
A Critique of “Don’t Fuck Up The Culture” - jmacd
http://scottberkun.com/2014/critique-dont-fuck-up-culture/
======
overgard
I wonder if this is just a strong contrarian streak in me, but I've always
been extremely suspicious of "company culture" anywhere I've worked. Almost
any real culture is implicit; it's not designed. I think it's because growing
up watching a lot of cable news, I've learned to be sensitive to narratives
that don't have a lot to do with reality, and frequently "culture" and
"values" are used to try to suggest a narrative to employees that also has
very little to do with reality. I don't need a culture of "integrity" not to
do evil things, I have a conscience. Nor do I need a cultural value of
"innovation" to come up with new ideas -- a lot of times the pleasure of doing
something well is more than enough.

It makes me also think about how uncomfortable I felt during high school
rallies. I mean, I didn't even particularly choose to be in that place, why
should I have "pride" to be part of that institution? And why do I need to
express that "pride" by yelling in a mob? I always found it somewhat creepy
how easily people went along with all of that. I guess it's better than being
lonely.

~~~
AVTizzle
Thinking about it from the perspective of an entrepreneur, even though it's
just my co-founder and I and a couple outsourced assistants, I did write down
a list values that I wanted to exhibit as a leader in my company.

As I see it, it's like writing down your goals. Having them written down isn't
the end-all of the matter. But if you write them down, it makes them much more
tangible and achievable.

Looked at that way, having aspects of "company culture" doesn't mean much on
its own. The test is whether the influential people (CEO, vets, etc...)
embodying and practicing those points on a daily basis.

~~~
medius
When writing values, it's better to write very concrete examples as well.

e.g. If you value "trust", mention that an employee can leave work anytime to
attend to their personal matters without showing any proof. The company trusts
employees not to abuse this.

Write as many examples as possible. I can visualize examples. I can't
visualize "trust" or "integrity" or "innovation".

Examples help everyone make decisions. Platitudes cannot.

------
hagbardgroup
You could say that the modern fashion-forward corporate culture is just the
German-Protestant ethic with the family shaved off and some hedonism stapled
on to replace it. Instead of the gospel, people read HBR or HBR-aping tech
publications. The CEO becomes father, king/presidente/generalissimo, and
priest, because it's likely that none of those things will exist in the lives
of the employees to the same extent as they did in previous generations.

In California tech, something like half of the employees will not even have
much stateside family, being immigrants, while another large portion come from
broken families, are un-churched (but perhaps yoga-classed), and are often
unmarried also. There is no 'society' there for such employees beyond the
company, no rival sources of meaning. Perhaps after 'success' there is room
for 'philanthropy.'

It is actually the whole culture because the alternate cultural institutions
have become so weak that the corporation just fills the gaps, as the only
remaining institution in the life of the individual with any confidence or
capacity for initiative. Otherwise, a good article.

It's funny that a guy who has contributed to HBR, which has done so much to
obliterate or subvert all competing institutions to the corporation, seems to
have a little trepidation about going all the way.

~~~
shanacarp
I actually find the decline of religio highly interesting in comparison to the
growth of stuff about company culture an interesting correlation that I never
thought about.

Though I would take philanthropy out of quotes. And I'd be careful about the
concept of unchurched (as someone who is unchurched and has no plans on
becoming churched)

I do wonder what people will use as anchor institutions now that church going
has declined - not everyone can do the corporate only thing

~~~
hagbardgroup
>I do wonder what people will use as anchor institutions now that church going
has declined - not everyone can do the corporate only thing

Entertainment. Religious behavior is so ingrained and universal that, when
people lose it, they immediately start organizing around the nearest banner
and making mock wars against the unbelievers.

Nintendo believers (with their computerized altars, mythos, and rituals) may
not actually kill the bros of the X-box, but they do get worked up about the
differences and frequently engage in mock battles with those of other tribes.

