I wrote last week about how 'culture' gets the blame for accidents or breaches of customer or employee care, and how I believe that senior executives should not seek to hide behind such intangible excuses. So this week I want to explore this subject further. Just how can leaders create and sustain the culture that they really want to see?

First of all the senior team have to be brutally honest about the culture they want. When they have decided, they need to ruthlessly check out whether they mean it, for the gap between their words and their true intentions (and thus their behaviour) is actually what leads to breaches of trust. 

Simple examples would be where a company communicates values around work / life balance, but where managers frown on employees when they dare to leave the office at 5pm one day; or where a salesman who ignores company policies on honest or ethical customer dealings, but who brings in high revenues, is tolerated (and maybe even celebrated).

In the first example the manager displays that what they really value is long hours (being such a reliable indicator of dedication and quality of performance) and in the second example its clearly money and results which actually come first. Senior executives, who in these cases would bemoan the quality and attitude of their middle managers, are still missing the point. Those executives need to hold the mirror up and notice how it is their own behaviour (their own relentless focus on results and on the outward manifestations of a 'blood and guts approach') that is to blame.

A couple of years back I met with the US head (himself an American) of a major Japanese car manufacturer in Los Angeles. I had come that same day from a meeting with a Senior Vice President of a major US corporation that ran its executives on '90 day deliverables'. I asked him where he expected his company to be in the US market in 5 years' time, fully expecting an answer along the lines "Well, we're at X hundred thousand units this year and we'll have to be doing X+Y hundred thousand units minimum in 5 years' time to still be in the game." It would not have been an unreasonable answer. What he actually said was: "Well, we're number 1 right now, but the gap between us and our competition is narrowing as they learn from us. So we need to raise our game and focus on re-inventing customer service. If we do that and get it right, then the volume will be what the volume will be". Notice the difference. The US corporation only focused on results - the Japanese company focused on doing the right things, truly living their values and applying their values to guide their decisions and strategies. That company marches on inexorably in the US.........

Someone once said: "If you focus on results, you won't get change. If you focus on change, you'll get results". The real problem some companies have is that their leaders simply don't trust that doing the right things will lead to great results. When things are going well, they relax a little and re-focus on people processes and ethical values, but as soon as the *** hits the fan again, the pressure comes straight back on sort term results. 

I have been working recently on this very subject in the Ukraine with a global food business. Establishing a global corporation with a 100 year+ history in a market that only emerged from Soviet Communist control 18 years ago has unique challenges. The key challenge faced by the company is how to grow market share in an environment where corruption is still endemic and yet maintain scrupulous adherence to their global anti-corruption stance. Their solution? For the senior leadership team to focus as a priority on a strategy for establishing the culture they want, to devise business practices and processes to ensure compliance with the culture, and then to manage their own behaviours.

First of all they appointed a specifically qualified (a former executive with the Ukrainian state broadcaster and ex Soviet Intelligence - the classic poacher turned gamekeeper!) Corporate Affairs executive who sits on the senior team and oversees all major contracts, legal and government issues. They could not have sent a clearer message to their whole organisation that they mean what they say about not engaging in any corrupt practices. Secondly they regularly review the balance of ex-pat and local Directors, with a view to developing senior leaders locally. Thirdly they ruthlessly check themselves and their whole organisation to ensure compliance with their values. Any behaviours that fall outside are simply not acceptable. Finally they resist the almost daily temptation to get hijacked by the chase for numbers and targets. And this is where the CEO comes in as the ultimate steward and shepherd.

I completely understand and empathise with CEOs who get intense pressure on short term expectations, but guys that's what the big bucks are for!! Its called leadership - its being unequivocal in your communications, your focus and your behaviour. Its being uncompromising with behaviour that does not align with the values. How important do I believe values are? Well let me put it like this: "when it comes to values, people are either living them, learning them or they are leaving."