Discussion on "personal culture" and "company culture"

L: Personally, I feel that the system is the guarantee of management, and culture is a result. Cultural beliefs can be "counter-incentive" after they are formed, but they are not the decisive factor.

W: Well said. In practice, the key question is, as an ordinary employee, where does his "cultural belief" come from? Why is it formed?

S: I think that when it comes to the word culture, it is not a short-term thing, it must be a kind of knowledge accumulated and achieved over a long period of time. A person who is newly integrated into the organization will definitely find common points by observing the behavior of other organizational members and learn from them. In fact, this is the real organizational culture.

Z: This is a good question. I think that corporate culture may not be instillation but stimulation for employees, or it may be more about stimulation: stimulating the ideas in employees' hearts and strengthening and solidifying them through various methods.

W: I am thinking that as a social person, there are relatively many factors that influence the formation of his beliefs and "cultural models", some are utilitarian and some are non-utilitarian. As a business person, he first signed a contract with the company based on "utility". Therefore, the formation of corporate culture and an employee's "cultural belief" in a company are based and premised on utilitarianism. From an enterprise perspective, the main goal of building corporate culture is also utilitarian - to stimulate employees' enthusiasm and creativity. Therefore, when observing the "cultural beliefs" of a business person, we may first be inseparable from this "utilitarianism".

I also have an idea. A person's "belief" and whether he agrees with the corporate culture of his company are not the same thing. A person with faith may not agree with the corporate culture of a specific company.

Whether it is natural or unnatural, the method for a company to "build" corporate culture is nothing more than distribution methods, ideological education and guidance, institutional norms, emotional care, support in the process, etc.; and Whether an employee allows himself to identify with this corporate culture must have gone through multiple, comprehensive thinking and even a "self-game" process - whether he thinks it is "worth it" or "not worth it" for me to do so.

S: The conflict between individual culture and organizational culture is inevitable, so the company keeps doing various propaganda, training, and work stoppages... However, once a major violation of the system occurs, this This kind of violation is often due to cultural differences. No matter how high the person's position is or how good his performance is, the only way to leave the organization is to leave the organization.

W: It is said that people with different paths do not work together.

S: Yes. Many times, these violations of the system may bring benefits to the company in the short term, but they will still be punished. This is a kind of strengthening of cultural proposition, which is more effective than any number of slogans written.

W: Is this what the ancients said about "taking the relics for justice"? Unfortunately, in many companies, this "cultural proposition" is not obvious, let alone firm.

S: Yes, it is very common to say one thing and do another.

S: Maybe it’s not as noble as taking relics for justice, right? It's just that the company takes a longer-term view, is unwilling to take risks for short-term interests, and pursues long-term stable development.

W: I am speaking metaphorically. In fact, the "righteousness" mentioned here can be understood as "meaning", that is, the concept advocated.

Z: If a person’s belief is inconsistent with the corporate culture of his company, does it also depend on the degree of conflict and mutual tolerance between the two? At the same time, I think, if many people in the company do not agree with the company's corporate culture to a large extent because they have their own ideas, then the corporate culture will be invalid, right?

W: I think a person's beliefs can be inconsistent with a company's cultural orientation, or they can be consistent. As you said, the key is whether they agree with each other. Employees have their own ideas, which can indeed lead to the ineffectiveness of corporate culture. Of course, there is also the question of who is higher and who is lower. But no matter what, the policy of obscuring the people is undesirable.

G: One thing that I particularly touched recently is that although employees can perceive corporate culture and agree with it, it is actually the employees’ retention and performance that have a direct impact. The leadership style of direct leadership, and different leaders vary greatly. When ordinary employees discuss the companies they have worked for, most of them talk about the feelings brought to them by their direct leaders.

Therefore, how to shape front-line and middle-level leaders who are compatible with the company's culture? How do business owners understand them? How do they obtain effective evaluations from their direct subordinates? How do they change middle-level managers who are inconsistent with the company's culture?

S: I have discussed this issue with my colleagues at our global headquarters. In the United States, when a leader makes a request to a subordinate that the subordinate feels is slightly inappropriate or even slightly uncomfortable, the subordinate will immediately go to the company's "listening ambassador", HR or a higher-level leader to communicate. But in China, everyone’s first reaction is to obey. What's more, many companies have no "listening ambassadors" or reporting channels at all. Therefore, I believe that as long as the transition from "rule of man" to true "rule of law" can be achieved, whether within enterprises, other organizations, or even the whole society, the world will be a better place.

W: That’s a good question too. In fact, we can also regard management as part of the "employees". It is precisely the differences or conflicts between the values ??of some management and those of the enterprise (leaders) that cause various problems in the transmission and practice of corporate culture. It also leads to a mismatch between employees' ideas and corporate culture to a certain extent. Therefore, an important obstacle, or difficulty, in the process of corporate culture construction is the management's value identity. This is also a big problem for many bosses. Sometimes, it is direct managers that hinder or distort a good cultural concept.

S: The management is a part of the employees. Any individual, whether the management or the grassroots employees, will make mistakes. At this time, they have to rely on the general environment to correct the mistakes. This may also be a kind of flat management. The advantage is that the more levels there are, the more links there are to convey values, and the more likely things will go wrong. I have been thinking about this issue recently because I am preparing for a training. The training is for the top leaders of branches across the country. They are "outside" and the bosses of the branches. If they cannot correctly convey the corporate values, it will be very troublesome. matter.

W: This is an important task. All large-scale companies attach great importance to the value orientation of leaders who lead independent teams.

S: Yes. They are all good at specific business, and they don’t need to know too much about technical details. I hope to convey more concepts to them through training.

W: The company’s value proposition and the company’s bottom line.

G: In fact, employees are quite helpless. HR in China has little say, so they have no way to complain when they encounter problems.

W: Yes, so some multinational companies have ethics officers and HR plays a big role, which is better. Some of our organizations, including corporate party organizations and labor unions, play a limited role in this regard.

G: Unless foreign companies are in their own country, HR for foreign companies in China is actually similar to that of state-owned companies. In fact, it is not a problem with the system itself, but with the characteristics of the Chinese people.