Organizational Atmosphere: Its Impact on Organizational Culture, Engagement, and Climate

Organizational Atmosphere: How it can support or undermine organizational culture, and ways you can create atmosphere to improve the way teams work together

Transcript

Dr. D.  0:03  
Hello, and welcome to the realm I'm Dr. D and I bring the strategy.

Dr. K  0:06  
And I'm Dr. K and I bring the psychology, we are business psychologists and your guides to the executive realm where we bring strategy and psychology together. So you

Dr. D.  0:16  
can bring your best to your C suite, your teams and your customers. Today we're talking about organizational atmosphere, how it can support or undermine organizational culture and ways you can use organizational atmosphere to improve the way teams work together. Let's get to work. All right, organizational atmosphere, this is kind of a unique term. I hadn't heard much about it. How about you

Dr. K  0:41  
kind of just took it as one in the same as organizational climate, it's a little bit more in depth that goes just one level deeper.

Dr. D.  0:51  
For me, it's kind of the missing piece. When you think about organizational culture, it's the overarching rules of the organization, they might not be clearly stated their unwritten rules really, and their ways that people are expected to behave. Now sophisticated organizations really do a lot to try to shape their culture. But culture is kind of evolved in their own way. And I think the biggest distinction between organizational culture and organizational climate is organizational culture are those unwritten rules are those rules within the organization, those behavioral rules, work climate is the way people perceive those rules in the way they perceive the environment around them. As they're interacting within the culture. The big difference here with atmosphere, atmosphere is kind of a microclimate. You can walk from meeting to meeting or interaction to interaction, and have a completely different experience. Depending on who you're engaging with, you may bring some elements to an atmosphere within a meeting or a conversation. Or you may know somebody who brings a really strong point of view, or a really strong behavioral aspect that may not line up with a culture, they can bring their own little microclimate their, their atmosphere, just like when you walk into a restaurant, the restaurant tours, trying to create an atmosphere for people to enjoy their environment. And you can walk between two or three different restaurants and have vastly different experiences, the same thing can happen in meetings or walking into different clients offices. And sometimes that experience is created for others. And it can either support or detract from the organizational culture. And it may be the biggest contributor to organizational climate, even bigger than establishing the culture. It's these micro interactions with people who do small interactions that can shape this atmosphere.

Dr. K  2:45  
Absolutely agree now that we started talking about organizational atmosphere, sometimes, as you were saying that, you know, these little interactions that we have, whether it's a 30 minute meeting, or just a quick conversation, how that can really turn a day around or turn a person's mindset around, I'm having a rough day at work. And, you know, yeah, the culture is great, but I'm not feeling supported, you know, maybe by a supervisor or what have you. And then I pop my head in or into an office, or I do a quick Google or Slack message, what have you, and having someone be like, No, this is what's going on. And you've got this, you understand, you're missing this one little element. And it can change the whole entire day, the culture didn't change, the climate didn't change, but that one little moment in time change that changed my whole opinion around.

Dr. D.  3:41  
And if you stack up those individual interactions, and over time, the atmosphere that you create, and that is created around you shapes your organizational climate, hopefully, the climate and the organizational culture reinforce each other, and are aligned and you have a engaged employees who say that the climate is nice, the atmosphere and individual meetings are productive and efficient and positive. And that leads to a well constructed culture within the organization. And I think that's really important because organizations who don't intentionally create their culture, by creating interactions that shape the climate of the organization, will have it shaped for them by external forces or by the varying degrees in which people engage within the organization. And it makes it really difficult to hire for culture. It's really tough to bring in the right people in your organization that are going to move your mission forward because you don't really know what you're hiring for. You might be hiring for skill, but Skill is only a small piece of what it takes to craft the workplace in terms of people,

Dr. K  4:59  
right greed. How in your opinion if we were hiring for culture, but there are as you call them little micro atmospheres all around how do we make sure there's a fit with new employees coming in and current employees that might be stuck.

