Culture

Your instinct tells you your culture isn’t fully supporting your goals.

We help you turn that instinct into a plan — clear, honest, and actionable.

It’s More Than Values on a Wall

Culture is more than the values you declare — it’s the behaviors, beliefs, and emotional norms that shape how work really gets done.

In our approach, culture has four layers:

→ Layer 0: Personal Cultural Backdrop
→ Layer 1: Universal Human Needs
→ Layer 2: Lived Reality
→ Layer 3: Aspirational Values

We diagnose your current culture across these layers — to surface misalignments, design strategic rituals, and make culture an actual lever for growth.

Layer 0
The Culture Before the Culture

Before we ever define values or design culture rituals, every organization is already shaped by its people’s own individual backgrounds — their cultural norms, generational assumptions, and emotional frameworks.

We call this Layer 0: the personal cultural backdrop that each team member brings with them when they join your team.

Understanding this layer helps explain why one-size-fits-all culture efforts often fall flat — and how to build rituals, values, and systems that actually land.

Layers 1–3
Culture in Practice

Layer 1

Universal Human Needs

How well your culture delivers on the trust-based commitments at the heart of Walt Brown’s 7 Human Promises

Layer 2

Lived Culture

The emotional undercurrents, behaviors, and informal norms that shape how people act and decide — and that often reveal themselves through the lens of implied values

Layer 3

Aspirational Culture

The values and ideals your company declares and aspires to — and how clearly they’re defined, demonstrated through everyday behaviors, and consistently reinforced

Make Culture a Lever, Not a Liability

We help leadership teams:

→ Surface and measure misalignment between lived and aspirational values
→ Identify rituals, messages, or behaviors that signal confusion
→ Align values with execution systems (hiring, recognition, accountability)
→ Repair emotional trust and clarity at key inflection points (growth, succession, crisis)

We don’t “fix” people.
We work on the systems and signals that shape how people show up, lead, and stay aligned.

Is Culture the Right Place to Start?

Culture work is often attempted too early — or too vaguely.

Before we recommend any intervention in this area, we typically begin with a holistic assessment to identify where your company will be best served.

More often than not, we find that implementing a strong C.O.R.e.™ goes a long way in fixing the majority of culture related misalignments.

Explore C.O.R.e.™

How the Five Areas Work Together

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Culture Is What Happens  When No One’s Looking.

It’s More Than Values on a Wall

Culture is more than the values you declare — it’s the behaviors, beliefs, and emotional norms that shape how work really gets done.

Layer 0
The Culture Before the Culture

Before we ever define values or design culture rituals, every organization is already shaped by its people’s own individual backgrounds — their cultural norms, generational assumptions, and emotional frameworks.

Understanding this layer helps explain why one-size-fits-all culture efforts often fall flat — and how to build rituals, values, and systems that actually land.