Leadership is the task of culture creation-of creating a culture of shared values, vision and trust where people know what to expect and participate in because it is what they want to do. Leadership cannot take place in a culture where people distrust each other, doubt other's motives, and pursue independent action agendas. Fairholm defines the leader's role in cultural creation, change, and maintenance as primarily a values creation activity. Leaders use values to define meaning for the group. He elaborates on team relationships and a cultural environment conducive to developing and using trust.
Three ideas form the basis of this book: (1) culture creation, (2) trust relationships, and (3) leadership. Shaping a culture in which group members can trust each other enough to work together is the first leadership task. Of all the new and pressing problems the chief officers in our large-scale organizations face day-to-day, one stands out. It is the challenge of creating and maintaining an organizational culture that fits the nature of the work done and the character and capacities of its growingly diverse work force.
Fairholm affirms that cultures exist in every organization-even in groups that last for only a modestly short time. The benefit of these cultures is that they provide methods of understanding events, symbols and messages. The author takes the state of our societal culture and shows how this affects cultures within organizations.
Fairholm also deals with details of leader actions and requirements in shaping culture. He defines cultural leadership as a function of values, plus strategic, communications, and office politics systems present in any organization. He ties cultural leadership to the effectiveness of the action used, the attitudes engendered in members by cultural artifacts, the service goals established, how leaders manage change, and how one exercises leadership. He focuses on how and by what means leaders create meaning within the organization.
Faiholm also introduces some elements constraining a fully trusting culture, including the quality of communication, the way a company assigns authority, and general feelings of apathy and alienation. Development of a trust culture may also be hampered by a lack of effective accountability mechanisms and time constraints.
Trust is key to an effective organization. Leaders within the organization are responsible for achieving a level of trust within the organization that is beneficial to all stakeholders. In developing a trust culture, leaders make the work easier for everyone within the organization.