Being human at work. What a simple concept. Organizations are just a group of humans trying to get something done together. And yet for decades, we’ve tried to cultivate success in organizations without acknowledging that their success is fully dependent on a bunch of emotional, irrational humans. It’s a scary proposition!
Which, my friends, is why I’m obsessed with learning about emotion, its impact on groups of people, and how to harness them rather than avoid them or deny they exist.
I often refer to the quote by Antonio Demasio, a famous expert in neuroscience and human behavior. He tells us that contrary to popular belief, we are not thinking machines that have feelings. We are, in fact, feeling machines that occasionally have rational thoughts! Our brains filter our perceptions through a veil of emotion. It permeates everything we think and influences all the choices we make.
Harvard Business Review published an article called “Manage Your Emotional Culture” in February 2016, offering a deep dive into the dynamics of emotion on organizational culture. It explores current research on emotion in the workplace. Can emotion create an element of a team’s culture? Is company culture highly influenced by emotion? Research has found that the answer is absolutely yes, on both accounts.
Cognitive Culture vs Emotional Culture
Cognitive culture refers to shared intellectual values, norms, and assumptions for the group to thrive. Setting tone for how we think and behave. Whereas emotional culture refers to the shared affective values, norms, and assumptions that govern which emotions people have and express at work… and which ones they are better off suppressing.
These two forms of culture are conveyed very differently in the workplace. Cognitive culture is usually conveyed verbally and explicitly, while emotional culture is conveyed through non-verbal cues. Leaders must be sensitive to and pay attention to these cues.
Emotions absolutely shape behavior! We can’t ignore their impact, and modern workplace dynamics are showing a clear trend that we should all be much more proactive and deliberate when it comes to emotional culture. After all, many people are leaving their jobs not because of the job itself, but how it feels to be doing the job.
Some companies might want their employees to show compassion, like in therapeutic practice. Others might their culture to exhibit a healthy amount of fear, like in risky stock trading. I’ve personally seen companies that have odd, dangerous emotional culture quirks, like openly allowing tantrums and fits.
Research over the last decade shows that Emotional culture influences employee satisfaction, burn-out, and even hard measures like financial performance and absenteeism. Positive emotions are consistently associated with better performance and service, while negative emotions lead to negative outcomes.
This sounds logical and even obvious, yet most managers don’t understand how to actively manage how employees feel and express their emotions at work. Sometimes this can lead to an emotional culture of suppression- no emotion allowed.
Strategies for Shaping Your Emotional Culture
Include positive emotions in your management principles, like ‘compassion’ ‘fun’ and ‘mutual admiration.’
Watch your non-verbal language – are you conveying stress, hostility, or mistrust?
Be intentional with office décor (e.g. photos of employees having fun together, or client successes).
Cultivate a culture of emotion (joy, playfulness) that aligns with your company’s purpose, and find ways to allow people to feel the emotions valued by the leadership!
Harness the positive emotions people already feel.
When negative emotions surface, embrace them and help employees think about situations and deal with situations in more constructive ways.
Model the emotions you want to cultivate– emotions are contagious. Negative ones are more contagious than positive ones!
Leaders are insufficiently aware of how much influence they have in creating an emotional culture. After watching these dynamics play out in dozens of companies, I urge leaders NOT to ignore the negative or unwanted emotions you’re seeing around you. Remember, they are contagious and spread quickly.
Learn about your emotional culture by diving into the emotions you’re seeing. Learn more about their source, and there you will find the levers you can work with to shift the culture!
Most companies focus on the cognitive components of culture, and get baffled and turned off by the emotional components. However, it’s up to senior leaders to establish which emotions will help the organization’s mission and success, create an environment that fuels these emotions, and model the emotions consistently.
What emotions do you want to see on your team? What emotions are you seeing that you know aren’t good for the team’s results or morale? How will YOU shape it?