Leadership: Biggest contributor to positive workplace culture

Workplace culture refers to the shared values, customs, traditions, rituals, process, routines, attitudes and norms within an organisation that new employees must learn and accept and practice in order to fit well into the organisation. It plays a vital role in creating a positive and healthy work environment where new ideas are encouraged and mistakes are viewed as part of the learning process. It can also be defined as “the shared values, belief systems, attitudes and the set of assumptions that people in a workplace share.” Workplace culture is the personality of a company, driving retention, improving well-being and shaping its brand image to attract top talents.

A positive workplace culture drives engagement and supports performance across an organisation. In contrast, a negative workplace culture can result in disengagement, safety incidents and high staff turnover. The best way to build an organisation’s brand and goodwill is to develop and maintain a positive workplace culture in the organisation.

What is leadership?

Leadership is the art, science and process of guiding, inspiring and influencing people to work together toward a shared goal. It does not require a formal title or position of authority, but rather relies on social influence, clear direction and trust. The core of leadership are:

Vision: Creating a clear and inspiring picture of the future. Leaders have the skill to see the future and they encourage other team members to see the future.

Influence: Motivating others to act through trust and persuasion rather than force. Leaders, unlike managers, do not participate in the process with their team members. They tell the team the objectives and wait for results.

Collaboration: Bringing people together to achieve results that individuals cannot accomplish alone. Leaders support their team members to achieve what the team members cannot achieve individually.

Empowerment: Supporting the growth and confidence of team members. Leaders see the good and profitable quality of every team member and help team members to develop this quality.

Leadership is crucial to the success of individuals, teams and organisations. It encompasses diverse skills. Leaders are individuals who guide, inspire and influence others to achieve set goals. They are the lifewire of all successful organisations and the missing link in failed organisations.

Leadership and good workplace culture 

According to a 2022 report by the company review site “Comparably”, Microsoft was the number one global company with the best workplace culture. The ranking is based on anonymous employee ratings for 70,000 companies shared on their site over a 12-month period from March 2021 to March 2022. Organisations such as Google, Netflix and Zappos were ranked topmost by Great Place To Work Nigeria – a research, consulting and training firm that helps organisations identify, create and sustain great workplaces.

Employees can have great pay, cool perks and ping pong tables at work, but if leadership is off, the culture still feels toxic. If leadership is solid, people will stay even through the hard parts of the job. Leadership sets the tone for everything.

Leadership is more than a position of authority; it is the ability to guide, influence, articulate a vision, motivate and rally others toward common goals, often in the face of uncertainty or adversity.

Why leadership is biggest driver of positive workplace culture

1. Leaders model the behaviour of workers: People copy what they see in any human community. If leaders communicate openly, own mistakes and treat people with respect, that becomes how they do things in an organisation. If leaders play favourites or hide information, that spreads too and becomes part of the organisation.

2. They set psychological safety: A positive culture means people can speak up, try things and fail without fear. That only happens when leaders respond to bad news with curiosity instead of blame and when they protect people from burnout. Leaders cover up for their team members. They share accolades in the season of great achievements and own responsibility for shortcomings of the team.

3. They define what gets rewarded: Culture is what you celebrate. Leaders decide if you reward teamwork or competition, results or politics, speed or quality. Teams quickly figure out what actually matters by watching who gets promoted and for what.

4. They create clarity and purpose: When leadership connects daily work to a bigger “why”, people feel meaning instead of just tasks. In successful workplaces especially, that sense of purpose and respect from leadership is what keeps teams loyal. When workers have clear instructions from leaders, they tend to be loyal.

5. They hire and protect the culture: Good leaders hire for values, not just skills. And they are willing to address toxic high-performers because they know one bad actor can undo culture faster than any policy can build it.

If a workplace culture will not survive if the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) or General Manager leaves an organisation, then the leadership of the organisation has not set up a sustainable workplace culture. This lack of sustainable workplace culture is the reason behind most failed organisations.

Conclusion: Though leadership has a great role to play in identifying, creating and sustaining workplace culture, the good news is that workplace culture is not just set by the CEO alone. Every team leader such as  supervisor and manager is a workplace culture carrier.

Without workplace culture, an organisation is just a random collection of people and tasks. It lacks a shared identity, a common purpose and a moral compass, reducing daily work to a disconnected set of transactions rather than a unified mission. And an organisation becomes a rudderless ship as employees do not know what values guide decisions.

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OLUFEMI

Olufemi Adedamola Oyedele, MPhil. in Construction Management, managing director/CEO, Fame Oyster & Co. Nigeria, is an expert in real estate investment, a registered estate surveyor and valuer, and an experienced construction project manager. He can be reached on +2348137564200 (text only) or femoyede@gmail.com