Workplace Dynamics
How to Shape Workplace Culture Without Being the Boss
Podcast Audio Only:
Workplace Culture Is a Career Skill: How Much Influence Do You Really Have?
When we talk about workplace culture, we usually focus on the organization and its leaders. That makes sense because leadership, policies, expectations, and how people are treated significantly shape what it's like to work somewhere, but we also participate in that culture every day.
This was one of the ideas I wanted to explore with Natalie Johnson, Chief Visionary Officer of ViDL Work and co-author of Leading the Culture Journey. Natalie thinks about culture through how people relate to each other, which brings it down to the interactions we have at work every day and raises an important career question: How much influence do you realistically have over the culture you're experiencing?
Your Experience of Culture Can Be Very Local
Two people can work for the same company and have completely different experiences, especially if they have different managers or work on different teams.
You can work for a company that's known for having a great culture and still have a terrible experience with your manager. You can also work within an organization that has plenty of problems and end up on a team with a great leader who has created a much healthier environment.
This is one reason I think we need to look beyond an organization's reputation when we're evaluating culture and pay attention to what happens when people disagree, make mistakes, give feedback, or challenge an idea. If a leader says they want honest feedback but becomes defensive every time someone disagrees, people will adjust pretty quickly. The same thing happens when someone regularly interrupts colleagues or behaves poorly, and nobody addresses it.
Those interactions tell you what the team accepts, regardless of what the organization says it values.
You Are Participating in the Culture
Natalie shared an example from her own career where a leadership change completely changed the environment around her. She had been working in a collaborative environment with a leader she trusted, but the new leader had a very different style, and over time Natalie became frustrated, stopped trusting the leader, and participated in some of the complaining and gossip happening with colleagues.
She ultimately left the organization, but looking back, she realized that she had more influence over how she responded to the situation than she recognized at the time. She couldn't control how the leader behaved, but she could control whether she contributed to other behaviors developing within the team.
I think that's an important part of this conversation because taking responsibility for how you show up doesn't mean taking responsibility for someone else's bad behavior.
You can look at your own reactions and consider whether there's something you could handle differently, including how you communicate or respond when you're frustrated. Self-awareness can also help you separate what someone else is doing from what you may be bringing into the situation because a manager may genuinely be difficult to work with while your reaction to them is also influenced by a previous experience or assumption you've made.
Understanding both gives you a better picture of what's happening and what you can reasonably do about it.
What Leaders Tolerate Matters
Your individual influence has limits, especially when the larger environment keeps reinforcing behavior you can't change.
Natalie sees this when organizations have a high performer who gets results but creates problems for the people around them. Leadership may know the behavior is an issue but hesitate to address it because the person generates significant revenue or has expertise the organization doesn't want to lose.
If that person receives direct feedback, is held accountable, and changes their behavior, great. But if leadership repeatedly allows the behavior because the results are valuable enough, employees learn quite a bit about what the organization actually prioritizes.
You may have influence over your own behavior and the people you work with directly, but you can't compensate indefinitely for leadership decisions that keep undermining the culture you're trying to create.
How Do You Know When You've Done Enough?
This was one of the questions I specifically wanted to ask Natalie because conversations about personal responsibility can go too far in the other direction.
Every job includes some amount of disagreement, frustration, change, and discomfort, so leaving whenever something becomes difficult isn't necessarily going to serve you well. You may need to have a conversation, develop a skill, or approach the situation differently.
There is also a point where you've addressed the problem, adjusted how you communicate, and tried to understand the other person's perspective, but you still don't see meaningful improvement. You may notice that staying requires you to behave in ways that don't align with your values or significantly change how you naturally show up at work.
You can do the self-reflection, have the difficult conversations, try a different approach, and use whatever influence you have while also recognizing when you've done what you reasonably can and the environment no longer works for you.
You don't have to stay indefinitely to prove that you tried hard enough, and you don't have to take responsibility for fixing a culture you don't have the authority or influence to fix.
Culture Awareness Is Part of Managing Your Career
Understanding workplace culture can help you evaluate both the environment around you and how you operate within it.
Pay attention to how you respond when someone disagrees with you, whether people feel comfortable bringing you a different perspective, and what happens when you're frustrated with someone you work with. You should also notice how leadership responds when someone raises a concern, what behavior gets addressed or ignored, and whether people have room to disagree without being penalized.
You won't have control over all of it, but understanding where you have influence and where you don't gives you better information for deciding what to do next.
Sometimes that means changing how you're showing up. Sometimes it means addressing something directly. And sometimes you've done what you reasonably can and decide the environment no longer works for you.
Get the book:
https://www.vidlwork.com/culturejourneybook
Learn more about Natalie Johnson:
https://www.nataliejohnsonspeaks.com/
Learn more about ViDL Work:
https://www.vidlwork.com/
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