Dr. D.  5:17  
There's always unwritten rules, bringing in new people into an organization is particularly tricky. It's really difficult for new people coming in, because they don't know what those unwritten rules are, they bring their unwritten rules from their past with them, they don't necessarily recognize and it's impossible to recognize what the culture of an organization is until you acclimate to it. If an organization is hiring for culture, they can be very deliberate about what attributes they want to bring into an organization, if your culture has continued to evolve in a very positive way, then you want to bring in reinforcing personalities into that culture. So you have to again, be intentional about what you're bringing in, if you have a very compassionate, empathetic culture, and you bring in a driver that lacks empathy, and maybe doesn't have a lot of emotional intelligence skills, they're going to have a really hard time advancing your culture, they're going to create an atmosphere in their meetings and with their teams that are counterproductive to the culture that you want to develop. The same way, if you have a culture that is evolving in an unproductive way, in you intentionally hire for culture and bring in the type of people that you want to embody that culture of the future, you have to do two things, you have to identify the culture that you want. And you have to bring in the right people to support that culture. And this is where atmosphere comes in, if you are trying to evolve your culture in a positive way, and I think most organizations are and you bring in somebody who can bring something very positive to the environment, bring a positive change to a team or the organization, then you have to give them the opportunity to create that atmosphere, you can't let the existing organizational culture work against that atmosphere, you have to allow them to create that atmosphere around their team in their meetings, and allow that atmosphere to shape the climate, and then shape the culture.

Dr. K  7:19  
Agreed. If you have different atmospheres within different teams, so you might have, you know, one team, the marketing team, and they're all about let's work together. It's it's a team, and we, you know, we have fun, and it's all collaborate, you know, certain times it won't be full collaboration, but collaboration and we support each other. And then you have another team, I don't know, finance, where it's do your, you know, do your numbers, get it done, figure it out, and less support between each other. And I think as a whole, that would be difficult. If you have these, you know, you have the one team that is you know, smooth writing supportive. And then you have another team that's not that those can clash, as in well, why are they getting support, I think it would be important for the organization to go, we want not only do we want, you know, this is our culture, you know, and then this is our climate, we want kind of a general atmosphere of this weather, it's we want total team support, we want, you know, for each of our employees to feel safe to go to any supervisor to talk to them, or any leader to talk to them, you know, create a safe environment that allows room for people to feel good within each little pocket of atmosphere, because some people have to go from different meetings to different meetings, because that's their, that's their position. They're not just okay, I'm in the finance department, and I only go to Finance meetings, and then I'm out people have to be bob around. So creating a sense, an overall general positive atmosphere, and then each little interaction will change. But a general sense, I think, would be important for leaders around the board.

Dr. D.  9:13  
Yeah, that's a great example. So two different departments that have really very different cultures. And you could say that that organizational culture is not being consistently applied across the organization because the organizational imperative within in your example, the finance team and the marketing team are so very different. Now. They bring something different to the organization and recognizing that the people in those teams behave certain ways because it is productive for them within that team by collaboration, and focus on whatever the external mission is, requires that these internal teams work together. So if you do have two teams that are operating very differently, then your culture is not doing its job. Your organizational culture is one of disparity Eat between teams, you might know what you're gonna get after you have time to work there. But you can't say, as a hiring leader, this is what our culture is because the culture is very different within the organization. And that is such a strong example of how organizational climate which generally as measured by employee engagement scores, pulse surveys, or that sort of thing, those scores can be so different from leader to leader. And that is because the atmosphere that's created within those teams can be so diametrically opposed the atmosphere within marketing, and the atmosphere within finance or accounting in your example, could be so different that it doesn't allow them to gel. So there's a couple of ways around that there's obviously coaching for the leaders and some intentionality around bribing, which organization better and bodies, the culture and to try to shape that organization that doesn't fit within the broader organizational culture to fit more within the organizational culture, you might have to change leaders to do that. There's a lot of reasons why that can happen. And I think that's very common in an organization. And typically today, I think organizations look at their employee engagement scores, which is the temperature of the organizational climate, and they try to create these action plans, but they don't really find a lot of effect, other than saying, this is your measure leader, you need to improve it. And the leader may not exactly know or understand why their atmosphere and why their engagement or their organizational climate within their team is so vastly different than the rest of the organization. I think this is where a deep dive into what the atmosphere should look like, what meetings should look like, how team interaction should look like how one on one interaction should look like, being very explicit in the design of those types of interactions for the leadership level, can shape the atmosphere, and bring the organization and help it evolve to a new culture or get in line with a culture that the organization wants to have.

