Everyone has a childhood.  Regardless if that is a positive or negative experience, that crucial stage in your life is one of rapid growth and development.  Ultimately the environment that you are brought up in will  shape your cultural views as an adult.  This will eventually carry over into the way you prefer and perceive things in your career.  In the 1950’s Geert Hofstede, a Dutch psychologist, did a study across cultures in the modern nations.  His work looked at factors like power distance, management quality and styles, and other collective group beliefs.    Hofstede concluded that there are 6 cultural anchors in which everyone acts.  These are:

1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. Management Philosophy
                                       2. Organizational Control
                                       3. Organizational effectiveness
                                       4. Audience orientation
                                       5. Personal Approachability
                                       6. Group identity

One of the most important building blocks for organizations is their culture.  Organizational culture is defined as the way members of the team relate to their work, each other, and the outside world.  Cloverleaf has developed an assessment that will measure those six cultural anchors and rank individuals on a scale according to their individual cultural preferences.  This measures the motivators, behaviors, and drivers of the individual.  Each of the anchors have two different sides to the scale.  These different views help to explain a person’s cultural preferences and will allow one to understand why they act the way they do or have an opinion in certain situations.

The picture below depicts the Culture Pulse assessment results on a TEAM dashboard view on the Cloverleaf platform .  This scale demonstrates where each team member lands. and provides the definitions for each category.  While some team members may be strongly focused in one area, others may be more flexible and able to bounce back and forth between the two different mindsets.  This can be a good visualization of the differences on a team, but also a great tool to coach others through differences during times of pressure or conflict, or when forming new work teams.

Management Philosophy

This topic focuses on the way one motivates others, so you will have Support vs Performance individuals. A person who manages with a support philosophy will work alongside and inspire their team, where someone who manages via performance will set benchmarks and measurable performance goals.  Different teams will respond to motivation differently.  Once a team understands the management style that their leader exhibits then they can more effectively work together towards the end goal

Organizational Control

This category focuses on how you control outcomes and consists of a scale of Loose vs Strict.  People with loose control will embrace unpredictability and innovation, while those with strict control will mitigate risk by embracing efficiency and planning.  Understanding the implications of putting a strict control person in an unpredictable situation can be very valuable.  This could cause them stress, leave them disengaged, or even result in a loss of an employee is the situation does not improve.

Organizational Effectiveness

This category is focused on what motivates you to keep going.  Are you a means or goal-oriented person? Means oriented people enjoy the process, while goal-oriented individuals enjoy the end results.  Here you will begin to understand how different individuals like to approach different projects and how you can introduce different scenarios to them to keep them engaged.

Personal Approachability

This category is how you as an individual react to personal questions or stories.  If you are approachable you will most likely give others access to information freely.  Guarded individuals will keep information close to them and most likely closed off.  This can be thought about in terms of management and how likely others are to train others.  If you are less likely to share information you may not be as willing to train others and share with them the knowledge that you specifically have on a certain subject.  This may be an effective way to identify members of your team who may be more welcoming of a new hire.

Group Identity

This will explain what makes you a part of a group.  If you are professionally focused, you will identify most with your profession and your title.  Community professional focused individuals identify most with the people that they surround themselves with.  This can explain how you prefer to interact with others within the group.  This will help to explain the way some of the team members think differently and how they choose to interact within the team.

Ultimately the culture of the workplace controls the way the team behaves internally as well as externally.  Focusing on clear and challenging organizational goals can be accomplished by developing an understanding of individuals’ motivation, drive, and behavior.  Culture and an organization’s success go hand in hand.  With the help of the Cloverleaf Platform, you can view your entire team on the scale to see where everyone ranks with their own cultural preferences.  This can be very beneficial in developing, growing, or maintaining the culture and success of your team.  To see what the cultural preferences are on your specific team click here to contact us and learn more!

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The Cloverleaf Platform is a digital platform that incorporates 7 different personality and behavioral assessments in a one-stop-shop dashboard.  With digitally delivered insights to your email and a calendar sync option, you have valuable development and coaching information for yourself or your team right at your fingertips.  Summit SmartFarms has sole distribution rights to the platform for all agriculture based companies with the US and Canada.