Page 449 - leadership-experience-2008

CikguOnline
CikguOnline
430 PART 5: THE LEADER AS SOCIAL ARCHITECT
2. Equality and trust are primary values. The culture creates a sense of
community and caring for one another. The organization is a place for
creating a web of relationships that allows people to take risks and develop
to their full potential. The emphasis on treating everyone with care and
respect creates a climate of safety and trust that allows experimentation,
frequent mistakes, and learning. Managers emphasize honest and open
communications as a way to build trust.
3. The culture encourages risk taking, change, and improvement. A basic
value is to question the status quo. Constant questioning of assumptions
opens the gates to creativity and improvement. The culture rewards and
celebrates the creators of new ideas, products, and work processes. To
symbolize the importance of taking risks, an adaptive culture may also
reward those who fail in order to learn and grow.
In addition, high-performance cultures emphasize both values and solid busi-
ness performance as the drivers of organizational success. Leaders align values
with the company’s day-to-day operations—hiring practices, performance man-
agement, budgeting, criteria for promotions and rewards, and so forth. A 2004
study of corporate values by Booz Allen Hamilton and the Aspen Institute found
that managers in companies that report superior financial results typically put a

high emphasis on values and link them directly to the way they run the organiza-
27
tion. A good example is Commerce Bank, which was described in the chapter
opening example, where recruitment, training, incentives, and other practices are
tied directly to the cultural values leaders want to encourage.

Cultural Leadership

An organization exists only because of the people who are a part of it, and those
people both shape and interpret the character and culture of the organization. That
is, an organization is not a slice of objective reality; different people may perceive
the organization in different ways and relate to it in different ways. Leaders in par-
ticular formulate a viewpoint about the organization and the values that can help
people achieve the organization’s mission, vision, and strategic goals. Therefore,
leaders enact a viewpoint and a set of values that they think are best for helping the
organization succeed. A primary way in which leaders infl uence norms and values
to build a high-performance culture is through cultural leadership.

Cultural leader A cultural leader defines and uses signals and symbols to infl uence corporate
Cultural leader
A leader who actively uses culture. Cultural leaders infl uence culture in two key areas:
A leader who actively uses
signals and symbols to infl uence
signals and symbols to infl uence
corporate culture
corporate culture 1. The cultural leader articulates a vision for the organizational culture that
employees can believe in. This means the leader defines and communicates
central values that employees believe in and will rally around. Values are
tied to a clear and compelling mission, or core purpose.
2. The cultural leader heeds the day-to-day activities that reinforce the
cultural vision. The leader makes sure that work procedures and reward
systems match and reinforce the values. Actions speak louder than words,
so cultural leaders “walk their talk.” 28
For values to guide the organization, leaders model them every day. Canada’s
WestJet Airlines, which ranked in a survey as having Canada’s most admired
corporate culture, provides an illustration. Employees (called simply “people” at
WestJet) regularly see CEO Clive Beddoe and other top leaders putting the values
of equality, teamwork, participation, and customer service into action. At the end