271 | Mastering the Art of Culture in Leadership

In this episode of the Lead Culture Podcast, Jenni Catron discusses the critical role of culture in leadership and organizational success. She emphasizes the need for a structured cultural system, introducing the Employee Journey Grid as a tool to enhance team dynamics. The conversation covers the six stages of the employee journey, highlighting the importance of integrating culture into every aspect of the employee experience. Jenni provides practical steps for leaders to assess and improve their cultural systems, ultimately reinforcing the idea that culture is a vital component of effective leadership.

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Transcript

Jenni Catron (00:02.2)
Hey, leaders, welcome to the Lead Culture Podcast, part of the Art of Leadership Network. I'm your host, Jenny Catron, CEO of the 4Sight Group. We're a company dedicated to helping leaders develop thriving teams. Each week, I'll be your guide as we explore practical strategies to equip you with the tools you need to lead with clarity, confidence, and build unstoppable momentum in your organization.

My mission is to be your trusted coach, empowering you to master the art of self leadership. So you'll learn to lead yourself well, so you can lead others better. Each week, we take a deep dive on a leadership or a culture topic. You'll hear stories from amazing guests and leaders like you who are committed to leading well. So let's dive in and keep learning on this leadership journey together.

All right, gang, we have been spending a ton of time this fall talking about some of the different elements of culture. And you all know my new book, Culture Matters is coming out in February. And what I've been trying to do, even on the podcast, is give you really some snippets of the book so you can begin to be thinking about how do you build your culture system? How do you create, how do you create the rhythms that reinforce the best of who you are?

and who you want to be as a team. I feel like the more that I do this work, the more that I see culture everywhere I go. It's kind of like that Spidey sense for a culture. I walk into a business and I will quickly discern what the environment is like for the employees based upon what I'm experiencing as a customer. so...

I just deeply believe that this is your competitive advantage as a leader, that building your team, building a healthy team is the thing that will set you apart. It will help you attract and retain the best talent. It will help that those employees serve your customers, your congregants, whomever you serve, they will serve them more thoughtfully, more intentionally because they are living from the values that you hold as an organization. And so I just really deeply believe

Jenni Catron (02:26.892)
This is some of the biggest and most important work you can do. Some of the best organizations, your favorite places to shop, your favorite organizations to be a part of, part of the reason why you are attracted to them is because of the culture they've built, which impacts the experience you're having. So today let's talk about the rhythms that reinforce or the rhythms that really protect your culture. Because here's the challenge, culture,

is a system. And that feels a little weird, right? Culture is the system that fosters the values, beliefs, and behaviors of a group or of a team. So if you're not designing the system, you'll default to one. Like there are patterns, there's a system you've defaulted to whether you've done it purposefully or not. And it's likely an ineffective one. If you haven't been purposeful to design the system, the one you're operating from is probably not terribly effective.

And that might be the most important revelation you need in order to make your culture great. See, some of you, you get it, you're not arguing with me about the importance of culture. You just are like, Jenny, I don't really know what else we need to do. Like some days it's good, some days it's not so good. You know, and you kind of just move on and stay focused on your goals, which I get it. But building a system that protects those values, beliefs, and behaviors that shape

how you want to show up that reflect the best of who you want to be as a team requires intentionality. The idea that culture needs a system is counterintuitive, because culture is about people, right? Like people are the point. You've heard me say that frequently. Culture is the stewardship of people in pursuit of your mission, right? It's all about people. And so as soon as we start talking about people and system, it conjures up feelings of corporate bureaucracy, right? Like that's where you get a little like itchy on me.

And so you kind of start to feel like, it's going to become heartless because we're just going to build a system and it's going to take the heart out of it. I absolutely get it. And that's not what I'm arguing for. But remember when I said that clarity is the chief indicator of the health of your culture? Clarity is the chief indicator of the health of your culture. Systems provide clarity. That's what I want you to pay attention to. Systems provide clarity. And as author and researcher, Brene Brown has so famously said, clear is kind.

Jenni Catron (04:53.528)
So building your people operating system is one of the kindest things you can do for your team, right? If you're gonna give a gift to your team this year, as you're winding down this calendar year, you're gearing up for 2025, the best gift you can give your team is clarity. The system brings consistency to how you live out my definition of culture, who you are and how you work together to achieve your mission.

See, lack of a system is why your team members are disengaged. Lack of a system is why your values were an episodic exercise that didn't take root. Lack of a system is why your hiring is ineffective. Lack of a system is why you can't get momentum towards your strategy. Lack of a system is why there's no consistency in your communication. Lack of a system is why there's confusion in roles and responsibilities.

Lack of a system is why you scramble to pull together an agenda for your staff meeting. Any of those feel familiar? Like I kind of cringe a little bit myself, right? Because again, there's no perfect culture. Even those who focus so much on culture like myself see gaps. But those statements, those lack of a system statements, I bet a few of those stuck out to you. And so what I want to do is I want to give you a few things to be thinking about. I want to give you one of the tools that we

unpacking the book is called the employee journey grid. And it's where you begin to build your system, your people operating system that helps support your culture. And what I hear from a lot of leaders when I'm teaching about culture is, gosh, we don't have room for another system, right? You you're already trying to do your operating system of some kind. You have all kinds of systems that help you manage your business.

