Organizational Dynamics, Vol. 36, No. 3, pp. 288302, 2007 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. www.organizational-dynamics.

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ISSN 0090-2616/$ see frontmatter doi:10.1016/j.orgdyn.2007.04.004

Creating Corporate Cultures Through Mythopoetic Leadership

CHIP JARNAGIN JOHN W. SLOCUM JR.
It has always been the prime function of mythology and rite to supply the symbols that carry the human spirit forward, in counteraction to those other constant human fantasies that tend to tie it back. Joseph Campbell nest in personal service fullling even the unexpressed wishes and needs of our guests. All new trainees are shown lms that emphasize customer service. Managers also demonstrate good client service practices in their interactions with guests. These are both aspects of the organizations culture. The repeated emphasis on good customer relations in both training and day-to-day behavior helps create and maintain a customer-oriented culture throughout the RitzCarlton Hotel chain. To foster a culture that affords employees the opportunity to demonstrate customer-oriented behavior, every employee at the Ritz-Carlton is empowered to do whatever is takes, up to $2,000, to solve a customer issue. The hotel employee is not expected to delegate the problem to the proper department or to ask permission from his/her manager, but rather to do whatever it takes to get the problem resolved. In fact, the employee owns the problem until it is solved. With this policy, the rm demonstrates its trust in its people. New hires are carefully screened for their ability to apply the common-sense judgment required to solve problems. The hotel chain also signals to their employees that there is no excuse not to

t one of the Ritz-Carlton hotels, a beach attendant busily stacking chairs for an evening event was approached by a guest, who asked that two chairs be left out. The guest wanted to return to the beach that evening with his girlfriend and propose! Although the beach attendant was going off duty, he didnt just leave two chairs on the beach; he put on a tuxedo and brought owers, champagne, and candles. He met the couple when they arrived at the beach later that evening. He escorted them to the chairs, presented the owers, lit the candles, and served the champagne. The beach attendants heroic effort to satisfy a customer is every managers dream of exemplary employee behavior. Companies want their employees to always give their best. The age-old question is how a rm inspires them to consistently do so. One of the guiding values of The RitzCarlton Company L.L.C. is to provide the

Acknowledgement: This research was sponsored by a research grant from the OxyChem Corporation. The authors would like to thank Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc. for its generous contributions to this article and Mike Beer, Don Hellriegel, Ron Kirkpatrick, David Lei, Mick McGill, William Reisel, Jeff Sonnenfeld, Don Tuttle, and Bob Vecchio for their comments on an earlier version of this manuscript.
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satisfy guests, and that no procedure or manager should prevent them from achieving a positive customer experience. It is better to err on the side of generosity and make sure customers have more, rather than less. Ritzs senior management believes that for every mistake employees make by overstepping their authority, they will also please and surprise 100 guests. Therefore, for the beach attendant to perform the exceptional service for the guest who only asked that the attendant leave out two chairs was expected because of the cultural values of the Ritz-Carlton. The purpose of this article is to present a framework we have created for developing a corporate culture that drives employees to consistently make heroic efforts. We call it Mythopoetic Leadership.

WHY CULTURE MATTERS

Corporations have spent untold millions trying to understand and change their culture. Most mergers turn out to be nancial ascos. McKinsey & Co., The Hay Group, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu and other consulting rms indicate that almost 20 percent of acquired companies performances fall after acquisition. In fact, 90 percent of mergers never live up to their expectations. One of the most common reasons for these failures is a clash of corporate cultures. One needs only to look at the experiences of Carly Fiorina at Hewlett-Packard Co. to realize that changes in a culture through media blitzes and slick communications campaigns cannot lead to success. She did not understand that she entered a company whose founders had created a culture that was deeply embedded in the history of HP and was a strength to be maintained not broken. Behavior in an organization is determined more by its culture than by directives from senior management. Moreover, most organizations nd it impossible to implement any strategy marketing, nancial, etc. that is inconsistent with its culture. The reality is that culture has a greater impact

on a companys success than anything else management can do. Besides having a tremendous impact on the organizations, cultures are incredibly resilient. But when the amount of change exceeds a cultures ability to repress it, the old culture is destroyed and a new culture can be created. Chief Executive Ofcers (CEOs) of organizations ranging from Medtronic Inc. to Southwest Airlines Co. and from JetBlue Airways to The Home Depot Inc. widely acclaim that the effectiveness of their organization can, to a large degree, be explained by their organizations unique culture. In fact, Bob Nardelli, former CEO of Home Depot, has stated that it was the culture created by cofounder Bernie Marcus that was a major factor in Home Depots success. Under Nardellis tenure at Home Depot, he replaced this entrepreneurial customer responsive culture with one that has been characterized as militaristic, arrogant and insulated. In January 2007, the board of directors asked for and received his resignation. In their book Corporate Culture and Performance, John Kotter and James Heskett studied more than 200 companies and then related the organizations type of culture to nancial performance. Over an 11-year period of time, they found that companies with a strong culture signicantly outperformed those companies with a weak culture. Companies such as PepsiCo Inc., Wal-Mart Stores, J.C.Penney Company, Inc., BMW, Lego Group, TDIndustries, Medtronic, Whole Foods Market, and Mens Wearhouse, among others, have cultures that serve their main constituenciescustomers, employees, and shareholders. Employees who embrace their companys cultures are also less likely to leave their company because top management believes that their employees have the ability to grow and learn.

