There are many definitions of corporate or company culture, and its impact on business performance has been well documented and studied for decades. According to Deloitte¹, which is a good place to start, company culture is defined as ‘the way things get done’ in an organisation – sustained patterns of behaviour over time, supported by shared experiences, values, and beliefs. The challenge, however, is that culture also influences the way things don’t get done.
For example, at TTP, part of our culture is to consider human factors early in the product design process. We believe that designing products people enjoy – or at the very least like – using is not an optional extra; it’s fundamental. Functionality and compliance are merely the baseline, and creating a truly successful product means embedding user engagement as a deliberate focus from the start. Without this belief driving priorities, organisations risk treating user experience as an afterthought. Culture shapes your organisational blind spots, so it’s crucial to align it with your corporate priorities.
What does your culture look like?
There are many ways your company culture can put product development projects at risk. In our nearly 40 years of consulting, we’ve encountered a wide range of these challenges. How does your organisation treat failure, for instance? Is it something to be feared or accepted? Does the most senior person’s opinion carry the most weight, or are all views treated equally? When something goes wrong, do people look for a solution – or a scapegoat?
The truth is simple: the most successful projects – and the best products – come from the best teams. These teams are highly adaptable, able to respond and evolve quickly as challenges arise. They don’t have big egos. They understand their goals, work well together, and support one another. Crucially, they are understood and backed by senior management. They also collaborate closely with other departments, teams, and partners – including quality management, procurement, and manufacturing.
As we said, it’s simple. But if you’re working in a team hesitant to speak up, or in a siloed organisation where it’s difficult to gain alignment, simplicity alone isn’t helpful. So let’s explore some common cultural challenges – and how to address them.
Schedule stress
Deadlines are inevitable – whether it’s meeting your targets for the quarter, creating a stand for a trade show, or having a product ready for market. The only difference is that some deadlines are more flexible than others. The challenge in R&D is that you often don’t know what problems you’re going to run into.
You start with a plan, one that maps out delivery by the deadline. You build in some slack to handle unforeseen issues. If you’re experienced in R&D, you might even make an informed guess about how much slack is needed. But even with these precautions, things can still go wrong. As boxer Mike Tyson famously said, “Everyone’s got a plan until they’re punched in the mouth.”
For organisations less familiar with product development, it can sometimes be difficult to distinguish between a plan and a guarantee. The suggestion that a deadline might slip can lead to major consequences. In one extreme case we encountered, a team faced significant fallout after being unable to meet expectations.
A climate of fear
If there’s a hard deadline, or if people don’t feel secure in their jobs, there can be a reluctance to deliver bad news.
In one project we worked on, the end date was immovable, but the tasks leading up to that end date were all taking longer than anticipated. The management team’s response was to suggest that all the remaining tasks could be completed in half the time. While this reaction is understandable under pressure, everyone knew it wasn’t realistic. People have a natural tendency to discount future difficulties to avoid discomfort in the present. But, like a child who tells a lie, the longer the truth is delayed, the worse the consequences become.
The best way to avoid these situations is to update management regularly and maintain transparency in communications. When senior leaders have early visibility of issues, they’re more likely to make informed decisions – and it’s often far cheaper to resolve problems sooner rather than later.
Tactical failure, strategic success
All this relies on fostering a ‘no blame’ culture. Product development is about creating something new, and figuring out how to achieve something that’s never been done before often requires accepting that some attempts won’t work. In other words, avoiding strategic failure means being willing to embrace tactical failures. Everyone involved in development needs to share this mindset, not just the project team.
Sometimes, even the project team can struggle with this. When you’re working on a sub-system, you become heavily invested in making it succeed. It can be difficult to accept that your greatest contribution to the project’s success might be recognising that your sub-system is going to fail – and that work on it should stop. Encouraging team members to zoom out and focus on the broader goal, while ensuring they feel secure in their role, is essential.
It can also be helpful to bring in an outsider’s perspective. A fresh set of eyes can offer new ideas or highlight issues without assigning blame. This can be invaluable when teams have narrowed their focus too much to reconsider alternative approaches.
‘Outside’ sometimes really means outside
Sometimes, the external voice you need comes from outside your department – or even outside your company. For example, we aim to involve the people who will manufacture the final product as early as possible in the development process. Their input can lead to design changes that significantly impact cost or ease of assembly. Such changes are straightforward early in a project but become harder – and more expensive – later on.
One of our colleagues recently encountered this on a project. The design was already well advanced, and the client was selecting a manufacturing partner for an initial small-scale production run. However, the quoted price was several times higher than expected based on commercial estimates. This caused frustration and delays as the team scrambled to identify cost-saving measures. Ultimately, the client had to accept the higher cost and move forward, hoping the price would drop during full-scale production.
Make allies, not adversaries
The lesson here is that it’s better to collaborate with other departments – commercial, quality, legal, procurement – than to work in silos. For example, there’s a risk that the commercial team may not fully understand the scope of the development challenge, while the R&D team might lack insight into the market requirements for the final product. These misalignments can lead to frustration and inefficiencies.
Creating a culture of open dialogue, engagement, and mutual respect for expertise enables productive conversations. Instead of a flat ‘no’ from R&D to an ambitious request, discussions about risks, timelines, and phased approaches become possible.
It’s equally important for both sides to communicate in terms the other can understand and value. Complexities often reflect genuine challenges, not unnecessary complications. Recognising this is key to fostering collaboration.
Standard operating procedure and new ways of working
Our final issue ties back to the start: if the way product development needs to work doesn’t align with your culture, you and your team may struggle to explore the required approaches.
Processes that assure quality are invaluable but can become a straitjacket if overly rigid. Sometimes, the solution is to revisit the principles behind the rules and create new ways of working, with senior management support. This allows innovation in a controlled environment without disrupting established practices.
One of our colleagues used this approach to great effect, developing new rules for a project based on the organisation’s principles. With CEO backing, this safeguarded the team while minimising risk for other departments.
What gets done? And how well?
If company culture is ‘the way things get done’, examining what does get done – and how well – offers valuable insights. Repeated failures may signal a need to adapt your culture to better support modern development methods or cross-department collaboration.
Working with TTP provides a chance to experiment with ‘local’ cultures. Think of us as an organisational Petri dish, allowing you to test innovative approaches without disrupting your broader operations.
Find out more about successful Product Development in our article The blueprint for product development success: strategies that work and you can find out more about our flexible approach to product development programmes here.
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