Culture Beats Scheme
Culture will beat scheme every day.” – Chip Kelly
As a rule, I try not to contribute to the sports is a metaphor for life view. It is already oversubscribed. But, there is an exception to every rule and I am making one regarding recent coverage of Philadelphia Eagles coach Chip Kelly’s assertion that culture beats scheme.
A few definitions are in order. By culture, Kelly means getting players to pull together as a team and work toward a common goal. It entails putting self – recognition and individual statistics behind team accomplishments.
Scheme refers to the kind of offense and defense the coach selects. For Kelly, his offense is known as West Coast. It is fast paced with lots of passing and typically no huddle. While he had great success with this scheme at the college level, he faced skepticism in bringing it East to Philadelphia.
You may know that Eagle fans are notorious for once booing and throwing snow balls at Santa Claus during a half-time show (well, they were losing to the Vikings). They take their football seriously in Philadelphia as dramatized in the academy award nominated movie, Silver Linings Playbook.
One Philadelphia sports writer, Mile Sielski, draws a distinction between Kelly’s team first culture and that of the New York Jets and their coach Rex Ryan.
“Ryan talks a lot in public. So do his players. They are brash and outspoken., … But they lack the culture, the human infrastructure, to maintain success. They grasp for an identity. They court attention, it seems, for attention’s sake.”
Are there business lessons here? Certainly the businesses with whom I consult have competitors. One big difference is that they face them five days a week, not just on Sundays. They also have a scheme in place for selecting products and services that can be differentiated in the market place.
But, does culture beat scheme in business? Does the business that exhibits high levels of internal collaboration beat the one with silos and barriers to team work? Does your business do enough to build a culture of success by investing in its people? Or, is it trapped in one dimension of refining its scheme by researching and developing products?
By the way, as of this writing the Jets are 1 and 7. The Eagles are 5 and 2.
Hope you are well. Love getting your postings. Even though I am pretty removed from the sales department these days…we are all selling in some way.
In fact, we are selling when we talk about our vision or try to create a culture. When I heard Kelly’s comments as he was mic’d up for NFL films, I stopped in my tracks. Then I saw this posting and had to reply. I am in the middle of composing a similar blog on LinkedIn, and I am presenting on this topic to the NE Ohio CIO/CTO Roundtable next month.
I sincerely believe that culture does beat scheme…when it is scheme alone. I look back at the organizations that I have worked for (including my own), and when we were “winning”, we created a culture where the team was in fact a team, and there was a common mission. Whether it was iCepts, Hyland Software, Human Arc or now at Asurint, we either created a culture, had a culture or changed the culture to match more of Chip Kelly’s approach – one team, working together. The failed businesses (either they failed or I failed there) were the exact opposites.
And this culture thing has been around the NFL and business for a long time. Whether it is the Green Bay Packers, IBM in the last millennium or the Patriots, Facebook or Google in recent years…successful organization…sustainable, successful organizations have “it” when it comes to culture!