Workplace culture is a huge part of what draws great talent to great companies. But what sets one corporate culture apart from another? Today, your office coffee culture crusaders at Corporate Essentials are here to give you the low down on some of the most common types of office cultures.
Grab a great cup of your favorite drink and read on to see where your company’s culture fits into the mix.
The Coffee is Always On
This is a culture that typically exists in smaller firms where everyone gets the opportunity to really know everyone else – the sort of company where everyone is part of one big family.
This type of company is great place to get your foot in the door. “Family” workplace culture is likely to provide solid mentoring opportunities. For those interested in long-haul careers, these employers are more likely to consider the career track an employee may take through the firm and provide appropriate guidance, training and growth opportunities along the way. Common businesses with a family-centric culture are local companies and regional firms that still have hometown roots.
The Long Pour
There is plenty to be said for valuing the contribution of all staff at all levels – and then there is academy culture. In an academy culture, employees are valued for their expertise in particular areas, but more than this corporate culture based on the academy model values ongoing professional development.
Employees are encouraged to continue developing their existing skill set, attaining higher levels of mastery as technology and research push the boundary of the field in which these professionals may find themselves employed. Commonly, these are educational institutions, healthcare industries and science-based corporations.
Single-Origin
While our corporate cultures are not truly ranked in any sort of order, the first two logically lead us to this third, “elite” office culture. In an elite workplace culture setting, employees are hired for being experts in highly specialized fields – and they are strictly vetted for the jobs they take.
These are employers known for rewarding the hard graft their workforce puts into their dedicated tasks with bonuses and promotions, so long as employees can stand up to the ongoing scrutiny of their work in the form of frequent performance reviews, and achieve lofty targets.
Elite workplace cultures exist in organizations where specialist skills are in demand, such as commercial airlines and government departments.
House Blend
The House Blend is a culture where everyone combines their effort to satisfy that long-standing goal of customer-facing businesses everywhere: customer service. Commonly referred to as a “pragmatic” corporate culture, this is a workplace where all activities focus on meeting the demands and deliverables to ensure that customers get what they want.
While a workplace culture like this can be difficult for employees who are rated based on their ability to guarantee that customers are happy, the rewards can be great for those with the ability to relate to others and work within a loose set of guidelines to provide service that meets expectations.
Single-Serve
Please, do not let the name lead you to think that this is a corporate culture based on selfishness – it is not. This culture that is all about the individuals – after all, satisfied workers are more likely to meet deadlines, achieve targets and stick around.
Happy workers feel respected, respected workers feel valued, valued workers make great contributions and all of these things come together to create amazing teams.
The key in these corporations is ensuring that the individuals who make up the workforce have the opportunity to achieve their goals with a degree of autonomy – allowing them to balance the opportunities work affords them with the demands their day-to-day lives might carry.
Thermal Carafe
Unlike the “single-serve” culture, this corporate culture operates with a much more “one for all” mentality. All of the employees are driven by strict bylaws and deadlines in their tasks, spinning like well-oiled cogs into the larger corporate machine.
Employees who are unable to make their designated quotas or achieve the goals they have been assigned are ushered out the door. This is not to say that these larger, insular cultures are bad for employees – quite the opposite, employees who excel at their jobs are given plenty of opportunities for advancement, great training possibilities and solid bonuses. The thermal carafe is definitely the Sparta of the business world.
The Latte
This is the arena where we find the corporate cultures based on risk. Bear in mind risk is not exclusively the arena of financial management companies – in the business world, virtually all innovation is a risk activity.
The trick is figuring out which risks will pay off and which are purely “pie in the sky” ideas best left on the drawing board.
For the Latte corporate culture, expect to find your share of open agenda meetings, brainstorming sessions, off-beat staff activities – and you bet there is a well-stocked break room to provide the creative fuel that drives employees to come up with some of the most amazing innovations both for the company in question and the world at large.
Whatever corporate culture your company keeps, know that the foundation for much of the communication and inter-departmental working that helps individuals meet their targets and fosters successful teams can be built in your office break room.
If you are looking to move your corporate culture to the next level, contact the team of coffee culture experts at Corporate Essentials. We have close to twenty years of experience making corporate culture better through coffee, and we would be thrilled to help you on your way.
