Safety advocates who favor outlawing multitasking behind the wheel say the new generation of back-seat hawks may be playing a crucial role in changing the culture – much as they did in helping enforce seat belt laws – in a way these advocates say laws alone may not be able to.

 “Driver Texting Now an Issue in the Back Seat,” NY Times, Sept. 9, 2009

Yes, multitasking while driving can be dangerous to your health and to those around you.  We’ve probably all been frustrated while stuck behind a driver whose reaction time was slowed because they were texting or yapping away obliviously on the phone. 

But what I love about this quote is more than how it echos some of my earlier posts about the dangers of multitasking behind the wheel.  I’m particularly smitten by the observation about the role of the backseat drivers and how they’re changing the culture in a way that the laws by themselves can’t. 

It’s a concept that is transferable to the business setting and helps explain why some business policies don’t work.  Afterall, a corporate culture is more than the sum total of an organization’s business policies, guidelines, and directives.  It also includes the white space on the organization chart.

In my humble opinion it’s the white space that reflects the enterprise’s true actions and values.  Your policy, for example, may say that there’s an open door policy for complaints.  But, if in reality anyone walking through that door is met with suspicion (“You know they really didn’t mean that racial slur, they were just kidding”) to outright denial (“No, that’s not the way it is around here”) it won’t take long for employees to realize that the door is really more ajar than tell-me-what-you’re-really-thinking wide open.  They enter at their own risk.

Actions are what give the words effect.  Actions help us interprete words.  They tell us what’s truly expected and whether you really mean what you say.  It clues us in on how seriously to take the words.  As a result, actions can either give the words force and effect, or they can undermine them. 

Consider the role of culture the next time you revise your business policies.  If you want effective policies, you need to make sure the white space on the org chart is in synch with the black and white in your policy manual.  Actions really do speak louder than words.

© 2009 Corporate M.O., LLC

Tags: corporate culture, distracted driving, effective policies, effective policy, texting, white space

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 9th, 2009 at 9:44 pm and is filed under Business Blind Spots, Communications, Leadership. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.