20
Structures, Artefacts and Rituals

In addition to viewing culture as a set of behaviours within a given context (as discussed in chapter 19), it can also be useful to look at culture through an anthropological lens. Here, we identify three elements: structures, artefacts and rituals.

Throughout history, these three components have been present in every culture. And, once attuned, you'll begin to see these elements within any thriving enterprise culture. Let's start with structures.

STRUCTURES

The structures that shape culture can be thought of in two main ways: visible and invisible.

The visible structures within a workplace culture are the physical structures you see — the arrangement of workspaces, the art, the plants, and so on — and these play a key role in influencing a workplace culture.^[1] Sometimes you walk into the head offices of an enterprise and immediately think, Wow, this is different. Intuitively, you know the space is conducive to great work — the ceilings are high, the rooms are flooded with natural light and there are plants and art, and a range of different work zones have been created for different types of work.

Other times, you walk into an office and see a warren of monotonous cubicles. You feel as though you need to tiptoe past people, so as not to disturb them. No-one talks to each other — no wait; you can see some people talking over by the coffee machine. But they're speaking in hushed voices. Are they conspiring? Also, it looks like the coffee machine is well overdue for a service, and the kitchen is plastered with passive-aggressive reminders to clean up after yourself.

But most of the time you just see the default layout, with no surprises. And much like with default thinking, people begin to stop seeing the environment within which they work. Even simple things — such as what desks look like, and how they are arranged — can go by unquestioned for years.

But when leaders get deliberate about culture, they get deliberate about the physical structure of the work environment.

Valve Corporation, for example, is an enterprise that develops and distributes software. Like many enterprises in a similar game, collaboration is critical to the work they do, and a fundamental element of their culture. This is not just talk — they have designed the physical work environment to ensure that collaboration is as frictionless as possible. One such design feature? The desks have wheels.

In the Valve Employee Handbook (an artefact — we'll get to these in the next section), they suggest employees think of these wheels as a ‘symbolic reminder that you should always be considering where you could move yourself to be more valuable. But also think of those wheels as literal wheels, because that's what they are, and you'll be able to actually move your desk with them.' And this is just one of many elements that make up the visible, physical structures that shape work culture.

So, when it comes to your enterprise culture, think about your strategic intent, and about the behaviours you'll need to see more of to drive it. Think of the things you say you value, and that you feel are important for the future of work. And then look at how the physical structure of work either enables or diminishes the things you want more of.

That's how you begin to shape work culture through visible structures.

There could be a whole book on this — in fact, there are. Several.^[2] But I should probably move on to the more invisible structures that influence workplace culture.

These structures include policies, procedures, laws, systems, templates, organisational structure, hierarchies, role descriptions and frameworks (among other things).

Perhaps one of the biggest invisible drivers of culture is incentives and rewards. If these are left unchecked, all sorts of behavioural distortions can occur. This may be a career-limiting move on my behalf, but: show me a large multinational enterprise struggling to adapt to change and avoid decline, and I'll likely find senior executives heavily incentivised to hit annual (or quarterly) goals and targets.

Invisible structures also include the platforms we use to communicate and connect with each other. In some enterprises, these structures look like a default computer with default email software installed. Oh, and there's an intranet. Somewhere.

In more pioneering enterprises, the barriers between people are collapsing. If your enterprise values communication and the free sharing of ideas, learning and information — and it should — you ought to be investing in better communication platforms.

Internal and/or business social networks, collaboration and non-email communication tools — when implemented and led well — greatly diminish the noise that exists in large enterprises. This sounds counterintuitive, I know, but creating a third space for communications enhances a work culture's ability to make meaningful progress.^[3]

Think about it. The two primary communication channels that exist in enterprises today are emails and meetings.

