clashes and the necessity for root changes. To see this challenge from a managing diversity perspective is to determine which roots will control the vision of the new combined entity. How can, or should, the two roots systems be meshed and integrated?

In an acquisition, often the roots of the acquiring company remain dominant, and those of the acquiree are assimilated; we might call this the branch approach. The acquirer treats the acquiree as though it had no roots, as though it were solely a collection of branches. The acquiree’s branches are dismembered and attached to the “main’’ company’s trunk. The acquiring company’s managers expect “acquiree” employees to “fall into line” almost automatically.

This approach works well if the roots of the two companies are similar. If the roots are dissimilar, however, the attached branches are destined to wither, die, and fall off. Remember my peach limb?

If the acquiring company recognizes the existence of the acquiree’s culture but still believes its own should be dominant, we would expect to see the acculturation approach. Here the acquiring company undertakes intense socialization to bring about integration. Even though this is different from the branch approach, the result is the same—the acquired company adopts the acquiring company’s way of doing business.

Another option is reverse acculturation, in which the roots of the acquired company infiltrate and modify the roots of the acquirer. Essentially, the acquiring corporation sees the acquisition as an intervention to bring about change in its own roots. This approach, too, relies on assimilation.

A fourth option, however—the hybrid option—calls for managing diversity. Here the acquiring managers would seek to build a new culture reflecting the strong points of both organizations’ root systems. This is a long-term process requiring both vision and considerable leadership skills.

The hybrid option would, for example, require an acknowledgment that the two cultures differ and an “up front” decision on which aspects of each culture are most valued. It would also require that the agreed-upon vision be made clear to both managers and employees, and that it become the driving force for managers in both companies.

Senior managers pursuing a hybrid vision must foster problem-solving and conflict-resolution capability; this probably calls for special training sessions. Under the hybrid vision, the issue of “who bought whom” would become less important than the issue of how to bring about the desired hybrid culture.

Growing New Roots

■ Repeatedly articulate new roots. One of the first steps in moving toward the new set of roots is to articulate them repeatedly. One organizational participant said of a corporate leader, “He says the same thing over and over—when you join the organization, at the anniversary of your joining, at celebrations of performance, at retirement parties, at planning sessions—whenever. He looks for opportunities to deliver the same message.”

Granted, employees and managers may find this boring. But repetition continually reaffirms the roots as drivers and determinants of behavior. In the absence of such reaffirmation, employee behavior is increasingly likely to fall outside acceptable limits.

■ Create supportive traditions and ceremonies. Every corporation has traditions and ceremonies: orientation programs, promotion and retirement parties, annual employee meetings, company picnics, and the like. The cultural change agent must examine these to ensure that they fit with the root change and to see how they might serve as levers for facilitating implementation. For example, check the orientation program for new employees; does it incorporate concepts and principles conducive to managing diversity?

■ Create appropriate heroes and heroines. Managers can also support desired root change by choosing carefully whom they raise as heroes. A CEO pushing empowerment management, for example, would not want to foster the recognition of doer managers as heroes. Instead, she would award hero or heroine status to empowering managers, those who put priority on managing people as the principal means of achieving business objectives.

■ Create supportive symbols. In organizations, symbols take on a reality beyond the literal meaning of their nature. For example, in one corporation all new employees assembled for orientation around a table built by the company founders. The table became a symbol of the roots put in place by the founders. Gathering around the table symbolized the expectation that newcomers would align themselves with the existing corporate culture. A change agent would work to ensure that this assimilation expectation was supportive of the new roots.

■ Influence communications networks. Change agents need to influence both the corporation’s formal and informal communications networks. They must be willing to use storytellers and whisperers (spreaders of rumors), as well as formal policies, manuals, reports, and memoranda, in pursuit of cultural change. Otherwise, they risk the possibility that informal communication networks will work against them. A few moments with a gossip and a few well-placed stories with effective storytellers can help enormously with the development of an overall climate facilitative of the new root.

■ Recruit new root guards. Because new roots are fragile, guards must be enlisted to protect them from old root guards. These recruits will not only protect the embryonic roots but accept responsibility for nurturing them as well. Change agents who don’t deal with this recruitment task may find that their hard-earned changes are short-lived.

Essentially, the recruitment task involves identifying and educating those who are predisposed toward the change. They will then become root guards for the new roots. Managers aware of the limitations of the family root, for example, would be prime candidates for guarding the new roots.

■ Reward change agents. Changing and maintaining corporate culture as opposed to operating within a given set of roots is a leadership task. Yet, unfortunately, corporate practices often don’t encourage and reward this type of leadership behavior. Instead, they emphasize short-term operational achievements. Successful cultural change efforts will require a shift in priorities so that change agents are encouraged to work on changing culture and to persevere over the long run.

Change the Systems

A tree behaves the way it does—produces holly berries or acorns, has yellow flowers or no flowers, drops its leaves in autumn or remains evergreen—because of its roots. In organizations, the roots determine how things work in that organization, how managers do their job, how employees are treated; in other words, all the behaviors that collectively characterize the company.

These behaviors constitute the corporation’s systems, both formal and informal. This is where things get tangible: the systems determine employees’ future in the organization. The most important reason for examining and modifying cultural roots is to enable meaningful, sustainable modification of systems. The type of analysis conducted on the corporation’s culture must be carried out for its systems as well. In essence, the task here is to look hard at all your systems and determine whether they help foster a managing diversity approach or hinder it. Stated differently, the diversity change agent must ensure that organizational systems affirm the new roots.

One very important example is the way people are developed for greater responsibility: the system of promotions, mentoring, and sponsorship. In many organizations, for example, it is difficult to secure a promotion above a certain level without a personal advocate or sponsor. In the context of managing diversity, the issue is not whether this system is maximally efficient but whether it works for all employees. Executives who sponsor only people like themselves are not making a contribution toward managing diversity.

Performance appraisal is another significant system. If left unexamined, practices within this system can have devastating effects. There are, for example, organizations where official performance appraisals have little in common with what is said informally in the executive lounge. Minorities and women operating within this system seldom get accurate appraisals of their performance, and so it is difficult for them to correct or defend their alleged shortcomings.

Consider the reward system. If managing diversity is to become a reality, the system must reward empowering managers and make sure not to reward doer managers. The objective is to avoid giving off conflicting signals: championing one behavior while rewarding another.

In the case of the hybrid culture being developed by acquiring and acquiree companies, sensitive managers will take great care to require that all the “people” systems of the combined company—rewards, measurement, education, development—reflect the new vision.

Settle In for the Long Haul

Culture change is a long-term process. It takes years, for example, just to establish supportive traditions. One corporation that has been implementing managing diversity for roughly four years has made only limited progress in bringing about the necessary mindset shifts.

We are talking about a relatively new phenomenon, and there is little accumulated experience to help us know what is a “typical” time frame. However, I believe that fifteen or twenty years of consistent and conscientious efforts will be required before a cultural change becomes naturally sustainable. Both managers and employees need to know this. In the meantime, the process of diagnosis, planning, intervention, monitoring, and evaluation must be ongoing. Reaching the desired end requires that we keep note of where we are going.