Assessing Your Team's Culture

The most dangerous leadership mistake isn't ignoring culture—it's assessing it without acting. Jason Barger argues that while many organizations excel at measuring team culture through surveys, they fail at the critical next step: using those insights to drive real change. He reveals that the real power of a cultural assessment lies not in the data collected, but in the signal it sends: that leadership is truly listening and committed to improvement. Drawing from his 'six A's of leading change' framework—assess, align, aspire, articulate, act, anchor—he emphasizes that skipping from assessment to action creates cynicism and erodes trust. The best cultural audits involve multiple layers: organization-wide surveys, deep interviews with cross-functional representatives, and candid conversations with senior leaders. But even more crucially, the process must be participatory, demonstrate authentic listening, and result in clear, communicated actions. When people see that their input leads to tangible shifts, culture becomes a living, evolving force—not a static poster on the wall. Barger challenges leaders to stop treating culture as a one-time audit and instead view it as a continuous feedback loop. The most effective assessments don’t just answer 'where are we?' but also 'what will we do next?'—and then follow through. He warns that failing to act after assessing leads to a corrosive cycle: surveys become performative, trust diminishes, and employees disengage. The antidote?