From the moment you start a new job, you’re indoctrinated in the culture of your employer.
You pick up on the formality of the workplace by whether people are wearing suits or T-shirts and by whether desks are neat stacks of paper or jumbles of Nerf guns and figurines. You figure out expectations of work behavior from whether your new colleagues are glued to their desks or cluster for informal chats. You learn whether the management approach is collaborative or top-down from the way people participate in meetings. You absorb a company’s values from walls covered in fundraising posters, sales leaderboards or inspirational leadership quotations.
At least that’s how it used to be. Now that so many employees work from home—and are likely to continue doing so even after the pandemic ends—corporate culture is no longer something that can be absorbed so easily by new employees watching and listening to how things are done, and then passing on those values through their own actions.
In other words, it’s time for managers to rethink how culture is passed on in a world of remote work.
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