It has been said that Bad Culture Eats Vision. I’ve learned that to be true. No matter how strong a vision is if the culture is bad the outcomes are going to be disappointing. As a result, an organization isn’t going to be as effective as it could be.
Working with churches I observed some outcomes of bad church culture. In fact, these were obvious from an outside view.
7 Bad Outcomes From Bad Culture
1. Corruption
Bad cultures corrupt the organization – specifically the organizational structure. As one example, often in an attempt to avoid toxic leaders, people work around the structure to find the answers they are seeking. Which makes leaders frustrated further perpetuating the bad culture.
2. Control
Bad cultures are often the product of controlling leadership. Therefore, the organization’s growth is capped. The best assets – people – are limited from contributing to their full potential.
3. Confusion
Bad cultures have notoriously poor team communication. People only know what they know so they invent their own stories. Their version is almost always a worse version of reality.
4. Collision
The vision is something people get excited about accomplishing. They are willing to work hard in order to help it become a reality. Yet, bad cultures collide with good vision. The culture becomes the focus of people’s attention rather than the vision. As a result, progress is derailed.
5. Curtails
Bad cultures usually discourage risk-taking. Failure is criticized, rather than being seen as part of the learning curve. This causes future momentum to stall. People aren’t willing to take new risks or try something new.
6. Contamination
Good team members are soon sucked into the habits of bad cultures. Before long they become part of the problem.
7. Condemnation
Bad cultures condemn a team to a state of mediocrity. Therefore, no one is satisfied with the results.
As leaders, part of our job is to make organizations better. However, many times, the culture produces unhealthiness and holds the team back from growing. In these settings, it is the culture that frustrates people and causes burnout.
Do you want to improve your church’s bad culture?
Most likely, you’ll first need to improve the organization’s culture.
If you think if I can help you or your team I would be happy to talk with you. You find more about my experience here: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ronedmondson/
This article on bad church culture originally appeared here, and is used by permission.
