Talking about Culture but...

This past weekend we completed our white paper on "Culture and High Performance in R&D". Our preliminary findings based on interviews with 23 senior R&D leaders in the Twin Cities are summarized therein. I undoubtedly am listening with new attentiveness to what others are saying (0r not) about the role of organizational culture in today's business environment.

Yesterday I attended a forum at the Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota, on "Innovation, Drivers and Impediments". Among the panelists were Carlos Gutierrez, U.S. Secretary of Commerce as well as Bill Hawkins, President and CEO of Medtronic, George Buckley, President and CEO of 3M, and Marilyn Carlson Nelson, chairman of the Board of Carlson Company.

Frequent and recurrent reference was made to "culture" during the course of the afternoon.

George Buckley, in commenting about 3M yesterday, said "3M is more like an organism than an organization. ...It comes down to culture. People respect what you inspect. ...Culture comes down to what it is you talk about, what it is you communicate."

Marilyn Carlson Nelson said, "Cultures willing to accept tolerance for risk have the greatest opportunity for innovation."

There was nothing dramatically new or radical in what I heard yesterday. Furthermore, in doing a literature search on the subject earlier this summer, my colleagues and I found that very little has been written on organizational culture in recent years. Most of the literature on the subject dates to the early 90s. I wonder why this is?? And there is even less written about culture and the R&D function. Maybe we can change the tide?

Can anyone cite recent work on culture that has especially grabbed your attention? Let us know.

Meanwhile, be glad to share with you a copy of our white paper.

Too Many Meetings

"Boredom is a compromise between desire and fear."

A professional whom I very much respect and trust made the above statement in a recent discussion. We were talking about the endless number of meetings that populate the calendars of technical professionals these days. Indeed, in my experience, the number of ineffective meetings that land on calendars is a persistent and pervasive inhibitor to high performance.

I sit through any number of management meetings in a given month in my role as consultant. I repeatedly observe first-hand the all too evident behavioral signals of impatience, frustration, and boredom. "Why am I in this meeting?" the body language so readily communicates.

A column in last Sunday's NYT "Another Meeting? Say It Isn't So?" offers some tips for dealing with meetings run amok. There's nothing profoundly new here, but I find that it's meeting basics that even the most senior leaders need to be reminded of again and again (e.g. be clear what kind of decision you are asking for, if any, and who's making it).

Next time you're sitting through yet another "boring" meeting, you might ask yourself these two questions: "What is it that I desire?" "What is it that I fear?" Maybe what you attribute to boredom will be transformed to ... what?? Try it.

Missing the Obvious

In our eagerness to look below the surface or under the radar to identify inhibitors to high performance, we risk overlooking the obvious.

I admit there is a part of me that is drawn to looking where no one else seems to want to look -- curious about what's not being said, not being heard, not being looked at.


The Politics of Creativity is very much about equipping leaders to make visible the invisible, uncover "undiscussables", examine the "sacred", or explore beyond in order to identify inhibitors to high performance.

However, when discussing culture and high performance with R&D leaders here in the Twin Cities last week, I realize now we emphasized our own bias towards uncovering those aspects of culture which are not obvious, not visible.

There are indeed very tangible and self-evident examples of cultural norms and behaviors. For example, do the men in your organization keep a neck tie behind the door to put on when going to the executive suite? If I asked you to describe some of the differences between the culture of Google and that of IBM you probably would be able to do so without much difficulty. Some of the differences are obvious.

I don't want to be guilty of missing the obvious while seeking to help others uncover organizational blindspots.

Culture and High Performance

Today I am working with anticipation and even some excitement on a presentation for a meeting at Cargill later this week with some twenty top leaders of RD&E from the greater Minneapolis/St.Paul area. We have just concluded with them Phase I of an empirical study on culture and high performance in RD&E functions. Our working hypothesis is that culture is the most under-utilized lever for creating sustainable high performance in RD&E.

While much of our learning to date is qualitative, we did ask all participants in the study to complete eight normative statements. The large majority of respondents agreed that “Culture is the main source of sustainable high performance in RD&E.” In contrast, however, there was a broad distribution in response to the statement, “My RD&E organization focuses on culture as a means of creating competitive advantage.” The scaled responses of participants indicate that many RD&E leaders do not focus on culture per se (though those surveyed overwhelmingly agree that it is a main source of sustainable competitive advantage).

We observe the following frequent disposition of RD&E leaders regarding culture:

• a belief that culture is a lagging phenomenon, not something that one works on directly
• an attitude that RD&E is too deeply embedded in the larger organization to address culture
• lack of confidence and/or skills to work cultural elements
• blind spots about the impact of culture to motivate and sustain high performance

Regardless of one's beliefs about culture, there are perceptions that it is nigh unto impossible to change the culture from the position of leadership in RD&E. AND, then there are those who are doing it!

We'll be expanding this study to the Bay Area in California in the fall. And writing a "white paper". Let's us know if you'd like to learn more.

Art and Logic

from The Power of Story by Tom Peters

Sometimes a picture speaks a thousand words. Are we evolving to the place where art and logic indeed can play in the same space? Is there really any alternative?

James Watson, co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, writes in The Double Helix: "Science as I hope this work will demonstrate, rarely proceeds with the logic laymen attribute to it."

Is it possible that is true of business models and planning processes as well?

Daniel Pink argues in A Whole New Mind: "The MFA is the new MBA". Perhaps there is some common ground here for research scientists and their business partners??