Emails, well. Where do we start? Emails are now a tragedy of the commons, and almost represent a global crisis. We're drowning in email — and this is because the average time we take to respond to an email is greater, in aggregate, than the time the email took to create.^[4] Using email as a platform to progress pioneering work and make meaningful progress — in among the Curse of Efficiency — is a horrendous idea. The channel is already saturated.

But we can't just arrange more meetings — either by phone, online or in-person. Meetings are disruptive. They exact a large toll in terms of people's collective attention, and should only occur as part of a purposeful ritual or learning experience, or because of a considered need to discuss an issue or arrive at a decision. But, even then, we can still leverage a third option.

And this third option looks like modern enterprise social networks, and collaboration and messaging platforms.^[5] It's what all the cool kids are doing. As in, literally — look at any fast-growing or innovative company today, and you're almost guaranteed to find an alternative internal communications platform to email. A platform that allows for asynchronous communication and the free sharing of ideas, learning and insights. Something that enables the egalitarian formation of special interest groups that may pursue worthy hunches and contribute timely insight to our active quests.

Email will never go away, and we'll always need meetings. But these new communication structures will eclipse both emails and the number of meetings we need to hold internally, threading the way for more meaningful progress.

And so ends our short tour of the visible and invisible structures that influence culture. Next up: artefacts.

ARTEFACTS

An artefact is the physical manifestation of a culture.^[6]

Take the Olympic Torch, for example. Here's a global cultural artefact that is drenched in meaning. At one level, it commemorates Prometheus's theft of fire from Zeus (both from Greek mythology — one the son of a Titan and the other the ruler of the Greek gods). But now it also represents the spirit of the Olympic Games, and great efforts are taken to parade this symbol through countries and keep the flame lit.

Other recognisable artefacts might include badges (as used in Scouts), certificates, trophies and the medals people receive in recognition of good service to a country. The value of these artefacts is not in the materials that make them, but in the meaning that they represent. They are the legacy of achievements deemed worthy within a cultural context.^[7]

Staff uniforms are a very visible example of a cultural artefact. Some enterprise cultures favour conformity and a unified, professional look — particularly for frontline staff. Enclothed cognition is a term researchers use to describe the systematic influence clothes have on a wearer's psychological processes. An article published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, for example, outlined that students who wore a lab coat performed tasks in the lab with more attention and care than those who didn't. If this lab coat was described as a ‘doctor's coat' the effect was even more pronounced (especially when compared to it being described as a ‘painter's coat'). In each instance, the same lab coat was used — but different meaning was attached to the artefact.

Therefore, if an enterprise wants to ensure that their (perhaps thousands of) frontline staff perform professionally and efficiently, a crisp, common uniform makes sense, and provides a ‘tribe-like' element of commonality.

But if the cultural context would benefit from greater diversity, authenticity and ingenuity, relaxing dress code standards might be appropriate.^[8] What often makes a startup employee easily distinguishable to outsiders is a branded t-shirt or hoodie. While this is almost a cliché, first investor in Facebook and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel argues that tech workers care about this very much. To them, everyone in the company needs to be ‘different in the same way' — and so the result is a tribe of like-minded people equally devoted to the startup's mission.

I've had the 'pleasure of working alongside Elmwood — a global, award-winning brand design consultancy — as part of world-leading business and culture transformation work for McDonalds. If you visit the Elmwood office in Melbourne, you'll be treated to a very, very cool workspace. But what's most fascinating is that each of the Elmwood offices throughout the world share similar cultural artefacts. The foyer has a wall of Polaroid shots of staff from around the world (so that you can quickly put names to faces). They have an almost cafe-like hangout space where staff can meet, and even a funky green rhinoceros/hippopotamus thing in every office. The result is that any Elmwood employee can visit any Elmwood office in the world and immediately feel at home.

Some enterprises go a step further, and deliberately seek to capture their culture in the form of books.

