A Book Review - Group Culture

Someone recommended the book "The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups" by Daniel Coyle and I just finished reading it. I would recommend it to others as well. There are some excellent ideas given for creating groups that work, based on three skills:

1. Build Safety
2. Share Vulnerability
3. Establish Purpose

Someday maybe I'll ponder how we used these skills in our family, because I definitely think our family is a successful group, but for now I just want to remember some of his ideas.

• Overcommunicate your listening
• Spotlight your fallibility early on, especially if you're a leader
• Embrace the messenger
• Preview future connection
• Overdo thank-yous
• Be painstaking in the hiring process
• Eliminate bad apples
• Create safe, collision-rich spaces
• Make sure everyone has a voice
• Pick up trash
• Capitalize on threshold moments
• Avoid giving sandwich feedback

• Make sure the leader is vulnerable first and often
• Overcommunicate expectations
• Deliver the negative stuff in person
• When forming new groups, focus on two critical moments: the first vulnerability and the first disagreement
• Listen like a trampoline
• In conversation, resist the temptation to reflexively add value
• Use candor-generating practices
• Aim for candor, avoid brutal honesty
• Embrace the discomfort
• Align language with action
• Build a wall between performance review and professional development
• Use flash mentoring
• Make the leader occasionally disappear

• Be ten times as clear about your priorities as you think you should be
• Figure out where your group aims for proficiency and where it aims for creativity
• Embrace the use of catchphrases
• Measure what really matters
• Use artifacts
• Focus on bar-setting behaviors

Daniel Coyle's website

GoodReads website

A review of the book