If You Do Not Define Culture, Who Will?

A Bitcoin conference in El Salvador sparked a leadership lesson I didn’t expect: the smartest brand moves often look “small” on the surface. When Steak ’n Shake started accepting Bitcoin, it wasn’t only about payments. It was a flag in the ground that said, “These are our people,” and it showed how brand identity and customer loyalty grow when your purpose matches a niche audience.

From there, we zoom out to the real work most leaders avoid: shaping company culture on purpose. Culture will exist whether you design it or not, and if you leave it to chance, you don’t get “neutral” culture, you get whatever habits, attitudes, and politics fill the vacuum. We talk about why some organizations feel effortless to visit and others feel tense, inconsistent, or even hostile, and how that comes down to a deliberate value system that guides decisions when no one’s watching.

We use the Primal Branding framework to make this practical: creation story, creed, rituals, vocabulary, anti-beliefs, icons, and leader. Then we bring AI into the picture with a simple method for team alignment: capture your answers in a brain dump, turn it into a custom GPT, and use it as a “team story engine” for emails, job posts, announcements, marketing, and internal communication. The goal is consistent messaging, better morale, fewer meetings, and a team that rows toward the same destination.

If you want a clearer culture and a clearer message, subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review so more leaders can build teams that actually feel aligned.

Transcript

El Salvador And A Bitcoin Brand Lesson

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Hey, I made simple live. Recently I was in El Salvador, and I was attending a Bitcoin conference. And um, that's a community. El Salvador is famous for uh being the first uh nation that um dedicated Bitcoin as a uh currency, as a legitimate currency. It's a big deal, and so uh it made sense that that uh Bitcoin conference was being held there, but one of the main sponsors was uh a company called Stake and Shake, and it was interesting because uh stake and shake uh about a year ago started accepting Bitcoin as payment for their um food. So you could go into the store, order the food, and pay with Bitcoin. And it was when I first heard about it, I thought uh that's cool, but what's the upside for stake and shake there? Well, what they were doing was aligning their purpose with their niche audience, meaning that um, you know, we go through our lives and we like brands, we like sports teams, we like um certain churches, or we we we allow certain brands, we may wear a shirt with a logo of a sports team or a product or a country or uh or whatever it may be, but we do that because we have a a self-identity, we see our way, our self as we move through the world in a particular way. And if a brand is congruent with how we see ourselves, then we don't mind wearing it. We might we don't mind buying their product, and so back to stake and shake. Stake and shake saw that the folks that use Bitcoin um they they want uh a brand, a fast food brand that they can be loyal to. And so being uh taking Bitcoin brought an audience that uh looks at the world a little bit different. They want to pay with Bitcoin, um, they want generally they want clean food, and so when we go and look at their uh website, we're getting to our team's story here, but when we go and look at their website, we see that um they talk about no seed oils. No, no seed oils is very important to a particular um group of folks that realizing that it's uh poisonous, yeah, basically it's just an industrial lubricant that's been repackaged after World War II, and most of our um foods that we eat are either fried in it or it's mixed in with our salad oils or whatever that may be. And this is becoming a concern. And you can see right here on their main page, you see RFK. And you remember the how famous uh McDonnell fries used to be. Well, they used to be cooked in beef tallow, and that's why they were so delicious. And so you have an you have a brand that's going, hey, we want, we we have a loyal following of folks that these things are important to us, and so this is what we stand for. Here's our logo, here's uh it's just their their logo and beef tallow fries. Now they go in and talk about seed oils and why they're doing it. They talk about us here. You know, their this is their origin story that you're seeing. You see that they are proud to be an American company and they embrace leading technology such as Bitcoin, and they seek to lead in food quality and service. And so what they're doing is they're they're positioning their brand to be congruent with the folks who um this is important to that they would make this stake and shake brand congru, it's congruent with their self-identity, so they become loyal to it. A lot of upsides for stake and shake. Um I I don't want to get the statistics wrong, but their per store uh profits have gone up since they've made these uh moves. Now, what they're doing is they're they're following a they're following a process, and that's what today's story is about. Is you're we've been doing this is part two in a three-part um series where we're talking about the three stories that your brand needs to be telling. You need you net need to have a clear client story, and that's what we covered last week. We talked about how to to um illustrate the story that your clients want to see, their aspirational future, and how you support them in that future, how your solution is a part of that future. The team story is important, it's very important, and it's back to stake and shake. This declaration right here is them telling what they believe, why they do what they do, and who who would uh be a part of their tribe, including the folks at work, manage, invest uh franchisees who who would be attracted to become a part of this iconic company, American company. And so the team story is so important. You know, I've worked for companies that had just this dysfunctional culture because it was left up, it wasn't a deliberate culture, but a culture will become a culture whether you're deliberate about it or not. Someone's going to design the culture of your organization, of your church, of your company, if if not the leader. And so to leave it up to happenstance, well, that's where that's where the dysfunction comes in. And you've gone into businesses and that you just love it. You just love going there. You when visitors come from out of town, where do you take them? You don't take them to the businesses you hate, you take them to the