WHAT IS CULTURE?
The concept of organizational culture rst appeared in 431 B.C., when Pericles believed Athens could win the war with Sparta
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through strong, unied teamwork. The concept reappeared in Peters and Watermans book In Search of Excellence. The authors aver that the key to high performance is a strong culture. As more managers and researchers became intrigued with the notion of culture, there arose some confusion as to the meaning of the term. A myriad of academics and managers tried to dene it. Some of these denitions were esoteric, while others focused on how people acted. We believe that the day-to-day practices of an organization are embedded in its culture, which, according to Schein, is the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterize a company or corporation. Culture provides a pervasive context for employee actions. Because employee behaviors are greatly inuenced by it, the conceptualization of culture has captured the imagination of executives for decades. While it is widely known that a strong culture is one of several components that must come together for a rm to be successful and endure, most cultures are not intentionally created. They usually evolve by osmosis over long periods of time, often as reections of the rms founders. But, while a cultures consequences have a profound impact on the behaviors of employees, most managers allow their companys culture to develop without a deliberate plan. They do so because a concrete characterization of corporate culture has never been developed; its genesis has always appeared inexplicable. And while there have been many studies on this subject, their illuminations have been evanescent.

THE CONCEPT AND FUNCTION OF MYTH IN CULTURE DEVELOPMENT

Because their symbols are rich, myths occupy a sacred realm of experience, as they have an innite potential for interpretation and retelling. They can vary a great deal without losing their basic pattern of interpretation. Old myths can be told in new ways to address
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contemporary issues. Contemporary interpretations of myths therefore relate to current organizational realities and practices. Myths are not about truth, but instead are a continuing redrafting of an ongoing story that becomes more comprehensible over time. They aim at exploring a plethora of behaviors. For example, the Greeks used myths to extol the virtues and vices of their gods. Mythopoetic Leadership is a framework for developing robust corporate cultures based on myths. It is grounded in the work of Joseph Campbell, the renowned cultural anthropologist. His studies demonstrated the cohesive similarities of myths and mythic structures throughout history and across the cultures of the world. Villains and heroes are expressed through myths by a storyteller who puts the myth into order to create characters and describe salient relationships. Mythological archetypes are anchored in each persons unconscious, yet shared by all people in the community. It is through myths that people cease being individuals and become capable of experiencing community. Myths serve in both reecting and directing the human psyche. Campbells observations on culture and myth provide insights to the organizational dynamics within the business world today. Myths are analogies used to explain the unexplainable. That is, myths help people make sense out of chaos. As people are thrown into new experiences, they seek an interpretation that is ongoing. Myths are mental models that permit people to make sense of their current conditions. According to Karl Weick, sensemaking involves a retrospective development of events so that people can understand their current situation. The language of the myth helps people make sense out of their organizational life. At DaVita Corp., an operator of kidney dialysis centers, the language one for all and all for one emphasizes the organization as a community. This language was instrumental in transforming the culture of the organization. Myths are about categorizing experiences. As such, they serve four functions:

the metaphysical, the cosmological, the psychological, and the sociological. The metaphysical function refers to mans realizing the wonders of the universe and experiencing the awe of this mystery. The cosmological function is concerned with science and the mysteries that it cannot explain. The psychological function relates to the psyche of the individual and his/her spiritual realization. The sociological focuses on validating and supporting a certain social order and is, thus, most central to this article. Campbell wrote: The social function of mythology and the rites by which it is rendered are to establish in every member of the group concerned a system of sentiments that can be depended upon to link him spontaneously to its ends. The sociological purpose of myth and ritual is to integrate individuals into a larger structure. Myths support the social order. They serve to both set and represent the collective unconscious of the group and characterize the connectedness and legitimacy of the groups social structure. Within organizations, myths provide a mentoring function; they give a perspective to employees regarding what is happening to them and provide guide signs as to how to respond to what they experience within the bounds of the group. Rituals are an enactment of myth; when people take part in a ritual, they are experiencing a mythological life. Rites and ceremonies reinforce the mythology of the group. Rites of installation and passage help initiate an individual into the social order through the process of social identity. When new Mary Kay Inc. saleswomen attend one of the companys seminars, they learn from the stories of others accomplishments what the organization expects. The lavishness and public nature of the ceremony conveys how important these accomplishments are to the company. Such latent messages, along with the awards and recognition given, help to motivate other saleswomen to achieve

greater efforts. The participation in such galas binds members together and commits them to the group. Campbell also wrote about a special type of myth, the story of the hero, in his classic work The Hero with a Thousand Faces. He stated that all of the hero stories throughout history converge to the same myth: A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are already encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man. According to Campbell, there is an inborn, fundamental need within the human psyche for the catharsis and transcendence provided by taking part in these transformative myths. The hero shows us the path so that we may follow it on our own. Thus, we may also experience redemption and become boon-bringers. The hero myth also serves to unite people with the same intention.

