Tag: Sam Silverstein

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Sustaining Culture: Continually Improve Company Culture

What’s measured is treasured. If it is important, you want to know what is going on and improve on it. And it’s data; it’s factual. And so right away, we know what to do, and we can see the improvements we’re making because we can measure and improve them. Sam Silverstein.

I am in the middle of premiering a new podcast series, Culture Crafters, on the Compliance Podcast Network. In this series, together with Sam Silverstein, we are taking a deep dive into corporate culture: how to measure it, assess it, monitor it, and improve it. Through this exploration, we have uncovered the surprising truth behind sustained success in company culture. We have taken a deep dive into maintaining a high-performing culture that attracts and retains top talent. We have discussed the often overlooked strategy that propels companies to celebrate every win, big or small, and compound their growth year after year. Today, we continue our journey by considering why you should continuously audit and assess your culture to improve it.

Achieving and sustaining a great culture within organizations is foundational to long-term success. It involves creating an environment where individuals feel valued and motivated to contribute meaningfully towards shared goals. This process starts with leadership setting the tone by exemplifying behaviors prioritizing people’s well-being and professional growth. Leaders can inspire employees to engage fully and commit to the organization’s vision by fostering a culture of trust, respect, and open communication. Consistently reinforcing core values and recognizing contributions are key components in nurturing a positive culture that endures challenges and fosters innovation.

Regular culture audits are essential for organizations seeking to understand and improve their cultural dynamics. These assessments provide a baseline for measuring progress and identifying areas for growth. By gathering data on employee perceptions, engagement levels, and alignment with organizational values, companies can pinpoint strengths and weaknesses within their culture. This information allows leaders to tailor interventions, policies, and initiatives that align with the organization’s desired cultural outcomes.

Moreover, ongoing assessments enable organizations to adapt to changing circumstances and ensure that the culture remains aligned with evolving goals and external influences. Sam Silverstein’s discussion on culture audits highlights the value of using data-driven insights to inform decision-making and drive cultural improvements. He stresses the importance of combining qualitative feedback with quantitative metrics to understand the organization’s culture comprehensively.

By being transparent about assessment results, leaders can foster a culture of accountability and continuous improvement. Sam’s emphasis on the iterative nature of culture assessments underscores the need for organizations to view cultural dynamics as dynamic and evolving. The conversation underscores that continual assessment is not merely a one-time exercise but a strategic tool for maintaining a healthy and adaptive culture over time. You should develop a plan to assess and regularly improve your culture.

  • Culture Audit: Develop a culture audit to assess the current state of your company’s culture. This can help identify areas for improvement and set a baseline for future assessments.
  • Documentation: Document your culture assessment findings and improvement plans. Utilize tools to create and maintain detailed records of your culture assessment and improvement initiatives.
  • Regular Assessment: Implement a schedule for culture assessments, such as quarterly or bi-annually. Use tools to gather feedback and measure progress over time.
  • Celebrate: Incorporate a culture of celebration within your organization. This can include employee recognition programs, town hall meetings, or even small gestures like personalized notes or tokens of appreciation.
  • Continuous Improvement: Based on the results of your culture assessments, develop a plan for continuous improvement. Use project management tools like Asana, Trello, or Monday.com to track and execute improvement initiatives, ensuring that progress is ongoing and continuous.

The bottom line is that authentic leadership plays a pivotal role in shaping a thriving culture. Compliance professionals and business leaders go beyond superficial gestures and genuinely prioritize the well-being of their teams. Leaders can create a culture where individuals feel respected and valued by demonstrating care and investment in employees’ development. Key traits include actively listening to employee feedback, providing growth opportunities, and demonstrating ethical decision-making. Ultimately, the conversation reveals that sustained success in company culture hinges on leaders’ commitment to prioritizing people and consistently reinforcing a positive work environment.

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Culture Crafters

Culture Crafters – What is Culture?