It's too reductive to call all of this behavior either religious or spiritual,
but if you look at it from the perspective of an anthropologist from the
future or another planet, it makes a lot more sense than to say 'the
enlightenment happened and each and every person separated the spiritual and
the secular in their brains and we all lived rationally ever after.'

So, generally, if you're in the business of making consumer products, you're
in the business of running an effective cult, or at least encouraging an
existing strong cult to adopt one of your mythic ways into their own, or
making use of one of your totems.

------
nemesisj
We specifically talk about how nobody, even myself as the CEO, is "above the
law" with regards to our values. We've had several instances where values were
invoked as reasons why we shouldn't want to do something that was against what
I wanted to do. It was a surprise when it happened, but I deeply appreciated
it. It's part of teamwork as sometimes people can lose site of things or by
omission or oversight make decisions which aren't the best or aligned with a
company's true mission. We talk a lot about this and I really hope that it
continues.

~~~
airnomad
Corporate culture is fancy word for lowering wages by hyping up a company and
thus shifting bargaining power from employees to employer.

I mean, I'm all for that, but let's call things for what they really are.

~~~
shanacarp
There is a huge issue in this - it used to be that there were much stronger
labor movements to create employee cultures that were somewhat separate from
employers/management

There can and should be ways to shift cultural control back to employees - but
white collar jobs in general are not so prone to unionization (one of the
major ways to do so)

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suprgeek
Pardon a silicon valley long-timer for this rant.

With minor exceptions whenever a company goes on and on about its culture, it
is time to leave.

Culture has become a by-word for: 1) Rejecting older applicants while hiring
"He is not a Cultural fit"

2) Making females uncomfortable in an all-male Bro-culture by cracking
"anatomy" jokes

3) Getting people with families to put in insane hours and justifying it by
pointing to the younger crowd and its culture

4) Fig leaf to cover up blatant exploitation

Rarely has company culture ever meant anything positive

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ZenPro
_How To Test The Value of Core Values:

Can an employee say NO to a decision from a superior on the grounds it
violates a core value? Try to imagine it. Would a cultural value from your
corporate handbook ever be used in making an actual decision about actual
work? If the answer is no, then the values are platitudes, or were written so
generically that they’re easily overlooked or easily manipulated to justify
just about anything (depending on your opinion, Google’s don’t be evil is
either a good example or a bad one)._

^^^

Outstanding insight. That litmus test is usually enough to destroy most the of
the paper-thin proclamations of culture trotted out by corporations
(especially start-ups).

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moron4hire
>> "When business and tech people sling the word culture around as if was
invented along with silicon transistors they get themselves into trouble."

<swoon> I've been trying to argue this for years. To call a business
environment "culture" is to grossly misunderstand the nature and importance of
culture and to over-aggrandize the business environment itself.

~~~
amirmc
IMHO the business environment is still worthy of anthropological study.

~~~
moron4hire
Oh certainly, but it's an environment that exists within a culture, albeit one
that increasingly abdicates to nebulous "business" rather than people.

~~~
auxbuss
I'd argue that a business exists within many cultures. I agree with your
second assertion. Within those two there is a clue why "business culture" is a
baseless idea.

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faster
A very long time ago, I worked for a company that was having growing pains.
They tried a few things, one of which was codifying the 'culture' in a list of
present-tense statements that management wished to be true. It was originally
called "the 40 points" but by the time I left, it was up to 66 points.

I asked my boss ('ask' is a euphemism, as I remember it) what was up with this
list (given that the statements were almost entirely false in the moment), and
he told me that there are two ways to guide people when an organization hits a
certain size: with detailed and explicit rules like the military, or with
concepts to guide smart people to make decisions roughly in line with the
direction chosen by management.

With experience, I have found that there are more than two options (that was
my first 'real' job after working at a gas station as a teenager). The "N
points" were deprecated after a few years, and amazingly (to me, anyway), the
company still exists.

As many people have said, culture usually comes from the leaders' actions, not
from their wishes. Or their lists.

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btrombley
The author is right to question the hype around culture as though it were
invented in Silicon Valley, but I think he also falls into the trap of
equating culture with superficial qualities that change over time. To
paraphrase Built to Last: if you look outside the tech world, there are plenty
of companies like Wells Fargo, Nordstrom's, and 3M that been around for over
100 years with very clear cultures and brands--far longer than any one CEO's
reign. Of course, the culture changed over that time as measured by social
attitudes and management practices, but they are successful because the core
company culture survived. At 3M it was innovation and meritocracy. At
Nordstrom's it was above-and-beyond customer service.

Don't let cynicism over the company culture of free t-shirts and late nights
cloud out the goal of building a culture that lasts longer than you will. Just
like parenting, it's what you do, not what you (or your posters) say that
matters.