THE MYTHOPOETIC LEADERSHIP FRAMEWORK

To build a strong corporate culture, an organization must develop a frame of reference it can use to create a viable social identity. A Mythopoetic Leader is one who proactively develops his or her rms mythology drenched in the companys social identity framework to create the culture of the rm, i.e., to shape the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices characterizing the organization. We suggest that this social identication process denes and shapes the social reality for the rms employees. Many managers talk culture but have little idea of how to shape it. Managers typically go to rational tools like structure and policies alone without ever going to the power that meaning develops through myths, rituals, and policies working as a coherent whole.
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The ability of a leader to create a compelling social identity is partly a combination of cultural heritage and rhetorical skill. That is, it depends on the ability to draw upon commonly available understandings of identity contained in the mission statement and values advanced by the executives of an organization. It also equally depends upon managers to take ambiguous or novel circumstances and, through metaphor and analogy, make sense of them in terms familiar to their followers. This is the genesis of the rms mythology. Employees weigh and evaluate these metaphors and analogies based on their prior experiences and other sources of information available to them and then use these myths as a guide in their daily actions.

The role of mission statements and values

It is the responsibility of top management and the board of directors to set the mission and the values of the rm, which become the underpinnings of the rms business strategy. These are the anchors company myths must be attached to. They build a clear vision of who we are and what we do, which denes the character of the rm and bonds employees with its goals. The mission and values also guide employee actions. Executive communications and actions need to integrate and ow from these goals, which will assist in coordinating employee behaviors towards the desired outcomes. Memetically speaking, the rms mission statement and values form the organizations cultural DNA, which must be replicated throughout the organization through myths, rites, and systems. Most rms have a mission statement. To be an integral part of the rms mythology, the mission must be stated after the fashion of a heroic myth specically stating how the companys services benet humanity. When Mary Kay Ash founded her cosmetics company, the mission was to enrich womens lives. By providing women with the ability to earn money by selling a product that most women use in the comfort of their own homes, Mary Kay believed that women could enrich their
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lives while gaining status and dignity. Similarly, when David Neeleman founded JetBlue in 1999, his mission was to combine common sense with innovation and technology, and to bring back humanity to air travel. As a customer advocate, Neeleman believes that travelers should have access to high-quality airline service at affordable rates. Everybody wants to be a hero in a story that is larger than their own lives. A Mythopoetic Mission Statement is written to illustrate how the rm benets mankind. By serving that mission, it gives employees the opportunity to feel good about themselves and to experience being cultural heroes. The chance to be a hero is inspirational. A mission statement written in this form becomes a symbolic aid that aligns employees with the goals of the rm. It binds them with a common purpose. This increases camaraderie and encourages a greater sense of responsibility and accountability. And it helps to minimize covert processes. According to Bill George, former chairman and CEO of Medtronic and author of Authentic Leadership, a meaningful mission statement serves to motivate people because it gives them a sense of purpose. While competitors may be able to duplicate a companys product and/or service, they will have a hard time duplicating its employees commitment to the intrinsic purpose of the company. As employees seek meaning in their lives, mission driven companies create commitment by having employees believe in the purpose of their work and being part of something worthwhile. George recommends that if you can move your organization to that level, employees can accomplish more than you think possible. A Mythopoetic Mission Statement also aids in avoiding the problems caused by hero worship. Hero worship occurs when there is a cult formed around the companys founder(s), which keeps the rms employees from experiencing being heroes themselves. In May 1840, Thomas Carlyle delivered a lecture entitled Heroes and Hero Worship. One of the major themes developed in this lecture was that man has been fascinated with hero gures since Plato in 380 B.C.,

because heroes set themselves apart from ordinary people. Heroes are capable of focusing on the relationship between themselves and their followers. It is a psychological bond that allows followers (subordinates) to dene themselves as a member of the heros group. This act of social identication is critical, because it allows subordinates to become actively involved in framing their own social identities. Heroes effectively create identity denitions and engage others to turn these into practical realities. A problem arises when employees become loyal mainly to a particular person rather than the mission of the rm (e.g., Dennis Kozlowski, Walt Disney, and Ed Land). This can be a successful formula in the short term. But when the hero leaves, the fabric of the rms culture can be torn, sometimes irreparably. A rm with an endogenous culture manifested by loyalty to its mission rather than its founder stands to outlive the founder (e.g., Electronic Data Systems Corp., J.C.Penney, Johnson & Johnson). As long as the founders successors maintain the same emphasis on the rms Mythopoetic Mission and Values, it will not suffer a discontinuity when he or she departs. A Mythopoetic Value Set establishes the rest of a companys social identity. The values in this set are based on universal ideals. By dening them thusly, situations that invoke those ideals will conjure a common social identity for an employee and access capabilities that are not directly accessible to him consciously. These values also set explicit behavioral guidelines. There are two types of values in a rms Mythopoetic Value Set. The rst describes how the rm ts into its industry and society in general. The second type describes how the employees t into the rm. Both should reect the society the rm operates in; they will already be recognized as laudable by the rms employeesthus having an intrinsic appeal. And they will allow every employee of the rm to express what he or she considers to be the best within him or her. Being able to express these values in their business lives will not only reinforce their own inner

