What is culture hacking and how does it help HR, OD and people responsible for ‘new ways of working’ in a large organisation?

1. Culture hacking: a fast,
simple (if not easy) way to
move to an agile culture
What is culture hacking and how does it help HR, OD and
people responsible for ‘new ways of working’ in a large
organisation?
Richard Atherton & Carrie Bedingfield | March 2018 | hello@onefishtwofish.co.uk | 0118 3217457

2. * 61.5% of all large company projects were challenged – Standish CHAOS Report, 2017
Change programmes suck.
I mean, they really suck.*

3. People have the best intentions
when creating change initiatives,
but are thwarted by the reality of
human nature and the
complexity of their environments

4. We’re starting to get clues as to why
change initiatives can be so difficult
from what are being the called the
‘complexity sciences’.

5. Complexity is telling
us that not
everything is as
predictable as
Newton’s apple
falling from the tree.

6. What’s the difference between sending a rocket to
the moon and getting children to succeed in
school?
What’s the difference between a surgeon extracting
a brain tumour, and a jury deciding if a person
accused of murder is guilty?

7. Let’s start with sending a rocket to the moon:
We need
● engineer-designed blueprints
● step-by-step algorithms
● well-trained staff
● exquisite combinations of computer software running carefully calibrated
equipment
A complicated system like this assumes expert, rational leaders who
manage top-down, command and control and no external influences or
complications.

8. The industrial world - into which many of us were
born - was all about ‘complicated’ - many steps but
all of them predictable, measurable etc.
The problem is, that’s not the world we live in now
where markets are global, competitors are
everywhere and the system is vast and unknowable.

9. They’re like
ecosystems - or the
weather. Predictable
and unpredictable at
the same time
Organisations are
not like ships we
can steer
We can apply this new “complexity
thinking” to companies.

10. Organisations are no longer command and control.
We can’t manage culture with Command & Control
approaches like top down change programme.s
Well, we can try but…

11. Change doesn’t start with these.
Great things of beauty though they are :-)

12. It starts with these.
Real people doing real things differently and creating new perspectives for
other people
This butterfly really going for it in
Brazil. Look out New York...
The dancing guy - and his
“First Follower”
Rosa Parks getting on that bus.

13. Plans and visions can help stimulate a conversation.
However, change in the complex realm really
happens when someone somewhere tries
something different and it catches fire.

14. Before you know it,
people are starting to do
things a bit or a lot
differently.

15. That’s where culture hacking comes
in.
Small, local acts with the potential to
make a big difference.

16. Culture hacks are discrete, counter-cultural
interventions aimed at changing how people
interact with each other.
When they work, they can have a big impact. When
they don’t – no big deal, we can try something else.

17. For example:
- In a branch, someone replaces a load of paperwork that was
slowing everyone down with a simple online form. The rest of the
business cottons on and realises they didn’t need it anyway.
- Someone who loads lorries asks his team to try a better way of
prepping stock and gets the picking team to make a small change
to make this possible. It saves them 45 minutes each day and soon
all the lorries are packed the same way.
- A project manager tries a new way of holding team update
meetings that makes blockers visible so they can be dealt with on a
daily basis. The team’s productivity skyrockets and they show other
teams how to do the same.

18. We have pioneered culture hacking
programmes in over 35
organisations in the last 4 years.

19. … in three main ways
Working with a
team over a period
of time
(we did this at BBC Worldwide)
A ‘culture
hackathon’ over
1 or 2 days
(we did this at Ricoh)
Releasing small
‘acts of culture’
from the centre
and seeing what
catches fire
(we did this at Pfizer)

20. Does any of this sound worthy of a conversation?

21. Kraft Foods said:
‘you are a guiding light to an
organisation trying to find its way in
a changing world’

22. We’d love to help you think aloud
about simple hacks to real change.
No expectations or assumptions. Maybe coffee (mmm, coffee). We’ll help any way we can.
www.onefishcomms.co.uk
Get in touch with Carrie Bedingfield
carrie@onefishtwofish.co.uk | 07769 708490