Again, which is why my argument is, why don't you have a system to manage the most important resource you have, which is your people? I digress. Here's the thing. The employee journey grid, the people operating system for culture is taking what you already do, the rhythms of your organization, and just being purposeful to bring your culture strategy into those rhythms. So the purpose behind this work,

Jenni Catron (07:15.048)
is to effectively serve and support the people on your team, right? That's our why, people are the point. We're not building a system for the system's sake, our motivation is really important. We're building a system to support the team. If we're not clear about the point of the system, I want you to hear this, if you're not clear about the point of the system, the system will become the point and the bureaucracy you fear will become your reality. So again, we need to understand what the system is doing. What is the system supporting?

So for this reason, the system is built around the employee's journey with your organization. Every person on your team goes on a journey with your organization and there's a beginning and there's an end, right? Like there's a start and there's an end. We're not in jobs for forever. Many of us might be in some seats for a long time, but these are not forever assignments. There are different seasons and different to everybody's journey. So there's a beginning and an end. For some that journey may be a year or two, for others it may be decades.

Regardless of the tenure, although our intention is that the system increases the length of everyone's journey, every employee is going on a journey with your organization. So the question you must ask is what kind of journey are you creating for your employees? What's the journey you're creating for your employees? Is it haphazard and chaotic that leaves them exhausted or is it purposeful and an exhilarating experience that brings out the best in them? Now you've

I've asked you this before to think about some of your best work experiences, the best teams you've been a part of. And it was one of those two things. Most likely it was haphazard and chaotic and you're like, get me out of here because this is miserable. Or it was purposeful and exhilarating and you were like, gosh, that was a fun team to be a part of, right? So that's what you're wanting to pay attention to. What are you creating for your team? Employees are giving the best hours of their day.

to the work they do in your organization. So your goal is to make that time incredibly meaningful and valuable. So here are the six stages to the employee journey. So here's what I want you to think about today. I'm just trying to tee you up to this idea of culture is a system, culture needs a system, and your employee journey is the most important part of that system. So here are the six stages to the employee journey.

Jenni Catron (09:41.334)
And I want you just think about this and I'm actually going to give you a little checklist towards the end of the episode where you can kind of start diagnosing, okay, which parts of the employee journey do we need to give attention? So here are the six stages to the employee journey. Interviewing, like just before they even join you, there's an interviewing process that's really critical. Onboarding, so once you do hire them, what's the process for onboarding them to your culture?

Number three is you're meeting rhythms and communication tools. So the things you just do week in and week out, the ways you communicate, the ways you connect as a team, those rhythms, those weekly, monthly rhythms and the communication tools you use, that's a key part of an employee's journey. Your performance plans and reviews. are you setting, are you giving them goals? Are you giving them a performance plan, things that they need to live in? And then are you reviewing them on that so they're getting really good feedback?

That's an important part of the employee journey. Training and development. Are you giving them ongoing equipping so they can succeed? Are you helping them continue to learn, to grow? And there's a both and. They need to demonstrate interest and commit to that, and you need to be creating opportunities for it. And then number six are departures. So again, everybody's leaving at some point. So how you handle departures is impacting your culture.

So here's the thing, this list probably feels pretty benign to you. Nothing revolutionary here, but I suspect you have some systems for most of these stages, but I want you to consider whether you've ever thought of these stages as a means to build culture. So even as I hit them, interviewing, onboarding, performance reviews, you probably have some of those things in place. I'm wondering if you're thinking about them and how they build culture, because here's where...

your culture plan is integrated with your other systems, right? Like every system you have needs to be reinforcing who you are and how you work together to achieve your mission. So you want each of these stages in the employee journey to be intentionally building culture, to be intentionally reinforcing the culture you aspire to. So if you're like most leaders, you've seen these more as compliance practices.

Jenni Catron (12:01.142)
Maybe, you know, like things, you know, HR just has to do and less about culture building. And I really want you to get how critical each of these stages are to culture building. I don't have a ton of time today to go into the why on each of these, but you can start to imagine it, right? In interviewing, really important that we're thinking about our culture as we're interviewing candidates to make sure we're bringing on people who are aligned with who we are and how we work together to achieve our mission. In onboarding, it's really important that those new hires get the best opportunity.

to understand how to win here, right? The more clearly they understand our culture, the more equipped they are to actually show up and be able to contribute in a meaningful way. Performance reviews and plans. People need to know what are our goals and how do I live into them? How am I doing? Am I living into our values? Like values need to be integrated into your performance plans and reviews. So all of that becomes really integrated. And I think sometimes we as leaders can have a tendency to just

put that over in the HR box when it actually is a key part of our culture work. So I want you to see these stages as essential to your culture operating system. They're so critical. Each of these stages needs to be infused with your defined and preferred culture, that who we are, how we work together. At each stage, you're clarifying who we are, how we work together to achieve our mission. That's the power of building a system. It's not a complicated system.

