How Can Entrepreneurs Create a Culture of Excellence?

Can a great culture put you in the driver’s seat as a leader?

Can a great culture put you in the driver’s seat as a leader?

Last Tuesday we talked about how help people see the positive power of making a change. Thursday we saw what could happen if you don’t do the right things to prepare your key stakeholders for leadership changing. Today, we share the key element in empowering your change efforts. I find that leaders who embrace and harness change attract and create a culture of excellence within their organizations. Your organization’s culture can provide you an edge in creating a high performing organization.

My experience with many successful leaders and entrepreneurs tells me the earlier you begin creating an organizational culture, the faster your organization succeeds. If I was to cite the biggest difference between good and great organizations in similar industries, it would be how well their culture is developed.  The difference in their results can be huge.

Great organizations have strong cultures. So how can entrepreneurs create strong organizational culture?

The first key to building a great culture is that it must be built on your organization’s strengths and unique capabilities, aligned with your organization mission, vision values.  To have a successful culture, you must understand your organization’s strengths.  You must be willing to embrace these strengths in spite of what others might say and do in your markets.  This means you build on these strengths.  You can do this by providing training and creating management and leadership development programs that allow your organization to create your unique way of doing business.

The second key to building a great culture is to understand your organizational priorities. Being good at everything doesn’t make you great at anything. Good organizations tend to do many things well, but fall short on the critical elements of success that clients want. Great organizations understand their client’s world and then strive to change clients and customers expectations to what they should expect from a vendor. Many great organizations sell their point of view to clients. They understand that many customers are looking to be led and look to lead as often as possible.

The third key to building a great culture is to understand how to measure and monitor the culture’s development.  Great cultures create performance management systems that track key elements of the organization’s success.  They track many key performance indicators including business performance metrics, key milestones, and critical behaviors. This allows them to know where the organization is at any time. These measurements also provide them with results driven feedback on what is happening in their markets. They are able to seize opportunities more quickly because they know what happening in their markets at all times.

The final key to building a great culture is to be an expert at attracting, recruiting and developing great talent for the organization.  Because they know who they are, they are much better at finding the right people for their organizations. Their hiring processes increase the organization’s capabilities while attracting new talent. Culture is a critical element to how millennials choose their employees so this edge provides them with future growth and expansion.

So, now that you have the tools to build a great culture, what will you do tomorrow?  Will you set this blog aside to tackle the work on your desk?  Or will you start taking the steps needed to begin changing your organization’s culture from good to great.  The choice is yours.  See you next Tuesday.

What path will you take to accomplish change?

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