An Everyone Culture: Becoming a Deliberately Developmental Organization

Summary

What if a company did everything in its power to create a culture in which everyone could overcome their own internal barriers to change and use errors and vulnerabilities as prime opportunities for personal and company growth?

Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey have found and studied such companies—Deliberately Developmental Organizations. A DDO is organized around the conviction that organizations will best prosper when they are more deeply aligned with people's strongest motive, which is to grow. This means going beyond consigning "people development" to high-potential programs, executive coaching, or once-a-year off-sites. It means fashioning an organizational culture in which support of people's development is woven into the daily fabric of working life and the company's regular operations, daily routines, and conversations.

An Everyone Culture dives deep into the worlds of three leading companies that embody this breakthrough approach. It reveals the design principles, concrete practices, and underlying science at the heart of DDOs—from their disciplined approach to giving feedback, to how they use meetings, to the distinctive way that managers and leaders define their roles.