Let’s be honest: 2024 has been challenging for many people in organizations. I am not necessarily talking about the hard goals and financial targets. These are being met in many organizations where I talk to people regularly. But there is something about the experience of work and how they are reaching those goals that is unsettling people. Despite many organizations’ commitments to building positive workplace cultures, this is often not reflected in how employees and managers talk about their current experiences of work. This is particularly challenging for people who “like” their job and really want to focus this time of year on gratitude and celebration but are not entirely satisfied with how things are going.

While organizations are committed to driving positive Organizational Culture – often with established programs of change and a metric-driven approach… people still talk about a general feeling of less stability, clarity, and overwhelm at work. While a positive Organizational Culture can certainly be cultivated alongside these organizational complexities, it may occasionally place additional expectations on employees and managers to consistently be at their best causing even the highest performers to feel overwhelmed.

The solution to addressing these organizational challenges knocks on the door of a whole range of People Strategy components – from effective Leadership skill development to Employee Wellness Programs. All of these can be practical tools for shaping the positive employee experience.

But when it comes to improving the lives of your employees (and customers!) through the organizational culture they experience every day, here are THREE THINGS that even the most comprehensive organizational culture change plans often overlook:

1) Consistent expectations for people in all roles:
This may seem obvious, but culture change must focus on all roles. I have advised on many culture change programs where this was overlooked. Changing the culture in just some areas, departments, or people is impossible. For example, culture can’t be changed in support functions without that same expectation being applied to revenue-generating roles. For the “producers” of an organization – whether that be wealth managers, sales executives, or investigative journalists – how they work and interact with others will set the tone for the rest of the organization.

Even if you want it to, meaningful and consistent change in the culture and behaviors of your operations managers and service teams cannot be sustained if the same is not expected and role modeled by your external-facing professionals and your revenue producers.

2) Alignment of your culture change goals to DE&I (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) goals:
We all want truly inclusive organizations where people can be themselves and where people can find career paths within the organization to thrive. But sometimes, what an organization aspires to in its ideal culture can unknowingly exclude the valuable voices of some team members. For example, in many North American corporate cultures, a strong value is placed on staying calm and rational. While calm and rationality are positive qualities in many situations, an organization’s culture (and its inclusivity) can benefit from valuing what may be seen as the counter to those traits (e.g., expressiveness and excitability). So, while it may be a strength to stay “calm under pressure” in certain job roles in your company, and certainly in crisis situations, an organization can also benefit from noticing where those with a more expressive and passionate temperament in their organization might also add value.

And this is related to the last point, below.

3) A statement of culture does not need to be binary:
When we value certain characteristics and their counterpoints, it helps an organization get into the weeds of what makes us unique. How can we be, for example, both calm and passionate? Both rationally minded and emotionally intelligent? Digging deeper into these paradoxes helps us to define that je ne sais quoi about your company. Where employees give reviews about your company like “the work is hard, but I stay here for the people. I really can’t imagine working anywhere else” and “I am still thriving in my career here a decade later, and I am still challenged every day and valued for my work.”

With 2024 nearly coming to a close, the culture agenda for your organization in 2025 is a blank slate. The first step toward creating that ideal culture is listening as broadly and deeply as possible to the people in your organization. Really listening at the start of your culture change journey is the first step to defining and creating your optimal organizational culture in 2025 and beyond. And in bringing all your people with you along the way.