4 ways to retain culture during a time of change

1. Identify the culture aspects you want to keep

During a time of change, identify what parts of your organizational culture you want to keep, and then take steps to make that happen, Newton writes.

When Newton's firm, CoachAdviser, started working with a European financial services firm, she asked leadership to describe their culture. They immediately talked about what needed to change in a rapidly growing firm increasing its focus on hybrid work. But Newton writes it took longer for leadership to determine the core concept of their culture they wanted to retain as they grew — collaboration.

Based on their discussions, the firm's leadership realized how valuable collaboration was and refocused their energy and priorities to make collaboration the center of their culture as they grew. To do this, leadership amended meeting rhythms, changed onboarding programs, and clarified collaborative behavioral expectations at the partner level.

2. Listen to concerns

During a time of transformation, leaders need to keep an ear out for comments from colleagues about what they're worried may change in the company's culture, specifically paying attention to concerns about how changes may affect the expression of the company's values, Newton writes.

When Newton's firm worked with a Scandinavian tech company during a culture refresh, the CEO and CPO told Newton the company's creativity was strong and an important part of their culture. But when Newton and colleagues spoke to team members, they felt ingenuity was being stifled by the increasing professionalization of the company, which they believed was caused by ownership changes.

When they discovered this, leadership raised the perceived conflict with investors and adjusted performance metrics in order to protect the company's innovative drive.

3. Know when you're being nostalgic

As your company changes, your team will likely grow nostalgic, Newton writes. But it's important to ensure that the parts of your culture you've identified as worth keeping are clearly aligned with your purpose and strategy. If they aren't, you'll likely hold your company back from change and realizing its potential.

Newton's firm worked with a professional services firm that was going through a merger, and both firms said they had a strong "people" value in their culture, with many team members describing a "family feel" to their daily life.

But as the two company's merged, doubling in size and increasing hybrid work, leadership was inaccessible, offices were empty, and banter was reduced to work-related conversations. The leadership team realized that, given their strategy anticipating aggressive growth in the market, maintaining a family feel across their firm wasn't realistic, Newton writes.

Instead, leadership acknowledged the changing culture and the challenges it represented and clarified to team members their strategy and its implications for culture going forward. Newton's firm then worked with the company to run workshops with team members to define what a "people" value might look like in their new firm.

4. Use data to constantly assess culture

Sometimes an organization's culture may shift and it may take leadership too long to recognize it. Newton recommends conducting regular culture assessments to gather evidence on what your employees across the organization are experiencing.

To get quantitative data, Newton recommends creating a survey with questions regarding the specifics of culture that you want to keep. And to get qualitative feedback, Newton recommends using free-text questions as well as interviews with a representative sample of the team.

When you interpret this data, Newton writes you should split it by geographies, teams, services lines, and more. Doing so may lead you to find your culture is changing in some areas but not others, and can allow you to make the changes necessary to keep the culture you want.

"Culture reaches across all parts of an organization, and all leaders (not just HR alone) can take ownership of shaping culture," Newton writes. "That can mean both pushing forward the changes you need and maintaining the parts of your culture that you need to keep driving your success into the future." (Newton, Harvard Business Review, 11/13)

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