Seeing the regulators catch up to the business world is always interesting. That is what has happened to corporate culture. The Department of Justice is now assessing the corporate culture of any company under investigation. Yet, more than simply complying with this mandate, companies should strive to foster the best culture they can achieve. The reason is deceptively simple: the better the culture, the better the company. However, many business executives and even compliance professionals do not know how to craft a culture that allows your employees and your organization to implement such strategies. How can you unlock the power of a thriving workplace culture?

In this podcast series, Sam Silverstein, the most trusted voice in America on accountability, and Tom Fox, the Voice of Compliance, discuss the ways companies can elevate their culture to new heights. In this episode, they discuss what culture is.

Culture is the organizational DNA that underpins every action and decision, with leaders playing a pivotal role in its creation and sustenance. Tom strongly believes that culture is a top-down approach that commences at the highest echelons and permeates all levels. Fox underscores the power of repeated positive actions in shaping culture and questions how leadership’s cultural focus sets the tone for the rest of the organization.

Similarly, Sam emphasizes that culture reflects what is accepted and repeated within an organization. He advocates for a “culture by design,” a strategic and considered approach that aligns with the organization’s core values and goals. To Silverstein, trust and communication are central to a robust culture, which everyone is aware of and contributes towards maintaining and enhancing.

Key Highlights:

  • Cultivating Trust Through Organizational Leadership
  • Valuing People: The Heart of Leadership
  • Preserving Organizational Culture Through Leadership Succession
  • Cultural Values Upheld Through Individual Responsibility
  • Enhancing Organizational Culture Through Audits

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Sam Silverstein

Sam Silverstein is on LinkedIn

Sam Silverstein

The Culture Audit™

Tom Fox

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Culture Crafters

Culture Crafters: Assessing Your Culture Through The Culture Audit™

It is always interesting to see the regulators catch up to the business world. That is what has happened around corporate culture. The Department of Justice is now assessing corporate culture for any company under investigation. Yet more than simply complying with this mandate, companies should strive to foster the best culture they can. The reason is deceptively simple: the better the culture, the better the company. But many business executives and even compliance professionals do not know how to craft a culture that allows your employees and, thereby, your organization to implement such strategies. How can you unlock the power of a thriving workplace culture?

In this podcast series, Sam Silverstein, the most trusted voice in America on accountability  and Tom Fox, the Voice of Compliance, look at the ways companies can elevate their culture to new heights.  In this inaugural episode, they discuss how to assess your culture through the Culture Audit™.

The concept of a culture audit is a transformative tool that assesses an organization’s critical areas such as ethics, engagement, accountability, and diversity, offering valuable insights for improvement and fostering a high-performance work culture.

Tom posits that the culture audit not only measures these critical areas but also guides action plans for improvement, emphasizing continual assessment and prioritization of key cultural drivers for genuine change.

Similarly, Sam Silverstein underscores the necessity of conducting a culture audit to discern an organization’s cultural strengths and weaknesses. He asserts that culture directly affects an organization’s bottom line, citing instances where cultural improvements have significantly boosted performance, profits, and employee retention. For Silverstein, a comprehensive culture audit from the boardroom to the shop floor is fundamental for developing a positive and high-performing work environment.

Key Highlights:

  • Enhancing Organizational Culture for High Performance
  • Cultivating Accountability and Excellence for Success
  • Enhancing Workplace Culture through Detailed Assessment
  • Transparent and Traceable Culture Audit Findings
  • High-Performance Culture: Driving Financial Success

Resources:

Sam Silverstein

Sam Silverstein on LinkedIn

Sam Silverstein

The Culture Audit™

Tom Fox

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Auditing Culture

Why should you audit your culture? A compliance professional can utilize a comprehensive approach to evaluate various aspects of a company’s culture, including ethics, engagement, accountability, and diversity. Tom Fox and Sam Silverstein took up this topic in the inaugural episode of the Culture Crafters podcast. Silverstein emphasized the pivotal role of a high-performance culture in attracting and retaining top-tier talent, ultimately leading to improved company performance and profitability. According to Silverstein, the shortest and quickest path to organizational transformation is through culture, as it forms the core of all change.

