Sarah McLellan

Image of a team working by Yan Krukau from Pexels Some cultures don’t struggle.   They succeed.   Performance is steady. Teams collaborate smoothly. There’s capability, pride and a clear identity. People can articulate what the organisation stands for and success stories are regularly shared.   If you walked in or joined a call, you’d instantly get a sense of, “we know what we’re doing here.”   And yet, there’s something missing…   The confidence in how we work and sharing of successes masks...

Photo by Mikhail Nilov via Pexels A leadership team invited me in because, whilst on paper, everything looked strong, they knew something wasn’t right.   Engagement scores were healthy. Attrition wasn’t concerning. People described the culture as supportive, collaborative, kind.   “It’s a nice place to work,” they said.   And it was.   There was no toxicity. No ego battles. No fear. In meetings, people built on each other’s ideas. They genuinely wanted colleagues to succeed.   And yet, as I...

Image by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash One of the clearest messages from the Growth Cultures Insight Report is this:   The best workplaces don’t treat people as resources to be optimised. They intentionally design and nurture the conditions for human growth.   As the world we work in and how work gets done continues to increase in complexity and ambiguity, many organisations are reaching for familiar, more ‘certain’ levers for growth. We measure what’s easy to count — utilisation, efficiency,...