If culture is set by the bosses at the top of the org chart, can anyone else influence culture? 

I support learning and growth for people who lead from the middle of their organizations. This question of who gets to work on culture is so common that it is now the starting point in my courses and workshops.

The short answer: Yes. People who are not in the most powerful positions can and do influence culture, in small ways and large ways, in helpful ways and not-so-helpful ways. To want to shape culture in healthy and productive ways is wise and brave.

Culture is the way things get done in a team or organization. The rules of the workplace, written and unwritten, accidental and intentional, including how we treat each other.

Think back to your first day at a new job. You were on high alert about culture: 

• How are decisions made? Who listens to whom? 

• Do people respect their colleagues for their differences? 

• Do deadlines matter too little or too much?

• How much do I hear people laughing during the workday? 

• Do I need to watch my back?

For anyone, even the people with the most power, culture change is complex work. It is something to do carefully, with open eyes that consider the level of effort required, your chances of success, and the power dynamics at play.

There are many levers for changing culture. One lever that can work regardless of position and power, and that reinforces the core cultural value I want us all to focus on: trust.

In working on culture, as with most change in human systems, it helps to think of in terms of scope, or footprint. How deep and broad are we going? 

The big wide organization-level culture is set at the top, based on executive personalities and habits, history, the industry we are in (finance, health care, community non-profit, construction). It is difficult for people with lesser power and titular authority to impact overall culture by fiat, or quickly.

A more approachable and opportune level of culture is the culture of your team, the people you work with most. We can all influence our team’s culture, as long as we go about it in a humble and inclusive way.

Scope and size note: The smaller your organization, the less this distinction between levels exists. This is good news! Each individual has more influence in a smaller organization.

The ideal culture, in my work in humble leadership and expediting middle managers, is one of learning and improvement that relies on trust and safety, instead of the old command-and-control compliance culture that relies on power and force.

To make culture change happen, you can start in your sphere of your highest influence. Stay humble (walk the walk, hey!) by learning with your team as you go. 

Here is a process to pilot a change in your immediate team: 

1. Get specific about the specific behavior change you want to see, that will contribute to one aspect of culture, or a shared value, you want to improve. Make the connection clear:

1. “Respectful and brief emails” supports “professional communication.”

2. “Send meeting agendas ahead of time” supports “collaboration.”

3. “Have difficult conversations directly” supports “respect.”

2. Seek agreement with your team that this change would help them, and be a win for team culture.

3. Work on the change together. Maybe it’s a new workflow or a week-long experiment.

4. Review progress, roadblocks, and questions with your team. Share the creativity and the responsibility. Stay open and humble to model the type of culture you want.

5. Keep learning together. Iterate till it works well and sticks. Then pick a new better-culture habit. 

Starting small like this is intentional. In starting small, you are talking about culture and working on culture in a practical way, all the while building knowledge and developing shared values. 

Small changes are what get us to new mindsets and new habits, more so than big pronouncements and fast unplanned pushes.

Now for the tricky part. Whether and how to spread better-culture changes beyond your team, to the overall culture. Consider your options: 

• Keep the change within your team. Maybe it’s too much work to spread the change. It may not be politically safe, meaning: a negative reaction could harm trust between you and more senior staff. Or maybe you see slim odds of the change being adopted by the larger organization. With this option, the leader or leaders of your one team needs to manage this difference between your team and other teams. This can be easy or tough to do, depending on the change. I have worked places where my team meetings were different from the other meetings I attended. It wasn’t my ideal, but it worked fine. And, at one organization, over time my team recognized some of our team’s meeting habits taking root in other meetings. Culture osmosis!

• Help this change take hold outside of your team. Think of this as humble advocacy. Gather evidence and anecdotes about the benefits of the change. For example, “When we put a midday break on everyone’s calendar on our in-office days, people started going on walks together and talking about ideas to improve workflows.” Then look for an opportunity. How could this change help what my boss or another team needs right now? By pointing to the benefit and matching it to a current need, you aren’t being a preachy know-it-all culture critic. Take it from me, the founding member of the Recovering Know-It-All Club (there’s stickers!). Show, don’t tell, when it comes to advocating for changes to culture. 

I hope these ideas are helpful.

This is tricky work, impacting overall culture without titular authority. Take care of your culture builder self. Think strategically. Pace yourself. Consult a trusted colleague. And remember, the little things add up. Culture does change, and you can help steer it in a positive direction.