HR strategy & workplace culture

Building a strong and positive workplace culture requires intentional effort and commitment. A well-defined HR strategy acts as a roadmap for aligning employees with the organization’s mission, values, and strategic priorities. It provides the structural support needed for fostering a workplace culture where people feel engaged, valued, and motivated.

Without an HR strategy in place to guide workplace culture, employees may feel disconnected from the organization’s mission, or perceive the work environment as disjointed or purely transactional. This can lead to difficulty attracting and retaining talent.

What is culture?

Workplace culture shapes employee norms, attitudes, and how people behave at work. While leadership plays a major role in shaping culture, all employees naturally shape culture as they work together through their daily interactions and habits.

Culture is made up of formal and informal elements. A code of conduct or performance expectations are formal expressions of culture. But the bigger driver of culture is often invisible, coming in the form of unwritten rules, old habits, traditions, and personal beliefs or assumptions. Within an organization, individual departments, teams, and committees may have their own distinct micro-cultures as well.

Building a positive workplace culture

Workplace stress, burnout, and mental health challenges are growing issues affecting Canadian workers, especially in nonprofit sectors like healthcare and social work. A strong HR strategy that prioritizes a positive workplace culture can reduce burnout, leaves of absences, and turnover.

In a positive workplace culture, people feel welcomed, valued, and supported. Key elements of a positive workplace culture include:

• Employee well-being – mental health supports are available, and people are encouraged to disconnect when away from work and given flexibility with working arrangements.
  
• Psychological safety – employees feel safe to voice concerns and share ideas without fear of reprisal.
  
• Accountable and transparent leadership – leaders and managers take employee feedback and issues seriously, communicate decisions clearly, and offer clear reporting channels for employee concerns.
• Clear expectations and mutual support – employees understand their roles and responsibilities, and are supported to do their best work, rather than punished when they don’t meet expectations.
  
• Employee recognition – leaders and managers regularly express gratitude and appreciation for employee contributions and accomplishments, rather than treating them as simply “part of the job.”

Culture attributes

Each organization has distinct attributes to their workplace culture. The Harvard Business Review breaks down eight types of workplace cultures according to the team’s ability to respond to change, and how collaborative team members are with each other in their day-to-day. Some cultures are defined by purpose, while others may be defined by order.  

With cultural attributes, there is no right answer — only the answer that’s right for your organization. Nonprofits looking to stay responsive to pressing issues may thrive with a workplace culture that is more centered on caring and purpose. Both are highly collaborative cultures where people are flexible and adaptable when faced with change.

Nonprofits that are subject to a lot of regulation, such as a housing developer or medical researcher, may need a more order- or safety-oriented culture. These cultures are still collaborative, but more hesitant about incorporating new ideas. 

Developing a culture-centric HR strategy

Understand the organization and its goals

Review the strategic plan. An effective HR strategy never stands on its own, but integrates the goals of the organization. An HR strategy will look very different for a nonprofit whose number one goal is to better support diverse populations, versus to become more data-driven and increase funding opportunities.

Assess employee engagement and satisfaction levels using surveys and other feedback tools. 

Assess current culture. Use a mix of surveys, focus groups, and internal observations to assess  the current workplace culture. This helps you understand how close you are to the desired culture, and identify practices or behaviours to reward or discourage.

Setting HR goals, metrics and initiatives

This is the part most people think of when they hear “HR strategy.” Once you have a better understanding of the organization’s landscape, set goals and objectives for change over the short and long-term. Make sure fostering workplace culture is one of the goals.

Approaching core HR focus areas with culture in mind may look like:

• Talent acquisition – hiring practices are attracting, and not alienating, candidates that align with the desired culture. For example, inclusive hiring practices will make a strong impression on candidates who act inclusively themselves.
  

• Talent retention – employee policies offer flexibility and autonomy wherever possible, rather than taking a punitive approach. Policies are communicated clearly in the employee manual.
  

• Onboarding and exits – employees are smoothly integrated into their roles and the working culture. Communicate the onboarding process clearly. Check in with the new hire at the end of their first week and month. When employees leave, conduct exit interviews to understand why and address issues that the employee brings up.
  

• Recognition and support – when recognizing or rewarding an employee, identify how the specific situation reinforces the culture you want to develop. For example, an employee has delivered a critical project that involved managing the priorities of many departments, but worked evenings and weekends to do so for a few weeks. As a caring culture, you might recognize the collaborative spirit and quality of the work. But support the employee by offering time off in lieu, rather than only praising the fact that the employee put in such long hours.
  

• Grievance procedures – workplace conflicts are inevitable, and employees need a fair and respectful way to address grievances when they’re unable to resolve it on their own. Typical grievance procedures tend to focus on fault-finding, which destroys trust in relationships, so consider community-based approaches for addressing hurt and harm. 
• Confidential reporting – employees should have a secure, anonymous way to report concerns or misconduct, such as with a service like ConfidenceLine

Learn about culture-building

When leaders role-model the behaviours and values they wish to see, employees are much more likely to follow suit. Culture-building and organizational behaviour is a skill like any other that can be learned and applied. Create a shared language for your team and with leadership early on about what it means and what it takes to build, shift and maintain a culture. Success depends on leadership to know how to model and continually communicate norms and shared values.

Fostering workplace connections

Much of culture-building is a heavy lift that requires intention and planning. But creating more opportunities for connection is a quick and simple way to get started. These tips can be adapted for in-person, hybrid and remote workplaces. 

“Buddy system” for new employees. Assign at least one onboarding buddy to every new employee for their first three months. Ideally, this is someone from another team whom they’ll be expected to interact with regularly. Onboarding buddies can set up a welcome chat in the employees first couple of weeks–the rest is up to you!

Coffee chats as part of professional development. Budget in a few coffees a year per employee for relationship-building and mentorship. Research shows that younger employees in particular seek mentorship at work, especially those working in hybrid or remote workplaces.

Special Teams channel for praise and celebration. Teams has a feature where you can send Praise to a colleague, and comes with a special banner and design. Offer tips on writing meaningful and specific recognition that goes beyond a simple “good job” or “congratulations.”

Team introductions at all-hands meetings. Set aside time at each all-hands meeting for a team or department to present a slide deck on the team. A photo, what people can go to them for in a work context, paired with some light fun facts, like pets, star signs and bucket lists.

Off-site retreats and planning sessions. Enable managers to take training and strategic planning off-site throughout the year. Don’t underestimate the power of being in a different setting to encourage people to feel a little constrained by work.

Further resources

Organizational Culture – Power Shifting | Land Trust Alliance

Why Workplace Culture Matters | Harvard Business Review