Every year, the State of DevOps Report includes the results of a survey which shows the impact that culture has on an organisation.
Statistical analysis of the results showed that team culture was not only strongly correlated with organizational performance, it was also a strong predictor of job satisfaction. The results are clear: a high-trust, generative culture is not only important for creating a safe working environment — it is the foundation of creating a high-performance organization.
This survey is based on a model of organisational cultures created by Ron Westrum, PhD. Ron Westrum is a recognized expert on organizational dynamics and the author of several papers and books on the subject.
The model places organisations on a scale ranging from "Pathological" (power-oriented) to "Generative" (performance-oriented). Successful organisations, that is to say organisations that have both efficiency and high job satisfaction, tend to be on the "Generative" side of the scale.
- Pathological organisations are characterized by large amounts of fear and threat. People often hoard information or withold it for political reasons, or distort it to make themselves look better.
- Bureaucratic organisations protect departments. Those in the department want to maintain their "turf", insist on their own rules, and generally do things "by the book" -- their book.
- Generative organisations focus on the mission. How do we accomplish our goal? Everything is subordinated to good performance, to doing what we are supposed to do.
The different organisational cultures have a range of attributes that are measured along six axes:
| Pathological Power-oriented |
Bureaucratic Rule-oriented |
Generative Performance-oriented |
|---|---|---|
| Low co-operation | Modest co-operation | High co-operation |
| Messengers shot | Messengers neglected | Messengers trained |
| Responsibilities shirked | Narrow responsibilities | Risks are shard |
| Bridging discouraged | Bridging tolerateed | Bridging encouraged |
| Failure leads to scapegoating | Failure leads to justice | Failure leads to inquery |
| Novelty crushed | Novelty leads to problems | Novelty implemented |
It's all well and good to know how the Westrum organisational theory ranks organisations, but what really matters is how your team ranks. The easiest way is to borrow from Dr. Nicole Forsgren's peer-reviewed research.
A subset of the questions that she asks when doing devops assessments are, unsurprisingly, related to culture. Rated on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree), the following statements should be put to your team, and the results aggregated. Doing so regularly can give you a high-level overview of whether you are getting better at creating the most optimal culture, and will help you to pinpoint which areas are lagging and need conscious effort to improve.
The statements are: