Align Culture
and Strategy
The first milestone of the transformation journey
is defining who we are and who we want (and
need) to be.
Overview
- We align brand promise, strategy, and culture to realize the vision and purpose of the organization.
- We listen deeply to the voice of the system. We use various tools and techniques to listen to the voice: surveys, pulse checks, interviews, facilitated focus groups, and open forum town halls.
- Fueled by the voice of the people, we work with the leadership and management teams to answer some key questions:
- Who are we today?
- Who do we want to be?
- Who do we need to be based on our strategy?
- What cultural shifts are required?
- Are there any barriers to building a new culture?
- The organization develops the key themes for the transformation; a task force owns each one.
- The final output is an organizational canvas of the desired culture aligned with the strategy and the core purpose of the organization.
How We Can Help
- We work with the organization in defining the scope of the transformation based on the analysis of the current state.
- We conduct several synchronized activities:
- Engagement or culture survey for the organization
- Survey result analysis: current and aspirational culture
- Assess the change power of the organization
- We review the following key business components:
- Strategy with key strategic pillars, themes, and objectives
- The strategic initiatives related to the internal experience
- The purpose and vision definitions
- Values and value statements
- Competency framework
- Brand strategy positioning and attributes
- Organizational structure and operating model
- We involve the whole organization to build up momentum around the transformation.
- We facilitate focus groups on specific topics and themes to produce the ingredients of the desired state.
- We align brand promise (CX) with strategy and the required shifts are identified.
- We define the desired state in a canvas and identify the shifts needed to reach it.
- We invite the leadership to dissect the voice and align on the desired organizational canvas.
- The canvas is socialized among the management and leadership for their final endorsement.
Our Experience
We designed a customized survey for a bank going through a merger led by a team with great ambitions.
The survey assessed the current environment and got everyone’s input on the desired values and culture.
The results empowered the leaders to develop the bank’s transformational values and associated traits.
The leaders went back to the full population with an announcement on what is the new way of living together.
With a large regional financial institution, we embedded the sixteen questions of the culture styles framework in the annual employee engagement survey.
The results were then benchmarked against the industry, and leaders were able to easily identify the gap and the needed cultural shift to close it.
The skills to make the required shift were identified and over 900 people managers given the opportunity to develop them.
We embarked on a cultural transformation project with a local organization in the Kingdom.
Prior to our project, they had conducted a full survey using the opposing values system, and they also developed a competency framework.
We build on the results of their previous efforts focusing our work on unifying the various cultural aspects into one canvas to enable the delivery of the brand experience derived from the strategy. The canvas was a direct reflection of how they want the world to see them.
Our Team
Managing Partner
Partner
Associate Partner
Senior Manager