sense of virtuousness, thereby boosting their self-esteem, but will also reinforce employees good feelings towards the rm and its mission. As an example, JetBlue has designed itself as a virtual organization. Many managers do not work out of its headquarters at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, but work and live in Connecticut, Utah, and Arizona. JetBlue also set up reservation agents who worked at home in the Salt Lake City area. Agents were trained, given computers, and then worked a minimum of 20 hours per week. Ann Rhoades, executive vice president of people at JetBlue, also designed human resource (HR) practices that permitted individuals to tailor their compensation packages to their distinct needs. Flight attendants, for example, could choose oneyear employment contracts at the prevailing rate of $19 per hour, with medical coverage plus $500 per month of additional pay to live in Manhattan, in lieu of other benets. This was designed for college students and young people who wanted to travel for a year. A second package was designed for people who wanted to job-share. Finally, a package was offered to people who wanted to make a career as a ight attendant. Corporate culture exists as a subset of the social culture it operates in, with a few added bounds of its own. The two are inextricably intertwined. A rm will be universally rejected within a society if it does not reect the mores of the culture it is embedded within. When Mary Kay entered China, they changed a reference to God in one of their values to that of a higher power. This was necessary to adapt to Chinese culture, as it does not have a JudeoChristian heritage like the U.S.

Top management
It is up to top management to expound upon and enforce the rms mission and values. This includes establishing systems that support them. Myths tap into the psyche, they help harness the human spirit, and also serve to inspire and direct the work force. They inuence the beliefs, attitudes, and
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behaviors of a rms employees. In so doing, the management is forging the collective unconscious the Zeitgeist of the rm. However, it is not enough for them, especially the CEO, to pay lip service to the rms values; management must live the values or they will ring hollow. Cultural formation cannot be delegated. Jack Welch said that he spent more than 60 percent of his time on people and cultural issues. Similarly, Archie Norman, the CEO who transformed the culture of Asda, a U.K. grocery chain, told Mike Beer that he spent 75 percent of his time on cultural formation. While many grocery chains have been slashing prices to compete with Wal-Mart and Target, Whole Foods has not. In fact, it has one of the highest prot margins per square foot in the industry. John Mackey, the companys founder and CEO, says that his goal was to create an organization based on love instead of fear, and describes Whole Foods as a community working together to create value for other people. At Whole Foods, the basic unit isnt the store, but small teams that manage departments, such as fresh produce, seafood, pastas, etc. Managers consult the teams on all store-level decisions and grant them decision-making autonomy that is a rarity in the retailing industry. Teams decide what to stock, and can decide whom to hire. Bonuses are paid to teams, not to individuals, and team members have access to detailed nancial data, including the amount of every workers compensation. Mackey believes that huge salary differentials are detrimental to the ethos of the community; Whole Foods has set a salary cap that limits any executives compensation to 19 times the company average. A disproportionate emphasis on monetary rewards leads managers to discount the power of volunteerism and self-management. Mackey has stated that he no longer wants to work for money and has asked the board of directors to donate all of his future stock options to the companys two foundations. Therefore, what differentiates Whole Foods from other companies is how Mackey reinforces its mission statement through how the organization is
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designed and its employees rewarded. At Whole Foods, the top 16 executives received only seven percent of the available stock options granted while the other 93 percent have been distributed throughout the company. Mackey and his top management team have developed a culture that blends libertarian politics, a commitment to selling healthy foods and ensuring compassionate treatment of animals, a willingness to share nancial information and knowledge, and a desire for growth. Whole Foods Declaration of Independence reects the hopes and aspiration of people and concludes Whole Foods. . . . spurs people towards creating a better person, company and world.

Storytelling
Throughout history, leaders have relied on storytelling to inspire followers. Listeners put themselves into a story by experiencing its emotional content. Relating to the events in the story provides them with a vicarious experience. Having an emotional experience directly engages the listener. Storytelling occurs in all cultures because it allows people to share their experiences. CEOs and others tell stories to illustrate their points, convey the corporate myth, celebrate acts of heroism, and retell classic epics that have confronted their organization. When people tell stories, they contribute to the sensemaking process, because their interpretation of the myth creates reality for employees. Storytelling is intrinsic to developing corporate mythology. It is the main vehicle that should be used by top management and by employees to transmit the rms mission and values throughout the organization. These stories paint pictures symbolizing the rms vision, which allows employees to personalize and absorb it. Because a picture is worth a thousand words, myths exponentially increase the power of the rms communications. They convey an understanding that is logical, intuitive, and emotional. This holds true for stories told both within and outside of the rm (e.g., marketing both Starbucks Corp.s and Whole Foods mythologies are

