It seems like today we celebrate the “I” more than ever. And I would argue that the biggest part of the desire to go somewhere else is forgetting that there is no “I” in “team.”

My point is simply this: If you are always looking out for you, you will never be satisfied with your job. Doesn’t matter how “cool” it is – once people know you are there and the “cool” factor wears off, it will come up short to your egocentric expectations.

To give yourself fully to your job, to invest in it, to think of it as your company, is one way to truly see if the place where you are is the right one. I’m not encouraging being taken advantage of, or working too much; I’m simply saying that giving your job all you have can lead to several positive outcomes:

- Great relationship with the company
- Richer experience
- Better job security
- Better attitude
- More opportunities
- Quick discovery if it’s not a good fit

Now, nothing is guaranteed, of course. And if you are working at a place that doesn’t value you, or one that doesn’t encourage innovation, independent thinking, or the desire to evolve, then you are probably putting in hours at the wrong place, or running your company in a way that encourages turnover. Life is too short – spend your time working somewhere you like getting out of the bed in the morning and heading to.

So… before you think about replacing a team member, or leaving your current job, ask yourself if you have been focusing on the “I” or the “team.”

Check out this great article by Good. Sums up a lot of what we have been talking about as well.

Does someone you know have that “grass is greener on the other side” attitude when it comes to his or her job? Do you? Unfortunately, it’s a fairly common occurrence. So, for our next few posts we’d like to address several ways to make the grass greener where you are, either as a leader or an employee. But let’s start here:

Contentment is sometimes considered an ugly word when used in the context of your job. Some see that word equaling complacency or lack of desire to evolve. And I think it is a shame. Unless you are a complete slug (in which case you should stop reading), contentment with your job frees you up to work at your highest capacity. Or if you really do have a crappy job, apply these next few posts to your next job or use them to assess an upcoming gig.

One illustration of this discontentment in our profession could be job hopping as young designers. Early in their career, many designers feel that they should work at as many firms as possible to gain experience. That can lead to planting a sense within a person that somewhere else is always going to be better. Now I know some of that is just natural; heck I look at other firms and wish I could work on some of their projects or have their clients. But, I truly believe any situation is what YOU make of it. Your daily enjoyment, quality of work and value to the company is in no one else’s hand but your own. You may not have the ultimate authority at your workplace, but you do have a chance to continually create value by always being curious and developing your own knowledge and skill. Contentment is choosing to be happy, and by taking care of your attitude and actions you can make a company better.

So next time you think it’s time to move on, or the company seems stagnant, maybe the biggest issue is not the company, but YOU. The first step is to be honest with yourself on what you want in your career. Are you sure where you are at can’t supply that to you? And if that’s the case, how do you know for sure? Have you sat down with your boss and said this is what I would like to do here or bring to the company? Most design firms, especially small to mid sized ones, would rather invest in an engaged employee that wants to stay and help the company be better than every few years bringing in someone different, but again that value is up to you and the culture of where you are at.

Agree, disagree or have questions? We are ready to talk.

Work environments have always been important to me. Not only the ones I work in, but also the ones I work with. When I met Don Jastrebski a few years ago he really helped me understand the importance of culture in regards to hiring, managing and working with clients. He literally changed the way I (and Rule29) look at business and how we work with people. Culture is definitely king. I will say without hesitation if you don’t understand culture you need to; it will change the way you operate. He has never been wrong when it comes to culture, which is why we affectionately call him Dr. Don, the culture king. Hopefully this interview will give you a little insight. His materials are currently being updated, but in the interim for more info go to the in3 site. Also if you have questions, comment below, Dr. Don will be happy to respond.

1. Don, in 29 words or less, what exactly to you do?
I help companies perform better by aligning their people component. People are a fixed cost. Optimal return on fixed & capital costs is realized by fitting people & programs to culture.

2. How did you become a culture/FIT expert?
In a former life, I was one of the leaders of a think tank that started Accenture’s (Andersen Consulting’s) Change Management practice. My job was to create the methodology, tools & schools to maximize human performance within a business. As one of the Firm’s experts, I was brought in to client after client to demonstrate the Firm’s depth and latest thinking in this area. I was struck by how my findings were well received in one company, and completely dismissed by another equally successful company. It became apparent to me that each company’s culture dictated not only how decisions were made, but more surprisingly, what factors were even considered when making decisions. Culture even revealed or disguised what influences might be impacting a business. I decided I had to be a student of culture if I was going to really understand and help businesses.