Beginning with the speech by Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco in October 2021, they recognized the need for companies to assess, manage, monitor, and improve their corporate culture. This was memorialized in the 2023 Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs (ECCP) update, announced in January 2023. In the ECCP, the DOJ asks the following questions: how often and how does a company measure a culture of compliance? What are your hiring and incentive structures around compliance? What steps have you taken in response to your measurements of compliance?

All these questions posed by the DOJ lead to the requirement that every company assess its culture because the DOJ will take any enforcement action or review. However, it can be done using the same current compliance processes, as culture is just like any other risk. As a risk, it can be assessed. This is why a culture audit is a necessary first step in determining where your culture is, what needs improvement, and how to do so.

As important as it is to meet these DOJ expectations, the real power is to create a high-performing culture to allow your organization to grow to its potential. Focusing on a high-performance culture can lead to an 80% increase in performance, profits, and employee retention, fostering a productive work environment and driving overall success. The bottom line is that a high-performance culture is essential for attracting and retaining top-tier talent and can significantly improve a company’s performance and profitability.

Every compliance professional understands that you must first assess your risks in risk management. When you have assessed a risk, you can start to put together a risk management strategy. The same is true for corporate culture. You must first assess where your culture is and then move forward to improvement through culture and a culture management strategy. With your culture strategy in place, you can train your employees and monitor their performance, determining the results. From there, you can improve your culture strategy as needed. But it all starts with a culture audit.

The steps are familiar to every compliance professional.

  1. Assess Every Level. To gain a comprehensive understanding of the company’s culture, you must assess everyone in the organization, not just senior leadership.
  1. Continuous Improvement. After conducting the culture audit, organizations must receive a detailed Culture Audit Report, which includes responses and action plans. This report serves as a roadmap for companies to focus on key drivers, enhance alignment, and continuously improve their workplace culture.
  1. Sustain High Performance. Focus on building a high-performance culture can yield remarkable results, including an 80% increase in performance, profits, and employee retention. Creating a culture that inspires individuals to excel and be accountable is essential for long-term success.

To facilitate this, Silverstein created Culture Audit™. The Culture Audit is a software solution that assesses critical areas of a company’s culture, such as ethics, engagement, accountability, and diversity, providing actionable insights for improvement. Available in over 20 languages, it aids in transforming a company’s culture for sustainable high performance. A high-performance culture is essential for attracting and retaining top-tier talent and can significantly improve a company’s performance and profitability. The Culture Audit Report, a detailed document with responses and action plans, enables organizations to enhance their workplace culture effectively. The audit results are auditable, ensuring accurate conclusions and data traceability, adding credibility to the process. Focusing on a high-performance culture can lead to an 80% increase in performance, profits, and employee retention, fostering a productive work environment and driving overall success.

Silverstein encapsulates the essence of culture transformation: “The shortest, quickest path to seeing transformation in an organization is always through the culture because that’s at the core of all transformation.” Every business is incumbent upon preparing a comprehensive document that takes a deep dive into its culture assessment results and guides it on the path to improvement. This report is a foundation for implementing educational initiatives, training programs, and organizational transformation.

In conclusion, the culture audit is not a one-time fix but a continuous process that requires regular assessment and improvement. By prioritizing a high-performance culture, companies can create a productive work environment, attract top talent, and drive overall success.

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Assessing and Improving Corporate Culture Through the Culture Audit™

I am hugely pleased to announce a dynamic new tool for compliance professionals, the Culture Audit™ which is a software tool designed to help companies evaluate their corporate culture and identify areas for improvement. Developed by Sam Silverstein, founder of the Accountability Institute, the Culture Audit™ allows a compliance professional or any business to assess their corporate culture quickly and efficiently as mandated by the Department of Justice (DOJ). (Full disclosure-I do work for and with Sam Silverstein and the Accountability Institute.)