interwoven into their brand identities). When Keith Hughes was the CEO of The Associates, time was regarded as a value. Many stories were told about senior managers who were locked out of meetings and left at loading gates of airports if they arrived later than the appointed time. The CEO should further reinforce the rms mission and values by establishing rituals that reect the rms myths. The rituals used at Mary Kay provide a good example of this. During elaborate reward ceremonies, gold and diamond pins, fur stoles, and the use of pink Cadillacs (Buicks in China) are presented to salespeople who achieve their sales quotas. Music tends to arouse and express emotions, and all participants sing the Mary Kay song, Ive got that Mary Kay enthusiasm, which was written by a salesperson to the tune of Ive got that old time religion. This song is a direct expression of the mission statement and values of Mary Kay and is fervently sung numerous times during the awards ceremonies. The ceremonies are reminiscent of a Miss America pageant, with all salespeople dressed in glamorous evening clothes. The setting is typically an auditorium in front of a large, cheering audience. During the ceremony, when Mary Kay was introduced, she would levitate on billows of smoke to the stage. The illusion of her rising and being kept in the air with little physical support symbolized how women could rise up and enrich their lives. During the ceremonies, bumble bee-shaped diamond pins are given to women who have reached certain sales levels. The pin presents the myth that bumblebees should not be able to y because of their aerodynamics. However, with their will power and self-determination, they can y. The use of the bumblebee reects Mary Kay Ashs vision for women that with help and encouragement everyone can nd their wings and y. Installation rituals should also be established to initiate new hires into the rm. The transition stage of rites of passage is characterized by a form of limbo in which newcomers are neither in their old roles nor in the new ones. The purpose of the initiation

rituals is to educate new employees about the rms culture so that they can begin to function immediately within the sociological structure. Obviously, it is important to hire individuals who not only espouse the rms values but who will also resonate with its mission. Unlike most fast-food establishments, Starbucks puts a considerable effort into screening candidates to ensure that they are team oriented and have a high customer service IQ. Once hired, they are given over twenty-four hours of training, including a six-hour class called The Starbucks Experience, in which they learn about the culture, traditions, and history of the rm. By implementing a Mythopoetic Leadership framework within a rm, a self-replicating culture is created that generates fabled stories of heroic acts by employees. For example, the story of the beach attendant at the RitzCarlton hotel is rmly entrenched in that rms folklore. As these stories get repeated and become well known, they reinforce the cultural fabric of the rm and further set the standards for employee behavior.

The personal qualities of Mythopoetic Leaders

Mythopoetic Leaders believe in, are committed to, and have a passion for the heroic mission and values of their rms, not just for making money. While it is necessary to engage employees minds, Mythopoetic Leaders are also going for their hearts. Because emotion potentiates human action, leaders want employees to be passionate about the mission and values of their rm. If top management does not feel those passions, neither will its employees. Mythopoetic Leaders also have the rhetorical skills to tell stories illustrating their rms mission and values. This both seeds and reinforces the culture that they want to create. And they have the ability to capitalize on stories of heroic efforts by employees and use them to stir their cultures mythopoetic pot. Empathy, inspiring, comforting, and purity of purpose characterize a Mythopoetic Leader. Arnold Hiatt, former CEO of Stride
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Rite Corporation, is an example. He often spoke about his rms morality during new hiring orientation sessions and how it is related to broader societal interests. The values of Stride Rite, for example, are built around a messianically broad social reach. You cant run a healthy company in an unhealthy society for long. . . . By failing to liberate our children who are imprisoned by poverty and inadequate education, we further comprise our future as well as theirs. This statement reveals the face of a priest because it expresses love for children in the communities in which Stride Rite operates factories. The use of language, such as children who are imprisoned by poverty and inadequate education, reect his emotions and personal feelings about protecting children. Stride Rite has constructed a child-care learning center near its factory in Roxbury, in a poor section of Boston, and invites members of the local community to send their children. Through his stories, Hiatt inspired moods, invoked feelings, and encouraged character development of employees.

MYTHOPOETIC LEADERSHIP IMPLEMENTATIONS

How the Mythopoetic Leadership framework is implemented depends upon the industry in which a rm competes, the rms business model, the values of its founders/ managers, and the society in which it exists. The following rms have invoked (channeled) the principles of the model to develop strong, archetypal cultures through heroic missions and values.

The Mayo Clinic

The Mayo Clinic is the quintessential medical community founded by two brothers, Dr. William J. Mayo and Dr. Charles H. Mayo, in 1910. According to the brothers, The best interest of the patient is the only interest to be considered, and in order that the sick may have the benet of advancing knowledge, union of forces is necessary. It has become
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necessary to develop medicine as a cooperative science. The mission statement of the Mayo Clinic has remained fundamentally unchanged since 1910. According to Robert Walker, a retired Mayo physician, Mayo leaders and staff through the years have been willing to change most everything in the way we work except the core values established by our founders. At many meetings, the core values and mission of the institution are recalled through stories. When visiting the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, you would nd that quotations, especially those that refer to placing the patients interest rst, appear in high-trafc spaces. Mayo physicians are referred to as consultants, to reinforce the value of conferring with patients about their treatment. The reward system also reinforces the values and mission statement. Just as at Whole Foods, all Mayo employees are salaried, with no incentives paid for the number of patients seen or procedures performed. A Mayo physician has no economic reason to hold on to a patient rather than to refer the patient to a colleague better suited to meet the patients needs. This tradition dates back to 1919, when the brothers established the Mayo Foundation as a non-prot, charitable entity that would own the Mayo Clinic. The hiring process used at Mayo is directly related to its mission statement: The best interest of the patient is the only interest to be considered. Its mission statement requires that an integrated multispecialty approach to medicine be practiced. Patients expect their physician to know everything and not make a mistake, an unreasonable assumption given that the Mayo Clinic attracts patients with complex medical problems. Therefore, Mayo requires its physicians to be team players. Patients experience the Mayo Clinic as a team of experts who are focused on patients need above all else. They perceive an integrated, coordinated response to their medical conditions, and often, related to psychological, social, spiritual, and nancial needs. Storytelling is a vehicle for how Mayos mission and values permeate the day-to-day

