Euan S. Thomson understands the opportunities that growth brings and, well, the challenges.
In eight years, the president and CEO grew Accuray Inc.’s employee base from 50 to 450 and the number of customers from five in the U.S. to 200 in 20 countries.
“As you grow, and as you grow that fast, it’s inevitable that you get cultural challenges,” Thomson says. “Managing a culture change as well as managing a company at each level that it happens to be at, I think, is probably the biggest challenge.”
Changes such as growth can mean needed adjustments to your company culture. Accuray reached a natural evolution of moving from technology-focused to customer-centric.
Getting those changes across to your employees means you, as the CEO, need to live the culture and communicate the culture. Explain the reason for the changes in a positive light and involve employees where possible.
The developer of the robotic radiosurgery CyberKnife System reached net revenue of $233.6 million in fiscal 2009.
Smart Business spoke with Thomson about how to deal with changes to the company culture.
Start at the top. Any culture has to start at the CEO. It has to be something engrained in them. Quite frankly, if that culture isn’t part of their personality, then they’re probably not the right person for the job.
It has to start with the character of the CEO. Then I think as the management team develops, as the management team comes together, you have to be able to choose and select people who also epitomize that culture and believe in that culture and get behind that culture.
Then it has to permeate its way through the organization and it has to be represented in all aspects of the business. Everything from customer relations to human resources to the way the company presents itself to investors and the outside world.
After awhile, you tend to find that when the culture becomes obvious that the right people are attracted toward the company. Employees who fit with that culture tend to want to join the company and they want to stay at the company. People who don’t fit well tend to leave. It tends to feed upon itself.
