Culture - Intertwingled: Information Changes Everything - page 79

Third, what are the tacit beliefs that are taken for granted and non-negotiable? Level three is all
about history. What were the ways of the founders that led to success? Are they still valid or
holding us back? When we fail to seize the future, it's often because we're blinded to the present
by the radiance of our past success. Assumptions are the bedrock of culture. They are hidden
and resistant to change. As organizations grow, technologies advance, and markets evolve, fric-
tion between old assumptions and new realities is inevitable, but people don't question what
they can't see. This is where an advisor can help. Only insiders can effect cultural change, but it
often takes an outsider to sketch the map.
Subcultures
No culture is an island. To understand any culture, we must study its context. For example, Ed
Schein notes that “in some organizations the subcultures are as strong or stronger than the over-
all organizational culture.” xciv It may be useful to think of them as “co-cultures” to avoid false
assumptions about influence and power. To succeed we must employ multiple levels of analysis
and seek leverage in the layer that counts.
A few years ago, I was asked to evaluate site search for one of the world's largest technology
firms. The problems were painfully obvious. Customer satisfaction surveys showed findability
to be the #1 complaint. Search analytics data revealed a zero click-through rate of forty-eight
percent. In nearly half of all queries, users failed to click on a single result. And in my user re-
search, I saw people fail to find basic content, over and over again. One customer summed up
the search results interface by stating “There's a lot of garbage here. And the filters are all
gobbledygook.”
I was excited by this opportunity to make search better, but I soon hit a roadblock. As I led
stakeholder interviews, a pattern emerged. The folks in Support were eager to fix site search, but
those in Marketing weren't very interested. Most of them were too polite to say it straight, but it
wasn't hard to read between the lines. They were enthusiastic about search engine optimization
as it offered new customers and easy metrics, but site search didn't fit their sense of mission.
They didn't study it in business school. This was a major problem, as Marketing owned the web-
site and held all the money and power.
So, I worked with my clients in Support to craft a message that would resonate with the people
in Marketing. We used data, told stories, and invoked experts. Here's an excerpt.
Gerry McGovern argues that “Support is the new Marketing.” This hints at the emerging tendency of
customers to evaluate a company's online support as part of the pre-purchase process. Our prospective
customers and partners are smart. They know that Support is a vital component of the total cost of own-
ership. If they can't find what they need quickly, they lose time and business. Also, we can help users be-
come aware of related products and services while seeking support. If done in a user-centered manner,
this cross-sell and up-sell can be a win-win-win for us, our partners, and our customers…Mark Hurst
says “the experience is the brand.” He's acknowledging the tectonic shift from push to pull that's driven
by the Internet. While names, logos, prices, packaging, and product quality are all still contributors to the
brand, people's perceptions are increasingly shaped by their experiences with the website. When custom-
ers can't find what they need, the brand suffers. In an era of user-centered design, where expectations are