Culture Matters
My husband and I spent the past week in Chicago reconnecting with colleagues from my former company, Amoco. The Amoco Marketing Group was a special group of friends that became family, in large part due to the leadership and culture our company created during our years together. When I started my full-time employment in 1982, I had already spent three summers during college interning at a local office. During my internship, I was struck by the environment in the office – a combination of friendship and a focus on performance, which seemed like a great combination of factors for a satisfying job. It was for that reason I chose to join them upon graduation from the University of Illinois. Over the next 15+ years I worked with an amazing group of people across the US (and during 2 years in China), where I learned the importance of relationships, and that friendship and dedication to work were not mutually exclusive, but essential.
Our week of visits began with some small dinners and culminated in a reunion event last night with 65 former colleagues in a hotel ballroom in Naperville, IL. As I sat at the table last evening, I counted six former bosses in the room and reflected on the impact they each had on my career and life. They were all wonderful leaders…some tougher than others…but they all taught me valuable life skills that sustain today. I also counted about ten former direct reports in the room and only hope I had the same positive impact on them that my bosses had on me.
During my years with Amoco, I had incredible opportunities to learn the business from great leaders. But the greatest thing I learned was the importance of creating an environment where people can thrive because they feel supported. For every job I had (many that required relocation), I could always count on a welcoming team for me and my family. The sales/marketing training program gave me an instant family with a cohort of new trainees and mentors. As I moved from market to market (Grand Forks, ND, Chicago, Omaha, Milwaukee) I grew my network of Amoco colleagues and got to know families of my co-workers and distributors. When we moved our young family to China, there were no marketers (I opened the downstream office in Beijing), but the Amoco Production team swooped in to help us find a home, a nanny for our infant son, a preschool for our daughter, a language teacher for my husband, and all of the contacts I needed to build an office and business presence. In each instance, it was culture that made this happen. Yes, there were processes in place, but the willingness of people to go above and beyond was incredible…and the connections have sustained through the years.
Amoco was a wonderful business for over 100 years, with global impact in the energy industry. After we merged with BP in 1998 many of my colleagues retired and a few of us continued in the new company. My husband and I moved our family to London, and as much as I enjoyed serving as the Group VP of Marketing, I stayed for 5 years and resigned. I didn’t realize how much culture mattered to me.
25 years after the merger in a room filled with people predominantly in their 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s, the backdrop was one of significant events we experienced, but the conversation was in large part about kids, grandkids, travel, and health. Most who attended brought their spouses. It wouldn’t have felt right otherwise. Organizational charts were irrelevant. Presidents and VPs sat at the same table with supervisors and staff, and individuals enjoyed one another’s company regardless of the jobs they held. This only happens if you have the right culture to begin with – one where leaders genuinely cared about their teams, where we celebrated one another’s achievements, and where you could always count on someone lending a hand when difficult events occurred.
There aren’t many companies that have been “gone” for over 25 years and can still convene so many people across the country with an Evite sent in February inviting them to a party in September, in Naperville, Illinois.