Distrubuting Culture Ownership
- Tara Giambrone
- Sep 23
- 1 min read
Culture can’t thrive if it rests on one office's shoulders alone. This approach will struggle for many reasons - it's not sustainable for that office, it's not a priority for everyone, etc. All parts of an organization need to take accountability for creating and maintaining the culture they need to thrive. Distributing ownership across your organization creates shared responsibility and makes culture sustainable (read as: easy). Here are 3 steps you can take to distribute culture ownership.
1 | Engage Leadership at All Levels
Invite leaders—from executives to frontline managers—to co-own culture by defining their role in modeling values and reinforcing behaviors. Host a workshop to gather their insights and clarify expectations.
2 | Empower Culture Champions Across Teams
Identify and empower “culture champions” (you know them when you have them - they're often leading grassroots effort change without formal authority). Provide them with tools, support, and autonomy to promote cultural initiatives and gather feedback from their peers.
3 | Embed Culture in Everyday Processes
Integrate culture conversations into regular touchpoints like team meetings, performance reviews, and onboarding. Equip managers with simple frameworks and questions to make culture part of ongoing dialogue—not just special events. Set clear behavioiral expectations (the "how") for your work and include accountability framework.
You'd be surprised how easy it is to create a ripple effect of culture changes when owndership is spread throughout your organization.
The next few blog posts will discuss accountability issues organizations have encountered when they've distributed culture ownership to all parts of their organization.
Catalyst is always happy to be a thought partner and strategist with you.