Marcia's Leadership Q and As: An Unbelievable Culture—It’s All About Leadership!

Q. Why is it that some organizations are so healthy and engaging while others are toxic and dysfunctional?

A. In the past few months (and many decades, too), I’ve observed and experienced a variety of organizational workplaces. Across all sectors from private companies to global corporations, education, healthcare, government, and non-profits, there are environments that are full of ideas, sharing and caring, high productivity, innovation, and unprecedented results. The other extreme is built on a foundation of chaos, busyness, stress, fear, arrogance, bullying, and a drive to succeed that can negatively impact success. Yet there are some dysfunctional workplaces that are also successful because people are driven to perform, and they do so to make a living.

There are the extreme work environments, but why do the differences occur? Recently my colleague and I visited a division of a very large media corporation, but this visit was like no other! From the warm hello when we walked in the door to the introduction with every staff member over several hours, we not only received a friendly greeting, but a warm, welcoming, engaging interaction! In more than 25 years of touring, assessing, and consulting, this was a rare experience.

Throughout the tour, I started pondering, what’s different here? How is this culture so incredibly warm? It’s not just a few people. It’s everyone. This high-stress and high energy work environment lived its common values.

At the core is leadership! Leaders who create a system where people not only identify their values together, but create the systems and processes to interview, hire and train for them have a foundation where people are one family. The team experiences support and collaboration under their high stress work (media reporting and breaking news.) Through the strain, they know they’re not alone. They can trust that everyone has each other’s back.

Leaders develop more leaders. No one needs to be arrogant or competitive because they are helping each other be the best they can be. Creating more teams and organizations across all sectors like this media corporation is a magical win-win in society. Let’s create it and help make a bigger difference and impact for the future.