decisions made by the staff. One story is told about a mother of the bride who was critically ill. The bride told the physicians how much she wanted her mother to be part of her wedding ceremony. They conveyed the brides wishes to the critical care manager. A team of physicians was able to gain control of her mothers condition. Within hours, the hospital atrium was transformed for the wedding service, complete with owers, balloons and confetti. Staff members provided a cake, and nurses arranged for the patients hair and makeup, dressed her, and wheeled her bed to the atrium. A volunteer played the piano and the chaplain performed the service. On every oor, hospital staff and visiting family members ringed the atrium balconies, like angels from above, to quote the bride. This scene not only provided evidence of caring to the patient and her family but a strong reminder to the staff that patients needs come rst. Mayos chaplain performed a wedding for the couple in the hospitals intensive care unit. As evidenced by this story, teamwork means not only partnering with colleagues, it also means partnering with patients. Mayo succeeds, in part, by inspiring considerable volunteerism from its staff. Volunteerism is essentially extra effort that staff members do for each other and for their patients. Mayo shuns the star system in which a physician works independently and perhaps lacks the interpersonal competencies to be a team player. The culture makes it okay for staff members to ask for help and not feel stupid for asking. Staff members can call any colleague at any time to discuss a patient, believing that they can learn from each other. Therefore, Mayos culture attracts individuals who see the practice of medicine as best delivered when there is an integration of medical specialties functioning as a team. Mayo has identied the competencies that best t its mission and culture. It looks for people who are committed to high-quality care and service, convey an upbeat work attitude, are enthusiastic and resourceful, have a strong work ethic that is not tied to extrinsic rewards, demonstrate an astute

understanding of cultural diversity, and aspire to work collaboratively. While many other organizations look for candidates with similar competencies, Mayo is set apart by how hard it works to nd people who actually posses these competencies. It uses behavioral interviewing techniques to elicit a candidates values. Mayo is willing to invest signicantly in resources to select new staff. A story is told about a young woman who was complaining about pain in her knee. An X-ray suggested the possibility of bone cancer. Her family doctor called the Mayo Clinic to ask if an orthopedic oncology surgeon could see her. As usual, the response was Yes, whenever she would like to come. By early that afternoon, Mayos pathologists had made a diagnosis of a high-grade osteosarcoma. The CT scan also revealed multiple lesions in her chest, which is consistent with this metastatic disease. By mid-afternoon, the patient was in the hands of a pediatric oncologist who was discussing the CT scan with the patient and her parents and preparing her for chemotherapy.

Toyota: Were on a mission for a higher purpose

When customer service is a companys product, there is a chance to delight each customer directly through the rms mission and values. When a rm manufactures a product that is sold through another party, the manufacturers opportunity to delight is through the value of its products; it is up to dealers to delight individuals. In a company with Mythopoetic Leadership, the effects of the manufacturers mission and values are exemplied by the qualities of the merchandise it produces and by how it services them. The rms mythology evolves from its mission and values to support those processes. By most measures, Toyota Motor Corp. is the best automobile manufacturer in the world. Its cars are known for and have received numerous citations for their quality and reliability, and are generally considered to be of the highest value. At a time when
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Ford and GM are closing plants, Toyota plans to open six more in the next three years. It is the most protable automaker in the world and will soon surpass GM to become the largest. Clearly, Toyotas products have delighted its customers. The company has long believed that its strong culture has been the key to its success. The base for its culture is called The Toyota Way, which is the name that has been given to its mission and values set. While the principles instilled by the rms founder, Kiichiro Toyoda, have remained essentially the same, The Toyota Way has developed over the years to reect the evolution of the rm. Toyotas mission is to enrich society through building cars. The rm believes it accomplishes this by providing high-quality products and services and by being an economic engine that creates opportunities for its employees and business partners. It views prots as a means to continually pursue its mission. The value set for The Toyota Way has two main pillars: Continuous Improvement and Respect for People. Both contain key principles with several elements dened for each one. For Continuous Improvement, these are: 1. Challenge a. Spirit of Challenge b. Long-range perspective c. Thorough consideration in decisionmaking 2. a. b. c. Kaizen Kaizen mind and innovative thinking Building lean systems and structure Promoting organizational learning

plunged his hands into the machines oil pan. He came up with two handfuls of sludge. Throwing the sludge on the oor he asked, How can you expect to do your job without getting your hands dirty? This was the origin of genchi genbutsu, which translates to go and see. Within Toyota it is understood to mean go to the source to nd the facts and make correct decisions. It sets the expectation that employees should go to the factory, the port, or the dealership to observe conditions that might be creating waste or interfering with smooth delivery of high-quality products and services. This story about Toyotas founder set a standard for every employee, including those at the executive level. Many years later, Dr. Shoichiro Toyoda, then Toyota Motor Corporations president, was visiting a dealer on the East Coast when he noticed a Toyota on a lift with the automatic transmission removed. Through his translator he asked the dealerships service manager if they were having problems with the car. The service manager replied, Yes, were having problems with the transmission. Metal shavings are coming off the transmission case and getting into the valve body. Dr. Toyoda said, Show me. The service manager took him to the transmission pan, which had just been pulled, and pointed to it. Dr. Toyoda was dressed in a dark suit with a white shirt and tie. He removed his coat and rolled up his sleeve. He stuck his hand into the pan, felt around, and found several metal lings sticking to his ngers. He carefully placed a number of them into his clean white handkerchief to save for analysis in Japan. The Toyota Way principles and elements dened for its Respect for People pillar are: 1. a. b. c. Respect for People Respect for stakeholders Mutual trust and responsibility Sincere communications