businesses that you love. And for some reason it resonates with you. And that's because there's some aspect of deliberate uh deliberate value system that exists in that company, that restaurant, that experience that the leaders designed on purpose. And so, culture that's called your culture. They designed a culture, and that culture is like this invisible hand that um that helps people be treated when no one's watching a certain way. It's how problems get solved. I've been in organizations where some people were great with customers, and then the other people in that organization despised customers. And when it went from um when the um experience went from the people that loved customers and in that production line, ended up with uh someone in that organization that hated customers, and there was there was a big turmoil, turnover, attrition, um, bad reviews, etc. And so if that's not a central part of an organization, the the specific culture, well, you're going to attract people that don't like customers in some respects. And that's why it feels off, and that's why you don't go back. It it impacts how problems are solved. You know, I was in I was in uh um some companies where you know where I almost felt guilty just solving a problem right away because I knew I would get in trouble later or get questioned. Or it would be uh it would be an opportunity to um downgrade my stock price if if this was in question, right? And so, you know, what kind of people do you attract? How do you keep great people? This is really important. And so there's a book called uh Primal Branding. It's written by Patrick Hanlon, and it's a really uh an excellent book in that it talks about these seven components in uh all great brands that are really clear, and it lists them out. And you know, when you think about when you go look at those seven components, it's like uh why why do we exist and who started this place? You know, what is it that we hold uh value and true? And this these are exist in you, you you went to university, and so that these are super clear in that university, and that's why you continue to wear your university's colors, or you go to their games, even on in, you know, years later after you graduate, or in a uh belief system, or in a government. These exist everywhere in your clubs, and so you know what is it, the values that we that we hold true? What is it? Um what are our rituals? You know, what when do we meet? When do we start? What what are the uh unique aspects of this organization that we repeat over and over? Because these are, you know, these are a part of this, a unique part of this organization. What are the vocabularies? What's the insider language? How do we refer to certain uh terms? I have a VIP client right now. We're going through an exercise where we're actually working on an official glossary or lexic uh um um vocabulary that are going to make sure that is in every proposal on their website, in their language, in their presentations. It's really cool. You know, the an organization exists to be a solution to an opposite, something that was offensive, right? A lot of times people start businesses when they run across a situation and go, My goodness, this is so bad, even I can do it better. And they start a business. So these are those are the things that you stand against, what you are not. Okay. Icons, icons are are symbols or the logos of a business, right? So here's here's steak and shakes. Icons become iconic, they become a part of what you wear, what your organization represent represents. You see this at change. There is they have several versions as well. And so these are these are very important, but more importantly, they need to be deliberate. And then the leader, the leader is not necessarily who started it, but the leader is the one that is keeping that voice consistent. When we when we go into this, so where does AI come into this part of the discussion today? And that's that's the superpower. That's one of the three stories that we need to be using AI to nail and make it so clear. So here's an example. This is a an infographic generated by Notebook LM AI, took the essence of today's discussion and put it into an easy to understand visual flow that just hits on all the pieces. You know, your culture is really a story, whether you choose it or not. And if you don't define it, your team will. And that story is coming from the ground up. And so imagine, imagine companies that you've worked with, or or there locally there was this uh great um car wash, and they you know, I even knew the guys that it was one of the best car washes in town, loved going, always worked, everything. Venture capital bought them out, then it became a train wreck. Why, why when it went from the original founders and what what they saw as um what a great experience with car washing, and then some venture capital comes in and takes it over, and it's just you go the next time, you know, what happened? Am I on a different planet? Well, in reality, you are because that belief system did not translate over, and so their culture was destroyed in that handoff. You have whatever was there deteriorated. You you had good employees probably leave because the management was not what what it used to be, right? Your customers come in, they go, This sucks. Then they leave, and they have to start all over until they get their story straight. And oftentimes in a venture capital situation, culture is is like um it's all about profit, is their culture, and so the experience is not a priority, and that's why a handoff feels good, feels wrong. You've you've had restaurants that you loved, you had um companies that you went to, and then they got sold out, and that's what's happening is that the culture is secondary, if if if not anything, or the culture that was absorbed was a toxic culture that absorbed that company into their bigger system. And so this is something that you can define, you can be deliberate, you can be a this is what makes a great leader, but you have to get clear what your story is, and then you have to curate it. You have to just like are you know, these archaeologists, they go out and they dig up these old places, and what do they find? They find these little clues and remnants of a civilization and they pick those things up, they dust them off, and where do they end up? In a museum, in a nice presentation that puts together the story of that culture, of that civilization, of that time. And so, in a way, that's what you need to do. You need to go through here and you need to answer like the seven core core parts that that primal branding book talks about. It's like, what do we