Beginning with the speech by Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco in October 2021, the recognized the need for companies to assess, manage, monitor and improve their corporate culture. This was memorialized in the 2023 update to the Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs (ECCP), announced in January 2023. In the ECCP, the DOJ asks these following questions how often and how does a company measure a culture of compliance? What are your hiring and incentive structures around compliance? What steps have you taken in response to your measurements of compliance?

All these questions posed by the DOJ lead to the requirement that every company needs to assess their culture, because the DOJ is going to do in any enforcement action or review. However, it can be done using the same compliance processes currently in place, as culture is just like any other risk. As a risk, it can be assessed. This is why the Culture Audit™ is such a game-changer in compliance as it provides you a software tool to perform that initial risk assessment. When you have assessed a risk, then you can start to put together a risk management strategy in place. With your culture strategy in place, you can train your employees on it and then monitor their performance, determining the results. From there you can improve your culture strategy as needed. But it all starts with a culture assessment, and that’s what the Culture Audit™ allows you to do.

The Culture Audit™ can be set to 20 languages, which makes this the best possible tool, not just for international companies, with offices around the world, but also those in places like in South Dakota, where there might be a production facility and there could actually be three or four languages spoken on the production floor. This allows all employees in an organization the opportunity to communicate, to provide the vital feedback, and makes this a very powerful tool.

The Culture Audit™ is simple for all employees to use as a link is provided used throughout the organization. Moreover, it is an anonymous survey. The Culture Audit™ does collect any specific Personal Identifiable Information (PII). The Culture Audit™ does not know who is responding, and there is no ability to track back to individual employees. This provides an environment where employees are free to share what they really think about the organization, what they really feel about what’s happening inside in their workplace culture.

The Culture Audit™ measures various aspects of a company’s culture, including compliance practices, hiring processes, and employee engagement. It generates a comprehensive report that highlights gaps and provides actionable steps for improvement. The tool is particularly beneficial for global organizations as it supports international language communication.

One key feature of the Culture Audit™ is its emphasis on auditability and transparency. In the event of a regulator’s inquiry, the Culture Audit™ provides a detailed report that can be shared to demonstrate the company’s commitment to assessing and improving its culture. The questions and the results are fully auditable. The raw data collected during the audit is also retained for future reference, allowing organizations to track their progress over time.

One of the key benefits of the Culture Audit™ is its ability to identify areas for improvement and provide actionable insights. The Culture Audit™ report includes an action plan that guides organizations on specific areas to focus on and steps to take for improvement. Silverstein emphasized that all companies should be either improving because they are underperforming or reinforcing what they are already good at. By continuously reinforcing positive aspects of their culture, organizations can prevent a decline over time.

The Culture Audit™ can also be a valuable tool for companies considering acquisitions. By using the tool to assess the culture of a potential target, companies can gain insights into the target’s values, ethics, and decision-making processes. This information can help inform the decision-making process and identify potential risks or areas of alignment.

The Culture Audit™ is a true game-changer in compliance as it provides organizations with a powerful tool to assess and improve their corporate culture. By measuring various aspects of culture, providing actionable insights, and emphasizing auditability and transparency, the Culture Audit™ helps organizations create a positive and productive workplace environment. With the increasing focus on corporate culture by regulators, the Culture Audit™ can also help companies demonstrate their commitment to ethical behavior and compliance. By utilizing this tool, organizations can drive better leadership, improve employee engagement, and ultimately enhance their bottom line.

Resources

Culture Audit

Set up a call to discuss the Culture Audit, click here

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FCPA Compliance Report

FCPA Compliance Report -The Culture Audit™ for Culture Assessments

Welcome to the award-winning FCPA Compliance Report, the longest-running podcast in compliance. In this episode, Tom Fox welcomes Sam Silverstein to talk about the new software product, The Culture Audit™ which allows a compliance professional to perform a culture assessment as required by the Department of Justice.

