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.