09/18/2026
Every business has a culture. The question is whether you intentionally built it—or simply allowed it to happen.
I recently came across a post about Tim Cook and Apple that got me thinking about this.
We spend so much time in business talking about strategy.
The goals. The numbers. The plan. Where we want to be next year and five years from now.
But none of those plans happen without people.
Culture isn't only the values written on the wall or discussed at a leadership retreat.
It's what happens every day.
How people communicate.
How decisions get made.
How someone is treated when they make a mistake.
What leaders recognize, and what they tolerate.
Whether people feel trusted enough to make decisions and take ownership.
I've seen throughout my years in business that even the strongest strategy becomes difficult to execute when the culture underneath it doesn't support where the organization is trying to go.
And there's another piece of this that I think about often: succession.
When you eventually hand leadership to someone else, you aren't simply transferring a title or a book of business.
You're handing over the responsibility for everything you've built, including the culture.
That makes me wonder:
Is the culture you're creating today strong enough to support the organization you're building for tomorrow?
