Changing the culture is the basic requirement for any enhancements or achievements. If you are aiming to improve your associate or guest satisfaction, reinforce you standards of excellence or improve your star ratings, the first step is to establish a culture with a mindset wanting to be the best at every turn.

Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

How exactly do you change a culture?

1. Lead with integrity and respect

Your employees need to be able to trust you and that you walk the talk and do what you expect from others and believe in. I started in a department with low mutual trust, respect, and moral, and I can tell you that it is close to impossible to push for any improvements or changes with your team not believing in you and your words. The first step is to gain the trust of your employees, and this can only be accomplished by leading with integrity and being a role model 24/7. If you don’t execute the values that you expect from others, how can anyone believe in you? Your decisions always need to be based on just and honest motives, and it only takes one slip to lose that trust. Having ulterior motives when making decisions or favoring one employee over another, no matter what the performance or your personal view of that employee may be, will damage your reputation forever and will make it impossible for you to build a culture of trust and respect. I remember how difficult it was for me at the beginning to even accomplish simple tasks because of the lack of trust, and that it can take a long time to build it. Once you have overcome these challenges and you and your team operate as one with a common goal, you’ll be able to move at a much faster pace, and this is where the true fun starts.

2. Set clear expectations and responsibilities

It’s most dysfunctional working in an environment where you and the people around you don’t have clearly established responsibilities, and no one sets expectations to your performance. You can have a department that is properly staffed with managers being highly ineffective, and a department that runs very lean on the managerial level, and is much more effective, if everyone understands what they need to do, and what’s expected from them. It’s important to help other achieve expectations and to jump in when needed, but it’s unhealthy for a team to have an uneven distribution of responsibilities. While you’ll need to push your team to meet those high expectations, it’s important to provide the resources and support to achieve them.

3. Hold yourself and other accountable to expectations

While most of us will push back when being hold accountable for missed expectations, in the end everyone loves accountability and a culture of high performance. We want to work with the best, and in a setting that does not accept low performance and commitment. We want to excel and achieve the impossible. Being consistent across the board in holding everyone accountable to their responsibilities, enables you to achieve those goals and better your department.

Changing a culture within a department and being able to move ahead, and even measure this success, is most fascinating and addicting. Understanding that you must not accept the status quo, that change is possible, and that people can and want to evolve to the better, is the core of changing a culture!

Question: What else does it take to change towards a good culture?