Espresso - How to build a culture - COOK

0:01Morning, morning, or welcome. Yes, I have grown a tash, I have got a nose ring and I am covered in tattoos. I am your barista for the day. Welcome to Espresso Short Snappy Espresso Short Podcast episodes. I've literally downloaded all the wisdom from all the founders and all the brands, like Gouda, Tills, Coconut Collaborative, Candy Kittens, Little Moons, Planet Organic, and I've distilled it into this micro, short, snappy wisdom to give you a mahoosive edge on the day, to kickstart your day. So look, without further ado, let's get cracking and enjoy this espresso shot. culture is really interesting it's kind of a bit like uh almost like decorating a christmas tree in that i think on linkedin on social media people are mistaking the decorations i the razzle dazzle the things that make it makes it sparkle i the decorations so i don't know whether it's beers on a friday or working from home a few days a week these are like the decorations you put on top of the tree but the real culture is built through years of like nurturing and and really going deep into the grounds i think that's where culture comes from i think where we're potentially going wrong is we're focusing on the decorations and not the actual tree and i think if we'd focused what's the point of having delicious decorations if there's no bloody trees hang on right i would love to know how and there's amazing perks amazing decorations at cook how did you build that die hard culture like how did you nurture that so the first thing to say is i have been very fortunate to work alongside my sister Rosie who's run the business alongside me for the last 10 years and I think she is probably in fact I'm pretty certain she is the best CEO of culture in the country in terms of how you do it she's obsessed by it and has always been obsessed by it so it's not it's categorically not something I would have been able to do by myself she is she's she is a culture genius um and so she has she's been the architect of it and i suppose i'd say a couple of things one is that culture is own you can only build it in an intentional way you have it's like anything else you have to plan it you have to you have to figure it out and i couldn't agree with you more the bells and whistles if people think they can hang bells and whistles or throw bells and whistles at the problem to create culture they're totally kidding themselves that's bullshit the thing that underpins everything in a culture is the values of an organization and values are things that most companies now make visible and um you can take values as seriously or as unseriously as you like um a lot of the time it feels like a lot of the two day you know people go away for two days and they sit around and they get pissed and they come up with and have a lovely time come up with the values come back and then it gets sort of put in the drawer and it's how do you you've got to figure out how do you make your values live and breathe in the business and both rosie and i see our primary roles as ceo as being the guardians and promoters of the values within our company.

3:23So the values are everything in Cook. And you only know values work in a business if people refer to them in sort of everyday conversations within the business. If people are not doing that, then your values aren't alive and well. And if your values aren't alive and well, then you have no foundations on which to build culture. It's values, values are the most important thing. So I think the other thing that helps build culture is values, there's try and measure it. So the best company survey has been really good for us because whilst no survey is ever perfect, we think that remains the best way of measuring culture.

4:07Every year we do it. Every year we learn things that aren't quite right in the business that we didn't know about people if you people can run companies and kid themselves about their culture they can think because everyone's nice to the boss um they can think everything's okay but actually beneath the surface is all sorts of resentment and or pissed off about specific things whatever it might be so it really really helps to actually measure it and actually take a survey each year and actually see where you are and get an objective empirical look at it because culture can be measured whilst imperfect it can be measured um so so yeah so those those those big things try and measure it values for us anyway have been hugely important um and also just a real belief um that we have in the business that at the end of the day we are we're making we're making frozen food right and the only thing there is no obvious barrier to entry um doing what we're doing no there's nothing technical we're still making small batch quantities and stuff the only reason we've been able to grow and thrive is because of the people that work in the business um it really is it's people really care about what they're doing whether it's working in the shops or working in the kitchens working in the office people really care about the business and it's just knowing that if that culture goes wrong, the business will soon go wrong.

5:38Thank you so, so much for listening. It honestly means the world to me. I hope you enjoyed your morning coffee and go and have an amazing day. Let's be having you. If you want the fun episode, it will be in the show notes. A link will be in the show notes for the full episode. Thank you so much. Please leave friends as well. It means the world to me.

6:02Boom, boom, boom.