Most executives I work with understand the importance of defining their workplace culture. Most also understand the importance of demonstrating those values day in and day out.
Where some executives falter is knowing when and how to defend their workplace culture. Let me tell you as plainly as I can. It’s time you put on your big boy pants and get ready to defend your workplace culture!
You know we live and work in a fallen world. A world that does not respect or value our Christian principles. I guarantee you will be under attack the minute you go forward, leading with Biblical principles and establishing a God-honoring culture.
So, if you are agonizing over whether you need to defend your workplace culture, I assure you that your choices are limited. You can ignore the attacks on your culture and hope they go away. They won’t! You can fold and submit to pressure to adopt secular values. Or you can anticipate the attacks and be prepared to defend your workplace culture.
Defend Your Workplace Culture
In his book Unconventional Leadership—The Bible’s Pathway to Wisdom, Influence, Results, and Growth, author Dr. Dave Alford describes the three steps needed to establish workplace culture. We start by defining the culture, demonstrating it, and finally, when needed, defending it. (We covered these steps in last week’s article: #495: Create A Growth Culture for Your Workplace by Taking These Three Steps.)
In my experience, the area where most leaders suffer the most angst is knowing when and how to respond to and defend against attacks on the workplace culture. Alford offers three dramatic examples of situations described in the Bible when the culture was defended and defended quite vigorously!
Moses
God gave Moses the Ten Commandments. One of which was the commandment not to take the Lord’s name in vain (Exodus 20:7). Shortly after Moses shared the Ten Commandments with the people, a man was heard using the name of God as a curse. I’m sure the people stood around wondering what would happen. Would Moses ignore the violation, or would he act against the man who brazenly broke God’s command?
It didn’t take long for them to get their answer. As soon as Moses found out, he ordered the people to take the man outside the camp and stone him to death (Leviticus 24:10-16)!
Joshua
When the people of Israel were preparing to take the city of Jericho, Joshua warned the people not to take any spoils for themselves from the city. Achan violated Joshua’s command by taking some fancy clothing, silver, and gold for himself (Joshua 7).
When Achan’s deception was discovered, Joshua ordered Achan, his family, and all his sheep and cattle to be taken outside the camp and stoned. To make sure people got the message, Joshua ordered them to be cremated and buried under a pile of rocks to serve as a reminder of what happened.
Jesus
The Temple of God was a place devoted to the worship of God. It was Holy ground. Yet over the years, merchants set up shop on the temple grounds defiling the temple.
When Jesus saw what they were doing, he fashioned a whip out of some cords and angrily drove out the merchants defiling the temple grounds, saying, “My house shall be called the house of prayer; but you have made it a den of thieves” (Matthew 21:13).
Moses Again!
Moses certainly had his work cut out for him establishing the culture of the Israelites when God handed him the Ten Commandments! In another example of defending the culture, a man decided to get some of his chores done on the Sabbath. Working on the Sabbath was a direct violation of the commandment not to work and to keep the Sabbath holy (Exodus 20:8).
Again, Moses’ defense of the culture was immediate and severe. He ordered the man taken outside the camp and stoned to death (Numbers 15:32-36)!
5 Lessons on Defending Your Workplace Culture
In defending the culture, five lessons from these Biblical examples are essential for us as leaders today.
- Anticipate challenges to your culture. People will challenge the authority of the leader attempting to establish cultural norms. Some will be from inside the organization, and some will come from outside, but they will come, and they will challenge you as the leader. So be ready!
- Don’t ignore it. You can’t defend the culture by ignoring violations, sweeping them under the rug, or hoping they will disappear. Breaches must be dealt with promptly.
- Get the facts. In each case, when the leader realized a cultural violation occurred, the first thing they did was get clear on what happened.
- Take action immediately. Corrective action needs to be taken as soon as it is practical. Any delays in taking action will cause people to wonder how serious you are about protecting and maintaining the culture.
- Don’t hide the issue. Note that in every Biblical example, the correction was done in public and involved other members of the organization. To defend the culture, people need to see that the values are being maintained, which needs to happen in a public forum.
The culture of a Christian workplace should set us apart from the secular world. We need to be a shining light on a hill that draws others to us because of how we live and work. That won’t happen if we do not take care to define and demonstrate our culture daily. And finally, when the cultural attacks come, and they will come, we must be prepared to defend our workplace culture. If we don’t defend our culture, the secular world will define it for us!
More Articles
I have written several articles on values. You can find them by typing “Values” in the search bar. Meanwhile, here are a few of my favorites.
- #495: Create A Growth Culture for Your Workplace by Taking These Three Steps
- #431: What Is a Christian Response to Woke Capitalism?
- #242: An Instructive Letter from My Back-to-the-Future Self
- #228: United We Stand, Divided We Fall
- #188: Your Values Aren’t Your Values Unless They Cost You Something
Join the Conversation
As always, questions and comments are welcome. Are there times when you have had to defend the workplace culture? If so, how did you do it? Is there an aspect of defending workplace culture that resonates with you?
I’d love your help. This blog is read primarily because people like you share it with friends. Would you be kind enough to share it by pressing the share button?
Category: Personal Development | Values
My workplace culture has been reduced to a home office, cup of coffee, two dogs and a cat. Not much to defend, but pleasant none the less!
Quite a change from your years on the police force, huh, John?!