Introduction
As our business environment becomes more challenging and complex organisations need to build cultures that are continually responsive and adaptive. Leaders play a pivotal role in shaping and maintaining organisational cultures; they influence key decisions, role model what will be perceived as core values and shape the thinking and action of people around them.
This month’s article will review the characteristics of high performing cultures, examine leadership strategies that shape successful cultures and suggest some practical ways leaders can apply these strategies.
The Nature of High Performing Cultures – A Snap Shot
Before examining leadership in high performing cultures let us quickly review some important aspects of what is known about organisational cultures.
Kotter and Heskott were one of the first to observe and describe two different types of cultures – constructive and defensive. They also found compelling evidence to support the view that constructive cultures, in comparison to defensive cultures, produce superior and sustained financial performance. Dr. Robert Cooke (Associate Professor of Management – University of Illinois) has expanded these descriptions to include two distinguishable types of defensive cultures – aggressive and passive.
People in constructive cultures are actively encouraged to carry out their work and interact with each other in a way that promotes achievement, builds self esteem and develops interpersonal relationships. Aggressive/defensive cultures are those in which people are expected to approach tasks in forceful ways to protect their status and security. In passive/defensive cultures people are expected to do whatever it takes to please superiors and avoid interpersonal conflict.
Leadership Style and Culture
It is known that leaders exert a significant influence on the nature of organisational culture. The key questions are:
- How does this influence occur?
- Which approaches are most effective in shaping constructively orientated cultures?
Dr. Cooke has proposed a model of leadership that describes a mechanism of influence and links different leadership strategies to different cultural outcomes.
The model proposes that leadership effectiveness is influenced by at least two factors:
- Leadership strategies
- The impact leaders have on other people
Leadership Strategies
In a general sense, leadership strategies can be described as:
- Prescriptive: strategies that guide or direct the activities and behaviours of others towards goals
- Restrictive: strategies that constrain or prohibit activities and behaviours towards goals
The model suggests that prescriptive strategies lead to more effective leadership outcomes because they define direction, promote organisational learning and support processes for problem solving.
Leadership Impact
In terms of leadership impact, Dr. Cooke’s leadership model proposes two basic types:
- Constructive: an impact that motivates people to think and behave in achievement orientated and cooperative ways
- Defensive: an impact that causes people to think and behave in ways that protect their status and position
The implication of this model of leadership is that leaders who adopt prescriptive leadership strategies will tend to have a constructive impact on the people they influence, which in turn will create and reinforce constructive organisational norms and expectations.
In a sense, the leadership strategies suggested in this model represent the two extremes of a continuum. Hence, in defining prescriptive strategies it is useful to compare each one to its opposing restrictive strategy. The following summarises and compares prescriptive and restrictive leadership strategies:
| Prescriptive |
Restrictive |
| |
|
- Creating a sense of direction
- Role modelling
- Active mentoring and coaching
- Lateral thinking
- Managing by excellence
- Giving helpful feedback
- Rewarding success
- Reciprocal influence
- Empowering people
|
- Talking about what you don’t want
- Putting restrictions on behaviour
- Learning through “sink or swim”
- Vertical thinking
- Managing by exception
- Giving destructive feedback
- Punishing mistakes
- Unilateral influence
- Constraining people
|
Studies that have compared leadership strategies and organisational cultures have demonstrated the validity of this model. Organisations in which prescriptive leadership strategies predominate exhibit constructive characteristics while the reverse is true for organisations in which restrictive strategies are prevalent.
An alternative view of effective leadership approaches comes from a study of high performing Australian companies (Graham Hubbard et al, “The First XI – Winning Organisations in Australia"). After surveying one thousand Australian organisations, the study identified eleven organisations that had consistently demonstrated financial success over a twenty year period. The study found a range of common elements in these organisations, including ten leadership elements:
- Captain-coach leadership
- Build the business not own careers
- Grown from within, long experience
- Walk the talk
- Passionate about the cause
- Decisive
- Have a long term view
- Communicate
- Consistent
- Have few trappings
The similarities with prescriptive leadership strategies are clear. The study also compared its finding to similar studies in the American business environment. One of the significant differences was the desire by Australians for their leaders to be captain - coaches. The study describes this approach as:
“…people who exhort them and encourage them to improve performance – rather than generals providing a vision and telling them what to do. They also want their leaders to be players on the ground during the game, showing captaincy skills in the field supporting them during the play and sharing the work involved, not generals who are removed form battle.”
The authors described this as a very egalitarian view of leadership, consistent with the historical value of mateship within the Australian culture.
What Can Leaders Do to Shape Constructive Cultures?
It is clear that some leadership strategies are more effective in shaping constructive cultures. It is also clear that aspects of societal culture can have an influence on how these strategies are manifested and applied. So, what can leaders do every day that will help to shape their teams and organisations towards constructive orientated cultures? The following suggestions, whilst not all encompassing will help:
- Be as Visible as You Can - Look to engage with your team and team members in some way every day. This can be informal (e.g., in the corridor or lift) as well as formal (e.g., scheduled meetings). Also be prepared to ‘get your hands dirty’; occasionally help with some of the more mundane tasks that you team needs to do.
- Coach Someone Every Day - Every interaction you have with your team is an opportunity to help them in some way. Be prepared to set high standards, and support team members in achieving those standards. Help team members find their own solutions by not always giving an immediate answer to their questions. Explore the options and help them select the one(s) that best fit their situation.
- Pay Attention to What is Important - Constantly reminding people of what is important will help them remain clear about the direction of the organisation and the team. Culture is as much about how things are done as what gets done, so keep reminding people of the core values and behaviours as well as the goals. Build into the structure of your team meetings an opportunity to discuss core values. Evaluate courses of action against the contribution to goals and the consistency to core values.
- Reward Often - Rewards don’t have to be monetary. A simple thank you can often be as powerful as money. Movie tickets, chocolates and public recognition all have an impact. Research has consistently shown that money of itself is an inadequate motivator. Look for things that people are doing right and acknowledge these in a way that positively impacts them. Again, be prepared to acknowledge how work is done as well as an outcome achieved. Also, recognise and reward achievement of important milestones towards a larger goal.
- Find Ways to Play - There is any number of ways of having fun at work. For example at Virgin Blue Airlines employees are given a licence to play. They interact with their customers in a way that attracts people to their airline and creates an energised work environment.
- Involve Your Team in Planning - Involving your team in planning helps maintain a clear direction. People trust processes that they have helped create. Involving your team will generate greater commitment and motivation. It also provides a great opportunity to build context for the team by reviewing the organisational goals.
Conclusion
An increasingly complex and changing business environment highlights the importance of performance orientated cultures. Leaders play a pivotal role in influencing and shaping organisational cultures by the way they influence the thinking and behaviour of those around them. A set of leadership strategies have been identified that are directly correlated to the development of constructive cultures. These strategies define direction, promote organisational learning and support processes for problem solving. There is also evidence that the Australian societal culture has an impact on how these strategies are successfully manifested.
The challenge for leaders is to find creative ways of applying successful leadership strategies that take account of the special nature of the Australian culture.
