Every company has a culture. What matters most, however, is how that company culture is being maintained: by default…or by design? The best leaders in the most successful companies know that taking ownership of the company culture is critical to competing in the game of business.
In fact, creating a company culture is so critical that I built its necessity into PFSbrands’ Core Purpose: To help others become more successful in work & in life. This belief is what has led us to assemble the right players and watch our company enjoy double-digit growth year over year for two decades, with nearly $70MM in annual sales last year.
To ensure a company continues on a path of scaling and success, clearly it is vitally important that a strong culture is in place. But when’s the last time you audited your company culture?
Here are a few ways to quickly gauge where your culture stands:
- Gather the Wisdom of the Crowd
Surveys and assessments raise to the surface the strengths and weaknesses within a company. They shine a light on the good, bad, and ugly. At PFSbrands, we do all kinds of surveys. They can be anonymous or non-anonymous. Twice a year we do a simple NPS (Net Promoter Score) type survey internally that is anonymous. The survey questions are: 1. How likely (on a scale of 0 to 10) are you to recommend PFSbrands as an employer to your friends or family members? 2. Why?
This allows for immediate feedback and an unfiltered peek into the minds of team members.
- Check the Core
When’s the last time you reflected on your company’s core values? Do they include maintaining a solid culture? In an ever-changing world, core values are constant. Core values are not descriptions of the work we do or the strategies we employ to accomplish our mission. The values underlie our work, how we interact with each other, and which strategies we employ to fulfill our mission.
If the contentment and success of your employees aren’t of value, your culture will always be lacking.
3. Measure Those Goals
How do your goals match up to the results? Are team members consistently falling short of both company and personal goals? The first step in understanding the importance of goal setting is to understand the why. If you don’t set goals, write them down, and evaluate the results, you’ll likely be the exact same company 12 months from now. You MUST identify those important activities that you need to do every day to get you to that goal. Then, you must create habits, systems, and processes that ensure you perform those daily habits. It’s just like that old adage: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.
You can have the best business model and most unique product or service on the market, but if your company culture is lacking, failure won’t be far behind. So add “polish my culture” to your spring cleaning list, and make 2019 your most successful year yet!