For many businesses, the last two years have been stuck in survival mode — and for good reason! When you’re struggling to stay afloat, whilst also dealing with the pressure of rethinking your entire business, it’s no surprise that important things like company culture can be pushed to the bottom of the priority list. While understandable, it can’t be ignored that this has had a negative impact for many teams and workers. It’s time for our priorities to change.

If designed with intention, a company’s culture can be its greatest competitive advantage. This is because, regardless of how great your product or service is, it is ultimately delivered by your people, and what those people do is defined by your culture. And let’s face it, we can’t kick the culture can down the road forever. This is the year to make culture your top priority and, if you aren’t already convinced, here’s 3 more reasons which you simply can’t ignore!

Your culture is your most powerful protection against the “Great Resignation”.

Across the world, people have been quitting their jobs in record numbers. According to the Guardian, 4 million workers in the US quit their jobs in April 2021. Meanwhile, in the UK, studies showed that the number of Brits planning to leave their jobs has been increasing rapidly. While, in the past, employers may have been able to “buy” their way out of this predicament by offering salary increases, this is no longer cutting it. According to Glassdoor, 56% of candidates now put culture above salary, meaning that you have a great opportunity to use your culture as both a retention magnet and a hiring differentiator, should you get it right! This retention point is really key, as it directly impacts the bottom line — in a recent article, the Guardian reported that it costs around £25,000 per employee to onboard them and bring them up to the level of productivity of the rest of your team. This is a cost that culture-driven companies simply don’t need to worry about as much.

A strong culture will support the transformation needed for the “new normal”.

Although many industries have or are starting to stabilise, the business transformation required across companies in all sectors is only just beginning. All companies will need to continue to focus on digital transformation, exploring new business models and embracing new ways of working. But none of this can be achieved without supporting changes in organisational behaviours and norms; in other words, your culture. A recent study by Boston Consulting Group found that companies that focused on culture were five times more likely to achieve breakthrough results in their transformation initiatives than those that didn’t. It’s true that a strong culture creates the foundation for great companies and transformational change.

Getting your culture right will enable your business to reach its full potential.

If you’re serious about your growth potential, you have to be serious about investing in your people and culture. This is because, regardless of how great your product or service is, it is ultimately delivered by people, and what those people do is defined by your culture. Yep, it’s so important that we’re saying it twice! If you get your culture right, you will create the environment for your people to do their best work and deliver on your vision. A great culture aligns people around your purpose and vision, which in turn brings quicker and more impactful results. The power of alignment really isn’t something to be sniffed at — The Growth Institute found that, although expanding a team from three to four people grows the team by only 33%, complexity increases by 400% as a result. This growing complexity makes team alignment fundamentally important when you want to scale and realise your strategic ambitions.

If you want to find out more about how you can level up your culture and turn it into a key driver for your growth, follow The Future Kind Collective on LinkedIn and Instagram where we regularly share tools and frameworks for you to apply to your organisation. We hope to see you over there!