What in the world is going on with the Cleveland Cavaliers? Even though they made it to the Eastern Conference Finals for the 4th year in a row, at some point the circus atmosphere they’ve allowed to develop is going to catch up with them. Drama has consequences, both in sports and in business.
Let’s run a little thought experiment. What if you ran your team the way the Cavs have for the last year?
At the beginning of the fiscal year, your company decides to ship off your best clutch salesperson and hires a couple of duds in his place (one who you know when he joins the team will spend the next six months on medical leave).
Then one of your major role players throws a bowl of soup at the boss’s assistant (it’s not important what kind of soup) during a meeting, and he only gets a light slap on the wrist for punishment.
Then, half of your team leaves (including the guy with hip problems who replaced your clutch performer) and all new teammates come in. They work out okay, but they are both raw and inexperienced.
Add to that the boss getting sick and missing several weeks of work and somebody on your team is dating a Kardashian (I don’t care what kind of team you are on, this would be distracting in any circumstance), and you get a clear picture of dysfunction in the workplace.
Oh, and to top it all off, your best performer, the guy everyone calls The King without irony, might leave at the end of the year. At least that’s what everyone is talking about over at the water cooler.
How can you run an organization like that? Even Cavs coach Tyronn Lue admits he presides over a soap opera, "I mean it’s just something different every year," Lue said. "You know, just, ‘As the Land Turns’ is what I call it.” (The Land is slang for Cleveland)
It’s so bad in the Land that poor behavior is just laughed at now. During the 4th quarter of the Cavs beatdown of the Toronto Raptors in Game 4 of the playoff semifinals, Lue summoned Rodney Hood to enter the game for LeBron James. Hood waived Lue off. Instead, he told Lue to put in Jose Calderon. Why did he feel it was okay to tell his coach, his boss, that he didn’t feel like playing? Because the Cavs have gone into full circus mode.
You might rightly point out that the Cavs have made it into the Eastern Conference Finals and that they crushed the Raptors in the last series. That doesn’t make them any less of a circus, it only highlights how great of a ringmaster LeBron has been this year to rally his band of misfits to this point.
But that can’t last forever.
Team culture is one of the most important factors determining its success. If you don’t get your culture right, without the best player in the world your team will fail. Even with the best player, it’s only a matter of time.
Your company can be at the top of your industry, but if you’ve sacrificed your culture to get there, your toxic culture will eventually take you down.
A 2015 Harvard Business School study found that even if a toxic culture doesn’t slowly eat away at your team, it’s hurting your bottom line. The study of 60,000 employees shows that each “superstar” employee identified in the study brings you an extra $5,300 per employee. But firing a toxic employee can save you $12,500 per employee! In terms of dollars, fighting against a toxic culture makes you twice as much as having top-tier talent.
One of the best ways to battle a toxic culture is to create a clear and compelling mission/purpose statement. That’s right, a good old mission statement. Research by Gallup shows that creating a clear mission that engages employees and clarifies your company’s purpose will help retain the best employees. Those employees who don’t agree with or follow the mission are either pushed out by the collective culture or self-select out of the company. Impressive what a little mission statement can do.
And it is important that you dust that statement off frequently – as often as every two years – and give it a refresh.
Take a look at your current mission statement. Does it reflect the values that you want to embody? Is it too generic to mean anything to your employees? Creating a specific, meaningful mission statement is the first step in battling the toxic effects of a bad culture.
Maybe LeBron James can save the Cavs’ circus again and lead them to another NBA finals. At the writing of this article, it looks dim that he can power his band of misfits past the Boston Celtics, but LeBron is an incredible competitor and I wouldn’t put anything past him. But the fact is, the Cavs are not a healthy team culturally, and eventually there will be a price to pay for letting the performers run the circus.
