You'll notice we have transitioned from being a learning company to a leadership AND learning company. We have been involved in leadership development for years (embedded in our learning organizations work), but have now made it an explicit part of our business. We've also added coaching to our services. This transition has been captured by our new logo, website, and blog and has been accomplished with the help of several people.

A big thank you go to Penny and Candace of Red Barn Coaching, who interviewed some of our clients and helped us discover more about our own brand DNA. They inspired and challenged us, a very good coaching combination we think!

Thanks to Rob and Chris of JumpStartWeb for our new website and logo. We appreciated their interest in creating a website design that captured who we are and had all the new bells and whistles we needed!

Our logo, a stylized hummingbird, is a great fit for us right now. Calliope is a type of hummingbird which can be found in western North American including British Columbia (where we now live full time). Hummingbirds represent to us what leadership and learning are all about - agility, taking flight, and accomplishing seemingly impossible things (did you know that the Calliope hummingbird migrates from Canada to southwestern Mexico?)

Finally, a big thanks to Mark of Intersection Consulting for his inspiration and guidance in social marketing. Mark has helped us get a blog going and we are continuing to pick his brain about how we can make better use of Twitter, LinkedIn, and whatever else seems to be coming our way!

Are you concerned about how your corporate culture has an effect on the health and productivity of your company? Then our workbook on Measuring Corporate Culture could be just the thing you are looking for.

The workbook evolved out of some work with one of our Victoria based high tech clients, Brandie Yarish, Director Customer Solutions of GenoLogics, to deliver a presentation on Culture and Employee Loyalty at the HR Tech Group Symposium in Vancouver, October 27. We realized that a 45 minute presentation wasn't sufficient to capture all of the complexities and thus the workbook was born.

We are excited to make the PDF workbook available to all of our Muse readers.

Dave was asked a fascinating question at the HR Tech Symposium, "Isn't it the senior management's responsibility to define the organizations culture?" Here's his answer from our blog.

What a great question. The short answer is probably "Yes." An organization's senior team has a big influence of the organization's culture. After all, they call the shots and model the behaviours that set the tone for the organization. Unfortunately, from my perspective at least, there is a problem with this. The senior team, more often than not, put in long hours, focus on little else but work, and some of them take themselves way too seriously!

Thankfully, there's a longer answer to the question. While the senior team have an undeniably strong influence over an organization's culture, there are others in the organization that can have a powerful influence.

Imagine a programmer who is a keen soccer player. She takes the time to organize a team to play in a local league. She's contributing to a culture that values teamwork, exercise and competitiveness. Imagine an office manager who knows when everybody's birthday is. He brings in a birthday card and gets as many people as possible to sign it. Maybe there are also muffins? He's developing a sense of belonging within the organizational culture. Imagine the small team of volunteers who organize the organization's United Way fund raising efforts. They're contributing to the organization's sense of community involvement and service.

So my final answer to the question looks a bit like this. Organizational culture can't be mandated from the top. For sure, the people at the top of the organization have a powerful influence over the organizational culture and they must be careful how they use that influence. We also have to recognize that anyone who chooses to step up to the challenge can have a profound influence over culture no matter where they stand on the organizational hierarchy. This is one reason why I believe true leadership isn't a position but a way of being.