Culture

Culture is downstream of structure. Posts on why the "fix the culture" reflex usually fails, and what to try instead.

51 posts
Culture Governance

Cooperation & Discord

I'm going back and reading through my old Diplomacy & World Affairs texts. They're useful: > Cooperation is contrasted with discord; but is also distinguished from harmony. Cooperation, as compared to harmony, requires active attempts to adjust policies to meet the demands of others. That is,

Speaking Transformation Culture Teams

Creating The Conditions

A corporate retreat day organized around three stories, three games, and three new practices.

Change Management Transformation Culture

Change Activism

“Change Activism” has been a handy if hard-to-use phrase to help me frame how I view change in an organizational context.[1] We invite teams to try simple practices that make it easier for them to change actively, on-purpose, and informed by user data. When these practices work for teams,

Speaking Culture Transformation

On Organizational Learning for YCN

Last year while in London helping Joe set up August's London office – and to help celebrate Joe's wedding, hence the gravelly tone and greasy appearance – I stopped by YCN to do a quick interview about how we help organizations learn. 0:00 /3:00 1× Transcript

Culture Economics

Amazon & Achievement

Using Amazon as a way to understand what works, what doesn’t, and what’s got to change.

Governance Culture Economics

Open Undercurrent

How self-organization helped a small consultancy grow revenue, profitability, and engagement – all at the same time.

Culture Values

Show Up Whole

I spent the better portion of P1 on employee reviews. At Undercurrent, we do official reviews every four months, with the intent of doing them all in one week while we’re “closed” for renovations. There’s no better gift than being in these reviews, and hearing about everyone’s

Structure Meetings Culture

Scheduling at Undercurrent

Standardizing timing changes everything. Scheduling and resourcing used to be a complete mess at Undercurrent. Individuals and teams would be double- and triple-booked some weeks, while their colleagues had nothing to do. Building a team required hours of concerted effort: Who works well together? What’s the right team for

Teams Culture Roles

Five Org Design Things N° 3

Conditions for a team; Measuring team effectiveness; Chautauqua; New customer relationships mean new responsibilities; Why do companies exist; The Shift Index.

Economics Structure Culture

Five Finance Things N° 1

Handelsbanken; Cross-subsidy; Regulatory capture; The origins of Venmo; Goldman Sachs.

Speaking Org Design Culture Power

Designing for Autonomy

Purposeful autonomy has been, and always will be, the main goal of organizing.