3. What are the three components to overall job FIT?
First, fit with the culture. Second, fit with the capability required by the job. If the person is bigger than the job, they will eventually get bored and leave, if smaller than the requirements of the job, they will get fired, demoted, or more often, the supervisor will tolerate the poor performance and others will have to pick up the slack, thus reducing the productivity of the whole department. Third, fit with how the internal or external customer measures success. What’s important to the customer has to be important to whoever is in the job.

4. What role does culture play in overall FIT?
Everything starts with culture because culture dictates what’s important, what people value, how decisions are made, how tightly people are controlled, if they operate collaboratively or independently etc. Culture fit is the foundation. If one does not fit culture, all their talent is never optimized.

5. Can you define culture?
I like Terrence Deal’s definition: “Culture is the way things work around here”

6. Does every company have a culture?
Absolutely

7. Is there a good culture or bad culture?
Generally speaking, culture is neither good or bad, nor right or wrong. A company’s culture is usually based on the cultural preferences of the founder. That being said, a culture could be wrong if it doesn’t support the company strategy (though it’s easier to change the strategy than the culture). Or the culture could lack some core values that are key to success in its marketplace.

8. Why is a company’s culture important? How does it color their everyday business?
The company’s culture is important because it is the root of its identity in the marketplace. It’s what attracts their best customers. A company’s best customers match up culturally. They buy because they know that this company understands them. Even in a commodity marketplace, price being relatively comparable, buyers will go with the company that fits them culturally.

9. What role does culture play in hiring employees and helping them perform?
It is the critical role. People can have a great resume—and fail because they don’t fit the culture. People can have a great personality—everyone wants to hang out with them after work—and fail because they don’t fit the culture. People can have all the knowledge and skill possible—and fail because if they are not culturally compatible, people do not appreciate their point of view, and implicitly know that “that won’t work around here”

10. How does a company’s culture affect the relationship with its clients/ customers?
I’ve had a number of clients who tolerated an individual who didn’t fit—until they ticked off a customer. They were willing to put up with their team churning, office in-fighting, productivity decline, etc. But once that person inevitably upset a customer, then they were gone. If you want to upset a customer, hire somebody that doesn’t fit.

11. How can understanding one’s culture affect merging with another business?
If the buyer plans to integrate 2 businesses, culture is critical. Culture will dictate if integration is feasible. Culture describes the way in which individuals work and interact together. Culture summarizes the behaviors, values, and beliefs that people exhibit in order to accomplish their work. Two equally successful cultures can be diametrically opposed, which of course would make integration impossible.

12. In which areas of a company does culture matter most?
Many of my clients have trouble recruiting good people. They look at candidate’s resumes; they interview them and then like who they are as a person. Yet when they hire them, those same candidates often fail miserably. Why? Because they may be likeable because of their personality, but that doesn’t tell you anything about how they would operate within the business: how they make decisions, what they prioritize or how they spend their time. Likeable people can habitually make decisions that rub people the wrong way. People have cultural values and preferences which dictate how they work, and those values and preferences may not agree with yours. They may have had a successful track record, but in a different cultural context. They did it in a way that wouldn’t work in the new environment.

13. What signs are displayed when a company is suffering from a FIT mismatch?
These are usually reflections of a weak or conflicted culture:
• Infighting: The Company is focused inward and disproportionate amount of time is focused on internal issues.
• Slow responsiveness: Leadership decides on an initiative, but the organization is slow to follow.
• Poor performance: The organization is lethargic and doesn’t hit its goals.
• Poor engagement: there is no esprit de corps. People aren’t excited. The company feels flat.

14. Can a company ever change its culture?
Yes, but it almost has to be in crisis. Without a crisis, culture change is a slow process. To change leadership has to focus on how jobs are designed, what’s prioritized, which things are measured, and what is rewarded, both implicitly and explicitly. Then leadership has to move these levers to draw the culture in the desired direction.

15. What is your process for discovering a company’s culture?
We use an online survey that takes about 5 minutes to complete; and then analyze the results of this survey to identify a company’s current and desired culture.

16. How long does this process take?
Depending on the size of the survey sample, anywhere from one week to a month.

17. What if someone fits the culture but still doesn’t perform? What then?
If someone fits the culture, but still doesn’t perform it is either a competence or a job design problem. Either the job is too big for the person and they do not have the wherewithal to deliver what is required, or they are in a job with an old design, and the focus, roles and measures of the job do not deliver what is expected and needs to be restructured.

