Creating a New
Culture
By Guy Riekeman, D.C., President, Life University
When I first became involved in chiropractic education I quickly learned that
I would need to adopt a new lexicon, the “lingo” of academics. One
of the phrases I heard commonly tossed out in meetings among academics was “campus
culture.” This phrase seemed benign enough when I heard it, and it was
sort of fun to say. However, I soon realized that when these two simple words
were injected into a conversation, they were often accompanied by a warning
and ruinous tone of resignation.
We view “culture” as the conscious or unconscious underpinning of
a group or organization, which identifies its uniqueness and spirit. But what
we don’t realize is that culture also encompasses the ingrained prejudices,
dysfunctional relationships and frustrations of its constituencies, which often
negates efforts of team building and can rob an organization of its ability
to be creative in reinventing itself for growth. Resentment of previous inequities
held by even a few individuals can be significant enough to diminish the joy
of another in important work done to affect positive change. Over time the impact
of such behaviors leads to a division in the workforce, and results in an environment
of mistrust, personal agendas and power struggles.
You may have seen this culture at work in a local service club or other organization,
witnessed it in your church or synagogue, or even experienced it in your own
practice or in another professional organization. You may even say, “So
what, that’s life.” And you move on. But, a negative culture can
cripple an organization or defeat an army. It can rob one of their dreams, defeating
every act as they watch the possibilities being squashed because of those who
are unwilling and unable to release the old “culture” for a new
vision.
How many times have we seen this in a sports team—an owner assembles a
team of superstars expecting great things, but instead watches the team implode
due to the egos and other personal indulgences of those unwilling to relinquish
old habits. Pat Riley, the former coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, said how
you shoot the ball is about personal style, but winning championships is about
setting aside personal goals for team goals.
Does building a team of superstars ensure success, or does having players in
the right positions with the spirit of teamwork win the game? Imagine the cacophonous,
chaotically piercing sounds of a gathering of hundreds of superb musicians warming
up their individual instruments, and then the pleasurable sounds of this same
grouping of musicians when led by the conductor. When did the random, frenzied
notes fuse into a symphonic melody? Success does not come from simply assembling
the pieces of a puzzle, but from the process of effectively integrating each
piece.
As a profession, chiropractic still hasn’t discovered how to best coordinate
many divergent views into a personage of unity, and we suffer because of it.
Our struggle is much like that of an organization struggling for growth, we
are held static with our varied internal cultures. At Life we are committed
to creating a culture of connectedness and working toward a common goal; we
work at it every day. During this past year we discovered we could be good in
crisis, pulling together and focusing on the issues impeding our future; accreditation,
enrollment and finances. Succeeding in accreditation, enrollment and finance
was our daily mantra, and it worked. Today we are approaching an enrollment
of 1,000 in our DC program, and 500 in our undergraduate and masters programs.
The crisis of accreditation is behind us, and our financial picture is stable.
But, being good at crisis management does not guarantee success in long-term
strategy and the execution of future initiatives. We must now get from, as the
popular Jim Collins’ book title reads, Good to Great, and learn how to
sustain ourselves at great and beyond.
I suggest that our strategy must be to first develop a “culture”
that understands and supports excellence and greatness, and then to affect change
through positive leadership. In his book, What Leaders Really Do, John Kotter
lays out eight steps for “Creating Major Change,” they include:
1. Establish a Sense of Urgency, 2. Create a Guiding Coalition, 3. Develop a
Vision and Strategy, 4. Communicate the Change/ Vision, 5. Empower Broad-Based
Action, 6. Generate Short-Term Wins, 7. Consolidate Gains and Spread the Change,
and 8. Anchor New Approaches in the Culture. Life has begun this process.
The majority of individuals who make up Life University, from the Board of Trustees
down are committed to the process of leadership and greatness. We are committed
to developing a culture that honors the past, but is focused on inventing the
future, from developing an innovative curriculum and educational programs to
building clinics that replicate a chiropractic practice. From an attitude that
combines philosophy with science and practice management, we will work to create
a culture of constructive values based on Eight Core Proficiencies: Integrity
and Citizenship, Leadership and Entrepreneurship, Learning Theory/Critical Thinking,
Contemporary Scientific Paradigms, Philosophy of Human Existence and Health
Care Policy, Communications and Relationships Theory/Skills, Belief Systems
and Performance and Integrative Change.
How do you change a culture? You honor its people, create a bigger vision, integrate
activity to maximize work, constantly reinvent yourself and create structure
out of chaos. You do it from the “Inside Out.”
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© Copyright 2005 Today's Chiropractic