Articles

Culture As Strategy

August 27, 2026

My presentation “Culture as Strategy” is now available through Henry Stewart Talks as part of The Business & Management Collection.

Culture is often treated as something separate from strategy – a “soft” organizational concern rather than a driver of business results. In this presentation, I make the case that culture is instead one of the mechanisms through which strategy gets executed.

Using the Westrum typology of pathological, bureaucratic, and generative cultures, I explore how shared values, beliefs, and assumptions influence information flow, decision-making, innovation, adaptability, and ultimately organizational performance. I also examine a real-world case study from the life insurance industry, following a software team’s evolution over approximately 15 years from a bureaucratic working environment to a highly collaborative, performance-oriented culture.

The central argument is simple: leaders should not leave culture to emerge by accident. A consciously cultivated culture should complement the organization’s objectives and strategy and reinforce the behaviors needed to achieve them.

Mele, A. (2026, July 30). Culture as strategy [Video file]. In The Business & Management Collection, Henry Stewart Talks. Retrieved August 27, 2026, from https://doi.org/10.69645/CSLK4869.