How do people learn how work happens here?
A new colleague needs to understand more than the formal process. Who can help with an unfamiliar situation? How does the team raise a concern? What does a good handover include? They learn some of this through direct explanation and some through the everyday work around them.
When locations or working arrangements change, it is useful to ask how that learning now happens. The question concerns access to people, examples and feedback, alongside access to the right documents and systems.
What might change in a distributed team?
An informal conversation can make a decision easier to understand for the people present. Colleagues elsewhere may need the same explanation. A recorded decision helps, but people may also need an opportunity to ask why it was made and what it means for their work.
Think about a recent new starter. Who showed them how to approach a customer request or a disagreement? Could they see how experienced colleagues reasoned through the situation? Their account can reveal what the induction process needs to make available.
What should we ask about hybrid work?
Bloom, Han and Liang’s 2024 randomised trial at Trip.com found improved retention without damage to measured performance under the hybrid arrangement studied. It offers evidence for considering such arrangements while leaving each organisation to examine its own work and context.
For culture, ask what people experience across locations. Do they understand the same expectations? Can they access help? Are decisions visible to everyone affected? Avoid assuming either that physical presence creates a shared culture or that working elsewhere prevents one.
How can managers and teams explore it?
Follow a piece of work from the first question to the eventual decision. Include people who work in different locations and those who have joined recently. Ask what they knew at each point, what they had to infer and what helped them proceed.
Agree an adjustment people can try. A short discussion after a complex task, a named source of help or a clearer record of the reasoning behind a decision may be useful. Choose an arrangement that fits the team rather than adding meetings by default.
Where does cultureMAP fit?
cultureMAP can support discussion of patterns in the participating group’s work preferences. It offers another way to ask how people like to prepare, connect and contribute. Interpret it alongside their experiences and examples of actual working practices.
Return to the question that prompted the work. What would you like people to experience differently, and what evidence would show that happening? Culture develops through the arrangements people encounter repeatedly. Reviewing those arrangements gives a team something practical to work on together.
Sources and further reading
What would you like to explore?
If this relates to work in your organisation, we can begin with a conversation about your situation and what you want to achieve.
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