Dr. K  12:11  
Right. And I would agree with all that, I think there needs to be room for flexibility, whether you have a company of five people or you have an organization of 1000s people are gonna bring their own stuff in. So it's, it's leaving room for flexibility, because you were using, and we try not to use the word shouldn't therapy a lot. But you know, you know, it shouldn't be designed like this, and it should look like that, that it needs to, in my opinion, there needs to be room for flexibility, because people bring in stuff from the outside, you know, emotions do get brought in been talking about COVID, and people's worry and stuff like that all that emotion comes in. And it should be a general sense of what interaction should look like. Not it should be like this, but a, you know, hey, we're gonna be we're gonna ask open ended questions, we're going to, you know, if we're going to read body language to some extent, and if something doesn't seem to be fitting, we're going to call someone in and see how they're doing what's going on what, why aren't you getting along with Terry and Stephen over there? You know, what, what's what's what the interactions, what's happening, that's creating this turmoil in the atmosphere? And then which would, you know, doesn't help the culture, which doesn't help the climate either. What are your thoughts on that?

Dr. D.  13:33  
People are unique and individualistic, and they bring their own perspective, and they bring their own baggage, and they bring their strengths and they bring their weaknesses to every interaction that they have. I when I think about atmosphere, I think about guardrails, the unwritten rules of the culture are, we're going to treat each other with respect, for example, which means if you see meetings where there's a particularly tough leader who has a tendency to scream and yell and pound the desk and be very demanding, that is counter to the culture that you're trying to create for a leader who puts things off until the very last minute for their teams, and drops big projects on them at the last minute and creates a very high stress environment unnecessarily. Those are decisions that leaders make that create an atmosphere for their team or for that interaction. That's not necessarily healthy for the larger organization. Leaders have to be held accountable. Or even team members need to be held accountable when actions, drive behaviors that create an atmosphere that are counter to the organizational culture. Because if you say we want to be an organization full of compassion and empathy, and open ended questions and really caring environment, and you take no action on the quote unquote jury In the organization, who might be an excellent employee and a great salesperson, but just runs roughshod and creates an awful atmosphere in every meeting and every interaction that they're in, but they get results, you're not going to shape your culture. And you open the door to say, hey, our culture is one, where, yeah, we say these things. But we don't enforce these things. So we can do whatever the heck we want, we undermine the trust in our culture, and create an organizational climate of mistrust, when leaders are just permitted to continue to behave in ways that are counter to the environment. And you can sense that in each interaction that they have, and the atmosphere that they create around,

Dr. K  15:44  
would you say that leadership support would be one of the most important aspects in creating a positive atmosphere.

Dr. D.  15:53  
If you want a positive organizational culture, you have to have leaders who embody positive traits. If you hire a bunch of people that are pessimistic and negative about a lot of things, you can't support a positive organizational culture, you have to have leadership support to be able to do that you have to have buy in from every level of the organization, to whatever those cultural norms you're trying to embody, in order to create that environment. Because again, every outlier that you have, in terms of behavior, can create individual interactions that are counter to the culture that you're trying to create and erode your organizational climate. I think about an example that I had my own working life, the organization was generally a very compassionate, very focused on business. There was one leader, a fairly powerful leader that brought in a very strong political point of view to every meeting, every meeting started with his complaining about the political enemy of the day, he would come in and say, I can't believe it was whatever you'd heard on the news that morning, likely, I can't believe that accent X, X and Y, they're so stupid, I hate blah, blah, blah, they need to go to prison or, you know, whatever, whatever the political vitriol of the day was, and knowing that, just given the statistics of the country being polarized, he was turning off half the people in the organization, I didn't really care what he said. But he created this atmosphere. A he wasn't very sensitive, be he was fairly easily manipulated by the media, because some of the stuff he said was true, but some of it was kind of nutty, or at least to be extreme. And so he undermined his own credibility with at least half the population of the audience that he was coming in. And he was often running meetings, and you would get people nodding in agreement or rolling their eyes. But you always knew that when this person walked into the room, what the atmosphere was going to be, and it was very counter to the organization and the organization had this tendency, well, if people have been here long enough, then they kind of got a free pass to do whatever, as long as it wasn't illegal. And that was very counter to the culture, because they would hold newer folks in the organization to a higher standard than those that had been around a while. And I found that very frustrating, personally, this, this person is being very counterproductive to me, he's a we're losing about 10 to 15 minutes to his rants, he's turning off half the group of the meeting. And people who don't know this person would be turned off and almost disgusted and couldn't get their brain unwrapped around whatever the behavior was at the beginning of the meeting. And so it just made the environment in the meeting less productive. And so when I'd have conversations with other leaders and say, How can we help fix this, and I've even brought it to his attention to he had no interest in changing. The organization just said, Well, he's been here for 30 years. What are you gonna do? That's just who he is. And it was awful. It was just awful and very counterproductive.