3. Genchi Genbutsu (go and see) a. Effective consensus building b. Commitment to achievement Early in the companys history, founder Kiichiro Toyoda was visiting a plant when he came upon a worker scratching his head and muttering that his grinding machine would not run. Kiichiro rolled up his sleeves and
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2. Teamwork a. Commitment to education and development

b. Respect of individuals; realizing the power of a team Because of the bleak economic situation in Japan after the World War II, in April of 1950, Toyota was forced to go back on its no-dismissal policy and lay off 1600 employees. During the labor unrest that followed, Kiichiro Toyoda took full responsibility for the rms problems and resigned. Toyotas management vowed that they would make every effort to avoid another layoff, and they worked to develop an ethos of mutual trust and respect with the rms employees. Since then, the rms executives have used careful planning and lean production to avoid a similar situation. When Toyota took over the Long Beach Fabricators manufacturing plant in California, it upgraded the facility to bring it in line with the Toyota Production System. Pursuant to the changes, only 300 of the original 335 employees were needed to run the plant. Instead of letting them go, as most companies would, it found other jobs for them within the plant. The company let normal attrition take care of the situation, which took about two years. Actions such as this over the years have been instrumental in cementing the trust between the rms management and its employees. Toyota has an internal saying Customer rst, dealer second, manufacturer third, along with an imperative to do the right thing. Early on, Lexus specied a soft tire compound to help give its cars a better ride quality. While this gave the ride Lexus intended, it was also responsible for the tires having a short tread life. Though less than seven percent of the customers complained, because the company believed it was the right thing to do, Lexus sent every customer whose car had those tires a check for $500 and an apology for any inconvenience that was caused. As one Lexus executive said regarding this incident: The way you treat the customer when you do not owe them anything, like how you treat somebody who cannot ght backthat is the ultimate test of character.

LEVERS FOR TURNING EMPLOYEES INTO HEROES

We have been able to identify seven behaviors that senior executives need to demonstrate to turn employees into heroes and for their organization to sustain high performance. First, employees must believe that they have an opportunity to make a difference and to provide a benet to others. According to George Platt, CEO of ViewCast Corporation, People dont come to work to be No. 1 or 2 or to get a 25 percent return on net operating income. They want a sense of purpose and come to work to get meaning from their lives. They must also have numerous opportunities and the support to do their very best at this each day. At Southwest Airlines, whose purpose is to democratize the skies, Libby Sartin, formerly in charge of the People Department, coined the slogan At Southwest, Freedom Begins with Me. Sartin and her staff dened the eight freedoms that characterize a persons working experience at Southwest Airlines freedom to learn & grow, freedom to be creative and have nancial security, freedom to work hard and have fun, and freedom to create and innovate. Second, a rms leaders must dene the values that reinforce the rms Mythopoetic Mission and business plan. Experiencing the substantial benets to Starbucks from using its mission and values has affected Howard Schultz so profoundly that he stated: Whatever your culture, your values, your guiding principles, you have to take steps to inculcate them in the organization early in its life so that they can guide every decision, every hire, every strategic objective you set. Whether you are the CEO or a lower level employee, the single most important thing you do at work each day is communicate your values to others, especially new hires. Third, leaders must use storytelling and actions grounded in their rms Mythopoetic Mission and Values to communicate with their employees and create their rms mythology. The story of how Ross Perot rescued two of his executives from jail
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behind enemy lines is retold in the book On Wings of Eagles. This scintillating story of escape illustrates how the culture imprinted by Ross Perot valued taking care of one of its own. While the eagle majestically ies to great heights, it always returns home to take care of its young. At EDS, the hero was the rugged individualist who was taking risks for the company and relied on the company to rescue him from peril, if needed. EDS was known for its generous benets and other progressive HR programs under Perots leadership. Fourth, like the Mayo Clinic, leaders need to create a living book that records the stories employees tell. Why? The living book is needed to breathe life into the rms mission statement and values. The book should contain stories about the aboveand-beyond execution of employees. It becomes the collection of the rms mythology that develops as a reection of the rms mission and values providing the road map to the rms denition of excellence. The book is something managers can use at staff meetings to reinforce the type of hero behaviors they are seeking. While it can exist as an oral history of the companys culture and traditions, as a rm grows larger, it becomes more difcult to ensure that these stories are effectively communicated to new people when they join the rm. So it is better to formalize their dissemination. Even as strong as Toyotas culture is, the rm formally documented The Toyota Way in 2001 to reinforce its importance within the rm and to help ensure that it would not be diluted as the rm grew. Fifth, leaders need to create rituals that reinforce the rms Mythopoetic Mission and Values. Organizations such as Mary Kay and Sewell Automotive, among others, have gala events honoring employees who have achieved excellence. The pink cars given to top producers at Mary Kay are a form of public acknowledgement that all employees know recognize outstanding work. Sixth, screen new hires for those who t into the rms Mythopoetic Mission and Values and have installation rituals to accul300 ORGANIZATIONAL DYNAMICS