believe, and why do why do we do what we do? What do we believe? What do we stand for? You know, what are our what of our habits or rhythms, or you know, what are the sounds or the smells that we want to when people walk in, you go into um a cupcake place, you know, it smells so great. You go into a restaurant, it smells really good. Those are part of your rituals. You're creating a an experience that that is congruent with their self-identity, and that's an important aspect. The the insider language, you know, as you there are brands. Let's you know, it's cliche, but Apple, Apple has their certain words that are in that Apple vocabulary that the users have. Okay, and so when Microsoft users talk, they have a different language. Apple users have a different language, that's an insider language, but it's deliberate and becomes a part of the rituals, parts of the beliefs. You know, the anti-beliefs is like, who who are we against? You know, colleges or the you know, where you know, they have their rivals, countries have their rivals, icons, just like we talked about with uh stake and shake, they're iconic, their sign, their font, their colors, those are all iconic aspects of stake and shake. They're not just their logo, and then the leader, who's the leader of that organization? You know, the you're the leaders of what countries are El Salvador, who's the leader? Boo Kelly. He didn't start it, but he's the leader at them at the moment. So AI, I call it a team story engine. So a custom GPT is where you take, you answer all of these questions. You just do a brain dump, you just ramble and talk about why you started this company, why did we start this organization, why did we start this nonprofit? And you just do a brain dump, a discussion, and take that transcript for all the answers, rambling answers, and you put it in and you create a custom GPT. And then guess what? You've got a story engine now that empowers your culture, so that when your team, you know, here's a problem with it. Running a company is hard, leading a team is hard. It takes it takes a very diverse aspect of aptitudes and talents. And one of those is uniting our language and our vision to get everybody, ever, you know, imagine everybody's in a canoe, and supposedly they're rowing to some point on the horizon that they understand they're supposed to do. Let's give everybody the benefit of the doubt. They're there and engaged and want to do the best. But if you went around and talked to them, everyone's rowing to a different destination. And whose fault is that? It's the leader's fault. And even though you've said it a few times, we've all heard that thing where you have to say it, you have to say something seven times before someone actually hears it. Well, this is how you can say it a million times, and everybody gets it. And it's using a custom GPT when your team, we create custom GPTs for our clients, and our project managers use it, our internal team uses it, the um leader of the company uses it, their employees use it, and all the outputs are what? They're all on the same page. Whether the team's using it, uh, the company's teams using it to write emails to customers, whether they're using it to generate job posts, writing announcements, writing feedback, whether my team's using it to help them write their their marketing emails or their website um content, helping them design PDFs. It's got that inculcated message from the deliberate input and the answers behind the leader. And so this is empowering the culture to come together and get everybody on the same page. Your messaging becomes clear. You can create graphic representations of various aspects because of the output. Of that AI engine, your team storytelling engine. So you you just get in there and define your seven core parts and more if you want. Then we then we you can build out a custom GPT. This is what we do for every single one of our clients. And I started off series one with um images, these graphical representations of ideas in the leader's mind that they spent time and brought and were showing me. This is what they're using to communicate to their external audience, and this is what you can use to communicate to your internal audience, your team, your employees, your your uh the folks that attend your church, the folks that are part of your uh nonprofit. This is huge. So you can achieve uh team alignment with less meetings, you can improve morale, because why everybody's understands where we're going, and you can ensure consistent messaging. And so um, I encourage you to get this book and read it, it's really excellent. But the the big thing is to go in and answer, answer these questions. Why do we exist? What do we do better than anyone? What do we stand against and don't want to become? What does great look like? What are the internal words and phrases that and then put that into a custom GPT? And if that's something that you need some help with, well, I'm your man. We learn today like uh your culture is important, it needs to be uh deliberate, you need to be proactive, and the way to do it is just download your answers to all of those, drop it into our custom CPT, get it to spit out a very nice representation, organized and pithy way to share it with your team and set it up. It's not just a poster, you know. We're moving from where we you gotta post it. Everybody does this. Oh, yeah, we did our mission and visions. This makes it living. This is a living way to put it into action, take some action. Action creates opportunities, right? Hey, I've got this uh link tree. Speaking of custom GPTs, I made you some great custom GPTs here. Your 2026 planning, business planning partner, one clear offer, prop coach. One of the most popular ones is a message message makeover coach. These are free. Just go to roionline.com forward slash link tree, click on it, takes you to your custom GPT and get busy. Makeover your message as far as your culture. Use this right here. I got a great newsletter goes out to over, I think, 20,000 people now. This is where you can sign up. Great uh resources there, good messaging. And then, Steve, I want to get one of these going for my culture. Go to ROIonline.com forward slash custom GPT, schedule a session with me, and let's connect. Let's make it, let's make uh make your 2026 clear. Get your message clear to your team, to your customers. And next week, boy, we're gonna be talking about um to get your message clear to the AI search engines. So important. I'm Steve Brown, ROI Online, AI Made Simple. If you got some value, hit like, follow, tell your friends and neighbors. And we'll see you next week on AI Made Simple.