18. Have you ever seen a phenomenal change take place in a company once they became aware of their culture?
Absolutely. I worked with a big company where the CEO gave the IT function one year to get their act together or else they would be outsourced. This company did a number of acquisitions of other large companies which also had IT functions. Prior to the acquisitions, headquarters IT was king. Now, subsidiary IT groups did not want to be told what to do by headquarters’ IT, and the crescendo of complaints had frustrated the CEO. Through the culture model, they realized they had to change their culture. They were an IT expert culture. They had to become a customer service culture in order to survive. They did so, basically following the process I outlined above. A couple ‘keepers of the old culture’ had to be replaced; but one year later, almost everybody else was still with the organization. They had changed their culture—and they changed because they had to.

19. Have you seen a positive or negative effect when music is part of a culture?
I think music is usually a helpful part of culture because generally it helps pull people together.

20. What about snack food? If a company has snack food as part of the culture, is that a good thing or indifferent?
I don’t know. I had Pepsi and Coke as clients. Do beverages parallel snack food?

21. What is your favorite snack food?
Definitely potato chips

22. What is your ideal culture?
I personally like big-thinking, fast-moving, people oriented cultures. But no culture is right or wrong. I have had clients with cultures directly opposite each other, and both were equally successful.

23. Is there a culture that is generally the most appealing to the masses?
Not really. If a company delivers what it promises, people are happy with them and they appreciate their culture.

24. What type of company had the coolest culture that you have worked with?
Rule29, of course.

25. The most challenging?
The old Ameritech culture, because the new leadership team did not appreciate its strengths.

26. How can someone apply an understanding of culture into their business?
The key to business success is going to market within a company’s cultural strength. That’s where it’s most competitive. Then ensure a culturally compatible workforce to deliver on promises.

27. What kind of companies do you work with?
I work with small firms, like Rule29, to big companies like McDonalds.

28. Outside of hiring in3, what resources would you recommend for me to understand culture and its effects?
I still like Corporate Cultures, by Deal & Kennedy. It’s an older book but it is very pragmatic and it gives a great understanding of culture, with very interesting anecdotes. The other is Good to Great, by Jim Collins, particularly Chapter 3. Both books give a great overview of culture and its importance to success.

29. What does design mean to you?
Good design accurately captures a company’s culture in such a way that it attracts similarly cultured customers. These customers will be buyers for life.

Recently we created a new twitter feed dedicated to the interactions that take place between us, our clients, partners and even random visitors. Sometimes you hear quite memorable and inspiring quotes, and other times errors in grammar reign supreme. From a self negating statement like, “For 40 bucks, you get a month of free yoga”, to a motivational Timspiration™ such as “Zubaz are always a good alternative,” every bit contributes to the experience of the Rule29 culture. As the current intern of R29 I have taken it upon myself to track and archive all the memorable quotes over the past six months. I found myself wondering about how much time it was taking to record these statements and if it would really be adding anything to the overall effectiveness of our work. Soon after thinking about the question, I remembered a book I had read.

In an architecture class many years ago, I read Cradle to Cradle, by an architect named William McDonough and a chemist named Michael Braungart. In the book they cover topics ranging from the current approach to ideas of renewability and sustainability, to using architecture to better your productivity and overall contribution to the workplace. Relating to this Cradle to Cradle mentality, I remembered a particular metaphor that McDonough and Braungart discussed relating to the ecological impact that a cherry tree has on its environment.

“Consider the cherry tree: thousands of blossoms create fruit for birds, humans, and other animals, in order that one pit might eventually fall onto the ground, take root, and grow. Who would look at the ground littered with cherry blossoms and complain, How inefficient and wasteful! The tree makes copious blossoms and fruit without depleting its environment. Once they fall on the ground, their materials decompose and break down into nutrients that nourish microorganisms, insects, plants, animals, and soil. Although the tree actually makes more of its product than it needs for its own success in an ecosystem, this abundance has evolved (through millions of years of success and failure or, in business terms, R&D), to serve rich and varied purposes. In fact, the tree’s fecundity nourishes just about everything around it. What might the human built world look like if the cherry tree had produced?”

It was interesting that although I cannot measure the tangible effects of the humorous and sometimes inspirational dialogue that flow through our workspace, they clearly contribute to the environment and culture of the office. So what is to be learned by the application of these ideas in our everyday interactions? I would contend that even the smallest events and environmental considerations all add up to a sum larger than the parts. Each hilarious comment, video and inspirational quote adds something to our office culture. In my estimation, if the human built world were to operate like a cherry tree, it would look similar to Rule29.

Enjoy some of the Rule29 culture for yourself, and follow our comments on twitter @Around29.com, @rule29 or @designsobriety