While doing some research on Bill George, I came across an elightening article he did a couple years ago.



"What do you do when you’re the new CEO and your employees tell you, "But that’s the way we’ve always done it"? An excerpt from Bill George’s book, Authentic Leadership.




"One of the greatest challenges for the values-centered culture is to produce top performance and succeed in the market against "win at any cost" competitors. Values are only one part of an organization's culture; the other half is its operating norms—the way in which day-to-day business is conducted. Practicing solid values does not guarantee results unless a passionate commitment to performance standards is incorporated into the organization's norms.

The question is, Do the organization's norms drive performance or do they undermine it?

The latter is what I found at Medtronic when I joined the company. The company's long history of success had led to a soft underbelly that manifested itself in a lack of discipline. The company was extremely values-centered, but its internal norms of consensus decision making, conflict avoidance, and lack of personal accountability all undermined the company's performance. For all its strengths, it was my impression that Medtronic's culture was too Minnesota Nice. I realized that these aspects of Medtronic's culture had to change if we were going to be an effective competitor and realize our vision of being the global leader in medical technology."

At HBSWK, he speaks in depth about the difficulties of transforming a culture of a company.
It's really an eye-opening article that remains timesless! 


 Robert Rudy      Paradox Advisors
   Strategy, Operations, Improvement and  Technology