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Toxic culture looms large right now. The headlines are full of toxic masculinity and the abusive behaviours it has led to. And of politicians behaving toxically – breaking laws, denying wrongdoing, and promoting policies designed to win headlines rather than improve things.
In the meantime, the UK has recently seen the CBI, the Metropolitan Police and the Department for Education all accused of having toxic cultures. The Australia Parliament House is under scrutiny following reports of sexual harassment and assault. In the US, video game company Activation Blizzard is facing accusations of widespread discrimination and harassment against female employees.
Corporate culture and financial performance
It feels like the world has gone bonkers, especially considering that over 90% of North American CEOs and CFOs believe that improving their corporate culture would boost financial performance. Improving the culture was ranked among the top three of all factors that could increase financial performance, including strategy, innovation and brand patents. More than 80% agreed their organisation’s culture was not as healthy as it should be and that leadership investment is by far the most important key to fixing this.
A need waiting to be met
The converse of this can be seen in PwC’s Workforce Hopes and Fears survey of 52,195 workers across 44 countries, which revealed that almost one in five UK workers (18%) say they are very or extremely likely to switch to a new employer within the next 12 months. And in what way are these people looking to improve their lot? While a pay increase is a main motivator for making a job change (72%), wanting a fulfilling job (68%) and wanting to truly be themselves at work (63%) are the other main motivations at play here.
Backing this up – MIT Sloane Management Review found that during the Great Resignation, a “toxic culture” was a far stronger indicator of employee attrition than compensation – 10 times stronger.
This isn’t surprising when you consider that toxic work cultures increase employee stress, anxiety, depression, burnout, and a higher likelihood of serious physical diseases.
What can be done? Top-down solutions
Improving corporate culture starts at the top. Leaders need to hold themselves accountable for toxic behaviour. And middle managers and supervisors need to be aligned with the efforts because of the microcultures they influence.
Most large organisations have official core values, but there’s often little correlation with how employees perceive the real values. So, ask what the values might mean in practice and ensure those behaviours are promoted.
As featured in my previous newsletter, which looked at evolutionary group psychology in workplace culture, organisational design is another important focus to improve workplace culture. Essentially, we must design with more thought for our animal selves rather than the rational beings we aspire to be.
While most CEOs are likely genuinely concerned for their employees, the best way they can ensure they are effective in this respect is to explicitly link cultural improvements to bottom-line benefits. The evidence is there.
What can be done? Bottom-up solutions
Regular, short, free-text-based surveys are an effective and revealing check-in with employees. They are a great source of powerful and actionable insights.
Unfortunately, most formal reporting procedures fail to uncover bad behaviour. One study of sexual harassment found that only 30% of employees told anyone at work about their experience, and fewer lodged a formal complaint. Employees must be safe to complain and provide important and useful feedback. This feeds into measures of effectiveness, which won’t function without true data.
Once feedback is received, it’s crucial to act on it. Need I say this improves trust and a feeling of agency amongst the workforce?
Acknowledge work well done – a study by the Boston Consulting Group reports “appreciation for your work” as the most important element to happiness on the job.
The high-level aspiration is to give employees more control over their work.
Drama for Change
In case you’re wondering how we fit into this picture – Drama for Change incorporates several of the abovementioned techniques and some unique methods of our own. It works to supercharge a group conversation about an aspect of workplace culture. It stimulates engagement, gets a buzz going and makes it easier to discuss difficult topics in the group. It’s essentially a catalyst to accelerate culture change and make it enjoyable.
Podcast
With such potential for change but relatively little taking place, I’d like to launch a series of podcasts on the subject of Toxic Culture and How to Change it. Would you tune in? Would you be interested in appearing on it? Who should be the guests? What topics should we cover?
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