In the ever-evolving corporate world, the importance of assessing and improving corporate culture cannot be overstated. This is the focus of The Culture Audit™, a software tool that provides a comprehensive assessment of a company’s culture, identifying potential risks and areas for improvement, developed by Sam Silverstein and the Accountability Institute. Tom views The Culture Audit™ as a valuable tool, especially in light of the Department of Justice’s focus on corporate culture in white-collar enforcement actions. He sees culture as a risk that can be assessed, managed, and continuously improved.

Sam shares this perspective and with his extensive experience in accountability and leadership, he emphasizes the importance of regular culture assessments, which can lead to a better bottom line by fostering a culture of high ethics, employee engagement, and quality decision-making. To learn more about the Culture Audit and how it can benefit your organization, join Tom Fox and Sam Silverstein on this episode of the FCPA Compliance Report podcast.

 Key Highlights

  • Culture Assessment and Risk Identification Tool
  • Multilingual Communication Tool for Global Organizations
  • Creating a Data-Driven Workplace Culture
  • The Culture Audit™: Assessing and Improving Workplace Culture
  • Measuring Relational Commitments for Organizational Success

Resources

Culture Audit

Set up a call to discuss the Culture Audit, click here

Sam Silverstein and the Accountability Institute

Sam Silverstein on LinkedIn

 Tom Fox

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The Ethics Experts

Episode 162 – Sam Silverstein

In this episode of The Ethics Experts, Nick welcomes Sam Silverstein. Sam Silverstein, a Hall of Fame keynote speaker, accountability expert, and the author of 12 books on accountability, leadership, and workplace culture, including the highly acclaimed “No More Excuses!” and “Non-Negotiable.” As the founder of The Accountability Institute, LLC, and a seasoned speaker who has worked with some of the biggest names in business, government, and communities worldwide, Sam has the expertise and experience to help your team overcome its most significant challenges and achieve tremendous success.

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The Ethics Experts

Episode 051–Sam Silverstein


In this episode of The Ethics Experts, Gio welcomes Sam Silverstein, Author: No More Excuses & I Am Accountable, to the show to discuss accountability, leadership, and culture.

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The Ethics Movement

Sam Silverstein – The Accountability Workshop


CONVERGE is in its 5th year of bringing together the world’s leading companies for 2 days of dynamic speakers, thought-provoking breakout sessions, and opportunities to connect with like-minded professionals. This year the conference has gone virtual. You will leave the conference with new resources and best practices allowing you to continue the hard work of driving ethics to the center of your business. In today’s episode I visit with Sam Silverstein. We visit about his breakout at Converge20 on The Accountability Workshop.
What is Accountability and why have your been getting it wrong. More importantly with the renewed DOJ emphasis on Culture, Culture Assessment, Continuous Monitoring and Continuous Improvement, how can you use Accountability to drive the desired behaviors and satisfy the DOJ. For more registration and information on Converge20, click here.

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Accountability: The Heart of Compliance

Episode 4-Delta Airlines Demonstrates Accountability

We have been getting accountability all wrong in the compliance profession. It’s not a set of tasks – it’s a way of thinking and it has to come from the heart as well as the head. On Accountability: The Heart of Compliance Tom Fox and Sam Silverstein dig into what accountability means to the corporate compliance function and business organizations and most significantly, how to make it an integral part of your culture. In this episode we consider a recent example of accountability in the corporate world, courtesy of Delta Airlines. Some of the highlights include:

  • Accountability means ‘your problem is my problem’.
  • Accountability means keeping your commitment to others.
  • When your organization is accountability to your community it inspires your employees.
  • How accountability informs your core values.

For more information on Sam Silverstein and his work on accountability, click here.