Cultural Transformation: Why culture is now a strategic asset

Organisational culture was once viewed as something intangible, or left to HR. Today, boards and investors increasingly see it as a strategic lever. A strong culture supports transformation, builds trust, and reduces risk. A weak one can stall performance and erode reputation.

The reality is clear: for organisations to succeed, cultural transformation is no longer optional.

From culture as an atmosphere to culture as an asset

Leaders often describe culture as “the way we do things around here.” But in practice, culture is a system of shared behaviours, values, and assumptions that shape performance. Treating culture as a strategic asset allows leaders to engineer it with intent rather than leaving it to chance.

That is where cultural assessments and benchmarking provide value. Without them, leaders rely on anecdotal evidence and assumption. With them, they gain tangible evidence of cultural maturity, alignment, and performance.

At FidesOak®, we describe this as culture being measured not to criticise, but to clarify. Clarity allows organisations to act with purpose, shaping the culture they need for high performance.

High-Hazard transformation: lessons from industry

The urgency of culture is most visible in high-hazard sectors. Here, high-hazard cultural transformation is not abstract, it is a matter of safety, resilience, and licence to operate. When culture is weak, incidents happen. When culture is strong, risks are managed, performance is reliable, and people go home safe.

In these contexts, culture and leadership cannot be separated. Culture and leadership support combines assessment, leadership alignment, and coaching to ensure leaders model the behaviours they want to see visible and felt leadership.

From insight to action

Organisations that measure culture often uncover both strengths and gaps. Culture performance insight and team performance insight reveal where team cohesion exists, where trust is strong, and where alignment is breaking down.

This insight is the starting point for targeted interventions: bespoke leadership programmes, safety culture assessments, and cultural transformation and integration strategies.

What matters is not a single initiative but a structured approach that builds momentum and embeds change.

Engineering, not hoping

Culture does not change through slogans or posters. It changes through engineering high performing cultures, aligning structures, leadership behaviours, and daily practices so that culture becomes part of how the organisation operates its DNA.

This requires cultural maturity assessments, leadership alignment and role modelling, and clarity on how values such as trust, honesty, and sincerity of intent are expressed in practice.

When approached this way, cultural transformation is not cosmetic. It becomes systemic, sustainable, and measurable.

What the research says

Independent research continues to reinforce the relationship between organisational culture and performance.

The CIPD’s Organisational Culture and Performance: An Evidence Review found that a strong, aligned culture is consistently linked to improved organisational outcomes. It highlights that culture should not be viewed as a ‘soft’ characteristic, but as a measurable system of shared behaviours and values that directly influence effectiveness and performance.

Similarly, research by Oxford Economics in partnership with Grant Thornton revealed that organisations with extremely healthy cultures were 1.5 times more likely to report revenue growth above 15% over a three-year period. The study also found that strong cultures correlated with higher engagement, innovation, and long-term resilience.

These findings align closely with what we observe across high-hazard and highly regulated sectors, where safety, reliability, and performance are inseparable from culture.

What this means for CEOs

For decision makers, there needs to be ownership of corporate culture. Here are four actions to keep at the forefront:

• Treat culture as a strategic asset: Link it directly to performance, resilience, and risk.
• Measure and benchmark: Use structured cultural assessments and benchmarking to establish reality, not perception.
• Lead visibly: Ensure leaders at every level practise leadership alignment and role modelling.
• Engineer the change: Move beyond initiatives, design the systems, programmes, and daily practices that embed culture.

Organisations that thrive in uncertainty are those that treat culture with the same priority level as finance or operations. For CEOs and decision makers, cultural transformation is critical. It is the foundation of high performance, resilience, and long-term value creation.