In 2012, Valve Corporation — the same company that has desks on wheels — produced its Employee Handbook for new employees. It carried the tagline, ‘A fearless adventure in knowing what to do when no-one's there telling you what to do' and contained stories, guidelines and examples to assist new staff assimilate into their culture. They even have a section dedicated to things they aren't good at — they openly accept, for example, that their relatively flat company structure has its downsides. If you haven't seen this yet, you can easily check it out by searching for Valve Employee Handbook online. Read it, and — like everything, including this book — take it with a pinch of salt and ask yourself: what might our enterprise employee handbook look like if we were to have a pioneering future?

Similarly, Facebook has its ‘little red book',^[9] which explains the company's history, mission and culture to new employees. As the company grew, Facebook faced a lot of different challenges. The discussions and debates that were had during these times helped to shape their enterprise culture. The book contains these stories and the ideas that reflect the spirit of Facebook. ‘Facebook was not originally created to be a company,' the book opens. ‘It was built to accomplish a social mission — to make the world more open and connected.' The book also reminds employees that people don't use Facebook because they like Facebook — they use Facebook because they like their friends. The result is an artefact that describes and reflects the values and ideals of their culture.

And, of course, we cannot talk about culture without mentioning the work-culture poster child Zappos, an online clothing and shoe retailer. Zappos prides itself on world-leading customer service, and its CEO, Tony Hsieh, is a pioneer in new ways of working. Their culture book consists of a collage of unedited submissions from employees within the ‘Zappos family'. These submissions include art, stories and photos, and they serve to reflect what the Zappos culture means to each employee. A new version of the culture book is created each year, so that it accurately reflects the true collective thoughts and feelings of employees. This culture book is available for the public to download.

So what might your enterprise culture book look like? Would it be courageous and bold, reflecting a compelling quest to make a difference? Would it have an edge? Would it take a stand for something? And would it reflect the real stories and values your enterprise culture embodies? Or … would it look like a standard enterprise brochure, with stock photography and a well-rounded, polished and politically correct mission statement that says nothing and does nothing different?

Artefacts are powerful objects that reflect meaning and represent culture. If you reckon your enterprise might struggle to craft a compelling culture book or artefact, you've got some work to do.

The best place to start? Rituals.

RITUALS

Let's come back to our primary definition of culture being a set of behaviours replicated within any given context. This given context might be at the organisational level, the society level or the team level. It can even be at the individual level. Within any given context we have observable, measurable behaviours. A company that genuinely values innovation, for example, will have clear behaviours that can be observed in this regard — that is, the things they do, and the way they work. Therefore, any conversation about culture becomes much less about the talk, and much more about the walk.

Aristotle once said, ‘We are what we repeatedly do'. So the question we must ask is, what are the things we repeatedly do?

If you pause to think about it, most of the things we do will naturally be in service to the Curse of Efficiency and the Delusion of Progress. Which, of course, makes sense — everyone is busy, and we have a finite amount of time, energy and attention. Stuff needs to be done, and we have established ways of doing it. So let's get on with it and do it, right?

And so one of the first things many folks do when they arrive at work is check email — perhaps telling themselves they're ‘getting a head start' on the day. Or they may do so automatically, without conscious thought — a default behaviour. Whatever the motivations, by doing this they instantly set up their day for reactive work. And, perpetually, we'll find that our days consist of putting out fires and responding to other people's urgencies. And because this is so frequently the norm, some people seek to distinguish themselves within this context by exacerbating the situation. They stay back late, host more meetings, use ASAP liberally, and ensure that everyone in the postcode is cc'd into every email. Meetings happen, nothing different gets done, everyone's busy, and the cycle continues.

Until we break it. Or carve out time for new rituals to disrupt default thinking.

Rituals are conscious routines we hold sacrosanct.

They're what keep individuals and cultures connected and congruent to their values, and on track to progress the things that matter.

In the next chapter, we'll explore a range of rituals that can liberate enterprise leaders from the perils of default thinking, the Curse of Efficiency and the Delusion of Progress.