When I speak to family business owners they frequently grumble on the shortcomings of their staff members. My reply is that they need to focus on building a strong company culture. When I dig in further I frequently discover that many family business owners and leaders try to change company culture with words alone, and it’s not working. I was reminded about this important point as I was reading a recent researched Harvard Business Review article entitled “To Change Company Culture, Focus on Systems—Not Communication.” This article lays out a brutal truth. A strong company culture cannot be formed on words, it needs to be as a consequence of the leader’s actions.

Culture is about what you do as a family business owner and leader and not what you say. In essence when family business leaders talk about culture but then their actions don’t align with the message, they are undermining everything and creating great harm.

The mentioned article performed a cross-national study across 164 senior leaders across North America, Europe, and Asia. The goal was to understand how leaders define and operationalise culture and how their efforts are interpreted by employees. The finding was striking: culture doesn’t fail because it’s forgotten; it fails because it’s misunderstood. If the building of a strong culture is treated as branding, not behaviour, even the most well-meaning efforts to build a strong culture, will have the reverse effect, where the very essence of strong culture i.e. trust is eroded.

So, culture is not about free lunches and fancy team building events. It’s about the underlying systems and power dynamics that shape daily life at your company. When you offer benefits like flexible Fridays but don’t fix the chaotic way work gets done, you’re not building a supportive culture—you’re reinforcing a sense that leadership is either unaware of deeper problems or unwilling to confront them. It feels like “handing out self-care instructions while the house was still on fire”.

True change comes when leaders are willing to give something up for their stated values. Think about that. You champion “empathy,” but does your compensation system punish it?. You preach “inclusion,” but do you protect employees who raise uncomfortable questions, or do you let them face backlash?. The strongest cultural signals are those that involve visible, personal risk. This could mean changing how incentives work, enforcing values even if it means losing a top performer, or sharing decision-making power that used to be held at the top. Without that cost, values remain performative—they read as theatre, not truth.

On the other hand silence is a powerful signal. In many workplaces, silence isn’t alignment—it’s fear and disengagement. In the above mentioned study, 69% of employees regularly withhold feedback from senior leadership because they fear being labelled as “difficult” or “high-risk”. You can’t just ask for feedback; you have to prove that speaking up leads to change, not punishment. This means actively making room for the “hard stuff” and protecting those who bring it up.

I am a champion for delegation. However building a strong culture can’t be delegated to middle managers. As a family business owner or top leader, you can’t just announce a new initiative from the top and expect others to carry the weight. The conclusion is clear, simple, direct, and non-negotiable: Culture only changes when family business owners and top leaders change first. Not just in words tone, but in structure and power. The most effective teams aren’t following words; they’re following a behavioural pattern. Such beahvioural pattern is built on three essential levers:

• Power: Who makes decisions, and who gets heard.
• Risk: What leaders are willing to lose to live their values.
• Modelling: What behaviours get demonstrated by leaders, not just demanded from others.

Stop asking people to believe what you haven’t yet proven through your own behaviour. Lead first, then name it. If you want your a strong company culture built on strong values, let action come before announcements, and proof come before praise. Anything less is just noise.

The “Award in Leading a Family Business” course at EMCS Academy provides a crucial framework for applying the principles of the Harvard Business Review article. It bridges the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical application, helping leaders move beyond performative communication to substantive action. The course’s focus on the unique dynamics of family businesses, can teach family business leaders to implement the three critical levers for cultural change identified in the article i.e power, risk, and modelling. By training leaders to address internal systems, define values that are worth a personal cost, and embody the behaviours they want to see, this course ensures they are not just talking about culture but actively shaping it. This practical training is essential for fostering a resilient and authentic company culture. Click HERE to register. Next cohort kick off on the 25th September.