Bronwyn Smith, an Organizational Learning & Leadership Specialist, challenges the premise that company culture comes from the top. She says, “it can come from the sides, from the middle and that all of us can have a big part in creating it.”

She is so right. It’s why you can have an incredible department in a dreadful company.

This is a really important conversation as we talk about culture in companies and what’s involved in designing it. At the beginning of our conversation Bronwyn pointed out some really important things for in-house or outside organizational changemakers to do:

Check your own agenda at the door.

Be curious and intentional in service to the company, the client, the people you are working with. Some great questions for this are, what have they experienced at the company, what’s the hardest thing about the way things are happening now?

Open their mind to thinking differently through curious questions.

Remember your responsibility to model this behavior.

This is just a start to the important work of really thinking and designing company culture. That there is not a need to wait for permission and all of us have a responsibility to join in.

We discuss the importance of feedback conversations and the responsibilities of both the giver and receiver. The challenges of multigenerational teams. That we all can experience events from different worldviews and we can best understand them with respect and curiosity.

These are hugely important topics for the future of work but actually, even the daily aspects of work.

You can find Bronwyn on LinkedIn.

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