~~~
sberkun10
We agree. I wrote:

"You have to do careful study to filter out which cultural values remained
immutable over time, if any at all. Ask the first ten employees to leave a
successful company why they left, and many will answer “the company changed.”

You have the benefit of retrospection with those companies - In year 1 or year
5 it was (likely) far less clear what the company would look like in 50 or 100
years.

It is also a matter of perspective - as an outsider to any organization the
perceptions we have of culture are different than what it's actually like
inside. 3M in particular has gone through many cultural changes, including the
ones that led to peaks in innovation (see:
[http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/en_US/3M-Company/Infor...](http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/en_US/3M-Company/Information/Resources/History/?PC_Z7_RJH9U52300V200IP896S2Q3223000000_assetId=1319210372704)
on McKnight circa 1950s) and low points (see
[http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2007-06-10/at-3m-a-
strug...](http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2007-06-10/at-3m-a-struggle-
between-efficiency-and-creativity) McNerney, circa 2000s).

So we're talking about two sides of the same kinds of coins - yes some
elements are stable, but it's hard to sort out what they are, and it depends
heavily on whether you are an outsider looking for examples, or an insider
actually trying to get something interesting done.

------
mempko
“How power is distributed has a primary role in defining culture.”

This is the single most important statement in the article. Being conscious of
the power structures is critical in understanding an organization and how it
functions. Most power structures are not legitimate and we unfortunately
placate to them as though they are.

Unfortunately most people spend their day in a totalitarian type
organizational structure where they have orders barked to them. Even in the
tech world. We need to start asking ourselves if we prefer to live most of our
lives in totalitarian organizations getting orders barked at us.

~~~
wpietri
What amazes me about this point (which should be obvious) is how hard it is
for people to even recognize power dynamics. It's so deeply baked in to our
culture (and probably our brains) that it's easy to miss.

For my fellow nerds who have trouble spotting it, de Waal's "Chimpanzee
Politics" is a good book showing power in our near relatives. For
understanding it in humans, various books on body language were useful to me,
as were some theater books, including the status transactions section in
Johnstone's "Impro".

More directly related to mempko's point, I'm also really enjoying "Confronting
Managerialism", which basically claims that American business culture has
relatively little to do with creating effective businesses, and a lot to do
with creating a caste system with managers and executives on top.

------
coldcode
Companies cannot have an unchanging culture. Business and new opportunities
always come up that aren't the same as when the company started. People get
complacent, executives demand more and more pay/power, competitors find
weaknesses, and the response is to either stay the course (get more
conservative), or more flail around and try to adapt somehow. Either way you
eventually have to do something different which changes your "culture."
Companies which refuse to adapt to changing conditions wind up like the dodo.

~~~
crdb
Yes! And a point that often gets missed out in this argument is that the value
of the job to new and current staff changes as the organisation grows in
headcount and complexity. It's easy to hire great programmers with plenty of
experience, who manage themselves and make the right strategic decisions, when
you've raised funding for a promising idea and you have enough equity to give
them a substantial slice. It's a totally different equation when you have
1,000+ employees each doing small but necessary jobs, and you have practically
no points left in your ESOP, especially since aforementioned talent expects a
20-30% raise every year. And good luck if you're a mid-size paper printing
business in Ohio who needs someone to do integration projects.