Dr. K  19:11  
Yeah, I worked for a company that was very boys club esque type of company. And the old the culture was one way the climate was another way. And the only thing that would change, you know, within, you know, as we're talking about atmosphere would be the interactions with the managers, you know, the managers you know, they would as we used to, as we called it, affectionately and non affectionately drink the Kool Aid, you know, whenever a new manager would come into the, you know, into the company, they all drink the Kool Aid, we got to change everything in this and that, and, you know, once the dust would settle, what would make the what would make the culture and the climate bearable would be See those either individual interactions or, you know, when we would have team meetings prior to beginning the day or what have you, and the manager would, you know, bring in a funny joke or, you know, be like, Hey, I know, it's been a rough week, let's look at this, you know, you guys have done a great job, they would use a lot of positiveness. And try to create, okay, I know things are rough, hey, this person, do you know, this CEO is going to be walking in the door today, you know, be ready for that. They would prepare us but they would also support us now there would be a few that would, you know, kind of do a lot of finger pointing, and, you know, you got to do better and done it ah, and not, not provide. It was always negative. If there was no support in there, there was no encouragement. And that would change the, you know, the atmosphere of how, you know, that day would begin, you know, sometimes I would see what manager was going to be on or what was going on? And I would just be like, Okay, let me let me get all ready for this. And then other times, I'd be like, Oh, it's gonna be a great shift. Look at who's on today.

Dr. D.  21:09  
And what did that say about the organization, it said that they didn't have a plan for their culture, they certainly weren't hiring for culture, and the atmosphere that was created by different managers, you couldn't have confidence in your day to day interactions with because the managers would bring their own atmosphere, and they weren't held to account for what was appropriate and what wasn't.

Dr. K  21:31  
Right. However, in this instance, them bringing their own atmosphere helped the culture, it was actually a positive when they would bring in a kind of different mindset, it actually was easier to deal with the culture and the climate that was created by

Dr. D.  21:47  
so the organizational culture was largely negative. And there would be bright spots from new managers that were brought in. Is that what you're saying? Yes, yeah. And what would happen with those managers, if the culture driven by the executive leadership was one of negativity, those positive leaders may not have lasted very long, they may have felt worn down and would leave the organization because their perspective was not aligned with the organizational culture. And that positive momentum that could have been shaped by them ultimately ended up leaving, I'm guessing.

Dr. K  22:22  
Yeah, I mean, you know, some would stay, some would go, they would rotate around, it changed from, you know, different regions, depending on the region that I would be in or what have you. But it would, you know, we would all know, this is our ultimate goal. How can I help you to get there to get all this done without kind of losing your sense of support, losing your sense of safety, losing your sense of autonomy, so forth and so forth?

Dr. D.  22:53  
And the managers that brought that positivity that support? Would you say that they brought good leadership?

Dr. K  23:00  
I would say on the most part, they brought good leadership, just like everyone, they're human, too. And they'd have their days where you'd be like, Oh, okay, you need a nap later. Go. Yeah. You know, but for the most part, it, it they were good leaders, they remembered what it was like when they were lower on the totem pole, or they, you know, have done their own research or, you know, I mean, I'm, there was one manager that actually would do research on improving their leadership styles.

Dr. D.  23:30  
That's great. Yeah.

Dr. K  23:33  
So that was always nice to bring in. So, you know, when we were talking, when we brought up talking about organizational atmosphere, you had brought up how we could have this really great sense of culture in this really great climate. But you brought up like, if there was external things that could happen that could change you the atmosphere or the climate for a certain amount of time. So I wanted you to kind of talk about that a little bit more

Dr. D.  24:03  
externalities, whether it's a short term shock, or a long term impact, can have devastating impact on the atmosphere. And if not managed, that atmosphere can shape the culture. I think COVID is a really good example of an external shock that happened to organizations. The atmosphere that was created right at the beginning of the pandemic was filled with a lot of uncertainty, it becomes a topic of conversation, it becomes a fear event that can shape the atmosphere of individual interaction, and recognizing that an atmosphere of stress and uncertainty can change the behavior of most people during that time that external shock could create a transient event that causes their behavior to create an atmosphere in interactions that are counterproductive. And the question is, as you as a as a leader of people, how much flexibility do you give? Because of those external shocks? And do you recognize for yourself when things that are external to you that you're bringing? For the day, lack of sleep, a fight with a loved one? A weather event? Who knows what that is? Are you bringing something that is detracting from the atmosphere? Or can you bring something from that, that enhances the atmosphere?