turate them. Steve Jobs has emphasized that Apple Computer Inc. only hires people who are passionate about what they do. CEO Art Levinson of Genentech screens out job applicants who ask too many questions about titles and benets because he wants only people who are passionate about making drugs that ght cancer. For decades, Brooklyn Union Gas Company, now KeySpan Energy Corporation, hired newly graduated college students and enrolled them in their cadet training program. This program lasted a year and required each cadet to have a rotational assignment in each of the companys major departments, e.g., rates, marketing, human resources, etc. During their assignments, the cadet had an opportunity to perform tasks in that department, make acquaintances with employees in that department, interact with the manager, and learn the rules of the road for that department. At the end of each assignment, cadets were invited to have lunch with senior executives of the company at the BUG club, an invitation-only club where senior managers ate lunch. It was during those ceremonial lunches that the cadet was introduced to key executives and had a chance to informally interact with them. Twice a year, senior members of the rms and selected cadets attended a three-day retreat at a resort. Cadets had to be nominated by a manager to attend this retreat. At each retreat, there was a formal program, time for golf or shing, poker, etc. Cadets were also expected to lead a discussion of an issue facing the company. The issue was usually announced during breakfast on the last day and the cadet had to gather their thoughts and make a presentation shortly thereafter. Careers were made or broken during the cadets presentation. Those who successfully traversed the rituals of these three days became accepted by managers. Those who failed were often times assigned to low-power departments and eventually left the company. Seventh, as one of the rms heroic values, leaders need to provide a human touch. A company is driven by values and

people. Connecting to employees on a personal level goes a long way towards unleashing commitment to the rm and its mission. If employees see that managers care, then they are more likely to live up to the cultural values espoused by their leaders. In the words of Iwao Kodaira, who was president of Toyota Motor Sales in the mid-1970s: A company does not function

unless human relations are established. I dont like the forcible approach. I prefer heart-to-heart communication and helping each other. I believe this is the essence of management.

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SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
For selected works by Joseph Campbell on myths and culture, see The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Princeton University Press, 1949); The Power of Myth (Doubleday, 1988); The Masks of God: Occidental Mythology (Penguin Group, 1964). See also Carl Jung, On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry, The Portable Jung, ed. Joseph Campbell (Penguin Group, 1971), 319321. For selected works on corporate culture and its impact on organizational performance, see John P. Kotter and James Heskett, Corporate Culture and Performance (The Free Press, 1992); Thomas J. Peters and Robert H. Waterman, In Search of Excellence (HarperCollins, 1982); Edgar Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership (Jossey-Bass, 1985); Bill George, Authentic Leadership (Jossey-Bass, 2003); Jeffrey K. Liker, The Toyota Way (McGraw-Hill, 2004); Howard Schultz and Dori Jones Yang, Pour Your Heart Into It (Hyperion, 1997); William C. Taylor and Polly G. LaBarre, Mavericks at Work (Harper & Collins, 2006); Stephen Denning, Squirrel Inc.: A Fable of Leadership through Storytelling (Jossey-Bass, 2004); Karl E. Weick, Kathleen M. Sutcliffe, and David Obstfeld Organizing and the Process of Sensemaking, Organizational Science, 2005, 16, 409421; Duff McDonald, Roll Out the Blue Carpet, Business 2.0, May 2004; Judy Hoffer Gittell and Charles A. OReilly III, JetBlue Airways: Starting from Scratch, Harvard Business School Case no. 9-801354 (Harvard Business School Publishing, 2001); Betsy Morris, The New Rules, Fortune, 24 July 2006, 7084; Mike Beer, How to Develop an Organization Capable of Sustained High Performance: Embrace the Drive for Results-Capability Development Paradox, Organizational Dynamics, 2001, 29, 243247; Leonard L. Berry, Leadership Lessons from the Mayo Clinic, Organizational Dynamics, 2004, 33, 228242; Barry Mike and John W. Slocum, Jr., Changing Culture at Pizza Hut and YUM! Brands, Inc., Organizational Dynamics, 2003, 32, 319330; and Angus MacKenzie, The Quiet Achiever, Motor Trend, April 2006, 6972.

Chip Jarnagin is one of the founding partners of LatticeWorks Consulting, a management consulting rm. During his career he has studied the cultures of rms in different industries, from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies. His educational background includes a B.A. in Mathematics from the University of Texas at Austin where he graduated magna cum laude. In May 2004, he received his M.B.A. with honors from the Executive M.B.A. program at the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University (SMU) (Tel.: +1 214 727 9446; e-mail: chip.jarnagin@latticeworkslp.com). John W. Slocum Jr. is the O. Paul Corley Professor of Management in the Edwin L. Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University. He has published more than 134 articles and 27 books, including Managing: A Competency-Based Approach, 11th ed., published by South Western, 2007. He is co-editor of the Journal of World Business, and Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies, and associate editor of Organizational Dynamics. He has been studying and writing about corporate cultures for more than two decades (e-mail: jslocum@cox.smu.edu).
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