How to Change Company Culture in 10 Steps

I’ve gone to conference after conference to listen to speakers talk about how important company culture is to the growth and sustainability of an organization – but I haven’t heard anyone really breakdown HOW to do it. Through years of experience working with long-term clients, I’ve figured out the “HOW”:

1. Benchmark Data: Administer Climate Surveys. Utilizing a 3rd Party might be best to ensure honest and anonymous responses.
2. HR Audit: Find the flaws. An HR Audit will determine weak areas in compliance and employee management.
3. HR Corrective Action Plan: Fix it. Once the audit is complete, a detailed corrective action plan is drafted with deadlines of when items should be resolved.
4. Vendor Analysis: Cut Costs. Re-negotiate or obtain quotes from other companies for high-cost vendors such as payroll and timekeeping, workers compensation insurance, and other software utilities.
5. Compensation Analysis: Pay Appropriately. Use market data against a position’s duties and responsibilities to determine pay ranges for each title an employee has within the company.
6. Benefits Analysis: Give Them What They Want. Using the data from the Climate Survey, determine which benefits can be discontinued and identify opportunities to add those that employees will be more satisfied with.
7. Executive Coaching: Leadership Bootcamp. A company’s weakness is the reflection of the leadership’s weakness.
8. Benchmark Data: Administer Climate Survey, again. It should take about 6 months to do all of the above and give employees time to experience the new culture – let’s see how they’re doing.
9. Create Workplace Content: Use the Data. Now that employees are happier and there is data to prove it – use the data to market the company as a Great Place to Work.
10. Talent Placement: You’re Ready to Grow. At this point, a company will see an increase in quality applications, shorter time-to-fills, higher retention rates, and as a result: increased profitability.

Whew! That’s a lot of work. It takes a MINIMUM of 6 months to Evolve the Workplace, but in most cases it takes at least one year. You see, the problem isn’t so much that there is a “shortage of talent” – it’s more that the talent doesn’t want to work for you. You can sit there and blame the economy or the millennials again (it’s always our fault) – or you can take action and push your business forward.