Consulting with Us

Culture Mining is our term for the consulting and creative services approach we take to solving business problems. It's a focused engagement in which we observe daily life in your organization, interview people at all levels, and research relevant history in order to bring to light specific stories, daily customs, unique language, icons and behaviors. These "cultural assets" are the material you can use to:

• Demonstrate how your initiatives, mission and values are being lived out.
• Support your communications and messaging.
• Act as a powerful alignment compass to the members of your organization.

Culture Mining can result in many different "final products":

• Video and audio for your intranet, for e-training or orientation
• A presentation or performance for a company retreat or leadership summit
• An album or set of postcards

Step #1: Collaboration

From beginning to end we see this process as a collaboration where we work with you to determine your organization's particular needs. For example Culture Mining projects will surface stories that:

• Highlight how particular values are lived out in the organization.
• Articulate the qualities and behaviors shared by members of the organization.
• Demonstrate how your organization is a desirable place to work.

Step #2: Road Map

We create a proposal that outlines a plan for answering your your specific needs. The proposal is such that you commit to small chunks of time.

Step #3: Information Gathering

Workshops

Using our workshop model, your employees will benefit from hard skills training in compelling storytelling techniques and cross-departmental networking through exposure to others in the organization. Meanwhile the organization will gather important stories, told in a creative manner, about its values, history and mission.

Other Methods

We intentionally collect information about your organization through a diverse set of research methods. We focus on identifying those elements that are essential to your identified needs and that make your culture unique. Examples of each approach are included in parentheses.

• Review organizational archives such as annual reports, video or transcripts of leaders' speeches, orientation and training manuals, and in-house materials
• Survey third party books, articles and other resources about the organization, its industry and other industries it touches.
• Use organization-wide surveys as an information gathering tool and informal introduction to the project.
• Interview a broad cross-section of people inside of and working with the organization.
• Gather observations of behavior, language use, trends, metaphors and ways of viewing the world held by members of the organization.

Step #4: Culture Mine Products & Presentations

Our research and story gathering can result in a variety of different deliverables.

Custom designed presentations and performances of story content are live events that can be recorded for later distribution. The goal of the presentation is to compel the audience (members of the organization) to recognize, reflect on and discuss aspects of the organization's values and culture. The presentation usually takes the form of a series of vignettes--some funny, some pointed, some interactive, some provocative.

• Presentations may be a mix of anecdotal histories, leadership lore, daily customs, shared language and other elements that make up an organization's culture.
• Presentations use a variety of media and delivery techniques including but not limited to: visual imagery, props, outlandish pie charts, and comedic audience volunteer interactions.
• Stories might be presented by employees, by us, or both, live or on video.

Besides presentations, there are many other possible outputs that could be created from the information and stories we collect, for example:

• An interactive compilation of company stories, facts and trivia for your intranet, recruiting or training materials
• A Harper's Index-style list of statistics that relate to the organization's people
• Top 10 lists
• Interactive games, treasure hunts, teambuilding and other activities used in orientation sessions, meetings or retreats
• Scrapbooks, card decks postcards or other physical commemorative objects that display formative stories or cultural icons

Step #5: Outcomes

Culture Mining serves a number of organization development needs, among them helping members to:

• Get perspective on cultural issues in a way that diffuses tension into something people can talk and even laugh about
• Renew their commitment to the organization by involving them in articulating and celebrating the organization's identity
• Consciously embrace and live the organization's values.
• Recognize both differences and similarities among merged groups and concentrate on developing a shared culture.
• Consolidate vision and stories so the organization speaks with one voice to customers, potential employees, partners, and the world.

See Portfolio examples