There’s More To Developing Organizational Culture Than Culture Fit

In a famous speech, David Foster Wallace tells a story about two fish swimming along in a body of water. Eventually, they encounter a third older fish who asks “how the water?” After they have passed the older fish, one of the younger fish looks over to the other and asks, “What the heck is water?”

In the words of Wallace, “The immediate point of the fish story is that the most obvious, ubiquitous, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and talk about.” Allow me to take this metaphor a little further with a quote from the Greek philosopher Heraclitus. “No man ever steps in the same river twice.”

I know what you are thinking, “What does this have to do with culture?” Everything. Culture is all around us, but it is difficult to define and near impossible to measure. It is the water for the fish, who are surrounded by it and know nothing of it. To add, it is always evolving and changing like the river hence the reason no one can step in the same river twice. Given that culture is ubiquitous and constantly changing, how can we develop a strong organizational culture? It is possible, and here are a few key points to remember.

Start with recruiting.

Recruiting for culture means recruiting for adaptability. Candidates should not only fit in to the culture. They should be able to influence the culture and adapt as the culture evolves. According to research by Barclays LifeSkills, 60 percent of employers surveyed said that adaptability has become more important during the previous decade. Furthermore, 20 percent of the same employers said that adaptability is lacking among recruits. So what does that mean for culture?

Matthew Corritore, Amir Goldberg, and Sameer B. Srivastava write about the importance of cultural adaptability saying: “Employers needing people who can quickly assimilate and be productive should pay greater attention to candidates who demonstrate the ability to adapt to new cultural contexts.”

In their study, they found that a strong cultural fit led to positive results (increased promotions, better performance evaluations, and fewer involuntary departures). Yet, cultural adaptability was even more important for success.

They continue, “Employees who could adapt to cultural norms as they changed over time were more successful than employees who exhibited high cultural fit when first hired.” This is because they were better able to maintain cultural fit, even in the face of evolving cultural norms.

Recruiting for culture means recruiting candidates who can adapt as the culture evolves.

A culture fit does not need to be a perfect fit.

To remain competitive, organizations need to innovate and continuously evolve. They need employees and leaders who are able to step outside of cultural norms, often into what I call the “positive cultural peripheral” to usher in positive change. If adaptability is key to maintaining cultural fit, being able to step slightly outside of the culture is the key to strengthening and improving the culture.

Imagine this: your organization has a strong culture of compromise and consensus. While this may mitigate conflict and encourage action, it may mean that the culture is susceptible to blind spots or groupthink. Hiring a candidate who is likely to challenge ideas, while slightly outside of the cultural archetype, might improve the organization’s ability to be innovative. A homogeneous culture can improve efficiency and coordination, but it often comes at the expense of diversity and innovation.

As Bryan Walker and Sarah A. Soule write, “Innovation demands new behaviors from leaders and employees that are often antithetical to corporate cultures, which are historically focused on operational excellence and efficiency.”

Developing your culture means first defining your culture.

Tessah Clark at Asperian Global argues that defining culture positions leaders to shape the culture, which impacts the bottom line. It also makes it easier to recruit for culture. As Clark mentions, there are a few things to consider when defining your culture.

What are your stated valued and standards? Think mission statements, objectives, and core values.

What are your practiced values? Practiced values sometimes differ slightly from stated values but it is important to understand them, as they are often better indicators of the organizations culture.

What are the basic assumptions? These are often not stated but are fundamental beliefs that are universally understood within the organization.

Considering these things will help recruiters and HR professional clearly define the culture of their organization.

Closing Thoughts

Opening with the fish metaphor is a bit perplexing because it subtly suggests that employees do not know what culture is. Of course, they do! But they probably haven’t spent a lot of time thinking about it. Especially not in a way that would equip them to identify its pitfalls or recruit specifically for it. Once culture is clearly defined, we are better able to recruit employees who will fit in and develop employees who will help strengthen the culture.

So let’s say the younger fish finally learn what water is, how would the story end? A few days later, the two fish see the older fish and he asks, “How’s the water?” The younger fish think for a moment about what they had learned of water in the past few days. They then realize that they not only know what water is, but they know it is different, better even, from how it had been before. Finally, they respond, “the water is better than ever.”