Creating Company Culture

Creating Company Culture

Creating company culture is hard.

Ask 10 people and you’ll get 10 different ideas on how to do it. The good news: you can build and improve company culture with a repeatable process.  You can do it without pretending culture is only aspirational.

**Author:  **Ian Richardson, Founder,Fox & Crow Date Published: December 18, 2023 Last Updated: January 19, 2026

Inspired by Thursday Process with guest Paul Azad, Service Tree.

What is Company Culture?

Company culture is the values, habits, and attitudes that exist** today** in your organization—and they shape how your team works and how customers experience your business.

What Company Culture Means (Today, Not Someday)

The term “company culture” has a variety of definitions. Indeed.com defines it as the:

"...shared set of core values & practices that define an organization."

Over time, I’ve come to enjoy an adjacent definition: company culture is the values, habits, and attitudes that exist today in your organization.

Emphasis on “today” is intentional.

Culture is not just an aspirational item, even if you can have a “goal” for culture.

• Your culture exists today—defined or not.

• Your team fills in gaps on values, vision, and mission. Related

• What you do not communicate gets substituted by personal beliefs. Related

• Team attitudes and actions shape employee experience and customer experience. Related

If leadership isn’t careful, toxicity can spread. I won’t claim there is only one way to create company culture. Get diverse points of view, forge your own path, and avoid the pitfalls that show up as poor team performance, customer churn, and anxiety in the organization.

Company Culture (Values, Habits, Attitudes)

If you want a clean way to work on company culture, separate it into three non-overlapping parts. This makes the work easier to diagnose, communicate, and improve:

Culture Component	What It Is	What To Watch
Values	The principles your team believes guide decisions.	Contradictions between stated vs. lived values.
Habits	Repeatable behaviors that become “how we do things.”	Meeting norms, follow-through, handoffs, clarity.
Attitudes	The emotional posture people bring to work.	Cynicism, blame, learned helplessness, fear.

Building Company Culture

So how do we build company culture?

Using the definition above, building culture is the installation of values, habits, and attitudes. Over time, those become your “new” culture.

Habits and attitudes get set by leadership. People will model the behavior you present. Start with living it yourself. Be willing to have conversations around your goal. Articulate expectations. Don’t expect Rome in a day—start small and focused.

• Choose one area to focus on.

• Gather perspective: What is wrong? What questions exist? What would “good” look like?

• Involve leaders across functions to broaden understanding.

• Set clear guidelines based on what you learned.

• Model the behavior and run a simple communication campaign.

• Reinforce publicly when people succeed;** coach privately** when they miss (no humiliation).

• Track misfires to measure improvement over time.

• Write policy & procedure so the behavior survives future hires.

• Repeat on the next focus area.

Changing Company Culture

I had a great conversation with Paul Azad, CEO of Service Tree, on company culture. One learning stood out: culture is how people work together to produce results. If people come to work dreading the experience, problems follow—performance drops and drag increases.

If you’re changing culture, focus on eliminating mundane, repetitive tasks. These “energy drain” items aren’t enjoyable for anyone. Use automation, procedure changes, and practical fixes. Get the team involved: most people want to make work better.

• Reduce “bad tasks” to increase energy and ownership.

• Celebrate early wins and ask, “What’s next?”

• Make it fun to create fun—momentum matters.

This effort translates into performance and improved customer experience. Better customer experience rewards companies with improved sales, and those sales create higher profits.

Final Thoughts on Creating Company Culture

Culture takes consistency. Building, changing, or defining is hard. You’ll need focus and resources to achieve your goal. Communication is mandatory. Allow time and grace while pursuing the effort. Remember: plans do not self-execute.

As Tom Paterson said:

If you plan your work, and work your plan, your plan will work.

If you’re struggling to get started: grab some time and let’s chat.

I talk culture in our newsletter — sign up here.

Readiness Checklist (Use This Before You “Roll Out Culture”)

• Defined: Can you name the values, habits, and attitudes you want to reinforce?

• Modeled: Does leadership demonstrate the behavior consistently?

• Communicated: Are expectations written and repeated?

• Reinforced: Do you recognize wins and coach misses appropriately?

• Measured: Do you track misfires and see them decreasing over time?

• Documented: Are policies and procedures updated for future hires?

FAQ: Company Culture

What is company culture in simple terms?

Company culture is how people behave, decide, and work together—driven by values, habits, and attitudes that exist today.

Who is responsible for company culture?

Leadership sets the tone, but everyone reinforces culture through daily behavior. Leaders own modeling and communication.

How do you build company culture fast?

Start small: pick one focus area, set clear expectations, model it, reinforce it, and write it into policy so it sticks.

How do you change a toxic company culture?

Reduce “energy drain” work, improve procedures, involve the team in fixes, and consistently reinforce the new expectations.

How do you measure company culture improvement?

Track misfires (missed expectations, recurring conflicts, customer issues). Over time, improvement looks like fewer misfires and clearer execution.