Culture: A Key Ingredient to Success

The consulting team at Strategy Development works with scores of dealers and resellers throughout North America. One frequent question I get when speaking at a conference is “what makes a company successful.” I could spend a year of articles on this subject—and you would want to start with having a solid business plan—but even with that plan you need a positive culture.

Whether you plan for it or it happens by happenstance you have a company culture. If the principals or senior management of the company have well defined goals and communicate the goals clearly and consistently at every level of the organization you can almost bet that you will have a goal oriented culture. If you set individual goals with a slight stretch and perfectly aligned with the company goals then provide generous rewards for achievement, you will develop a culture of accomplishment and reward.

Fun is an important aspect of culture; at least I think it is and I can tell you that every successful company we work with designs fun into their culture. Do you create an environment of fun at work?

I made an important qualification above that I hope you picked-up on; goals need to be aligned. That is another key aspect of having a winning culture. If the company’s goal is to grow 20% this year—and yes, many MPS companies are growing by far more than 20% even in this environment—and your sales force can earn a great living simply managing their base of accounts you have a disconnect. Your sales force is the engine and if they aren’t paid to grow it will not happen. You will consistently miss your goals and your culture will not be goal oriented. You are allowing a culture you would never desire to creep into your company because of lack of planning, alignment, and communication.

So great companies do not hesitate to move the goal line as long as everybody on the team understands why the goal line needs to be moved. Great companies then give outsized rewards to those that are able to achieve the more difficult goals and they make sure that everybody has fun in the process.

I have seen nothing but bad things happen when culture is left to happenstance. Employees get rewarded for behavior that can actually be detrimental to the company’s goals and because of lack of planning and lack of communication “management” becomes the reason for all things bad. Without planning and communication departments do what is best for their own fiefdom and a culture of “all out for me” develops, impairing a company’s ability to grow or achieve reasonable profits.

One of our very successful clients had a quarterly trip for those sales professionals that significantly exceeded quota. It was a short trip—a long weekend in Sonoma—for the sales professional and significant other. Five of the company’s top achievers earned the trip. When they arrived at the airport they found out that the flight was delayed for five hours due to mechanical issues. Clearly, the trip in itself was an indication of the reward culture at this company but I think what happened next will highlight the focus to culture even more. The principal of the company chartered a private jet for almost $15,000 to take his reps to Sonoma.

The principal was telling me about how great the trip was and just mentioned this event casually. My response was, “Wow that must have been expensive.” He rejoined, “Yes, but I was faced with having my top five reps remember the trip by the five hours they wasted in the airport or a great time in Sonoma and I didn’t want them to be talking about being stuck in the airport for the next three months.” The point is not to charter jets for your trips; the point is to focus on how your actions create a company culture. It is a key ingredient to success.