5 Characteristics of A Winning Culture

What difference does culture make in an organization?

Organizational culture is defined as: the values and behaviors that contribute to the unique social and psychological environment of an organization.

The effects of culture on an organization's success or failure cannot be over stated. Here are two examples:

In 1958, the Green Bay Packers had 1 victory, 10 losses, and 1 tie. Needless to say, the season was a complete failure. At the end of that season, Green Bay fired their coach and hired somebody who had never been a Pro Football Head Coach, Vince Lombardi. When Vince Lombardi came to Green Bay, he was determined to make the organization into a winning organization. This transformation started with and ended with changing the culture of the Green Bay Packers. Here are the things Coach Lombardi did:

• He got rid of poor performing players and brought in better performing players.
• He instilled in his players a winning attitude.
• He encouraged the players to work hard and showed them the amazing results that come from hard work.
• He helped his players have better focus in accomplishing their goals.
• He found within the team natural leaders and put them in place where they could have the most influence.

Over the next 9 years, the Green Bay Packers won 5 NFL Championships and 2 Super Bowls. It is clear, that the turnaround of the Green Bay Packer culture was a complete success. The Green Bay Packer organization now had a winning culture.

In a more recent example, the Denver Broncos recently won the Super Bowl. How did this happen? Only five years earlier, the Denver Broncos had a record of 4 wins and 12 losses. They had a loosing culture within their organization. After that terrible season ended, John Elway was hired as the Vice President of Operations. During Elway's earlier days as the Bronco's Quarterback and leader, he was part of a winning culture. Elway and the Broncos went to five Super Bowls and won two of those five. He was part of a winning organization. His task now was to bring back the winning culture to the Denver Broncos. Here are the things John Elway did:

• He got rid of poor performing players and brought in better performing players.
• He instilled in his organization an aggressive and physical style of play and thus improving the teams attitude.
• He encouraged the players to work hard and showed them the amazing results that come from hard work.
• He helped his team have better focus in accomplishing their goals.
• He found natural leaders and put them in place where they could have the most influence.

The similarities between Green Bay's cultural turnaround and Denver's is consistent with the methods an organization can use in instilling a winning culture within itself. Here are the five characteristics of a winning culture:

1. High Quality Employees - Low performing employees who are not dedicated to the success of an organization, should not be a part of it. In order to improve the quality of employees, it is important to find the ones that have the right skill set, talent, knowledge, work ethic, and attitude. This type of employee will have a positive effect on others around them.
2. Attitude -  It is important for employees to have a winning attitude. When employees are positive and truly believe in what they are doing, it will show in their quality of work and interactions.
3. Work Ethic - Employers need to encourage and reward hard work through promotions and other incentives. If an organization wants its employees to work hard, then it needs to demonstrate the results of hard work and the great results that come from it.
4. Focus - Having employees coming to work truly focused on the goals of the organization and what they need to do in order to accomplish those goals is a wonderful and unique thing to have. Look for and promote those employees. Employees that only come to work to "punch-in and punch-out" have no place in a winning culture.
5. Leadership - The employees that are put into leadership positions, should embody the qualities that the organization is looking to develop within its culture. This is a critical component of developing a winning culture. It is the leaders within the organization that help drive and mold the desired culture.

Does the culture of an organization make a difference? Yes, it is the biggest determining factor between success and failure. Does the culture of your organization embody the characteristics of a winning culture? If not, start making the necessary changes to help your organization have a winning culture!

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5 Steps to an Effective Performance Management Program

Annual appraisals are only one aspect of effective performance management

Jackie walked apprehensively into her supervisors office. They were meeting to discuss her annual appraisal. She was nervous about what her supervisor would discuss with her. During their meeting, Jackie and her supervisor discussed things that occurred during the past year that had effected Jackie's' overall performance. Often, Jackie would try to recall the various instances, but so much time had passed that she could not remember the exact details the same way her supervisor did. As the meeting went on, Jackie began to feel defensive and irritated. Finally, the meeting was drawing to a close and Jackie had already checked-out mentally. She was done with this meeting and just wanted to get back to work. Here supervisor handed her a list of areas Jackie was to work on improving in her assigned position at the company. Jackie took the list, shook her supervisors hand, and walked back to her desk feeling a bit flustered by the whole experience. She put the list of areas to improve in her drawer and never looked at it again. She went back to work, relived that she would not have to go through that again for another year.

What is performance management?
Performance management is about establishing a shared understanding, between the employee and employer, about what is to be achieved at an organizational level. It is about aligning the organizations objectives and expectations with the employees skills, competency requirements, and resources in order to achieve a desired result. With performance management, the emphasis is on improvement, learning, development, and reaching set goals in order to create a highly productive workforce.

Annual appraisals
It is important to understand that annual appraisals are only a part of a overall performance management strategy. However, far too often, many organizations hold these annual meetings as their entire performance management process. Annual appraisals are often perceived as a painful process, by both participants, that result in no real change or improvement in employee performance. By only having annual appraisals, results in unintentional outcomes:

• Too painful, emotionally charged
• Poor understanding of expectations
• Misdirected bonuses (favorable review, but organizational goals not met)
• Poorly timed
• Subjective supervisor opinion
• Missed development opportunities

Effective performance management

Performance management, when done correctly, effectively links the organizations plans and goals with the employees individual performance. When an employees individual performance helps an organization achieve its goals, that employee would then be rewarded with favorable reviews and possible bonuses that are in-line with the employees performance and contribution. Here is a basic outline of a performance management program:

1. Initial Meeting - Face-to-face planning meeting between the supervisor and the employee. During this meeting, the supervisor and the employee will work together to establish objectives, development plan, and a competency review for the next 365 days.
2. Continuous focus - During the next six months, both the supervisor and the employee should be taking notes independently documenting performance milestones, progression, and set-backs.
3. Interim review - An abbreviated meeting should be held between the supervisor and the employee to measure progression toward the objectives as discussed in the initial meeting. This is also an opportunity to discuss any updates or changes to the objectives based on any change of the overall organizational goal. In addition, this is the time to discuss any additional resources or training the employee might need in order to reach the objective within the next six months.
4. Continuous focus - During the next six months, both the supervisor and the employee should be taking notes independently documenting performance milestones, progression, and set-backs.
5. Final review - At the end of the 365 day period, the supervisor and the employee will meet to determine if the objectives set during the initial meeting were met. If the objectives were met, then the supervisor would have some form of recognition for the employee upon meeting their objective. If the objectives were not met, then the supervisor and the employee would discuss the nature of the objective and if it was obtainable. In addition, a discussion about available resources and training would also take place at this time. This is not a meeting where only the supervisor does the talking. The determination of meeting the objective should be discussed and decided upon by both the supervisor and the employee. If the supervisor does not feel that the objective was met, but the employee does, then their was a communication gap during the initial meeting and the interim review.

Outcomes of an effective performance management program

There are clear signs of an effective performance management program within an organization:

• Communication improves
• Everyone knows the objectives and expectations
• Improved documentation
• Reduction of stress
• Final review (appraisal) becomes relevant and effective
• Learning and development becomes part of the organizational culture

The difference between a standalone annual appraisal and a performance management program is striking. Improving employee morale, reduced turnover, promoting the right people into the right positions, earned job performance recognition, and growing employee skill sets are but a few of the results that will occur when an organization has an effective performance management program in place.

For more information, please feel free to email support@hcsiinc.com

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