As you start to position yourself for success heading into a new job, remember that leadership is personal. Your message is the key that unlocks personal connections. The greater the congruence between your own preferences across behaviors, relationships, attitudes, values, environment and the new culture you enter or create, the stronger those connections will be. This is why the best messages aren’t crafted—they emerge. This is why great leaders live their messages not because they can, but because they must. “Here I stand, I can do no other.”
Knowing your strengths and motivations will help you better create career options that are a true fit for your skills, will allow you to better position yourself in interviews (sell before you buy), and will help you thoroughly assess and effectively mitigate risks.
Culture First
In many respects, leadership is an exercise in building culture. However you define it, culture is the glue that holds organizations together. It may be the only truly sustainable competitive advantage for any organization. Culture is impacted by pivotal events like a new leader joining an organization or an acquisition being integrated, presenting opportunities to transform the business, enhance competitiveness and deliver better results. Culture change is about bridging the gap between the current state and the desired state – that which is needed to achieve the organization’s mission and goals.
The greater the cultural differences, the more difficult the adaption or change will be. Take control by understanding the most important cultural differences and then building a plan to bridge those gaps over time.
Some define culture simply as “The way we do things around here.” Others conduct complex analyses to define it more scientifically. Instead, blend both schools of thought into an implementable approach that defines culture as an organization’s behaviors, relationships, attitudes, values and environment (BRAVE). The BRAVE framework is relatively easy to apply, yet offers a robust way to identify, engage and change a culture. It makes culture real, tangible, identifiable, easy to talk about, and provides a starting point for change. It’s helpful to tackle the BRAVE components from the outside in as shown below:
BRAVE Framework
Environment – Where to play? (Context)
Values – What matters and why? (Purpose)
Attitudes – How to win? (Choices)
Relationships – How to connect? (Communication)
Behaviors – What impact? (Implementation)