Growing Pains: Managing Organizational Change
The nonprofit sector is growing quickly. According to the Urban Institute’s 2008 Nonprofit Almanac, the number of nonprofit organizations grew to over 1.4 million from 1.1 million in 1998. The report also notes that in 2006, nonprofits accounted for 9.7 percent of jobs in the U.S, up from 7.2 percent in 1998. That number is projected to grow, as a 2006 Blackbaud report found that nearly half of nonprofits (44 percent) planned on increasing their staff size in the following year.
As an organization grows, almost every aspect of its operations are impacted, and perhaps none more so than organizational culture. Because organizational culture is shaped by many factors—leadership styles, the demographics of team members, the physical work environment—growth deeply impacts the cultural feel of any nonprofit.
Fortunately, many of the cultural aspects that nonprofit jobseekers desire are likely already a part of successfully growing organizations. In its Voice of Nonprofit Talent Survey in 2008, Commongood Careers found that nonprofit jobseekers most value organizations with cultures that are collaborative, results-oriented, and strategic. Many of these characteristics exist in growing organizations just by virtue of the fact that they are growing.
The Challenge of Maintaining an Evolving Culture
Organizations face many challenges as they grow to scale, and one the biggest challenges is managing the culture change that comes with growth.
The first step in managing an evolving culture is understanding the culture that already exists and proactively supporting the ongoing development of the organization’s culture. Using the vision and mission statements can be a good place for an organization to start defining its culture. It is important to look at not only the goals and objectives of the organization, but also the language the organization uses to communicate them, and the emphasis employees and management put on connecting to these statements, especially when hiring new employees.
Hiring for Cultural Fit
“It’s definitely a challenge to maintain culture as an organization grows,” said Tiffany Cooper, Chief Operating Officer of Field Operations at BELL, “but we try to manage our growth by ensuring cultural fit in all of our hires. We make culture fit a key part of interviewing.”
This means BELL that recognizes and names cultural factors such as preferred leadership styles, interpersonal dynamics, and organizational traditions and celebrations, and incorporates this information into the hiring process. Of course, all of those factors can be affected by growth, so it is important to periodically re-examine important cultural elements, identify those that are truly core to the organization, and hire candidates who embrace and embody those core cultural factors.
“Solid hiring is critical to an organization’s growth and is hugely important in managing culture change,” said Cooper. “Hiring people motivated by our culture and our mission is essential to our organizational growth. We are very slow to hire and we will turn down many great candidates in order to make sure we get candidates that are both great and compatible with our organizational culture.”.
Additionally, BELL focuses on supporting new hires through the onboarding process by being explicit about various cultural elements and making sure that those who are familiar with the culture are involved. “Once we’ve made the hire we ensure that the people with the most history with the organization, like me and the CEO, are involved in the onboarding process,” Cooper said.
The Risk – and Opportunity – of Subcultures
Adding new employees in a growing organization inevitably will bring some degree of cultural change. The value of new hires – new expertise, different perspectives, geographic expansion – can also lead to challenges.
The subcultures that develop as a staff grows can stem from various factors. Geographic subcultures result from cultural differences in environment, like standards in dress, styles of language, and expectations of the community served. Subcultures developed within functional areas highlight the transition from relying on employees to be “jacks-of-all-trades” to creating more specialized and culturally unique functional responsibilities. As diversity in experience, background, and life experience grows, so too can subcultures evolve based on these factors.
It is important to recognize and value these subcultures while also staying mindful of overall organizational culture. It is important that everyone on staff remains committed to and connected with the organization’s mission and feels like a valued part of the organization. Reminding employees that they are all working to solve common problems and to reach common goals, despite location or function, can build unity and an important shared identity. When the overall organization culture is one of healthy, positive respect, subcultures need not be feared.
Communication is Key
Perhaps the most important factor in building and maintaining organizational culture is communication. Employees need to and want to feel included in organizational developments and decisions, even if they can’t be involved directly. Sharing information through various formats sends a message that employees are respected and valued, no matter how large the organization.
“Communication is essential to managing cultural growth. We have various systems to do so including cross-functional meetings, a monthly internal newsletter and a quarterly external newsletter,” Cooper said. BELL also uses a unique quarterly “town meeting” to share organizational developments and encourage employees at all levels to contribute feedback on the strategic direction of the organization.
The Importance of Intention
Perhaps the most valuable lesson for organizations experiencing growth and the associated cultural evolution is to be intentional. Don’t let changes in organizational culture just happen without being thoughtful and aware. It is much more challenging to change a culture that has evolved in a negative way than to proactively build a positive culture, even as growth is happening.
This article was written by Commongood Careers and is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-NoDerivs 2.5 License.
For more information about nonprofit and socially entrepreneurial careers, visit Commongood Careers at http://www.cgcareers.org.