Page 166 - Performance Leadership

Chapter 9 Values and Culture • 155

F igur e 9.4
Cultural Performance Management Analysis

Company 2 Company 1
Group Individual

Meritocracy Aristocracy

Rules Relational

Long term Short term

Theory X Theory Y

Internal focus External focus

very individualized orientation, and through the meritocracy everyone
has the chance to work himself or herself up. It is very rules-oriented;
there is a process for everything. Given its public nature, it has a rela-
tively short-term focus; new business strategies need to pay off within
a fiscal year. The company tends toward Theory Y for the higher staff,
but there are people whose job it is to just follow the process. The com-
pany is relatively internally focused, and plans its business using a tra-
ditional budget. This company benefits from the typical best practices
of performance management: top-down strategy implementations,
openly shared feedback with a ranking of the best-scoring people in
sales. The bonus program, based on overperforming on the goals, can
be found on the company’s intranet, next to all other procedural
descriptions.
Applying this style of performance management in company 2, a
manufacturer about the same size as company 1, would not be suc-
cessful. Company 2 has been a family-owned business for multiple gen-
erations. Senior management knows most of the employees; many of
them have worked for the company their entire professional lives. The
next generation of ownership is growing up and the company needs to
secure their future too. The culture of the company is externally
focused, and it can only survive in the market due to an extreme