How To Improve Your Business Culture

A strong business culture can help your business weather the ups and downs that you will face on your business journey. And during a crisis, the importance of a business culture can not only be seen, but can also be felt by both employees and customers or clients.

What does the culture of a business mean?

The culture of a business, company or organisation refers to the values and behaviours of both employees and management within the business. A business culture is a little bit like the personality of a business. It can be reflected in the way employees dress, how they interact with each other and with management, and the general vibe or feel that you experience when you interact with the business.

Why is business culture important

Business culture is important because it can be the difference between a successful business and one that is just surviving. It can demonstrate a business that values its employees or one where there is high employee turnover. Creating a business culture that people want to be part of is not an easy task, but it is a critical element in creating a successful business and one that both employees and customers feel connected to.

Maintaining a strong business culture during a crisis

During a time of crisis, such as the COVID19 pandemic, it is important to maintain the culture of your business, that you have worked so hard to create.

Some things to consider include:

• What strengths did your team display in response to the crisis? How could you look to leverage these strengths even further in your daily business operations?
• What challenges did you face? Were you able to quickly overcome the challenges, or did they take considerable time to work through?
• How would you rate your ability as a business, and a team, to adapt to a change in work environment? Eg. Working remotely.
• Were you surprised (positively or negatively) by different employees and their reactions during the crisis and their ability to adapt?

By understanding more about your employees and your team when confronted with a change in circumstances, it can assist you greatly in putting in place ways to protect your business culture.

Maintaining a strong business culture during a crisis can also be a powerful measure to retain great employees and also work to attract new talent to your business.

At the end of the day, businesses with a great team culture, who are compassionate enough to think about their people, their customers and their suppliers, are the ones who will not just survive, but thrive once they come out the other side of the crisis or challenging times.

Ways to improve your business culture

If you’re looking to improve the culture of your business, or get it back on track after recent changes, here are our top tips to help you create an enviable business culture.

• Take the time to evaluate your current culture. Accept it for what it really is, and look for areas that don’t align with your business values.
• Foster an environment of accountability, from management through to individual employees.
• Ask your team what really matters to them in their individual role, and as part of a bigger team. Understanding what makes different individuals motivated can go a long way toward improving not only your culture, but results for your business too.
• Communicate, communicate, communicate. Communication is the key to a successful business. Ask your employees for their opinions and feedback. Embrace the difficult feedback and implement and action when it is beneficial for your business.

Improve your business culture to create a successful business

If you can inspire your team to work towards a bigger purpose, feel valued and create an enviable culture, then you will develop a competitive advantage.

Developing or improving the culture within your business will help you to not only build a successful business, but it will create a workplace that attracts great people.