Decoding Culture: One Journey, Many Trails

Let me start with this — I find culture work hard.

It’s nebulous, messy, and deeply human. It doesn’t follow a timeline, it resists checklists, and it rarely behaves the way strategy decks say it should. Years ago, I listened to Bongani Nqwababa (then Joint CEO of Sasol) speak about their culture journey. One idea stuck with me:

 “Culture isn’t a destination — it’s a long, continuous journey.”

That resonated. I’ve supported multiple culture initiatives since, across industries and countries, and I still wouldn’t call myself an expert. Culture is one of those disciplines you never master — you just keep learning to listen to it more deeply.

Culture is also intrinsically unique. It seeps into decision-making, meeting rooms, and even silence. It’s the tone behind an email, the rhythm of a factory floor, the pause before someone speaks up — or doesn’t.

And while culture can’t be owned, it can absolutely be influenced. It can be guided, energised, and shaped — if we’re deliberate about how we engage it. Here are some steps to consider.

1. Define What Culture Means for You

It sounds simple, but defining what culture actually means to your organisation is foundational. Without that shared language, culture work becomes a series of parallel conversations that never converge.

The anthropologists Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn once compiled 164 distinct definitions of culture. That’s how wide the field really is.

In my experience, culture can be viewed through several lenses:

• Traditional: “The way things are done around here.”
• Anthropological: The shared values, ideas, and rules that hold a social group together.
• Biological: A self-protective organism that collects information and adapts to survive.
• Neuroscientific: The interplay between culture, psychology, and the brain — shaping how we think, feel, and act at work.

I’ve always resonated with the biological view. Culture exists whether leaders engage with it or not. Left alone, it evolves for survival, not success.

Stan Slap framed this beautifully:

“You are not part of the employee culture. To get what you want from it, you have to give it what it wants first — energy, trust, and reinforcement.”

That means culture isn’t changed through slogans or posters — it’s changed through exchange. Leaders must give culture what it needs: clarity, predictability, and a sense of self — before asking it to change.

2. Join the Dots

Culture isn’t a standalone stream. It’s the water that flows through every part of the system.

During a year-long engagement with a Human Capital leadership team, we built what we called a cultural ecosystem map.

It traced the “golden thread” between our Employee Value Proposition (EVP) and our Client Value Proposition (CVP) — showing how internal behaviours directly shaped external brand and business outcomes.

When we visualised those connections — between leadership identity, employee experience, and customer loyalty — something powerful happened. Leadership stopped viewing culture as “soft.” It became systemic, a tangible lever for business performance.

Once you can see the web of influence, you can pull the right strings intentionally instead of reactively.

3. Identify Where to Focus

Once you can see the connections — the golden thread linking leadership, employee experience, and customer outcomes — the next step is knowing where to act. Seeing the web is one thing; learning where to place energy within it is another.

Culture responds to where attention and intention flow. Think of it as a living system where commitments and design choices feed in, experiences move through, and outcomes emerge — agility, innovation, trust, performance.

The space in between — where culture truly forms — is where action matters most. That’s where signals are sent, behaviours take shape, and meaning is made every day.

You can focus your energy on:

• Everyday employee experiences that shape belief and behaviour
• The tone and consistency of leadership and line-manager actions
• How values show up in decisions, trade-offs, and recognition
• The stories people tell about what gets noticed, rewarded, or ignored

When you can see these areas clearly, you can be intentional about where to intervene and how. It’s not about pulling mechanical levers; it’s about choosing where to engage the system so that the right patterns can take hold and strengthen over time.

4. Measure What Matters

I’ve been involved in several large-scale cultural measurement programmes, and if I’ve learned one thing, it’s this: measurement without meaning is noise.

Culture surveys are expensive — not just financially, but in energy and attention. So, it’s worth investing the time to measure the right constructs and interpret them carefully.

One lesson: always give everyone a voice.

In one multinational, we started with a 60% participation rate. After amplifying communication and offering hybrid access (digital and paper), we reached 75%. The improvement wasn’t just statistical — it changed the quality of insight.

Another: keep it simple.

Complex, double-negative survey items alienate respondents and dilute validity. Clarity equals accuracy.

And finally, close the loop.

Culture fatigue sets in when people give feedback and nothing happens. Measurement only builds trust when it’s followed by visible action — even small wins.

5. Enable and Make It Practical

Culture shifts don’t happen in workshops. They happen in everyday moments — during meetings, feedback, recognition, and decisions.

I like to think of this stage as translating values into habits. The goal isn’t to preach culture; it’s to practice it until it becomes second nature.

A few guiding principles:

• One journey, many trails: There’s one shared cultural direction, but every team may travel it differently — and that’s okay.
• Don’t boil the ocean: Focus on a few priorities each year; make progress visible.
• Don’t burden middle management: Support them instead — they’re translators, not sherpas.
• Make culture talkable: Weave it into routines, performance discussions, and leadership narratives.
• Link personal purpose to business direction: When people feel their personal compass aligns with the organisation’s, engagement transforms into ownership.
• Celebrate progress: Recognise and publicise cultural wins — it signals what “good” looks like and builds momentum.

One executive once told me:

“This ship is sailing in a direction that aligns with my personal compass. If it changes course, I’ll find another ship.”

That’s the essence of cultural alignment — when people choose to stay not out of obligation, but conviction.

Culture as a Living System

Over time, I’ve come to see culture as a living, breathing organism — one that learns, adapts, and protects itself.

Left alone or left to chance, a culture will run the risk of toxicity — through Pavlovian habituation, repeating what feels safest for survival, or through normative social influence and conformity, which perpetuate unspoken rules and habits.

But those same forces can also be harnessed for good.

The same psychological mechanisms that sustain toxic patterns can be redirected to build thriving ones. With deliberate leadership, habituation, social influence, and conformity can drive excellence, trust, and purpose — creating a workplace where people bring their best each day.

Culture exists whether leaders engage with it or not. The question is: will it evolve by design, or by default?

When guided with care, culture becomes the quiet engine of performance — the pulse that drives engagement, innovation, and growth.

Over to You

Every organisation has its own journey — and its own trails.

I’d love to hear from others leading or living through culture transformation:

• What have you learned about shaping culture intentionally?
• How do you keep it alive, rather than just declared?

Let’s learn from each other — drop your reflections in the comments or message me directly.