Culture Doesn’t Come from Slides, It Comes from the Stories Leaders Tell

Despite popular beliefs, company culture isn’t defined by what a company says, by the slides, or a deck shared in the intranet. Company culture is a direct result of the stories that leaders in the organisation share and live. 

Yes, I said “Live” because stories are not just shared. When you think about business storytelling, you probably first think about: presentations, speeches, copywriting, client conversations, etc. However, the best-kept secret about business storytelling is that it is built in the doing. 

Leaders Shape Culture With Their Actions

The saying that tells us that leaders lead by example is practically sharing that leaders create narratives every time they behave in a certain way. Their examples will become another chapter in the history of the company culture. 

This is not a small responsibility, and rightfully so. Which is why it is surprising that self-leadership isn’t a bigger investment than it is now for companies. Companies in the EMEA region invest between 1% to 5% of their revenue in leadership development training. However, very little attention is given to self-leadership.

The Case for Self-Leadership in Modern Organisations

Self-leadership is the part of leadership development that focuses on helping leaders develop their personal narratives, their emotional intelligence and soft skills. And why do those matter, you might ask? 

Two reasons.

First, people tend to leave people, not organisations. Meaning that it’s often the bad management that fails and decreases employee engagement. 

The second reason is that leaders are responsible for culture, for the stories they share and live. And if they haven’t spent some time finding and articulating their own narratives, they will inevitably bring their triggers, traumas, past experiences and biases to their employees, leading to disengagement, low retention and a bad reputation. 

A Framework to Help Leaders Lead With Their Story

Often self-leadership is relegated to tailored executive certification because no one has found a way to make it mainstream. In my upcoming book, Lead With Your Story, I walk leaders through a framework they can implement to develop their self-awareness and become better storytellers and better leaders. 

Clients who have followed the framework I share in the book have gone from being silent, quiet and self-conscious, to becoming outspoken, getting promoted and leading new teams.

Those leaders are the ones who are really building their company culture. 

What about your leaders? Are they telling the stories that build a culture resulting in a positive and productive work environment, or breaking it without knowing?