Dr. K  25:28  
Yeah, that's, those are all, you know, great questions. And to kind of tag along with that, you know, it the atmosphere, as we are describing, it is kind of those interactions, those day to day interactions, and so forth, and so forth. And just one little, you know, a huge pile up on the 10, or something like that can change the atmosphere for one person when they walk in? It's, I think, flexibility on the size of leaders, okay, I see what's going on. That's, you know, obviously, you know, if someone's always late, you need to talk to them about, you know, their, you know, being tardy, however, it's going, okay, you know, they're kind of, you know, they're disappointed in their self or they're frustrated with traffic, because, you know, LA traffic is the worst. And it's going, Hey, I get it, don't worry about it, you know, we'll you know, Tomorrow will be another day or later on, giving them that support now, because traffic, you know, especially just going with traffic traffic in LA can really bring, I mean, there's road rage, there's all kinds of stuff. But if you can go Whoa, let's just kind of, you know, as a leader go in and be like, we get it traffic is awful. And it's not fun to be in. But you know, don't worry about it, let's just, you know, let's get the day going, Are you doing okay? Take a breather, and that could change the atmosphere for that day, it's understanding with the way that we are describing atmosphere is that the atmosphere can change moment to moment, day to day, week to week, give or take what is going on, if you have you know, we're trying to get this, this marketing block out. And I know, it's not called a block, but I can't remember what it's called. But this marketing block out, the atmosphere for that week may be stressful, because we've got to get it out, we have a timeframe and the, you know, the clients want this, and it's got to be perfect and all of that. But then knowing you know, back in on Monday, Great job, guys, you know, you really pulled together it's supporting the team or the individual, but it's knowing that the atmosphere has potential of going back to what it is, as long as you have a, you know, it's kind of like an internal sense of what you're looking for the atmosphere to be, if everybody's coming in Grumpy Pants and being you know, are all down, that's gonna be the atmosphere.

Dr. D.  27:50  
Absolutely. And I think that's great leadership, I think great leadership brings not just a consistent atmosphere, and a great leader is thinking about the atmosphere that they're creating around them. But a great leader senses what the team needs and creates the atmosphere that the team needs. If there is a lot of uncertainty, say there are wildfires and evacuations, creating an atmosphere of understanding and say, Hey, I recognize you've got a lot going on. There's stuff going on that's outside of our control, and being patient with people while they're adapting to whatever circumstances going on around them. Or in that stressful environment, a leader bringing in coffee or food for the team and saying, Hey, I know it's a really busy time. I'm here to support you. How can I help and getting into the trenches with them can create an atmosphere that is supportive of the environment doesn't necessarily change the externality, but that leadership support brings a dynamic to the atmosphere and helps shape the atmosphere to turn it from being a negative experience for whomever it is to a more positive and supportive one.

Dr. K  29:03  
So Dr. D, how do you think leaders can prepare to create a positive supportive atmosphere? I

Dr. D.  29:11  
think it starts with having a clear understanding of your organizational culture and an unvarnished perspective on where it works and where it doesn't don't sugarcoat it. Note common traps where climate may work against culture building, like in meetings or with new hires are those externalities that we talked about us atmospheric sensing as a deeper understanding of engagement within teams and dynamics across teams. If your employee engagement measures are suffering in certain areas, look at the atmosphere in those areas and what's created from leaders and team members in that area. Ensure there's frequent and open dialogue about the organizational atmosphere and use it to sense the direction of organizational climate. Finally, be deliberate about expectations and give space for people to explore new ways to bring the right balance. Spirit at every interaction. employees that have a positive atmosphere, a consistent atmosphere, a relatively consistent atmosphere, from leader to leader, recognize what the organizational culture is. And I think it brings a sense of peace of mind. It brings a positive experience in going to work and at the end of the day, I think it breeds retention within an organization, you'll keep the right employees and you'll attract the right employees, because the atmosphere that they can expect from meeting to meeting and interaction to interaction is supportive of the culture that you're trying to create. what's on tap for next week?

Dr. K  30:41  
Next week, we'll be discussing confirmation bias in organizational decision making and how scientific thinking and bias sensing can help teams and leaders avoid faulty decision making.

Dr. D.  30:54  
That's an exciting one. I I really liked that one. So great. Well into all of you joining us on this journey to the round. Thanks so much. I'm Dr. D.

Dr. K  31:04  
And I'm Dr. K. And we are looking forward to your next visit with us to the executive realm

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