The Origins of Corporate Culture

Posted by: Meagen Ryan, Director of Strategy Mar 24, 2009 0 Comments

I love my local hardware store. I love it because it smells like fertilizer and dust. I love it because I can buy a bathroom fan in one aisle and a portable radio in another. I love it because it is overflowing with inventory. But most of all, I love it because I can stop any employee, age 17 to 70, and ask for the most random item (“Do you have those brown square rubber thingies you put under furniture to prevent floor damage?”) and they will tell me the aisle number, and then lead me to the exact item.

My local hardware store is slightly more expensive than a big box store, but even in this economy I will keep going back because of their customer service. That is the power that culture can have over a business and its brand. Given that culture is so important, how does a company establish it? Is it set from the top down or the bottom up?

Here is one personal example of the top-down model. My last job lacked an atmosphere of camaraderie. We liked each other, but tended to spend more time working quietly at our desks than collaborating on projects. Some attributed that to the office setup, but I suspect it had more to do with the tone set by the company president. He is a great guy but very focused, and would often come and go without saying hello or goodbye. That behavior was pretty much the norm for everyone in the office.

I didn’t realize how a simple greeting could set company culture until I came to Rock Creek Strategic Marketing. Every morning I am greeted by name by either Chris, Scott, or Margaret, the company’s principals, as well as by other colleagues. It’s a small thing, but from my first day here it has made me feel like a part of the team. That morning greeting, which I’ve come to think of as the hallmark of Rock Creek Strategic Marketing’s culture, typifies the company’s fun, friendly, and collaborative brand.

On the other hand, a recent study argues that culture is influenced from the bottom (of the barrel) up. According to a study out of Rotterdam School of Management in the Netherlands, which was discussed on NPR’s This American Life, a “bad apple” employee can spoil a whole bushel of perfectly good employees. The researchers divided test subjects into small groups and gave each group a task. One of the test subjects was actually an actor, and told to depict a slacker, a depressive, or a jerk. The groups with the actor did measurably worse on their task than the ones without, regardless of the other group members’ talent. By the end of 45 minutes, the entire group was slacking, depressed, or jerkish.

Here’s what I took away from that research: if you want to know the truth about your organization’s culture, don’t look to star performers but rather to your slackers, your Debbie Downers, your jerks. How bad are they? If their attitudes infected an entire team—as the research says they will—what would that mean for your organization? What would it mean for your brand?

I suspect culture, being a product of human interaction, is set by both the top and the bottom of an organization. Because of this, maintaining a positive corporate culture that aligns with the stated brand is everyone’s responsibility. Given the impact that culture has on brand, it is one that everyone should take seriously.

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Meagen Ryan

Director of Strategy

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