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UweSchmidt
Good points, expanding on the original article.

Now what? Take Berkun's definition of culture, and don't fuck up _that_.
Culture could be the thing that stops future innovation? Make it part of the
culture not to try to stop future innovation.

Culture sure is kinda intangible, but it's still good advice to founders to
pay close attention to it. Whatever it is.

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xacaxulu
Leaders should probably check themselves and make sure their actions are a
'culture fit' for the kind of company culture they pay lip service to.

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bryang
I'm sure Peter Thiel changes his "best advice" depending on the situation -
therefore making this argument entirely pointless.

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jamieb
Isn't some part of their culture "be disruptive"? How does that square with
"OMG Don't fuck it up!"

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smoyer
It's pretty clear that Chesky was talking about "company culture" as opposed
to the broader (and generally longer-termed) anthropological culture (societal
culture?). The idea of "company culture" has been around for as long as I've
been in the workforce (approaching 30 years) and I think it's perfectly valid
that Chesky's readers would (rightly) assume he wasn't talking about societal
culture.

~~~
mkempe
Methods and concepts of anthropology and ethnography apply to groups of
various sizes, not just to large societies. They also apply to subcultures.

Berkun's arguments are that there is an established body of knowledge and
methods about culture, and people who care about culture in their companies
would benefit from learning about those. This notion does conflict with the
common, latent self-perception of founders -- that they are starting and
inventing _everything_ anew.

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testing12311
Why is the title all caps?

~~~
reledi
Probably copy-pasted the article title, which is all caps.

------
michaelochurch
Also, "culture" (in the modern, anthropological sense of the world) is mostly
ugly and bad, because people are mostly ugly and bad. Foot-binding was
culture. Religious and racial bigotry are culture. Almost every social
injustice that ever occurred came out of some _cultural_ prejudice. People on
Hacker News are quick to bash religion, but it's pre-baked thinking in general
(which is much of what culture is) that is the cause of so much suffering.

When "culture fit" is used to justify not hiring a capable, 43-year-old woman
out of the fear that she'll justify the money-making machine that exists when
25-year-old, male, clueless commodity programmers are stapled together into an
underpaid, overworked team, the word _culture_ isn't being misused. That's
exactly what culture is.

Most companies that have a strong cultural identity have a negative one. It's
also not necessary that a company have one. Banks don't trumpet "our culture"
but (excluding analyst programs, which are hellish) are decent places to work
in spite of the weak cultural identity.

A corporate "culture" eventually realizes that it must defend itself against
perceived enemies. And it inevitably ends up being the worst kinds of people--
passive-aggressive, malevolent sorts-- who acquire the position to decide who
those enemies are going to be.

Culture also tends toward arrogance, injustice, and hubris as it develops
_exceptionalism_ , which is what it will fight hardest to defend. I still have
people from Google, _three years_ after I left, going out of their way to fuck
up my life because they perceive things I've said as being threats to their
culture's exceptionalism. (Never mind that I've been gone for 3 years and have
absolutely no power over anything that happens at Google.)

A commercial enterprise like a business will never have a balanced, full-
fledged culture. Culture is immersive, not something people participate in for
8 hours per day in order to make money. I would say that, as much as possible,
you _don 't want_ a strong culture (or, more dangerously, a strong cultural
identity) at your place of work. You want people to get in, do good work, be
paid well, and be happy. But once you have people start talking about "culture
fit" as if it were a real thing, you've hired too many passive-aggressive
assholes, and you need to cool it with the "culture" nonsense.

~~~
andrewljohnson
_I still have people from Google, three years after I left, going out of their
way to fuck up my life because they perceive things I 've said as being
threats to their culture's exceptionalism._

You bash Google at every opportunity, every since you left, AFAIK. You reap
what you sow.

The rest of your post was good, but then you had to go off on Google again.
Get over it.

~~~
woof
So if he stops his criticism of Google, he will be left alone? Just like
critics of Scientology?