Your culture system is a system where you're looking at the employee journey grid and saying, how do I infuse who we are and how we work together into all of these existing rhythms that already happen? Maybe I can improve upon them. Maybe you're going to look at each of those different stages of your employee journey and you're going to go, okay, actually we're a little lax there. We need to do a little work there. Or you're going to see, okay, we just need to add a little something.

to make this part of our interview process or our performance plans just to bring our culture into that part of our employee journey. So I wanna give you a quick clarity check. These are actually built into the book. And so in a minute, I'm gonna remind you to go pre-order the book because pre-orders matter so, so, so much, but more critically, this book is your guidebook. Like it will walk you through everything I am coaching you and I'm teaching you to do related to culture. The book is going to guide you through it.

Jenni Catron (14:26.678)
And one of the tools that I put into the book is the clarity check, where you, I'm literally just saying, hey, just a quick check-in, how are you doing on these? Because then it's gonna point you to the places where you need to give energy and time. So here's my clarity check questions for you today. Is your interview process clear and consistent? Yes or no. Do you have an onboarding plan that ensures culture alignment? Yes or no. Do your meeting rhythms

positively contribute to your culture? Yes or no, that's a dicey one because sometimes our meetings are actually a detriment to our culture. Then you need to do some work there. Do you have a consistent process for writing performance plans? So does everybody get a plan? Do they know their goals? Yes or no. Do you have a consistent process for facilitating performance reviews? So some of you write the goals, but you never actually review with people or give them feedback on how they did. So do you have a...

process for facilitating reviews, yes or no? Do you provide consistent training and leadership development for all team members? Now, it doesn't mean that everybody gets the same training and development, but do you have a training and development process for each team member? And do you have a clear and consistent process for departing employees? This is a big one because how people leave matters and we can't control it all, but we can have a system for how we handle our part.

in departures. And so a lot more to go into there than we have time for today. But there's your clarity check questions. And if you answered no to any of those, those are the places to start, right? Those are the places to start going, okay, we could put a little more intentionality, a little more time here and make this so much stronger, so much better. So friends, I hope that is getting you thinking. And again, this is not meant to overwhelm you.

In fact, one of my big mantras around culture is it's patient and persistent work. It's simple and consistent work. So patient and persistent, we just got to patiently keep after it and persistently keep after it, right? We're not going to change it overnight, but we need to patiently and persistently stay after it. Simple and consistent means what can we do simply? What is simple that we can do consistently? That is where things begin to shift and change. And so

Jenni Catron (16:49.002)
Again, I want you to pick one or two things that you're saying, you know what, this is where we need to start. This is where we need to give a little attention. And the best way you might start is by ordering Culture Matters Book. Go to culturemattersbook.com and pre-order. When you pre-order, you're going to go to your favorite retailer, you're going to pre-order, you're going to come back to culturemattersbook.com. You're going to plug in your order information.

and then we're going to unlock a bunch of bonus materials for you so you can get started. You're going to get the first three chapters of the book in PDF form so you can get a jumpstart on the first phase of the framework. So you can just jump right in and not have to wait for February 11th when the book ships to you. You're also going to get our workbook, which goes hand in hand with those chapters. You're going to get my masterclass, which is me teaching you those first three chapters of the book.

And then you're gonna be invited to our Culture Champion Network where you're gonna connect with other culture champions who want to learn and grow together. And you're also gonna get the recording of the Culture Matters Summit, which is happening on January 23rd. Now, I want you right now to go to culturematterssummit.com and register for the summit. It happens on January 23rd. It's a half-day event where myself and a bunch of other extraordinary culture leaders are going to

talk you through are going to teach you elements of healthy organizational culture. I'm going to be joined by Mark Miller, Deanne Turner, Nona Jones, just a remarkable lineup of leaders who are passionate about helping equip you to lead well. So go to culturemattersummit.com. You're going to get registered there for free, but when you pre-order the book, you're going to get the recordings of those too, so you can use them for ongoing training.

Culturematterssummit.com, register for free for the summit, and then go to culturemattersbook.com to pre-order the book. Friends, I am so grateful that you are committed to this work. Culture matters. Your team matters. People are the point. And we get the remarkable privilege of leading others to be a part of great missions. So let me know what you thought of today's episode.

Jenni Catron (19:03.566)
What was helpful? What do you need to learn more about? Because I can always tailor future episodes to help continue to equip you. You can follow us on Facebook or Instagram at Get4Sight or on LinkedIn at the Foresight group, or you can follow me on any of the socials at Jenny Catron. And I want to encourage you share this with your team. This is a great practical episode to go take that clarity check and say, okay, in our employee journey, where are our gaps?

and you guys might be able to put a simple plan together to start consistently living into the culture you aspire to. All right, gang, have an amazing week. Thank you for being committed to leading yourself well and leading your team well. I will see you next week.